I am a 20 year old kid, who has got finally what i have been wanting for a long time in terms of academics. However right now i am just not motivated to work, lazy, almost helplessly self destructing. I am wasting my time, sleeping for a lot of time. I am anxious and petrified of failure. I have to deal with this situation and i don't really know how. It's not like i have not tried - I tried keeping a diary, to write down things, and forget, breathing exercises, even religion. I am just unable to forgive myself and move on with who i am. Its scary cause i am going to a place where they expect high academic rigor and here i am just not motivated to even lift a pen! I am in a bad slump. I cant figure what i have to do to become my motivated self, its almost like i am killing myself in a slow motion, mentally.
I spend hours aimlessly staring at the wall, or the net, knowing that i am really messing up my life. I mean this sort of phase used to happen once in a while but i could get over it, but this is the longest that it has been.
Ben's Answer
The most important thing you said about what you are going through, is that you are "anxious, and petrified of failure." To simply call yourself lazy or self-destructive is probably not helpful, nor really true. For some people, anxiety can look like being spaced out, unmotivated, and stuck.
I have found no better method than EFT/Meridian Tapping, to eliminate anxiety of all kinds and to get yourself unstuck quickly. While you're sitting there staring at the wall, you could be tapping on meridian points, saying "I feel lazy" "I can't make myself do anything" "I'm afraid of failure" "I'm afraid to try..." "I'm terrified of failure..." and so on (I'm not explaining the whole process here). The result of doing this is that you're not resisting or avoiding the real feelings and dark thoughts that are already running your life and sabotaging your success; you're making these feeling conscious, and you're shifting your energy and your nervous system in a subtle way that will allow this fear to be released. This could happen in a few minutes of tapping, or it may take some persistent work, covering many different aspects of these fears... maybe even tapping about some past memories in your life when you were told negative things about yourself, or were called a failure, or someone said you were lazy, for example. By resolving and releasing this old programming, you free your mind to function naturally, joyfully and to work in the service of your own best interests.
Five or ten minutes of tapping every day could probably change everything in a big way, within a short time.
Ben Schwarcz, MFT
Santa Rosa Psychotherapist
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