In this blog post, you can find the summary of my week 3 in 30 days challenge self filming series. I challenged myself to film a video for 30 days to improve my confidence. Let’s see how it worked from my third week.
00:00 Day 13 | Food Can Harm You
The overall video is about health issues that are related to food consumption.
Phát watched two documentaries named Food Inc. From the films he realizes the reality of the food industry. Based on what we eat, it can harm your health seriously. People are getting sick easier than before. Watching what we eat is important. Big organizations in the food industry just focus on money and profit. They don’t care about our health. Be smart!
In his video, the speaker discussed the rise in conditions like diabetes, cancer, and obesity compared to the past. He attributed this increase to changes in the food industry. To maximize profits, the industry focuses on boosting the growth of animals like pigs, chickens, and buffaloes. For instance, chickens that typically reach their full size in three months can now achieve it in just 45 days. This rapid growth compromises their ability to walk normally, making them obese. Consuming such chickens can contribute to obesity in humans.
Phát is concerned that the bad side of the food industry is reaching other world continents. And they will not stop exploiting this industry. As a wise consumer, we must prepare for that. We must understand the food we take into our body. Don’t just consume everything without concern. We shouldn’t believe the calories count on the label of ultra processed food. Those calories are just “fake” numbers that make us consume more. Then, our health will be affected essentially.
Because ultra processed food is added with many chemicals and flavors. They do the trick to our brain when we consume them every day. That’s why the calories count in the label is not real. The same calories between ultra processed food and healthy food can affect our body differently. Ultra processed food can destroy our cell function and metabolism. Coincidently, our body will not function correctly to detox and nourish ourselves.
So, we must consider carefully consuming food. We must eat more vegetables and fruits daily. Listen to our body. Don’t ignore any signs even if they are small. And, we must stay away from or eliminate ultra processed food as soon as possible. Eat the real food my friends.
09:30 Day 14 | Health Concern & Law of Detachment
The first part of the video, Phát talks about health concerns when consuming too much sugar. He said sugar is not good for your health. Sugar in ultra processed food such as donuts, sweet candy, etc. can increase our blood sugar dramatically. He consumed too much sugar in his life. It makes him feel good for a short time, then it makes him tired. It’s kind of an addiction when we consume sugar daily.
He suggests reducing daily sugar intake. Don’t try to cut it completely. It’ll shock our body and affect our overall health. Take some time for our body to get used to the new condition. Then we can decide to eliminate sugar completely from our life or not. The key is that we must control what we intake into our body.
The second part of the video Phát tries to relate the topic back to the Law of detachment. “The more we want to get something, the harder we can get them”, he said. We must believe in ourselves and enjoy the process without thinking about the results. Even if we could fail, we must try. Next time, we can do it faster with what we have learnt from our failures. If we don’t try and fail, we can go nowhere.
He mentions that we can still have a goal, but we don’t have to think about it too much. Just take action as much as possible, then we have nothing to regret. It’s the main purpose. A person’s main task is to find purpose in life. So, ask yourself:
- What do I want to learn?
- What do I want to achieve?
- What do I want to share?
We must understand ourselves first and figure out our problems. If we cannot become 1% better everyday, we must not expect to help anyone else. A calm and quiet mind can help us build a strong mindset. Phát suggests that we can start writing down what we love, what we hate and what we really want in life. By doing so, we’ll have a clear big picture of who we are. Don’t follow someone and pretend we want to be that person. Be unique, be ourselves.
18:23 Day 15 | It’s Hard to Focus and Learn to Detach
Phát starts the video saying that the 30 days challenge is not easy. If he does not focus, he could lose the track. Fortunately, he still does it. And there are some good signs he is confident and comfortable in front of a camera. He suggests we do it, film ourselves every day like a documentary film. We can consider it a journal, a kind of meditation where we can express ourselves.
