Ciaran O'Loughlin

Writer, musician, other stuff.

Check out my vlogs or my latest book Reframe Reality at the link in my bio.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

There is a subtle but important distinction between giving up completely and allowing failure to happen and accepting it as part and parcel of life. It’s not usually something that should be sought out, and we should obviously strive to succeed. But in doing so, it’s important to know that no matter how hard we try, we are almost certainly going to fail repeatedly and consistently throughout our lives as well. If we aren’t doing so then that’s almost certainly because we’re choosing to stay in our comfort zone and never take risks, or attempt anything ambitious. Which I think most people would agree is much more of a true failure than trying your best and not succeeding.

When someone goes out with a metal detector, hoping to find a piece of gold or some interesting artefact, they know they’re also going to encounter lots of old tin cans and worthless old keychains. For every worthwhile item they find, they probably find a hundred pieces of junk. They aren’t looking for junk, in fact they’re actively hoping to avoid it and to find something better, but they’ve accepted that they will find a good amount of it, and that continuously doing so really only speaks to their persistence. That’s not to say that they can’t optimise their methods, search in better areas, or upgrade their equipment. It’s always worth trying to be better and trying to succeed more. Going out and deliberately searching for junk would be a fool’s errand. But so would staying at home with your metal detector gathering dust in the corner because you’re too worried, upset, or angry about the idea of digging up something you weren’t aiming to find.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

Fear of this kind of failure is a prohibiting factor for so many people, but it shouldn’t be. The vast majority of people who’ve achieved anything big in life will be the first to say that failure was a completely necessary part of their path to success, and that if they had run away from it, they never would have gotten anywhere. The key is making sure to fail in the right way.

If you genuinely grow from your mistakes or from the times you fall short, if you adapt and you learn from them, then very few of them can truly be considered failures. The truth is, whatever you want to call these moments, they’re something that you need in your life.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

Training to failure is not easy; in fact, it’s very hard. It takes a lot of courage, motivation, and willpower to push yourself to the point where your arms, legs, or core can’t safely do another repetition. It hurts. And of course, in the long run, it’s greatly beneficial. So, is it really a “failure”, in the negative sense? Is it a “failure” in the same way that not bothering to try and train or to improve yourself is? The word is the same in both cases, but the realities couldn’t really be more different.

There is such a thing as genuine failure. Bad failure. Getting to old age and seeing that you’ve destroyed your family and that they’re all going to spend the rest of their lives miserable because of your bad choices: that’s true failure. There might be an opportunity for some kind of last-minute spiritual or personal redemption or even for a change of direction that positively benefits others but realistically, the irreversible consequences of your actions suffered by others almost certainly outweigh any potential growth or change you might undergo in your later years as a result.

But how about studying as hard as you can for a university entrance exam and still not doing well enough to get in? Is that even a remotely comparable kind of failure? In reality, that’s much more similar to what we do at the gym: training to failure. You worked hard, you pushed yourself to your limit (or at least close), and it wasn’t quite enough. Hopefully you can adapt, grow, and move forward. You might never get into the university you want, but you grew your intellect, you exercised your mind and your willpower, and you had to learn to overcome disappointment. You are inevitably stronger in some way as a result, even if you didn’t achieve your preferred outcome. You tried.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

I had this shown to me about fifteen years ago during an Ayahuasca experience. I was able to enter this state where I felt like I could take in everything that was happening around me. I remember looking at a leaf with rain water running down it and feeling like I was learning so much, and yet at the same time it was all beyond my comprehension. But somehow, without any words or direct teaching, I feel I learned more in those few hours than any other in my life.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

There should be two words for failure: one for true failure, where something goes wrong or you don’t meet life’s expectations of you, and it has genuinely bad consequences with little to no silver lining (which is pretty rare), and another word for the kind of failure which is an essential, beneficial, and quite natural part of daily life, and an unavoidable prerequisite to success.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

Any of us are capable of changing how we approach things at any moment. It doesn’t mean that it’s easy, it doesn’t mean that we can fix everything, it doesn’t mean that the damage we’ve caused is all reversible, and it certainly doesn’t mean we can go back in time. But we alwayshave the option to try again, to try something different, and to change our trajectory, even when external or internal factors seem to make it difficult.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

There are stories of people who’ve spent their entire lives obese, unhealthy, and unhappy, up until a certain day when they simply decided to change. They woke up that day and, for whatever reason, started thinking differently and making different choices. The fact that they didn’t choose to do that before doesn’t mean that the option wasn’t always there. It was. They simply didn’t choose to take it before. And when the change did come, it didn’t just happen; it happened because they chose for it to happen.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

An excessive adherence to past failures is often seen in people’s perception of themselves when they say things like: “I never succeed”, “I don’t get along well with my colleagues”, or “I don’t work hard”.

