Tim Ferriss on lovingkindness meditation
On Dan Harris' 10% Happier podcast, starting around 1:00:45:
Ferriss: I have spent my entire life, minus the most recent 6 months let's say, at best tolerating myself, typically loathing myself, and being extremely brutal. Brutal. I didn't view myself as worthy of love, certainly not self-love. It seemed self-indulgent.
And I'd focused on just becoming an instrument of competition... I could help other people experience joy, but my function was to be an instrument of high pain tolerance and competition. That was my function, that was just it. Frogs are frogs; horses are horses; Tim is an instrument of competition with high pain tolerance.
I just want to say to anyone who feels like they merely tolerate themselves that a) you cannot love other people fully if you merely tolerate yourself – I actually read a quote from Gertrude Stein recently... "We must remember that the golden rule goes in both directions". So people are familiar with the "do onto others as you would have them do onto you" but you also need "do onto yourself as you do onto others".
And developing your relationship to yourself as a friend – I found lovingkindness meditation, metta meditation, very helpful for this...
Not to be too long-winded about it – if you feel like you have been or are in a place like I've described for myself, for my entire life, I would underscore that you don't have to choose that path. There are other paths you can choose. You can choose a path of light, and love, and forgiveness towards yourself. And if you had told me this a year ago that that could be developed... I would not have believed it.
But, I sit here right now today, feeling like living proof that it is possible. You do have to do the work; you are going to have to face a lot of pain. But if you put in the work, and you focus, and you dedicate yourself to that as your top priority, it can be done.
His delivery is powerful – I recommend actually listening to it.
The whole episode is worthwhile. A great example of worldly success not mapping to self-actualization or enjoyment of life.