He feels sleepy during the day. And his focus level is low. He has arguments with other team members in daily meetings. He’s not happy about it. But, he blames no one and he decides to move forward. He tries to apply the Law of detachment. He learns it the hard way.
Phát feels positive about his English speaking skill after a while using it on his videos. Compared to his first video, he believes there is improvement overall. We need practice time to become better at something, it’s completely true.
Lately, he doubts himself on what he has been doing recently. Then, he still wants to give it a try. He decides to learn the theory and practice them right away. He realizes he’s old enough to start focusing on one thing. Seeking a new challenge every day is still a part of that.
He states that he over thinks a lot. He hopes that drawing can help him. Drawing is stopping him from overthinking, and it slows down his world. He wonders if drawing is his life task. Because he can feel so much when he draws. Also, he loves analyzing things. Asking questions is part of his journey to explore the world. Be curious, be open minded. The world is so big to examine and we don’t have to stop discovering it.
When we take action, we have no time to think. When we stop taking action, that is when we start thinking. The more we think the more we over think. Our brain will consider thinking as a productive task. So, it makes us think that we do a lot when we think a lot. In fact, we complete nothing. So, we must take action more and adjust during the process. Keep doing what we are doing, and we can see a way.
27:54 Day 16 | Listening and Speaking Connection
Phát starts the video by mentioning it’s a rainy day in Hồ Chí Minh city. People feel better when the weather is cooler. It’s great that he reached this point of not counting the day of the challenge. He mentions his stomach is not good due to food consumption. His digest system hurts a bit. But, it’s not that bad, he can still film himself.
He complains again that he is not in a good mood at work. He cannot focus on doing the work. He spends time on other stuff that is not related to work. He uses office time to research his personal development. Then, he has a concern of it being a tradeoff on losing his paid-well job. Or, it could be because the work is not hard enough, so he is careless.
The amount of tasks we have can affect our focus level. If we have less work, and they are easy, we get bored. If we have too much work, we are overloaded, and we don’t want to do them at all. Plus, if we try to do too much work, we are stressed and tired. Then, our brain rejects working.
He recognizes that as we age, we tend to listen more. And it is a sign that we are mature when we speak less and listen more. So, listening and speaking, they have a close relationship. The most successful people try to listen, so they can understand better. When they understand better, they can speak with a thoughtful mind. To master listening, we must take some time to practice.
As a human being, he believes we were born to react. So, when we can master the listening skill we can master our life. The most successful speaker is one who can listen well. Before that, they listen to different topics to get different perspectives. Then, they can make up their thoughts before they present it. So, next time, we must be a listener.
Why? Because our view and our world will be opened. Our brain tends to connect the neurons when we listen. On the other hand, when we try speaking a lot, our brain closes and it is hard to get new ideas and views. Then, our brain cannot connect the information. Be humble and hear why people have those thoughts. The 80/20 rule can be applied here. Just spend 20% of our time speaking, and 80% listening. We can see miraculous things happen.
37:18 Day 17 | Bad Drinking Habit, Share and Receive
Today is a productive day for Phát. He focuses and makes things done. He is concerned about his appearance, because he thinks he is getting fat. He gets fat easier than ever, and he thinks it is caused by aging.
The first part of the video he starts telling a story about his drinking habit. He poisons himself with alcohol and beer consumption. In the past, every day was a party day. He enjoyed drinking, and partying. Then, his body gives him a test. The digest system hurt him a lot that day, and he must be in the hospital for two weeks.
In hospital, during treatment, he sprays to get well soon. But, life is hard, it makes him suffer. He counts every day to improve. Then, he promises himself to completely control the amount of alcohol and beer he consumes. He now drinks for fun, not for getting drunk. He enjoys the moment instead of drinking till dead.
Some young guys laugh at him, but he feels nothing about it. He does not want to return to the hospital. He states that we are strong and healthy until we are hit by a life lesson. He chooses to live healthy, because he knows it is worth his time and mind.
