Deep Thinking: From Curse To Superpower

During a live show, Jordan Peterson was asked a question:

"The depth of my consciousness causes me to suffer. Is it a blessing or a curse to feel everything so deeply?"

Peterson said, "The only way out is through. You take more of the thing that poisons you until you turn it into a tonic that girdles the world around you".

While we all understand what JP is saying, let's have some fun and flesh it out.

We will discuss why deep thinking is a curse until it becomes a superpower.

"The obstacle is the way", says Ryan Holiday.

The only way out is through says JP.

So let's go through

The Curse

"Take more of the thing that poisons you"

If you are a deep thinker like me, your mind can sometimes feel like the enemy.

We suffer more in imagination than in reality," says Seneca.

So true.

Deep thinkers like us are not blessed with blissful unawareness. We desire to understand things fully. We want to put ideas and concepts under the microscope and pull them apart to see what's inside.

But something strange happens.

When you look closely enough at a pixel on a TV, you see that every pixel is made up of red, green, and blue dots. Everything becomes nuanced at a high resolution. You must be able to contend with those complexities.

If you don't, clarity is easily lost and direction is hard to find. You are confronted with uncomfortable truths about the world, human nature and yourself.

You see things that others don't. You feel misunderstood and lonely because most people are not like you. You are different.

So much of your time is spent in your head.

Deep thinkers tend to overthink, overanalyse and ruminate. Especially when you fall short:

When I failed my driving test by 1 point, I tore myself apart.

Every math test I failed in high school, I tore myself apart

When I was making monthly videos for YouTube, which would get 50 views, I tore myself apart.

Being too self-aware is a thing. I remember JP saying, "The moment you become self-aware is the moment you become miserable, technically speaking." There's no place to hide when you look at yourself.

Self-obsession is a recipe for depression.

Everyone has a negativity bias, but I think for deep thinkers, it is amplified.

Twenty good things about myself can be instantly crushed by a half-baked negative thought.

Put more, we struggle to be kind to ourselves.

The Stoics believed pain is inevitable and cannot be avoided. Pain is the universal language of life.

The ancient Hindus believed that what you want is hidden beneath a layer of poison.

The thing is, deep thinkers grip tightly to preserve control. It's the cortisol version of ourselves, our threat detection system. There's danger here, there, and everywhere. So we have to analyze it, pull it apart until we find a solution—until we solve the problem, and our nervous system can't calm down.

This is useful for staying alive in the savannah, but can cause significant pain.

One rubber band at a time, our mind wraps us into a tight and tense ball.

So, the answer is to confront the pain head-on and take more of the poison.

Transformation

"Until you turn it to a tonic"

Over the years, I have developed a much better relationship with my mind. Not many people would enjoy going on solo multi-day hikes with not a single other soul around.

You are truly alone with yourself.

I am not perfect; I have a long way to go, but my improvements compared to how I was are evident.

Meditation, mindfulness and voluntary discomfort have made the difference.

One core teaching of Buddhism is that desire causes suffering. You will suffer when you wish things were different.

Marcus Aurelius had a similar idea:

"Choose not to be harmed--and you won't feel harmed. Don't feel harmed--and you haven't been."

It's why I have had cold showers every morning for the last seven or so years. The more you try to fight against the water, the worse the experience is. But when you anchor yourself to your breath and allow your body to soften, it's not exactly pleasant but still somewhat enjoyable. It's learning to lean into the poison.

Here's a reframe I have been thinking about recently.

No one will ever experience 5% of your depth of consciousness. Your inner landscape is a fascinating place if you approach it with humility and curiosity.

Humility because you are not above the trivial thoughts of your mind.

Curiosity because you want to understand yourself better. But rather than coming from a place of control and judgement, it comes from a place of empathy and exploration.

Exploring the texture of your mind is a curious adventure instead of a painful endeavor.

That's the ideal to aim for at least.

Your superpower

"that girdles the world around you".

I saw some clips of Vic Blends interviewing with Tom Brady. Tom said things like, "It was hard to get up and train early in the morning, while my friends are eating pancakes for breakfast."

I bet it was painful. But no one talks about the other side.

It would have been far more painful to sit at that table and eat those pancakes than to go and train.

What people don't realise about high performers is that their mind torments them to do the thing.

It's a compulsion similar to how we want to understand things deeply.

That compulsion is a superpower. Being a deep thinker is a superpower.

Charles Darwin was undoubtedly a deep thinker, and he developed the greatest theory in the history of biology.

Isaac Newton was a deep thinker and a troubled man. He discovers the laws of motion, the law of gravity, invents integral and differential calculus and then discovers the law of optics before he turned 26.

We're not Charles Darwin or Isaac Newton. You might be, but I'm not.

My point is that when you think deeply, you see things others don't. You see connections where others see dots.

How you direct your thoughts is essential. How you aim your focus is important.

Dan Koe says, "You have one million dollars trapped in your head." Dan is a pretty good case study for thinking deeply, paying attention, and making a career out of it.

So is Chris Williamson, by the way.

Being a deep thinker is a superpower. Allow the compulsion to run wild, channel it into building something that is yours, and get out of your own way.

That's all for today, friends.

Enjoy the rest of your day.

Josh