Epiphanies and Exercises In Humanity 

For me, changing my own humanity sparked from a form of empathy and accountability combined. It may be easiest for me to set the stage, and describe what was happening in my life in conjunction with what was happening in my mind, to better understand the latter. 

It was 2010, and I had just moved out from the apartment my wife and I were living in with her two boys. I was 30 and my wife and I had been together since I was 24; it was the first relationship I had ever had. We were happy during this time and didn't even argue much until that last year. I was not a bad step-father or husband, except for one all important aspect: I wasn't committed. I was going through the motions, and deep into a serious relationship I was never ready for, and wasn't honest about. 

The last year went down hill fast, almost entirely because of that secret I was subconsciously burying the whole time. It blew up and it blew up because of me; but I didn't think of that way yet. I moved out. I got my own apartment and a few days later things changed drastically; I had my epiphany. 

Sitting alone, well with my dog (I took him with me), I lost control of my mind and body to a degree. Falling into a ball of screams and tears on the floor, I FORCED my self to face what was deep in my subconscious my entire life: my personal human frailties, the damage they caused and the regret of allowing them to control me. I saw how I was to blame for a broken marriage because I wasn't honest about my desires, dreams and thoughts. I saw how I could be unconditionally stubborn, arguing just to argue, or more accurately because I was afraid of looking ignorant. I saw how my social anxiety was negative for me, and that I was holding my self back because I was afraid to show others who I am, including my very unique and often contradictory thoughts. From that point on, at least for the coming four years, I grew, I changed, and I progressed my own humanity in large part because I wouldn't let myself go back to ignoring it. 

This was literally life-changing, not in a social sense and not even seemingly in a biological sense, but it was life-changing in an 'alter destiny and causality sense'. It was the difference between human conscious interaction affecting reality and standard subconscious default mechanisms controlling human life the same way it has since our evolution (at least mine). Conscious recognition of your self (your humanity) and conscious action to alter it (your mentality) are change, they are progress, and nothing else is. 

During that time, after these revelations, I filled 3 or 4 notebooks with writings of my thoughts. I turned that into a 500+ page document and made two books out of that text:

1) The Introduction of Self

2) The Indulgence of Self

..which you can find here: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=joe+charogoff&crid=34YQ5796FC9BH&sprefix=joe+charogoff%2Caps%2C509&ref=nb_sb_noss

The books were and still are very valuable/meaningful to me, but also still very unsuccessful sellers. Not only are they very personal, they are also very contradictory to what people want by default. They have information to help you actually deal with analyzing and improving your humanity, and not just information to make you feel better, which is what most 'self-help' books contain. None of us will grow by getting what we instantly want- all of us will by sacrificing that default desire for reality.

WHO ARE YOU?

Not everyone will deal with something they regret to the extent that it forces them to be better/improve, but if I'm supposed to have the answers to how you can improve, that's a hell of a place to start. Face your regrets, be honest about them and what you've done poorly at in your life, whether that's kindness, honesty, fairness, compromise, compassion, being open, expressing your self, or whatever it may be. 

Below is a list of mental traits or concepts. Don't just look at these "words", but think about what they mean, and what they mean for you. Whether or not you can be fair about the first trait, will determine where you go from there...

Honesty

Logic

Stubbornness 

Avoiding your fears of perceived discomfort

Conceit

Compassion

Greed

Humility

Hate

Perspective

The desire to understand

Faith

Laziness or lack of motivation

Determination

Perseverance 

Revenge

Wanting to be comfortable/at ease

Intuition of exterior reality

Intuition of interior reality/self

Empathy

Hope

Regret

Love

Value

Anger

Depression

Your acceptance of who you are/your identity

The degree to which you believe or know there is more to your self/your humanity than you live for

Anxiety

Being at peace

Being conflicted and not knowing why

Being conflicted and knowing why

Happiness

Sadness

Satisfaction

Frustration

Stress

Knowledge

Ignorance

Truth

Belief

Presumption