Tell me if this sounds like you...

You went into a new playing field in life. This could be business, dating, fitness, friendship, family, nutrition, anything really (we will be focusing on Twitter though). You started things off with loads of excitement and enthusiasm. You had a vision of how things will go. You told yourself that this is going to be fun and easy. But then you realized...

It's not as easy as it seems. The things you thought to be effective turn out to be pointless, procrastination in disguise. You feel like you're hitting against a wall that won't give in. Results don't come, no matter how hard you push. You get frustrated, and eventually discouraged. But why did this happen in the first place? Why did it get so bad?

Here's the harsh reality: Life doesn't give a shit about whether you feel productive or successful. All of this happened because you are deluding yourself. You think you're doing the right thing, when that just isn't true.

You are actively running away from the truth. You don't want to know what's true, you fear truth, because truth stings. You spend a lot of time and energy on doing that, and you don't even notice unless someone like me comes and points it out for you.

For example: You wouldn't be eating the food in supermarkets if you knew where it came from and if you saw how it is produced, unless you had no other choice. Why? Because it's produced in the cheapest way possible, to maximize profits. It's contaminated with pesticides, heavy metals, and many other poisonous compounds. The people that are running these companies don't care about your health, they only care about money. Ideally, you would produce everything by yourself. And deep down, you know this...

But you don't want to think about it. Ignorance is bliss, as they say. You would rather say to yourself that "it's not that bad" and that you "have no choice". And of course, I am not an exception from this. Not at all.

Let me tell you a story...

I started my creator journey in July of this year. At the time I was still working my shitty minimum-wage cashiers job. If I had been presented with a more attractive alternative, I would have taken it on the spot. And of course I did, when I found out about the one-person business model.

The amount of excitement I had for it was out of this world... I'll finally be able to quit my job and get rich for real! I could picture all of the sweet rewards that I was going to get. Real estate, cool cars, nice clothes, bla bla bla...

But as I was fantasizing about all of these things, I lost track of the most important thing: The actions that would actually get me there in the first place. I deceived myself into thinking that success will come easily. Because of course, I didn't really care about what was actually true. It was fantasy. My mind used the heat of the moment to lead me down the completely wrong path. After struggling for so long, I thought I was "finally free".

Did I seriously think I could sit on my ass, write a couple lame tweets, and the rest was going to come by itsefl? Absolutely. That's what the ego-mind will do when it's avoiding every painful realization that it can avoid at every cost. As it turns out, you can't just put in minimal effort and expect things to happen. Matter of fact, the exact opposite is the case. It's the things that no one wants to do, least of successful people. The uncomfortable, awkward, exhausting, painful things. The things that require massive amounts of focus, effort, and most of all: Perseverance. All that without any clear guarantee or way of telling what's gonna happen.

95% of people (that includes creators on Twitter) are holding on to a fantasy. That's a hard pill to swallow, but it's true nevertheless. I was one of those for a long time! I still have some fantasies and delusions to decontruct. Do you really think that you can post a few tweets, write a few comments, watch some YouTube videos, listen to some podcasts, take some notes, "learn", and you will just magically start making boatloads of money? Why would you ever believe that? It makes no sense! Of course, it's because you are unconsciously deceiving yourself. Deep down you know that this won't lead to anything, but you don't want to face that truth. You would rather distract yourself and stay in the comfortable, blissful bubble of ignorance.

"I want to make money". Bullshit. I literally offered to teach people how to monetize on Twitter for free, and guess what? A tiny handful of people reached out to me. Where are all of these people that (supposedly) want to get rich? Nowhere to be seen. If you really wanted to, you would do everything it takes to actualize that vision for yourself. You would put in the effort into finding out which actions will ACTUALLY make that come true, not the things for which you would LIKE that to be the case. But you don't.

The only thing worse than looking back and seeing the stupid things you believed in the past, is not to. Because if you can't see them, you are not making any progress whatsoever. You are subordinating yourself to your ego. You are a slave.

If any of this offends you... Tough luck. You will never achieve true success if you choose to avoid the truth. Even if you think you're making progress, you'll remain miserable deep inside. No amount of distraction can change that.

BUT... There's hope. I am not just here to point this stuff out. If you can quiet down your ego and open yourself up to truth, this newsletter will do wonders for you. If you want to start recognizing and eliminating self-deception in your own life, we need to understand why it happens in the first place.

1. The Ego Mind & Survival

Your thoughts shape your identity (literally). You are whatever you think you are. If you develop a fantasy of who you want to be and how you want things to go, your ego will try to survive that at all cost. It feels good, I know. But that completely shuts you off from how things actually work! You are literally sabotaging yourself and keeping yourself from achieving anything worthwhile. And for what? Just so your ego can experience a small and temporary boost?

