Hey friends,

This week’s post is about finding direction in life. I hope you benefit from this and as always, thank you for reading 🤍

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What's Inside:

• 🗺️ How To Get What You Want In Life
• 🩺 Medical School Update
• ✏️ Insights - Podcasts, Books, Amazon finds & other cool things

How To Get What You Want In Life

If you go through life without a clear vision of your direction, it’s easy to get lost and live on autopilot. Instead of ending up somewhere you want to be on purpose, you arrive somewhere else, incidentally.

I think a life without a goal in mind is boring. I can only fulfil my potential if I am deliberate and conscious about my actions and direction. It’s sort of like playing darts. If you have an end in mind, you can see the board and you’re aiming for bullseye (or treble 20 for the people who know darts). If you don’t have a goal in mind, that’s like throwing darts without a dart board.

Pause to ask yourself, where are you going? Do you have a destination in mind?

Don’t worry if you don’t. Today I’ll share the best methods to help you find direction in life. These are techniques I have used and succeeded with thus far in life.

Visualising

This is something I’ve been doing for over 20 years, ever since I was a child I have always been obsessed with imagination, the fact that you can literally close your eyes and go anywhere in your mind’s eye still blows my mind.

Put simply, I close my eyes and imagine I am living the life that I aspire to live. For example before medical school I used to visualise myself graduating from medicine and becoming a doctor.

Not just visually, but with every inch of my body I felt as if I was there.

My heart rate would change because of the visualisation. Many times this has led to me crying.

It’s an emotional, full-body experience.

This connection isn’t easy to attain, it takes time and doesn’t happen often but every once in a while I have a deep connection with my vision and it’s liberating. It leaves a taste of what could be for weeks and keeps me focused on what matters.

I know it sounds like manifestation and the law of attraction, but it’s not the same. I have seen many theories about the law of attraction, but here’s mine.

When you routinely visualise a future you want to build, you start to embody the mindset and lifestyle needed to make that dream come true. That means you’re more likely to do the small habits today that lead to that life tomorrow.

A year ago when I was starting to make video content, I felt like I was onto something. I remember sitting and visualising building an audience, making quality videos, being consistent and showing up day after day. I used to sit and meditate every day and I asked myself the same question, where am I going?

I didn’t ask to have an answer in mind, I just wanted to make myself more aware of how the actions I took today would impact where I end up further down the road.

I believe that visualisation that helped me stay consistent with content creation, which is what lead me to where I am now. I also believe that not all things will work out how you want them to, so it’s not a simple task of visualise, act and achieve. It’s more like visualise, act and see where it takes you.

As a Muslim I believe whatever is best for you will be the outcome, so I hold my visions loosely and allow nature to take it’s course with my life.

Journaling

Write the part from Madeformethod about writing connecting with your brain and signalling importance to what you’re writing then continue on below.

The use of pen and paper gives the brain more 'hooks' to hang your memories on. Writing by hand creates much more activity in the sensorimotor parts of the brain. ****It signifies more importance on what you write about. Put simply, if you write something down on pen and paper, you’re more likely to do it than if you type the same thing.

These days I type most of my notes, but journaling is the one thing I always do with pen and paper purely because of the neurological impact it has.

There are countless apps and methods of journaling but nothing will ever come close to pen and paper. I don’t journal often, but when I do I write a lot. Especially about the important things in life. Every 6 months or so I like to review my life and think about where I’m going. Where I’d like to be. Where I think I’ll be in one year.

These entries are so nice to read back on not just for the nostalgia, but also to learn from. When I read posts from 2016 about my life predictions, then I see how life turned out in the next 5 years I can clearly see what I should have done differently.

I apply those new lessons to the next 5 years and I’m sure I’ll read my newest entries in the future with the same analysis.

Journaling is a brilliant method to get your mind onto paper. Thoughts are great but they disappear so quickly, it’s a good idea to capture them somewhere. Journal for 6 months and read your entries. You will start to get to know yourself from a 3rd person perspective which is a very unique angle.

If you want a full guide to journaling for success, subscribe to my YouTube. I’m working on a video to teach this.

Audio Journaling

This is very similar to paper journaling but something I do when I’m travelling or doing a lengthy entry. Just keep in mind that if you use audio then you need to be organised with your labelling system otherwise they just end up collecting dust in your phone.

