Pick Your Pieces

Acknowledgements

First, I want to thank you for caring enough about yourself and the world to read a book like this. As of 2023, we're facing some very difficult social, personal, and political challenges. The upside is that these challenges are forcing us to find healthier ways to cope and overcome. It's counterintuitive, but the "bad" is paving the way for the better. We are making progress because of people like you.

Second, I've also got to thank my old friend Jim Principi. Jim, your sincere interest in this material, along with your encouragement and feedback, kept this project moving along. Thanks to you, I finally stopped "thinking about" writing this book and, instead, actually got it done. "Pick Your Pieces" is here in 2023 (rather than 2033) because of you!

Preface

This is not a political book, but it is an attempt to facilitate the creation of a competing parallel system -- a system that you can build within yourself, a psychological system that protects against the onslaught of modern-day challenges and programming that we all have to endure.

Except for the introduction, most of this book consists of separate, stand-alone passages under 200 words each. (For context, the introduction covers the absolute mess I was when I was younger, and the short passages cover the ideas and perspectives that not only helped me unwind that mess but continue to help me decades later.)

I sincerely hope you'll grab a pen or pencil and, as you're reading, highlight passages that speak to you, and use the "notes" section to record why. Likewise, if you're bothered by a particular passage, write out your argument against it. Consider creating your own index of passages that you want to revisit again. Bottom line: Mark this book up; make it your own. Lastly, be patient with this material. When you encounter ideas that require more thought (an hour, a day, a week or longer), set the book down and give yourself some time. You'll gain more.

Please, if you find this information useful:
1) Let others know that they can read for free at PickYourPieces.com
2) Leave a rating or short review at Amazon or your preferred book review site(s).
3) If you really like it, pick up a copy for yourself or somebody you care about.

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Introduction
Quality of Life

What really determines our quality of life? Some believe it boils down to whether or not we have lots of money or talent or beauty or popularity. But the world is filled with people who, despite having these things, are miserable nonetheless. (Some of them are even suicidal.) How about physical health? No again. There are lots of people who possess perfect physical health, yet live in a state of constant anger, resentment, fear, or depression. Is it about having a great family and great friends? Apparently not. Some of the most unhappy and self-destructive people in the world are dearly loved, surrounded by friends and family who desperately want to help them but, sadly, cannot.

So, what is it? What ultimately determines the quality of a person's life experience? Maybe it's not a "what." Maybe it's a "who." And maybe that "who" exists as an identity that we've created and interact with in our daily lives. When we interact with pieces of our identity that are healthy, we experience a better relationship with our mind and with our life. However, to the extent we interact with pieces that are unhealthy, we move toward habits of thought and behavior that are self-destructive and ultimately lead to suffering. In a worst-case scenario, we might falsely conclude that these self-destructive habits are more powerful than we are. They're not. In fact, within a healthier identity of our making, they couldn't even exist.

In a nutshell, that's what this book is about. It's about the "pieces" that we pick up and unconsciously incorporate into our identity. It's about the natural process by which this happens and the dramatic effect it has on our lives. Above all, the short passages in this book aim at weakening the unhealthy pieces—pieces that undermine the process of beneficial identity creation.

Let's start with a few ideas:

1. We can acquire habitual thoughts and behaviors that cause us unnecessary harm.
2. Some of the harms are so integrated into our identity, and so prevalent in our culture, that we don't even see them.
3. Our personal challenges are infinitely unique, but our mental and/or physical response tends to fall under one of two categories: helpful or harmful.

The easiest way to illustrate the three ideas above is through a story. Since my own personal story is the one that I know the best, I'll briefly cover some of the unique experiences, challenges, and bad responses I chose as a kid, along with the realizations that prevented me from completely destroying my life.

A Quick History:

I had an unusual upbringing that led to unusual opportunities and plenty of bad choices. I was 10 years old when I began smoking pot and drinking alcohol. By age 13, supply permitting, I was getting high daily. My goals in life were pretty simple: Hang out with my friends, get stoned, listen to music, and chase girls. I considered myself a "stoner," and I pursued that lifestyle 24/7. Not surprisingly, this led to many undesirable outcomes. I was physically, emotionally, and spiritually unhealthy. I was unreliable and insecure. I was a coward who'd pick on weaker kids, but I'd back down in a second from a legitimate challenge. I stole to get drug money or other things that I wanted; I vandalized property, broke into houses, cars, schools. Basically, at a remarkably young age, I'd become a complete asshole. If I had a single redeeming quality, it was my conscience. It nagged at me. It made me feel gross and disappointing. But there was a solution for that: Get high, put on some tunes, hook up with a girl, and worry about it later.

One night while lying in bed (14 years old), something broke the final straw in my mind. Truths I'd refused to face and issues I needed to deal with had boxed me in. None of the normal justifications for my choices were working; no lies were sufficient. I hated who I was, and it hurt—bad. In that moment, a different version of myself began to appear in my mind—a version that I desperately wanted to be. (A potential version that, if I didn't change, would never get a chance to live.)

Standing over me in my mind's eye, I saw my opposite. A person with self-respect. A person who wasn't so small inside that they needed to bully others and was big enough inside to fight (win or lose) when necessary. I saw a person who possessed a type of power I'd never developed: integrity. One who could be counted on and trusted. An individual that was patient and always did their best. I saw a person who truly knew the pitfalls and inherent weakness of dishonesty and had become too wise to even consider it—my opposite, indeed.