Lately, in the video, he mentions sharing and receiving lessons he has. He gives fruit to his colleague, and in return, his colleague gives him a cake. So, just give without expecting to receive, then we can receive more. But, we must be careful about the way we give. It can bring positive or negative results immediately.
Another point in the video he states about where we put energy in, it becomes our karma. We put positive energy, the universe gives us more positive experiences in favor. We put negative energy, the universe creates more negative experiences in favor. So, we must consider it carefully when we sow.
46:47 Day 18 | After Discussion with My Line Manager
Today’s video is a negative feeling expression. Apparently Phát is on the downside of his career. He doesn’t feel good about his work. He finds less challenge in his work. He’s like a zombie doing repetitive tasks. He does not enjoy working like before, around one and a half years ago.
He thinks the Law of detachment does not work in his manner. Because he has fear and self-doubt, he starts worrying about his future. He just works and goes home without planning and preparing for his future. With all of that, it seems that he’s stuck on his mind and thoughts.
He has a dream to not work for anyone. He has a dream to work for himself anywhere, anytime he wants to. He looks for options daily and he finds not even one. He’s stuck with his work in a block office. And he is not happy about it. He does not know the small steps that people mention. People say we need small steps for big change. But, what is that small step? He has no answer for that yet.
He knows he must act, not think. But, he feels good when thinking makes him feel productive. He admits that he does not take enough action, so he cannot achieve what he wants. Every day, there is a voice in his mind that stops him from doing things. The voice says “You can’t,…”. That makes him think he cannot afford things.
However, he does refuse that. He fights to figure out what he can do. He decides to act dramatically. He tries his best to conquer new things in his life. There is no time for small talk. It’s time for him to take responsibility seriously. He knows it’s time to grow up and steps out of his comfort zone. Even if we don’t know, we can still act. Do it like there is no way back. Do it for ourselves and our beloved.
56:40 Day 19 | Teamwork is NOT for Me
Another relaxing Friday. Phát starts with a question “What do you usually do on Friday?”, then he does not know what to say. But, he lately talks about his fresh mind in the morning, and how wonderful it is. After that, he states he is not good at working in a team. It seems like he is not really good at collaborating with others.
He has conflicted thoughts about working with people or working alone. Sometimes, he finds it hard to work alone, and sometimes he finds it fine to not work with others. He does not know what he actually wants. He tries to listen more recently. Then, he can discuss with team members. But, in the end, it is not working as he expected. So he says he wants to work individually. It fits him.
He is just anti-social when he works in a team. He lists that there are too many misunderstandings, misconceptions, back-and-forth discussions and even arguments. So, he hates them because they drain his energy. He wants to save his energy for meaningful and valuable things. And he can have his energy when he does not deal with other people.
He believes the possible way to deal with others is to listen more carefully. Then, we can understand their messages, so we know what to respond to. It could be the way to have a better discussion, instead of an argument.
It’s normal to be alone and isolated. Because we have so many differences in points of view and perspectives. When we have time for ourselves, we can have a chance to understand ourselves better. And when we understand ourselves better, we can have a better life. Only you can understand you, we must take suggestions as a part of development. Don’t completely follow someone.
It’s important to spend time for ourselves. Then, we can ask the why questions to understand more about our own world. Why we react like that, why we think like that, why we feel that way, etc. All kinds of questions can give us a clear view about ourselves. It’s valuable when we know who we are, it could be hurt because we are not the people we want. Later, we can figure it out and move forward.
Don’t just follow someone’s idea, and stick with it. It’s not an ideal thing to do. We must explore and examine the idea ourselves. It’s how Phát applies to his life and journey. It helps him a lot with learning. He practices as much as he can to apply the theory, instead of learning just theory. It’s a waste of our time if we just learn the theory. It’s a passive way of learning. However, learning from practice is an active way of learning, and Phát loves it. The knowledge will stay with us forever when we practice.