One of my deepest desires is to be free—not from extra influences, but from my own unconscious habits and unhealthy desires.
And last night, I was walking the dog. And I had two minds within me, so clear: Material Mind, and a Spirit Mind perspective.
The Spirit Mind perspective could see that I’d been ten days without watching movies at night. This has given me such great results. I feel more present, I sleep better, I’m connecting better with Hisami, my work is more clear. Really, there’s no place in my life that wasn’t improved by this choice to curb one of my bad habits, right?
And there’s this second mind—my Material Mind—that’s wanting to go back down that road. Even though I’d had a long streak with no movies at night and great results, the night before I had watched one episode of Picard, where Number Seven is plugging herself back into the Borg intentionally as a kind of a defensive maneuver.
And I was struck as I watched it: whoa, this is really what I’m experiencing in my world, in my time—screens and streaming services, and probably games for some people, and social media. These are the Borg. These are things that, once we plug in, even though we don’t necessarily want to be there, even though you can see some unhealthy things happening, there’s something about it that’s so compelling that we don’t actually quite want to escape—as strong as we want to stay.
And so I—after kind of a 10-day streak of great results—I had one night where I’m like, “You know, I’ll just watch one episode.”
I didn’t sleep that well. I woke up feeling this kind of agitated mind that’s flicking around for what’s wrong. I didn’t connect with Hisami in the morning at all. I just ran off to work. Basically, all the things—the reasons why I had wanted to stop—all came back. As soon as I had just… one day on.
And so when I woke up, I had total clarity. I’m like, ah, I don’t need this. You know, my Spirit Mind’s really clear. Total clarity—I want to go back to the road of just not watching at night. Going for a walk, exercising, doing anything else—playing guitar, connecting with my wife, taking a bath, you know, the thousand things that are actually enjoyable, much more than just plugging in by myself and escaping into this not-real world that has this negative effect on me.
And so, I made that choice yesterday morning. Okay. I’m set. Clear.
But like I said, I’m walking the dog, and I’ve got two minds. I still have the Spirit Mind that’s really clear. And not only can I see the great results I’m having, but I can see that just maybe one more night—if tonight I watch—I’ll be back in the old groove. And I’ll just watch every night for the next six months until I pattern-interrupt myself again for some reason.
And meanwhile, my life won’t be going as consciously as I want. I won’t be connecting with Hisami. Work will be difficult. I won’t sleep that well. I’m really clear. I’m 100% sure which way I want to go, which way is healthy. And there’s this clarity in everything from Spirit Mind.
And my Material Mind is right there with equal clarity and certainty that I’m probably going to watch another movie tonight. Right? I don’t even want to. There’s no storyline I’m wanting to pick up. There’s no series that I’m super into. I don’t have any reason. I just know that I’m probably going to do it.
Like I can just feel that my body—my Material Mind—are driving down that road just because it’s the road I’ve driven down before. It’s just habit.
Really fascinating. Because, you know, I love observing Spirit Mind and Material Mind—seeing this dynamic, both so strong. I really didn’t know what was gonna happen.
There’s a little bit of apprehension too in me, that I can’t believe it’s not easy. It’s not just a choice.
I actually had more compassion than I’ve ever had before for people that are dealing with addiction—like drug or alcohol or a more, you know, common addiction or “real” addiction, you might say. Because before, I just didn’t understand. I didn’t understand, like, why can’t people… like if you have a problem with wine, then just don’t buy it. It seemed really clear to me.
But when I described it to my friend, you know, she was like, “Well, that seems like the answer, but it doesn’t really work that way.” And I didn’t understand. I hadn’t been through that.
But last night I was like, Oh, wow. I think I’m starting to understand. This is a different thing, clearly—but the feelings are very similar to what she was saying. And I didn’t know what was going to happen.
So I came home at night. I still didn’t know. Went to bed. Had a little time. Hisami was out early. And even at some point I thought, “Well, I’m not… I’m not going to watch. I… I’m gonna watch. I’m not gonna watch. I’m going to watch.” I thought, well, maybe I’ll just grab my iPad just in case I want to watch.
I couldn’t find it.
That was a little clue. Just kind of woke me up. I started chuckling. I can’t find the iPad. Don’t even want to watch. 100% sure I shouldn’t. I don’t want to go down that road.
Oh, that’s enough.
Take a couple breaths. Bring myself back to Spirit Mind. And just enjoy the space of curiosity, the human experiment, everything that we’re going through. The joy of being here. Being in this game. And of being conscious. And of making a choice in this moment to curb one small habit. To turn things back into a space where I feel like I’m creating what I want. I’m living the life that I truly desire—not just the one that I’ve habitually adjusted to.
So it was wonderful. And I didn’t watch.