Nobody wants to do something that has no obvious benefit, because your ego doesn't like that. It doesn't think this advances your survival. But this is such a misleading path to go down... You've heard of "trust the process", but this goes even deeper.

Think about it: If you could learn about something that would make you 10x more effective at what you're doing, would you do it? You will say yes, but that's not how you act at all! You cling to your delusions like a rock climber to a wall in the face of certain death. None of this is "logical" in any way. But that's what happens when your awareness levels remain low.

Here's a perfect example from my own life so you can make more sense of this: When I was building the landing page for Creator Bootcamp, I sent a raw version of it into my mastermind group for feedback. And sure enough, I got feedback. Valuable feedback. But my ego was so attached to my current beliefs that I unconsciously closed myself off from realizing certain things. I only accepted what I wanted to accept, and I blocked myself off from even considering the other options. I deceived myself into thinking I'm being skeptical, but really I was just being close-minded. This is dangerous.

Your mind is literally a self-deception machine, unconsciously leading you towards experiencing pleasure and away from experiecing anything that might resemble pain. The thing is, you have to show your dominance in this battle. If you can't stand above your ego mind, you are making yourself its slave (by choice).

This is not an easy thing to do, not at all. You have no idea of how far and how deep this self-deception is reaching, but neither do I! Leo from actualized.org said that if you would suddenly be able to see all the ways in which it's happening, you would be ashamed and disgusted beyond any reasonable standards. You don't want to run away from this.

It's a constant battle that requires a lot of effort and attention. In this newsletter, I want to plant a seed in your mind. The seed of knowing about this deception. That way you can start looking for it happening. Just the mere intention will make you notice some of these things.

2. Do An Audit

In some sense, I will be your own personal therapist today. If you want to change things for the better, you know the first step: Awareness. Positive change always starts with raising awareness about a problem. You need to start noticing this phenomenon in your life, way of thinking, and way of doing things.

You are not seeing the success you would like to see... because you are wrong about what has to be done to achieve that! It's obvious when I put it like that, but honestly. Did you ever even question the advice that people gave you on how to grow? Did you go deeper into the topic, or did you stop on the surface? Did you engage in critical thinking, or did you just take the advice you got for granted?

If you are not growing on Twitter as fast as you would like to, you are wrapped up in a fantasy. If you are not making money (even though you want to, and you know you do), it's the same thing. It's because you are fearful of what's actually true. You don't want to know, because that might just destroy your fantasy of how you want things to go.

How do you fix this? By thinking deeply about your current life situation. To help you with this process, I have compiled a list of common self-deceptions that you might have.

Ⅰ) Thinking You Know Anything

This is the biggest mistake you can possibly make. You can never know anything for sure. You can only deepen your understanding. Never attach yourself to a position or belief. The things you might see as "logical" or "certain", might be horribly wrong.

Think about it... From the literal millions of beliefs and ideas you believe in, there is no way in hell that a large number of them isn't false. But that's not what you think. Here are some perfect smaller examples of false beliefs that many people hold as true to prove my point:

a) Most beginner creators think that they're going to grow by creating content, by writing "valuable" tweets & threads. This is completely wrong though, because that stuff only works if you already have an audience that is going to retweet that content.

b) Many people still believe that traditional education will lead them to real wealth, which is not the case at all. Even if you make decent money (which still gets dwarfed by anything in business), you will be selling your time. Even if you are wealthy in a financial sense, you'll be poor in everything else (time & freedom).

c) Believing that "more" will somehow make you a better, happier person. Pursuing these types of desires is an addiction. And as all addictions, it can never be satisfied. It's a "dog chasing its own tail" type of situation.

Always stay flexible with your beliefs. Attaching yourself to them can have disastrous consequences!

Ⅱ) Thinking Your Thinking Is Rational

Let's take "I'm not ready" as a perfect eample.

On the surface this seems like a very rational and logical explanation to you, right? But look below that and you will find that it's not rational at all! Your mind is trying to justify your insecurities with 'facts' like: "Oh come on, there are so many better people out there. Why would someone choose me over them?" or "I will collect some experience, and THEN I'll be ready to make money (or do whatever else)".

The reality is that it's not about expertise or experience. It's about you as a person and how you can position yourself (and your offer). We are all emotional creatures, but we delude ourselves into thinking otherwise. And the worst thing about this?

If you delude yourself into thinking that we are rational creatures, you will believe that people would have no reason to invest into you because you're "not good enough". That what would be true if we would think rationally! That of course is not the case, in fact it couldn't be further from the truth. Think about it:

If someone killed your mother and put a "better" mother in her place, would you like that? Of course not! And why? Because you are emotionally attached to your actual mother, just like everyone has their own emotional attachments.

