I’m a poet,
I don’t doubt it,
even if
I’m not very good at it.

You can choose,
who you want to be,
you’ll just have to
work at it too.

You might not be
the best there is,
but I’ll give you the credit
for what you do.

So be careful,
with what you practice,
because you’ll become
better at it too.

For it would be a shame,
if practicing mediocrity—
wasn’t really—
what you were aiming to do.

Spanish Version

Soy un poeta,
no lo dudo,
aunque
no soy muy bueno en eso.

Puedes elegir
quién tu quieres ser,
sólo tienes que trabajar—
también en eso.

Puede que no seas,
el mejor que hay,
pero te daré el mérito
por lo que haces.

Así que ten cuidado
en lo que practicas,
porque te harás mejor—
también en eso.

Porque sería una vergüenza
si practicar la mediocridad—
no fuera realmente
lo que estabas buscando lograr.

Por: ElRoyPoet © 2019

“When you’re trying to do something hard, what your brain does is give you something else to do that’s not quite as difficult, so that you can feel justified in not doing the thing, you’re supposed to be doing in the first place. Basically what your brain is doing, is tricking you into believing that your doing something else that’s also useful. And if you give into that temptation, which you often will, then it wins and because it wins, it gets a little dopamine kick and it grows stronger. Anything you let win, the internal argument grows, and anything you let be defeated shrinks, because it’s being punished—it doesn’t get to have its way. So another thing to remember, is to not practice what you don’t want to become. Because those are neurological circuits—you build those things in there—they’re not going anywhere. You can resort to another strategy (coping mechanism) to inhibit them, that’s the best you can do. But once they’re in there, you can’t get them out. And then the ones you inhibit, can also be taken out by stress and the old habits will come back up. So you got to be be careful with what you say and what you do, because you train your subconscious that way.” By: Jordan Peterson (edited for clarity)

“If you’re a perfectionist, that might mean you can be pretty hard on yourself. A mistake at work, for example, could result in some pretty negative self-talk or actions, like depriving yourself of a snack later that day. In other words, you’re punishing yourself. But self-punishment doesn’t encourage growth: ‘When you punish someone, that person doesn’t learn how to change; they learn how to avoid the source of the punishment.’ If you are the source of your own punishment then you learn to avoid yourself. This might look like overworking, overspending, or numbing yourself with excessive consumption of social media or TV shows.” Excerpt from This positive psychology theory will help you learn from your mistakes: ‘Punishment doesn’t work’

“In the novel Catch-22, the author Joseph Heller famously wrote: ‘Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them.’ He’d taken a quote by Shakespeare on greatness and turned it on its head. The implication was clear: mediocrity is a bad thing, to be avoided. Yet most of us go on to live what by most measures are pretty ordinary lives. So what’s wrong with settling for mediocrity?” Excerpt from: How to Be Mediocre and Be Happy With Yourself

“There are things we all do, or don’t do, that lead us to waste far more time than we realize in the moment.” Excerpt from The Biggest Wastes Of Time We Regret When We Get Older

Definition: Self-sabotage is when people do (or don’t do) things that block their success or prevent them from accomplishing their goals. It can happen consciously or unconsciously. Self-sabotaging behaviors can affect our personal and professional success, as well as our mental health.

Commentary: The human brain is not a computer hard drive that you can wipe clean. If you could format your brain like a hard drive, you would end up a vegetable. So don’t fill your head with any wrong ideas! But most importantly, don’t let hackers invade your free space and don’t let anybody push your buttons. Because once you allow malicious code to enter into your memory, it resides there forever.