Read the book: «Don’t eat yourself. Take care of yourself»

© Vitaly Dudin, 2026

ISBN 978-5-0069-5283-6

Created with Ridero smart publishing system

Don’t eat yourself. Take care of yourself

Introduction

The book’s goal is to demonstrate the importance of self-care and offer practical recommendations and exercises on how to put it into practice. In it, you’ll find popular science articles, psychologically oriented fairy tales about the “Vital Fox”, verbatim descriptions of two real-life consultations with clients, and reflections on personal development training and the powerful psychological exercises it contains. I think the general spirit of the book can be revealed by this small note:

Don’t eat yourself

You know, sometimes you make mistake and then you scold yourself.

Whatever you did then, it’s necessary. There’s still much to experience in life. And one day, death will come.

Maybe you should ask yourself, why did you do it? What need did you want to satisfy? And it’s important that it’s a genuine question, not a annoyed claim to yourself.

I’m also sure that no one has ever truly stepped on the same rake. Each time, their actions are fundamentally different, even though they may seem similar.

Right this second, somewhere, someone needs support. His little paw hurts. After all, we will not to do him more pain. So, and you shouldn’t eat yourself either.

May the reading be enjoyable and the conclusions useful.

Relationship with yourself

The voice within you decides

A long time ago, I’ve been convinced that to lead my life to the very good state, I need to overcome many global intellectual challenges.

Understand who I am, where I’m going? Why does the World exist? And many other philosophical and psychological questions. And then there will be happiness. Maybe. Or maybe not. But there’s a more lively and pleasant way.

– To listen to your inner voice and feel your state. And ask yourself: is this what i want right now? Do i want what’s happening to me to happen further? This question is really important in those moments when you’re feeling down, confused, or sad about something.

Let’s check.

Right now, you’re reading this text. Are you comfortable sitting/standing/lying in this particular position? Do you want it this way? If not, you can change it.

Have you made plans for today? Do you like them all? Are there any that aren’t based on your own desires, but are based on habits, “automatic rails”? If you’re honestly feeling overwhelmed and you really don’t want to realize some plans, it, then you can forget about them, cancel them, or change them, or throw out, or discuss your emotional state with someone.

The idea is to catch yourself in those moments when you stop feeling the “a sense of calm satisfaction from the process of life” and make minimal, but so necessary adjustments to this situation.

There’s a common misconception about this. I had one myself. Sometimes I’d ask myself, “Do I want this right now?”. And start expecting something like this: now, in theory, the heavens should open, and I’ll hear a voice from there telling me what to do. And then, I’ll know what to do.

Of course, there was no heavenly voice. And of course, I continued to do the same crap that I was suffering from. That is, I was waiting for some kind of sign.

But it does not exist. And the voice is inside, and the thoughts that run through head are very accessible. It’s important to catch them more skillfully.

It should be even easier if to know that before the inner voice “settled” in the head, it had come a long way. And the psyche helped this happend.

The beauty of the psyche (soul) is that while we’re alive, it creates new parts of our inner world – subpersonalities – from everything it comes across. These are like “copies” of other people in our head. More precisely, “copies” of these people’s behavior, their statements, views, habits, and so on.

Why does the psyche do this? For example, a pie is delicious and filling – you want and need to eat it!? And you do it. In a similar way with the psyche. It “absorbs” everything that’s interesting and vital. Do you remember good moments in your life? For example:

– when you noticed that someone treated you kindly,

– did something good for you,

– listened to you and supported you when others couldn’t.

And it was precisely in these moments that the psyche “absorbed,” that is, learned to do the same from these people. After that, it began to understand you a little better: how and to what you react; how to make you feel good; when it’s important to calm you down, and when it would be good to cheer you up. Metaphorically speaking, a true friend lives in our heads, and although they are impossible to touch, their influence is no less powerful than that of other people.

Try listening now

For example, you can try this: stop and freeze (literally), and slowly listen to what your inner voice is saying.

Most likely, in the first few moments, you’ll have to listen and discern where you hear yourself, and where the background of a multitude of insignificant information. It often happens that thoughts about something important were already flashing through your mind repeatedly. And today too.

The voice often “asks” you to make a choice. You may have to make a minor choice, or, on the contrary, an important one. Or maybe your communication session will prepare you for a future choice.

A heavy and scary choice

People not infrequently tend to dismiss their inner voice, trying to avoid listening. Because it often speaks directly and presents a difficult choice as soon as you give him the floor. Some cases of choices:

– To trust (to belive) a person or not?

– To leave your family or stay?

– To leave an unbearable job or stay?

– To reveal a secret to your loved ones or die with it?

– To marry, or to trust your legs and run?

– How to treat someone you don’t know how to treat?

– To conceive a child with this person or not? To give birth or to have an abortion?

– To move or to stay?

– To change careers or to hope for a miracle?