I frequently do audio entries but I make time and space to write out the important parts. The main purpose of an audio journal is to capture ideas. If you get an amazing thought the most important thing is to capture the thought as quickly as possible with little friction. Audio achieves that very well.

This isn’t sponsored, but my current favourite app for audio notes is otter.ai. This app will transcribe whatever you speak in real time to high accuracy. I genuinely think this type of AI is the future of note-taking. I use this a lot for content and medical school too.

Video Journaling

Video journaling is my favourite of them all. I think we can all agree that watching videos is far more entertaining than reading, hence why social media and Netflix dominate the entertainment industry.

I only make video entries of the most special moments in life. Things I actually want to look back on. There is one particular video I love to watch from many years ago. I was in Turkey on a boat riding in the sun. I had just meditated for 10 minutes in the sun overlooking the sea with nothing but the sounds of the waves in the background.

I was living life.

I was on holiday though. Somewhere inside I knew that would come to an end once I fly back home, but why did it have to end? Why couldn’t that be my life? I decided then and there that I was going to create a life where taking a ride on a boat in the sea under the sun was a daily occurrence.

It didn’t matter to me how, I just told myself that if I work hard enough I’ll be able to achieve that. I wrote a caption on the video reading,

‘Life is goooood, don’t stress g work hard for this lifestyle’

It might sound a bit cringe, but that video is from 2018 and I’ve looked back at it many times since then. It’s imprinted in my mind whenever uncertainty or difficulty strikes. It keeps me going. It’s like a vision of myself succeeding except I have it in video form so I can literally see it.

I’ve got tons of videos that I don’t share with anyone saved from 2015 onwards. Maybe one day I’ll post one of them.

Re-Evaluate

This is the most important step. It is highly unlikely you will start and end on the same path. You’re human, you will change your mind. Things will change. Reality won’t meet your expectations. That’s why it’s important to re-evaluate your direction sometimes.

I prefer to see it as an upgrade. As you go on your journey and document your thoughts, you are collecting information about your life. The more information you have the more equipped you are to make a good decision. Each time you re-evaluate your direction there should be an improvement in your vision.

Take Away

Here is how to practically benefit from this post.

1. Start thinking about where you are in life and where you’re going. Don’t put limits on yourself either. Anything possible, as long as you believe so.
2. Start one of the processes from above. I would recommend starting with journaling or visualising. Do it well. Do it often. Make time to isolate and put effort into it.
3. Be consistent with your actions. Your process for direction should be your guiding principle. If it’s journaling then start your day by reading the entry. Let all of your actions take you along the path to success. Consistency in this manner will work wonders.
4. Re-evaluate.

I think unlike most of my newsletters, this one is the most intangible concept. It’s very much in the mind. Even the action points are quite vague. I still chose to share it with you because it’s one of my dearest methods and something that has truly shaped my future. I’d like you to experience the same.

Thank you for reading, if you enjoyed this you will like next week’s post where I speak about how to create your ideal life.

Until next time, stay curious.

🩺 Medical School Update

I finished my first term of 4th year this week. I’m back with my family with all my time to myself. I’m just grateful to have a few weeks off to focus on other aspects of life without medical school interfering.

I didn’t have any exams in December but I forced myself to study for the past 5 months just to get into routine and it’s been going well. I’ve reached a stage where I just study every day, it sounds weird but it’s part of my daily routine now. I have developed the habit pretty well. The last 100+ days of studying are what will allow me to continue doing content, exercise and other business alongside med school for the next 6 months.

✏️Insights

🎙️ Podcast: Bilal Assad - The Death Of My Son (YouTube)​

I couldn’t find this on Spotify so I linked the YouTube video. In short, Bilal Assad’s son passed away in front of him. The podcast explores his early life, then the death of his son and how that changed his view on life. There are many lessons in this episode and it’s an emotional one.

📚 Book: The 4 Hour Work Week​

I’m finally reading this book. It’s been on my list for years but I never got around to it. I will have updates on it soon. Read it yourself if you want, or wait for my review.

🎥 Movie/TV Show: John Wick 4​

I watched this in cinema and although the action was brilliant, the movie was far too unrealistic and predictable. I don’t know why it’s 8+ on iMDb, I wouldn’t rate it above 6 personally. I think I’ve watched too many 10/10 movies so when I see an 8 or a 7 it doesn’t amaze me any more.