I think we all go through a phase or certain experience that makes us feel like we’ve technically got our hands on the wheel, but we’re actually completely out of control and unable to regain it, and I’m not talking about the times we put the car in neutral and backed it out of the driveway at 2am without even a learner’s permit.

(I know what you’re thinking, and the answer is: yes, I’ve always been a badass.)

I’ve only truly spun out once in my life, though it felt like it lasted a lifetime – to be clear, I’m still being artsy and using the car metaphor to refer to a period of absolutely mind-boggling depression. In the moment, I was traumatized. In retrospect, it was one of the most life-changing periods of my life.

Once I finally escaped, I realized the illusion of value was shattered for most things in my life — I had no clue what beliefs I still held, but I knew they were fundamentally different from ones I held earlier. It was unnerving at first, but I am so thankful to have gone through it. Ultimately, when I came out on the other end, I emerged incredibly confident in my ability to “do life.”

These days, my biggest issue isn’t the knowledge that my thoughts and values will evolve, but how rapidly they are doing so. Seriously, I sometimes feel like a stranger in my own mind because just when I think I’ve accepted a new perspective or mustered up the courage to try a new experience, there’s a shift and I’m back at square one of the adjustment period.

I don’t really know how else to explain it, but I think this quote by Eleanor Roosevelt does a pretty decent job of articulating something similar: “You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.”’

Having confidence in my ability to be okay — to survive; to redirect when I go off course; to kick a bitch’s ass when they force me off the road — is the most intensely liberating and empowering feeling. More importantly, I have faith that I will continue to improve these abilities. Honestly, I find the entire process a bit intoxicating, hence why I’ve spent enough time thinking about it to construct a blog post on it.

I had one other epiphany take place, pretty much simultaneously:

No one cares about my happiness/success/[insert descriptor here] as I do. No one can improve or protect those things for me as well as I can. It’s nobody’s responsibility to – I am a grown ass lady, dammit – but if it was, they still wouldn’t be able to do even a fraction as great of a job for me as I can do for myself.

I lost control, bottomed out, time did its thing, and I survived. Since then, I’ve turned recovery into a repeatable process, and learned a lot about self-improvement along the way.

Ultimately, there are three big areas of self-improvement that I try to dedicate my time to:

1. Self-Awareness through Fundamental Reasoning
2. Building Safety Nets
3. Living Intentionally

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Self-Awareness through Fundamental Reasoning

I’m a naturally curious person. Growing up, I used to pester the hell out of my parents by repeatedly asking them “what do?” I would point at a desk, an airplane in the sky, a door handle, or a pair of high heels and, after moments of complete confusion, ask for an explanation. (To be fair, I am still sometimes confused by really high heels…wedge girl fo lyfe.)

As I got older, there were less things that I could ask “what do” about. Naturally, I now understand, at least on a basic level, what pretty much everything does. So instead of asking so many “what” questions in hopes of definitions, I began asking “how” and “why” with an annoyingly high frequency.

I’m also a naturally introspective and reflective person. Despite my borderline-obnoxious personality, I actually prefer to be alone than with a group of people so that I can swan dive cannonball into my thoughts without interruption. These qualities certainly have their tradeoffs – at their best, I am highly self-aware and analytical; at their worst, I become overly analytical and stressed out.

One thing that’s really helped me become more self-aware is the process of analyzing my thoughts and dismantling what I perceive to be the reasoning behind the things I do. I don’t know if this is a widely known term or something I made up, but I call it Fundamental Reasoning.

In short, when something interesting happens to me – maybe I act in a way that surprises me, or I have an emotional reaction that I don’t understand –  I ask “why.” When I have an answer, I question that, too. I do this until the explanation cannot be broken down any further; at this point, we’ve arrived at a deep layer of self-awareness.

Here’s a real and very personal example from a year ago: A friend of mine had a plastic surgery operation performed, and I became irrationally angry. I droned on and on to my mother about how it will continue to perpetuate itself to corrupt society and I don’t want to have to fight with my 10 year old daughter in the future about why she’s actually beautiful just the way she is. I knew from the get go that it went deeper than that. Here’s an oversimplification of my fundamental reasoning in action.

Why are you so mad that she had plastic surgery?

Because it isn’t fair to the rest of us who don’t believe in plastic surgery.

Why does that matter?

Because it gives me something unattainable to compare myself to.

Why does that upset you?

Because I’m already insecure about my appearance.

Why are you so insecure?

Because when I was a chubby youngster, a person of authority in my life called me fat and harassed me about what I should and should not eat.

Basically, my own brain had fooled me into thinking that I was really concerned about plastic surgery and the future of society, but the reality is that I had an experience growing up that made me very hyper-sensitive to anything vanity or appearance related.

This area is both enlightening and disturbing. Here’s the disturbing part: the fact of the matter is that we are all comprised of an array of unique experiences, and while the positive ones are great, they aren’t usually the ones that define us. Of all the fibers that weave together to form our psyche, the thickest ones are those from times of trauma and distress. Generally speaking, when you make it down to the fundamental reasoning, you realize that you’re controlled by your scars.