These are all actually statements about the past (albeit up to and including the very recent past), but when phrased in this way, they are being projected onto both the present and the near future.

Really, they should read “I haven’t succeeded yet”, “I haven’t gotten along well with my colleagues so far”,and “I haven’t worked that hard in my life up until this point”.

Just by changing the grammatical form of the statements, and without being dishonest or bending the truth in any way (in fact, with this grammatical change we’re being more accurate to reality), these statements now leave far more room for change and growth, as opposed to reinforcing a harsh or restrictive view of oneself.

The stories we tell ourselves are important. They are more than just empty words, and there is no more powerful reinforcer than our own minds.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

Too much of a connection to what came before can shackle us to history and render us unable to make progress. Self-limiting or pessimistic views can easily take hold in the narratives we create around our lives. Sometimes it feels easier to dwell on the past than to imagine the future, but that doesn’t mean either one has any more bearing on the present than the other.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

Every day, every moment and every decision that you make are opportunities for a new start. That doesn’t mean it’s possible to erase the past or that the new starts we make in the present can be completely devoid of any connection to it, but every new day is still an opportunity to change our approach, attitude, direction, and how we feel. It’s not the beginning of our life, but it is the beginning of the rest of our life.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

At times, there really is no inherent, explicit, or implicit meaning or message behind the event. It’s just a random, unfortunate, negative event. But in these cases, you can apply your own meaning to it. You create your own message. What is life telling you? What couldlife be telling you? What would you likelife to be telling you? What would you like to tell yourself?

The apparent emanation of this message doesn’t have to be something “real” for there to be a message and for it to have a powerful impact on your life. It doesn’t have to be some divine signal from beyond or something spiritual. It can just be a loud noise going off nearby, waking you out of a stupor, reminding you that you have work to do, problems to solve or things to think about. Something that takes you out of the daydream and puts you back in the driver’s seat.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

A lot of the signals life gives us are overt messages or warnings: an injury or a bout of poor health is your body directly telling you that you aren’t caring for it properly and are putting yourself at risk. Lots of people start eating more healthily after a cardiac event or some kind of early warning sign.

And at other times, the messages or warnings are less clear, but still present if you look for them. A huge, unpleasant fight with a family member or partner can serve as a reminder of all the ways you or the other party have neglected the relationship and can be the thing that pushes you towards mending it or perhaps moving on from it if necessary. An unexpected bill that you can’t afford to pay can be a reminder that you need to find a new job or take some other measures to improve your financial situation. A relative passing away unexpectedly can be a reminder to tell your loved ones things you would want them to know if you were no longer here.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

@jakerattlesnk The first few years of Peterson's rise to fame were something else. He changed the world.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

@RRR0BYN I think there will be a huge social/political divide, the people who have kids and those who don't. It will get quite ugly.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

Nobody likes the sound of the alarm going off. It wakes you up, snaps you out of the dream you were having, and reminds you that you have to get up and go to work. Nothing about this process feels good.

And yet, despite this, we all understand that the alarm going off every morning is a good thing, provided we respond to it correctly.

Similarly, nobody likes it when bad things happen unexpectedly in life. None of us wish for shocking, upsetting, or disappointing things to occur. But these events can serve as alarms in their own way: reminders of the work we should be doing, important tasks we’ve forgotten, or the things and people that we’ve been neglecting and should pay more attention to.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

Just a few simple tweaks in how you look at things can make an enormous difference to your quality of life. And this reframing part of your mind is like a muscle that grows stronger every time you use it. The more you deliberately employ this kind of thinking, the better at it you become, and the more it happens by default.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

To be honest, neither is an enviable position: on the one hand, you have a group being told that what they are is AMAZING and BRAVE even when it isn't, which pushes them into a very shallow existence. On the other hand you have a group being told that nothing they do is good enough and that they will always be worse in comparison, but that the work must never stop regardless.

It's a very depressing situation for both genders, and I think universities are mostly to blame.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

The human mind can be a difficult and sometimes quite painful place to be, but it also has incredible malleability and strength, and it’s pretty amazing what you can achieve by taking ownership of your thoughts.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

Once you begin to understand how much control you have over your own thoughts, and how much your thoughts can alter your feelings, it becomes much easier to be a happier and, in turn, better person.

[Ciaran O'Loughlin @Reframe_Reality]

Understanding that progress is accumulative but non-linear.

Some days you'll go forwards, some days you'll stand still. Some days you might even go backwards a bit. But if you set your sights on something better and keep putting one foot in front of the other, you'll be shocked at how far you can get.