I studied that human for a couple hours and imagined how much different my life would be if I tried to be more like him. The clarity and power of the experience was non-negotiable. It forced me to let go of all the lies, and, to my amazement, I felt liberated. For the first time in my life, I knew what I needed to do: Stop running, accept responsibility for my choices, and grow up. Then and there, I committed myself to that goal.

I'd love to say that the intense experience triggered an overnight transformation, but it didn't. I stopped smoking pot for a couple weeks, felt uncomfortable around my friends, and then ran back to my old identity and habits. I didn't revisit the goal until 1985 when, at the age of 15, I received a sentence of one to six years behind bars. Fortunately, I only had to serve nine months, but that was long enough. It provided plenty of time to reflect and finally accept full responsibility for my choices and their consequences. That's when my trajectory permanently changed for the better.

I was released from jail about a week prior to my 16^th birthday, and over the next few years, I slowly inched my way toward developing the traits I'd seen when I was 14. Day One, I started with quitting pot, no more stealing, and no more bullying. Then, I progressed to regular exercise, eating healthy, and learning the confidence-building benefits of being honest. By age 19, I'd made a lot of progress. I was definitely a better person—as long as I wasn't drunk.

From age 16 to 21, I was basically a weekend drinker, and as long as I didn't drink too much, everything seemed OK. Unfortunately, when I did drink too much, remnants of the "old me" emerged with a vengeance. My highlight reel included things like breaking into a closed pizza shop to make myself dinner (embarrassed beyond words, I went to the police and turned myself in the next day); standing in a suburban subdivision and repeatedly loading and then unloading a 38 revolver into the ground (that fiasco made the local newspaper); kicking out arresting officers' back windows, fighting, shouting, making a monumental ass out of myself; and racking up more driving violations than most families do in a lifetime.

Despite the progress I'd made, my drinking threatened to destroy my life in an instant. That realization led me to "stop drinking" many times,[1] but it wasn't until March 28, 1991 (three days after receiving my fourth DUI), that I got it right and stopped for good. Finally, I'd conquered my inner idiot, and all would be well!…No, not exactly.

For some reason, I assumed that sobriety would end my suffering once and for all. I was wrong. Yes, it ended the suffering associated with getting drunk, doing stupid shit, and then paying the price, but sobriety brought a new challenge. I hadn't yet developed the ability to deal with unmedicated reality. I'd been using drugs and alcohol to avoid unpleasant thoughts and emotions for more than half my life. My brain developed from childhood through adulthood with that crutch, and now the crutch was gone. My outward behavior was where it needed to be (no cheating, no stealing, no drugs, no alcohol, etc.), but the intensity of my reactions to the outside world became nearly intolerable. I tortured myself with negative perspectives. I exaggerated the significance of things I considered "bad" and blinded myself to all that was good. In short, my inner idiot was alive and well. He still held power and was using it to create dangerous states of hopelessness and depression. This went on for six years until I finally realized that "he" wasn't "me."

The small piece of my identity that created depression was no different than the piece that formerly created a desire to smoke pot daily. It was no different than the piece that formerly drove my desire to drink. No different than the other pieces that justified lying, stealing, cheating, etc. Each was just a piece of identity—a circuit in my brain—that I nurtured with false beliefs and associations. I successfully eliminated and replaced the other unhealthy pieces; so why did it take me half a decade before I figured out that I could do the same with the piece creating depression? Hindsight provides the answer: I'd recognized the earlier pieces as my enemy because they inspired behaviors that undermined who I wanted to be. They created an immediate conflict, and that enabled me to choose a side. But the depression was different. It was rooted in a piece of my accepted identity. It was so firmly integrated into who I thought I was, I'd never even thought to question it, despite its clearly destructive impact on my life.[2]

That lesson was the most profound I've experienced in the 52 years I've been on this planet. It led me to discover what I firmly believe is the most important job we have: to guard against and eliminate "pieces" of identity (accepted thoughts, impulses, and behaviors) that turn our own energy against us. By doing so, we free up a tremendous amount of energy for our second most important job: to develop and strengthen pieces of identity that empower us and improve the quality of our life, regardless of our circumstances. By committing myself to those two jobs, I made more progress in the year that followed than I'd made at any other point in my life. Best of all, decades later, that progress continues.

If nothing else, I hope the short passages in this book will help you experience the following truth for yourself: Effortless abstinence from destructive thoughts, impulses, and behaviors and effortless fidelity to constructive thoughts, impulses, and behaviors are both achievable. They're the inevitable result of carefully monitoring and deliberately rewiring your mind. And though the rewiring process itself takes some effort and patience, the rewards last a lifetime.

NOTE: The main ideas in this book are covered many times in slightly different ways. For instance, the ego, the automatic mind, mental circuits, programs, the inner idiot, and even "pieces of identity" all basically refer to the same thing. The different terms and analogies provide alternate paths to the same primary idea: that "you" are none of these things. You are the awareness that can distance itself from harmful thoughts and acquired identity, observe them both, and make changes (large and small) that transform your life for the better.