Self improvement is a funny game.  You can generally tell when things are "getting better" - you might get better and more sleep, your appetite may improve, and you might be able to control urges or frustrations in a more productive way.  But trying to make yourself a better or happier or more appealing person is a strange objective.  When have you made it?  What really is the target?  How will you know when you've made it, and can relax?  It's like someone saying, "I want to run as fast as I can".  How can you be sure how fast exactly that is?  How hard are you willing to push yourself?

I don't think you can know how calm a person you could be.  I don't think you know how happy you could be if you could deal with your anxiety.  I certainly don't think you have any idea at all how much of net positive you could be to the world.  So why not just...keep pushing?  Why set a specific ultimate goal?  Why not embrace it as you might with something like playing the guitar, or drawing, or writing?  We know from everyday life that the things we do most often are the things we get best at, and techniques and achievements you thought impossible at the start become second nature.

If I say to myself, "I want to be able to get through an average day without feeling sick with anxiety", that's perfectly reasonable and fair.  That's something you should want, if you're feeling sick with anxiety with any frequency.  So I decide to look into ways that I can manage my anxiety.  There are lots of potential solutions to anxiety, but finding the right one for you can be an effort.  And you'll only know if that effort was worth it after a reasonable stretch of time.  If you accept that as true, that time is a requirement, then why set a limit on the amount of time you're willing to spend using and improving that technique, whatever it is?  It's not like you have to meditate every second of every day.  You don't need to refuse to watch your favorite TV show because you're "busy meditating" all night.  And if what you're doing does help and feels good, then maybe you should keep doing it.  For as long in the future as you can imagine.

Like most people who live with anxiety and are trying to actively do something about it, I've come to realize that it's a far from simple matter.  Anxiety can be caught up in all sorts of past experiences.  I got to a point where I decided that I wanted to cut to the chase and start addressing the basic, root issues which were allowing my anxiety to run out of control.  This is an area where journaling has been amazingly useful for me.  Stepping back over almost 50 years of my life, lifting up rocks to see what's underneath them, finding my sore spots and gingerly approaching them to see what really is going on has been a fascinating, revealing and amazing journey so far.  And as I've mentioned in my previous blog posts, being honest and open and getting to really know myself is the adventure of a lifetime, because it takes a lifetime.  You change every day, and so do your circumstances, so there is always more to learn.

Imagine the day when I finally conquer my anxiety.  Will I be the finished article?  I seriously doubt it!  I've got other issues too, like procrastination, an attention-seeking reflex, and bouts of imposter syndrome.  They could use a polish too.  For all I know, they're all related in some way.  For all I know, there's one big subterranean problem and all these issues are just the places where that shows up on the surface.  Who knows how long it could take to work all that out?  I know I don't and who's to say it's even possible anyway?  But there is a game within the game here, and I think this is the core of the matter: Self-improvement is without end in either time or potential.  It's the second-longest journey you'll ever go on and there's very little chance you'll cross the finish line before you reach the end of your life anyway.  So then why not make it a permanent part of your life?  Why not really go all-in?  You're not going to collect winnings after the game you know, so you can either take the nihilist view that "nothing matters", or you can commit to trying to be the best you can be, enjoy both the growing of the tree and the fruit it produces.

If I set a target for myself, it has to have a concrete metric.  An easy example is losing weight.  I'm about 20kg (3 stone for anyone else my age) overweight, and that's a lot of cans of beans to be lugging about all the time.  So I've decided I want to drop ALL of that weight.  So I set up a plan.  Take a 7km walk every day.  Do that for as long as it takes to shed 3 stone.  But then it strikes you:  What, am I going to stop walking because I've lost weight?  Because if I am, you know what's going to happen.  All those 36-inch waste trousers will come back out of the wardrobe again and all the nice, natty 30" ones will have to go away again.  So how about I change the nature of the game?  How about if I say, "how much distance can I cover if I walk 7km a day for as long as I am physically able"?  

So if I find a way to get my weight under control, it's fairly obvious that I'm going to have to keep doing that, whatever it is, for a long time.  It might end up being in a modified form, I might decided to ride my bike for 15k a day as an alternative, or whatever, but I'm going to have to do something.  Eating less is OK I guess, but I do like food.  And if I don't want to be keeling over any time soon, exercise is the only real option, no matter what the spam emails tell you about "this fat-melting root known by the ancients".

Now transpose that to the idea of dealing with anxiety in a more positive way.  Am I going to say, "the level of anxiety I live with isn't zero, it does stop me doing some things, but I'm willing to live with that"?  I hope not.  I hope I'm saying "this method is helping me deal with situations which make me anxious, and now I'm enjoying life more than I was, so let's see how far we can take it".  Because I do believe that it's possible to find better ways to be and think and live which offer increasing returns over time, provided you're willing to put the hard miles in.  And if you do it right, and with honestly and commitment and self-care, there's no real limit to the contentment and satisfaction available to us all.