– To trust yourself, or “I already trusted myself once… it was a bad experience, so I’ve had enough…”

Want to hear a horror story about this?

– When you make a decisive and bold choice, you often can feel empty and alone. Although, at that moment, would be more useful understanding and closeness.

– There is no objective device or person in the world who can measure the correctness of the decision (choose) taken.

– Choice is inextricably linked with risk. Also there are plenty of “conservative experts” out there who love to burn people at the stake who stumble in their choices.

And want to hear something positive about this?

– Even though it sometimes seems like there are only two alternatives to choose from – “black or white,” but in reality, there are an infinite number, like the colors of a rainbow

– Close ones will remain close ones and will become willing to deal with the consequences of your choice. You’ll get to know the true face of your pseudo-close ones. Then you’ll decide whether you need them or not.

– Yes, there’s no objective measuring device for assessment your decision (choose). But, there is a subjective one. When after your choice, you will feel yourself calm and satisfied, even if on the outside, life seems more like a mess.

– As a child, I wanted everyone close around me to be alive. Many are gone. Back then, I thought life without them was impossible. But it is possible.

Sometimes it seems that after an important choosing, life will become unbearable. It’s scary. And then a person may unconsciously decides not to choose. To do anything, but not to return to the necessity of choice. And then the necessity of choice insensibly disappear, giving way to the daily routine. And that path is possible, too, why not. Ultimately, truth, health problems. The psychosomatics, after all, does not sleep.

How to finally force yourself?

• There’s no need to force yourself; ⠀

• There’s no need to hang over yourself like an angry bird of prey; ⠀

• No need to look at your watch and regret that just a minute ago you could have forced yourself, and this moment would now have been purer than the last; ⠀

• No need to force yourself, you’re already ok!

• No need to trust people who promote the phrase “force yourself”. They are fools. ⠀

There is a sense to leave yourself alone. It makes sense to wag now in the direction you like. It makes sense to stop before you realize where you want to wag.

There’s no point in dreaming about anything in the spirit of “Napoleonic plans”. But it makes sense to know what you like. After all we do we like, easily and with interest. And then there’s no need to force yourself. In the end forcing yourself means going against nature. Whereas it make sense to arrange with yourself.

A few words about how to understand who “i am” and where “i am”

I know several paths, can help better understand yourself.

Well, for beginning we will try to find where hide “i am”. At first glance it seems that super easy. Everybody know where i am, and where not i am, that is – others. But let’s look to small things.

Well, i am not my body. I am very connected to it, but it is not me. I have a character, a temperament, but that is also not me. I experience emotions, but they are also not me. Perhaps the “I am” is somewhere deep inside? But I can’t say that my “I am” lives in my brain.

Anything that is not me can change regardless of my desires.

The body, for example, can age become ill. And the brain can forget information that I would very much like to recall at that moment. Or he might show me a hallucination. That is, the brain can also get sick. Emotions can overflow when I would rather not. And so on.

Then, who am I?

I am the one who controls all of this. As far as possible. The one who makes important life decisions and takes actions.

Remember when you made a significant decision you really loved, and the feeling you had when you brought it to life. After all, could say that at that moment, you felt a clear sense of who you were. That is “I am” is not embodied in something physical thing, but is reveal itself in moments of the life, and in the feeling of “i am”.

I can’t stop blame or be angry at myself because…

It’s hard to see people, feeling guilty, seeming to lose trust in themselves, and taking rather strict control over themselves, monitoring themselves to prevent possible future mistakes.

But I haven’t witnessed this approach working good. As a result, people get only an emotional tension.

There are a few questions that might help you.

• What objective reasons do you have for blaming yourself?

• Are you being too hard on yourself right now?

• What are you blaming yourself for? Describe it in detail

• What did you do wrong? Why? Could you have acted differently?

• What can you change right now? What does your intuition tell you?

• What kind of support do you need now?

• How would you react if your best friend or loved one exhibited

• similar behavior? Would you blame them? Or?

• How would your loved one treat you in this situation? Would they offer any advice?

Let’s talk about secondary gain

Imagine someone has some kind of psychological problem. He know about it. It influences his life, and it is usually not good. That’s what makes it a problem.

Naturally, the person wants to get rid of it.

He try everything he can with it, but it doesn’t go away.

Sometimes the problem retreats for a while, let the person get some sleep. But then the person wakes up, goes to brush their teeth, and the problem is right there again. And it all starts over again.

little by little the person loses faith that there’s any cure for his problem in the world.

Can i then declare that this person has gain from his problem?

In the end, if it’s not beneficial, then why doesn’t they get rid of it?

Ultimately, any psychological problem can be cured.

Not that it’s beneficial to him… Rather, it’s safer and more familiar.

And if you are anything like this person, so here are some ideas on what you can do.

Perhaps you should acknowledge the positive function of the problem. The ones problems tend to obscure other problems. And while we are care about one, it’s as if the others don’t exist. That is easier to live. Because we are not yet ready to face that other problem, which we have not yet been able to recognize, but already unconsciously we have a premonition that it will something very serious.

