5 ways to embrace discomfort

It’s October of 2022.

The wind is blowing in my face as I climb the hill and I’m grunting with every step of the way.

I can see the top of the hill and I begin to smile. “I can do it!” I think. “The pain will soon be over.”

The 70kg rock I’m carrying has been my companion for the last hour. It’s as big as my torso and it’s been digging into my arms with each step up the hill.

I’m getting closer to the top. Keep pushing, keep pushing, almost there, don’t drop it now, you’ve got 10 seconds left. I reach the viewpoint, walk around the corner and drop it.

I exhale a sigh of relief and instantly sit down to take stock of what’s just happened.

But my friend Joe, who’s been my shaman for this whole challenge, who hasn’t said a word to me this whole time, looks me dead in the eye and says; “your misogi is half complete. You must now carry the rock all the way down the hill to where you found it”.

I laugh in disbelief. Oh, he’s serious.

I gather my energy. Slap my legs to wake them back up. I meet the stone again and begin the descent. 2 Hours later I have completed the hardest thing I’ve ever done. And my life hasn’t been the same since.

The 1 key to your success in life is your ability to be comfortable whilst being uncomfortable.

And in a world where no one wants to do this, you will stand out amongst everyone with even the slightest willingness to embrace discomfort.

On the reverse, this also means the decay of your life is caused by your tendency to pursue comfort.

So how can we become happier, more fulfilled, wilder by embracing discomfort?

If the next 10 minutes of your time isn’t too much of me to ask, I’ll show you.

Hi guys, welcome back to the channel my name is Lewis and today we’re going to be dissecting the top 5 most vital lessons I learned from Michael Easter’s book the comfort crisis.

1.) Embrace boredom

Let me tell you a story of two cavemen, Nokk and Jeg.

It’s 10,000BC and both are picking berries from separate bushes three hours before sunset. Nokk is able to get bored but Jeg is not.

Nokk starts picking berries from his bush but as he picks it takes more time and effort to find the harder to pick berries at the back of the bush. Because Nokk is gradually picking fewer berries, the uncomfortable sensation of boredom kicks in and compels him to find another bush with easy to pick berries. He repeats the process, going from bush to bush to pick the quickest-to-pick berries. In an hour, he has two pounds of berries. And, with two hours of light left, he manages to spear a small kudu.

The second caveman, Jeg, quickly picks his bush’s easy-to-pick berries. But he doesn’t have the cue of boredom. So he keeps picking from the same bush. This means he has to begin looking and reaching deep into the bush to find more berries. The amount of berries he’s getting is decreasing. But, hey, this is thrilling work when he doesn’t have the cue of boredom to kick in to tell him it’s actually an incredibly inefficient use of his time.

By sundown Jeg has picked the entire bush and has two pounds of berries. At the end of the day, Nokk’s family are eating kudu for dinner and berries for dessert. Jeg’s family are rationing out berries, trying to forget how hungry they are.

Before bed, Nokk will again experience the magic of boredom. His mind begins to wander. It rests and resets, planning how to hunt the next day, how to improve his family’s life.

The moral of the story is the caveman who was bored was more productive, he was also healthier and had a better chance of survival. The caveman who was continuously occupied and had no time for restorative thought and boredom died young from berry poisoning.

When was the last time you felt bored? No, I meant, REALLY bored? Perhaps you’re on YouTube right now because you’re escaping the feeling of being bored.

Like trying to do rep after rep of an exercise, our brain expends a shocking amount of effort when we kill boredom by burying our minds in a phone, TV or computer. Your modern brain is overworked, and an overworked brain is linked to depression, life dissatisfaction, the feeling of time passing quicker and missing the beauty of life which is only available to a undistracted wandering mind.

So once a day, for 20 minutes or more, unplug from everything and allow yourself to be bored.

As Naval Ravikant says:

“Better bored than busy.”

2.) Make time for silence

When you’ve driven down the wrong route, need to stop the car to check your GPS, what is the one thing you do? You turn the music down and tell everyone in the car to quiet down so you can get clarity in your head. This allows you to gather your thoughts about the only thing which matters to you in that moment: finding the right direction.

The escape from boredom is usually coupled with the escape from the uncomfortable sensations of silence.

But as research shows, anti-anxiety medication rises a relative 28 percent for every 10-decibel increase a neighbourhood experiences, and people who live near loud roads are 25 percent more likely to be depressed.

Silence is a practical resource for living a rich life, as Norwegian explorer Erling Kagge says.