You're not taking people's good will into account. If you have true determination, we want you to succeed. We will support you in any way possible, that's how humanity got this far in the first place!

Don't let limiting beliefs get you. And listen... Many people say this, but few understand what this actually means. It's written off as a "platitude", but it's a serious topic. If you know you want to make money, but you're not succeeding at it, ask yourself why that is. This stuff is so deeply ingrained into your psyche that it's hard to get to the bottom of it.

Ⅲ) Thinking You Can Succeed By Doing What You Want

This one is heavy. The self-deception here is so deep. We literally trick ourselves into thinking that we are doing the right thing, just because it's what we want to be true. This is the biggest trap you can fall into.

Think back for a second. Go back in the past. Remember as a kid, when we all used to have these fantasies of what we will be in the future? Astronauts, rockstars, film stars... These days every kid wants to be a YouTuber. We had a completely skewed picture of what that job is actually about. We thought that we can achieve that without any real effort, ignoring the reality. Remember that?

Here's the funny thing: You think that you're above that now... But you're not! The same thing is happening in this exact moment, you just don't realize! It's just a deeper, more subtle, more hidden type of self-deception. There is literally no difference between you and your childhood self, no border. You've just existed for a longer time.

But back to my point here... You could work as hard and as "smart" as you want, but all of that goes to waste if you're not doing what's ACTUALLY required to finish the job. Here's a simple test to visualize what I'm saying:

The next time you work on your Twitter, on something that you THINK contributes to your success, ask yourself this question: Why am I doing what I'm doing? Does this actually help me get the results that I would like to get?

Ⅳ) Thinking You Don't Need A Vision

Have you written down a detailed vision of where you want your life to go? If not, you have already failed. You absolutely need a destination to find your way around town, otherwise you're running around in circles!

You need something to aspire to: A guiding light, a north star that you can use to navigate the terrain. Your vision is your compass, and it makes the game infinitely more fun to play. You will see a clear picture of what you want your life to look like.

Ⅴ) Thinking You Don't Need To Set Goals

The next step down from your vision is your plan of how you are going to actualize that vision. Setting goals is like picking a destination in the city and coming up with a plan of how you'll get there. Not doing that is like ignoring everything and just starting to walk. Surprise, surprise: You will get lost many many times, and the journey will take 10x as long. What route are you going to take?

Ⅵ) Thinking You Don't Need A System

I have personally fallen into this one HARD. For the longest time, I've just been trotting along and doing whatever I felt like doing in the moment. Your system is the transportation vehicle itself. If it's shit, well... You see what I'm pointing at here.

Your system follows your needs. That means you establish a vision, you set goals that contribute to actualizing that vision, and you develop a system that has you work towards achieving those goals. Let's tie all of this this together with an example.

My vision (for now), is this: I build a one-person business with a monthly income of $100.000 (Dan Koe already proved it to be possible). I do this by offering high-ticket services (coaching/consulting) and creating digital products. I get to choose my work, my location, how I spend my time, and who I choose to work with. I build digital leverage to the point of not having to sell my time anymore, so I can chase my REAL passion (producing music). After that, who knows? From there I might even go into business.

Therefore, my goals are a) to build an audience and personal brand, b) to build a successful coaching/consulting offer (Creator Bootcamp), and c) to build a portfolio of digital products as time goes on.

Now I can break that down into my system. I have to ask myself... What do I need to do on a daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly basis to actualize that vision and achieve those goals? That includes activities like writing (tweets, threads, newsletters), intentional research (like I did for this newsletter), building out my projects (Creator Bootcamp, The Holistic Creator,...), getting eyes on my content (networking & engaging), and getting clients (marketing & doing client outreach).

Can you see how all of this is connected? And when you have these, things just start to click. You lose all of the confusion and overwhelm. You start loving life with an intensity that's hard to imagine if you haven't experienced it. I love every single second, minute, and hour of my life.

Ⅶ) Thinking That Anyone Except You Is Going To Help You

News flash: No one is going to "save you". You are responsible for everything that you want to get out of life, no matter the circumstances. Life isn't fair... If you truly want something out of life, you have to be willing to give it your all to succeed.

I grew up in a pretty dysfunctional family. My father is a toxic, unpleasant, and ridiculously close-minded person and has caused me and my brothers a lot of pain in the past (and he still does).

The thing is, we can't just walk away. We have nowhere else to go. We have to marinate in this air of negativity until we get our own place. I could use that as an excuse to distract myself and run away from that pain. It would be much "easier". But instead, that just motivates me even more to make money. Because then I'll be able to leave.