The enlightening part is that…well, it’s enlightening. Coming to this level of self-awareness makes it easier to perceive situations without bias and make better decisions. Learning which beliefs or habits are rooted in which scars means that we can correct for them, putting ourselves on the fast-track to self-improvement. Most importantly, at least for me, it helps me to remember that I am in charge of myself. Another story of plastic surgery won’t elicit a similar response from me in the future if I prevent it, and the only way to do that is to know what caused it.

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Building Safety Nets

If you ask me, life is really just one big game of coping and resourcefulness.

What differentiates the successful from the unsuccessful is their ability to withstand the emotional impact of being dealt a shitty hand (cope), then doing something with it that others won’t or can’t (resourcefulness). Teaching yourself to adapt and self direct are essential to maximizing resourcefulness and coping abilities, but there is an often overlooked piece of the pie that I like to spend some time on: protection and prevention.

I don’t mean prevention in the sense of controlling exactly what happens to me – I’ve yet to find a way to do that with much consistency, so if you’ve got the answers, hit me up – what I mean is that I think there is great value to figuring out how to protect yourself from extreme and/or unnecessary damage.

Essentially, how can I mitigate my risks to maximize my outcomes?

For most of us, coping with shitty times by wrapping up in a comforter like a burrito and sleeping so hard that you wonder if you’ll wake up in a blissful utopia (guilty, on many occasions) just isn’t feasible. For years I struggled with handling the times when I got screwed over – they completely threw me for a loop and sent me into an irrational and panicked tailspin.

I can’t speak for the rest of the hijacked minds out there, but from personal experience, the best way to stay afloat is to build a safety net. It’s actually intuitive — most people build them without even realizing it – but the more effort and thought you put into developing it, the better it works.

So, what is a safety net, you may be asking? It depends. It’s the thing that keeps you from falling too fast or too far; the place that offers you refuge; the habit that reinstates your stability; the person that pushes you forward after a period of moving backwards. A safety net is the fail-safe that flickers on right before you bottom out. If you haven’t built yourself a sturdy ass safety net, you’re suicidal.

Safety nets can be made out of pretty much anything – individuals, organizations, particular experiences, locations, lifestyle habits, etc. —  but one quality is common amongst successful safety nets: diversity. Over the years, I’ve worked really hard to try to cushion my happiness and sanity with a variety of activities, people, and experiences. I never thought I’d refer to finance lingo on my blog, but the concept is very similar to investors when they refer to diversification of their portfolio; by adding value to my life in a variety of ways, I’m cushioning against the inevitable moment that one of them crashes and burns. Instead of losing everything, I lose just one thing.

And that’s a fuckton easier to deal with than the reverse.

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Living Intentionally

Trust me when I say that this is not the last time you’ll read about living intentionally on my blog. The more I write, the more I realize that it’s the skeletal structure of nearly everything I do.

To start, what is intention? What does it mean to live intentionally? I asked my dear friend Wikipedia, who always makes me sound smarter than I actually am, “what are the synonyms of intentionally.” Answer: purpose, aim, and resolve.

But because I am a one-upper, I’m going to give you my own definition of Living Intentionally.

Living intentionally (v. & adj.) – to come up with goals and do what is possible, even if improbable, to meet them; making time to be introspective and reflective so you know which path you’re headed down and initiating change when you want to be on another path; making decisions consistent with your goals and desired perception; most importantly, living under the assumption that “fate” is really just an aggregate of what our choices and actions, day in day out, week after week, year after year.

I’ve cared about what people thought of me from day one. Unless I was trying to defy my parents, prove a point, or prove someone wrong, judgments (not necessarily bad, just the instinctual need to size someone up when you meet them) had an impact on me. Most of my decisions are executed after I’ve fully thought through the consequences and residual affects they will have. That being said, there were certainly times when I lost sight of my usually thorough oversight, and, as usual, was emphatically redirected.

Sometime around age 14, my awkward stage had passed (mostly…not sure I ever completely grew out of that) and was replaced by an unpredictable rebellious streak that prompted me to start begging my parents to let me get a small stud in my nose. I say “start” because I spent the the next few years relentlessly heckling them with an impressively annoying stubbornness. (Fact: Jewish children, particularly females, are born with an innate ability to nag until they get their way. I tried to use this to my advantage, but quickly realized the flaws in my plan, namely: my mother’s nagging skills were far more powerful than my own. That, and the theory failed to explain why my Catholic father, Buddhist uncle, and Baptist Grandpa could also nitpick and nag their ways out of a corner.)

But just as I had them in my crosshairs  — this is up for debate, but 16-year-old me likes to think so — and was itching to pull the trigger on that piercing gun, one conversation changed everything.