So despite the initial discomfort that you feel, take out your earphones, leave you phone in another room, be unreachable from others and be silent for however long you need to be. Get lost for 3 days in complete silence. And you will discover hidden parts of yourself.

“To be silent is not to lose your tongue. On the contrary, it is only through silence that one can discover something new to talk about.”

• Alan Watts

3.) Practice hunger

When was the last time you were hungry and didn’t instantly grab for something to eat?

I’m not qualified to give you nutritional advice, but an incredible way to develop discipline and reclaim brain energy throughout the day is to fast.

Fasting allows you to tear the tethers which keep you hooked on comfort food and in many spiritual practices its a gateway towards transcending our earthly bonds.

But before we get too caught up in the transcendental, the tip here is simple: skip breakfast and don’t eat until 1pm. Occasionally push the boat out by doing 24hour fasts.

You’ll thank me later.

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4.) Think about death 3 times a day (Mitakpa)

You’re hiking across a mountain top and you see a cliff 500 yards away. That cliff is death. The catch? We all have to walk off the cliff at some point.

The hiker who recognises the cliff and doesn’t deny it is able to change course, notice the beauty of the trail along the way and pay attention to who he’s walking with.

The hiker who fails to recognise the cliff, however, approaches it in ignorance and gasps an inhale of regret before descending.

Do you understand that one day you will die?

Listen.

Do you understand that one day you will die?

The modern world is sick. And this is best shown by its ability to lead us further away from the truth. It constantly promises our happiness but in fact blocks our one true path to joy.

In order to be reliant on something it must first create a need. And the need this sick modern world relies on is your self-proclaimed need for comfort.

Obsessed with false hopes, dreams and ambitions which promise happiness but only lead to misery, you are like a traveller crawling through the desert, dying of thirst. Until the modern world holds out a drink for you. But it is a drink of salt water, designed to keep you more thirsty.

Realise that the person who keeps death at the forefront of their minds in each action is able to pierce through to the necessity of life and to the truth of the moment.

Perhaps the thought of saying goodbye to your loved ones, shedding tears at their funeral and then one day facing your own walk off the cliff scares you.

Well then let it scare you.

Get rid of your distractions and live with urgent compassion. Let go of your grip on reality and be at ease with the nature of finitude.

The Tibetan word for body is Lü which means “something you leave behind”. So evert time Tibetans utter this word they are reminded that we are only travellers, taking refuge in this life and this body. And the buddhist word for impermanence is Mitakpa which Tibetans remind themselves of three times a day; at breakfast, lunch and dinner.

So set your three alarms and embrace the ego-shattering truth that you will die. In fact, the diagnosis has already been written. Whether you like it or not, you’re dying already.

He who binds himself to a joy,

Does the winged life destroy;

He who kisses the joy as it flies;

Lives in eternity’s sunrise.

• William Blake

5.) Once every 2 months, do a Misogi

“There exists an archetypal need in all of us to be initiated” - Michael Easter

The story I told at the beginning of this letter was a misogi I did 3 months ago.

Originating in Japan, a misogi is an ancient Shinto practice which translates to ‘water cleansing’. Japanese people who practice this tradition frequently bathe in freezing cold water or perform gruelling tasks in order to cleanse their spirits.

In essence, this is the hero’s journey. You leave the comfort of your home, enter an isolated and desolate land, complete a mission and then return home renewed and stronger.

Here are some examples of a misogi:

Imagine you don’t run very often. If you know you could run 10 miles, 15 miles is a stretch, 20 miles seems like an  impossibility, then running 25 miles in one go is a misogi.

Imagine you’re an introvert. Approaching 50 people in one day, sparking up a conversation with each one of them and aiming to give 1 compliment to each person is a misogi.

Undertaking a misogi allows you to snap yourself out of the mundane comfort you have lulled yourself into. You can perform it alone or with others, but regardless, there are two rules. The first rule is you can only have a 50% chance of succeeding at it. The second rule is you cannot die.

When thinking of a misogi, be as wakky, creative and unique as possible. Misogis aren’t just physical challenges either, they can be social, emotional, spiritual, mental. But the main key is to accustom your brain to challenge and failure. Because if you haven’t noticed already, our brains hate failure.

Lastly, if you’re not failing your misogis, they’re too easy. The whole point is to fail and push past the limits you’ve currently placed on yourself (and occasionally succeed).

So once every 2 months do a misogi.

Thank you for your time and attention. I wish you all the best in your discomfort journey. And remember; stay dangerous.

I’ll see you in the next one.