Realize that what happens to you is not your fault. HOWEVER, it is your responsibility to deal with it in the right manner. You can't change circumstances, but you can sure as hell change your behavior. There's this saying I like... If you find yourself walking through hell, don't stop. Keep walking. Stopping would be the worst possible thing you can do.

If you want something, you will have to fight for it. That's just how life works, whether you like that or not. Realizing that is actually such a freeing experience, because it puts the power into your hands. It's not going to be easy, not at all. But who says that easy is good? You do. What if you could convince yourself that difficult things are good things and easy things are bad things? See, then it wouldn't be a negative experience.

3. Commit To Change

Here comes the difficult (and most important) part... You literally have to let part of your old self die to make room for a new part of an identity. Even though this "death" is not physical, it feels like it. Your ego (which literally translates to "self", by the way) will try to latch onto that part of your identity as if it life depends on it. Because it actually does. If you wouldn't be able to define yourself as something, you would cease to exist, and you would literally go insane.

But see, here's where things go full circle. Personal growth is painful for this exact reason. Instead of remaining on the surface and equalling bad feelings = bad, you need to be able to see and act beyond this paradigm. Pain is good in this case, it's awesome! It confirms that you are actually making progress. People tell you to "embrace pain", but honestly... How many of those people actually do that? Most of them only say it because saying it makes them feel good. They don't actually live by those standards.

You need to actively and intentionally seek out these painful experiences if you want great things to happen in your life. Because that's how life works, in a very counterintuitive way!

If you don't, you get stuck in one place - Just like most people do. You will remain unhappy and unfulfilled for the rest of your life. I see this all the time... I give people some advice, they say "I get it", and then they don't use it. The funny thing is, they actually believe that they are making progress.

No, you are not! Because if you were, I would see your life improve. All of that stuff becomes nothing more than mental masturbation. Quite honestly, I am fed up with some of this "acceptance" stuff. People misuse that to justify staying the same person and not doing any work. Why? Because it feels good.

I say, DON'T feel good (if you want to grow as a person). At least temporarily. Progress should feel deeply uncomfortable, because you are stretching your limits. It's like lifting weights. It's not supposed to feel comfortable! On the contrary, it's supposed to sting and burn. That is how you make your muscles grow!

For example: Do you think I want to engage on Twitter after I have been doing deep work for 4 hours straight? No, of course not! I would rather do something else that's easier. But these are just my feelings. I still do it, because it needs to be done. It's my responsibility as a creator. And that expands my limits. It's slowly killing off my old, lazy, distraction-seeking self and exchanging it for the person that I want to become. It feels unfomfortable, and it's supposed to!

You need to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Once you see what that gets you for your growth and success in life, you will develop a deep appreciation for that kind of stuff. You will want to feel uncomfortable.

Let me summarize now...

You are unhappy and unsuccessful because you are not acting in alignment with truth. Truth stings, but only temporarily. You really only have two choices:

1. Avoid facing truth so you can feel comfortable with your current belief system, and keep making no progress in your life whatsoever

2. Embrace the momentary sting of feeling truth, let your old self die, and increase the success, happiness, and fulfillment that you and everyone around experience in the short-, mid-, and long-term

The choice seems obvious when I put it like this, but really... You need to catch yourself being a hippocryte, and this happens so much more often than you might think.

If you act on the information in this article, a whole bunch of your problems will start to disappear. If you're not growing on Twitter, it's because you are holding on to a fantasy. Same thing goes for making money, and literally anything else in the health, relationships, and happiness sectors. I'm not kidding.

If you can drop your false beliefs, misconceptions, fantasies, all that stuff, you will become powerful beyond any reasonable standard. Because then you will be immune to bullshit in every area of life. Truth brings about a sense of clarity and confidence that you can't replicate with any other thing in life.

If you fiercely commit to learning the rules of the game (whether it's Twitter, business, or any other game), you will be able to outplay 99,9% of players. If you don't... Your life will suck. You will not get any results whatsoever.

If you have full clarity on the rules, your productivity will skyrocket. So will your confidence, satisfaction, and general sense of happiness in life. Trust me, I have experienced this myself. If I hadn't made a conscious effort to understand the game and apply what I learned for myself, I would still be at 500 followers getting little to no engagement on my tweets. I wouldn't even have came close to monetizing as I am doing now.

Wanna learn how the Twitter game is played? Check out Creator Bootcamp, where I teach you everything you need to know about personal branding, audience building, and content creation.

That is it for this week, hope you enjoyed this longer and more in-depth style of article :)

-Tym