An older, high profile businesswoman from New York had joined us for dinner, and within minutes I proudly shared that I wanted to pierce my nose. She must’ve been Jewish, too, because I had been thoroughly chewed up and spit out in a matter of seconds. Among other colorful comments, she said that if I’m going to punch a hole through my nose I might as well “punch a hole through my future and that she would never hire me”. Her ending comment went something like, “I know you personally, so I could make up an excuse or rationale for why you pierced your nose. I could say you are creative, expressive, just trying to find yourself, all of which are probably true. But, the truth is that very few people would know that, and very few people would care even if they did. Because of one tiny, superficial choice, people are going to judge you on a deep level. Whether you like it or not, perception is reality, and the opinions of others form the world in which you live.”

Needless to say, my opinion on perception, judgment, and obvious piercings was forever changed. (I also decided that I wanted to move to New York so I too could be a feisty, Jewish businesswoman that eats teenagers’ hopes and dreams for an appetizer.)

Now, that’s not to say that we should spend our lives in fear of what people will say or think about us — pandering to the many shallow, spiteful, and imbecilic shitheads out there is rarely a good solution. The beauty of what this woman told me is that it applies to any decision we make that others are aware of, which is a large majority of our choices. Here, living intentionally means making choices and taking actions that are consistent with what we want and how we wish to be perceived. I’m sure there are thousands and thousands of people with obvious piercings who don’t mind being judged during an interview and are comfortable with the consequences (no call back? whatever, I hate corporate America and suits anyway!), but… I am most definitely not one of those people.

Shocker, right? And because I wanted to make my decisions consistent with my goals, I gave up on irregular piercings.

(Well, to be fair, I gave up on visible irregular piercings…hehehe)

So how is living intentionally put into action?

I believe that we are all comprised of three different “people”, or rather, three different versions of ourself.

First, you have your present self – this is who you are right now, through your own eyes. Second, you have your ideal self – this is who you want to be in the future. Third, you have your perceived self – this is who you are right now, but through the eyes of those around you.

The ultimate goal of the living intentionally is to try to keep the three selves as aligned with each other as possible. A certain amount of dissonance between the three is expected, but large amounts make for a lot of confusion and dissatisfaction.

This is done through consistent re-evaluation of the three selves. As the differences between the three increase, someone who lives intentionally will make a series of choices to minimize them.

Here is an over-simplified example: You think that your present self is outgoing and funny, similar to your ideal self. But, your present and ideal selves are at odds with your perceived self, because people around you actually view your humor as mean and too aggressive. This creates dissonance, which we naturally seek to relieve.

At this point, we have multiple options, such as:

1. You can find a new group of friends that are more receptive of your humor, or
2. You can make a conscientious effort to change your sense of humor, or at least how it is perceived, or
3. You can accept your perceived self and create a new present self that doesn’t mind being mean or aggressive.

Different people would make different choices, depending on circumstance and the relative value they assign to each self. The important takeaway here is to make the decision that best suits your goals, aka your ideal self.

Once I started focusing on living with intention (sometime back in early high school, though it was much more informal and discombobulated back then), people began remarking on my ability to make thought-out decisions, relative to my age. I’ve since become pretty talented at taking control of various things in my life — whether it’s adding new ones, removing some, or tweaking ones that already exist.

While I make plenty of casual mistakes, it is rare that I make any big, poor decision without intense consideration; in fact, my worst decisions are usually the ones I have to think about the longest, because I’m trying to figure out how to work it to my advantage. Yeah, that makes them seem even shittier when they eventually blow up, but I generally enjoy massive benefits from not making a shit ton of stupid and preventable poor decisions along the way. And all because I take some time to hone in on my three selves to choose the factors I will use to evaluate my options.

I never get so frustrated as when I’m solicited for advice from adults, friends, whomever, and they knowingly make decisions that will create even more dissonance between their selves. I’ve seen somewhat basic decisions spiral into horribly difficult situations and end up stealing a lot more than the upfront time and thought would have.

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In Summary….

I started writing this post six hours ago, and have not moved from my seat — I shit you not, my roommate actually thinks I’m nuts — but that’s how passionate I am about what a little extra effort towards self-awareness and improvement can do for you. If you want a number, I’m approximately 3,310 words passionate about self-awareness and improvement.

At the core of the Sarah Method is mental and emotional responsibility and self-control.I certainly had neither of those qualities when I first embarked on this convoluted path — in fact, I’d venture to say someone would describe me as the opposite — but here I am.

It should be obvious by now, but I’m so passionate about it because it seriously changed my life. Practicing self-awareness through fundamental reasoning, the art building safety nets, and the Intentional lifestyle have completely redefined my perspective of the world and what it means to actually live this life.

I became happier, more confident, self-assured, and satisfied with pretty much all facets of my life. When I saw how tangible the impact was, I decided to start thinking about how I’d articulate my strategies to people.

Boom, bitches.

On that note, I’m going to end here with a slightly morbid question that came to me when I was writing the first sentences of this post. A bit weird, but I think it’s pretty relevant.

If somebody or something is killing you and you choose not to fight it, is it murder or suicide?