Not yet ready – ok. There’s no need to jump in with both feet. But for the beginning you can find the answers to the following questions.

Imagine that the pressing problem no longer exists. Absolutely not. It’s gone.

• What kind of life will you have then? What will be the main difference between life before and after?

• Do you like the image of future you imagine?

• And if yes, so what small step are you ready to make right now to cope the problem and move closer to a better future?

I know how to feel very important

– you stop what you’re doing.

– you turn all your attention to your breathing.

– you pay attention on how this breathing began at the very beginning of your life.

And it hasn’t stopped for a single moment.

At the very beginning of your life, you took your first breath. And at this moment, you take another, thereby continuing the activity you began many years ago.

It’s similar with the eyes.

Close-open-close-open-…

Many years ago, you opened eyes for the first time and saw the place where you will spend all your new life. And right now these same eyes are reading these words.

Neither your breath nor your eyes have ever taken a vacation, they don’t know a day off, nor do they know a break.

Now that’s important! Such a serious system supports your life. So efficiently. And it only makes itself known on rare occasions.

Individuality

Is it a value in the modern world?

I think so. Overall, the world benefits on all levels when people, having discovered their unique characteristics, bring new things to it and set the direction for development.

What are the pros and cons of expressing or limiting individuality?

To answer, I’ll use a russian psychological saying:

“One is born an individual, one becomes a personality, one defends one’s individuality”.

Defending individuality requires a great deal of effort. This includes recognizing (finding) within oneself what thing must defend.

The limitations stem from the fact that in the process of realizing individuality, a person is left alone with themselves, lacking instructions and templates by which he could act.

And in defending individuality, one typically encounters resistance from everything familiar, formulaic, and conservative. Therefore, people often need support.

One could say that individuality is now in vogue.

“Demonstrative counterfeits” are appearing. Easy ways to achieve it are offered: eating fashionable food, wearing clothes, cars, etc. In other words, using the external trappings of individuality without making any changes to one’s personality or life. Like “let’s will be candy wrapper instead of the candy itself”.

By embracing individuality, a person gains access to positive experiences associated with creating their own life. They gain the opportunity to give something useful to the world. They are freed from the need to live against their desires.

Relationships with people

Why do we feel uncomfortable in relationship with some people?

Relationships with certain people can sometimes feel uncomfortable. There’s a term called “depression” (from the Latin deprimo, meaning “to press,” “to suppress”), which, at first glance, describes a sad state of mind that has arisen for a not entirely clear reason. Although Depression often stems from pressure from others. Interestingly, this pressure isn’t always noticeable.

Today, we seem to live without any obvious pressure. We drive to work ourselves, no one drags us by the legs in the morning. And politicians even care about our opinions. We have freedom. *However, when i wrote this text, no one had yet forced us to go on the war. Ok. Here i will try to ignore this fact.

So what makes that pressure?

It arises when someone uninvited has broken through the fence into “my inner temple”. After that they settle in, and have the audacity to do whatever they want. Now I’ll explain with an example from my own life.

I was little. I was riding the bus, sitting by the window. Then she came in… A large granny, who sat down next to me, pinned me against the window, and rode on.

Do you know this feeling?

Imagine – she and i have a common universe, a common land, a common city, a common bus, common seats… And granny decided all it was hers alone. Her resolve was so strong inside that it didn’t even allow her to really notice me. To her, I was more like something that a little bother her under right side. I was a good boy. So at that age, I was already afraid of grannies, because they screamed terribly. And i decided not to rebel.

That is, a depressive state occurs when:

1. Someone has invaded my personal boundaries (has broken through the fence) with their own agenda. The agendas are usually rather strange: they’re trying to lecture you, take advantage of you (to ride me), mock you, or assert themselves at your expense.

2. While at that moment, I want to concern with my life. But for various reasons, I can’t fight back and am forced to focus on the disturber of my peace.

3. Well, my attention becomes fixated on the negative, and my mood plummets. For example, back then, I hated this granny the whole time. Although a beautiful city floated past the bus window. My eyes saw this city, but i didn’t notice it. Because i was passively angry.

I’m sure that if you have a life-or-death situation, then hardly any “granny” will get through the fence! And in everyday life, to be honest, everyone has a hole in the fence of their “inner temple” through which those we’re not particularly happy to see can slip or stride.

We can live with that. After all, no one died. But all these “unnecessary guys” take up time, demand attention, and ruin our mood.

Here’s how to develop attention to these moments: try to spot from afar this someone who has their eye on “your temple” and is already looking for a hole in the fence. Or is climbing on you for a ride.

• Do you want this to go on?

• Are you afraid of something now?

• What can you do right now to prevent it?

• Update the reason why you intend to defend yourself now.

And one more thing. When you acknowledge that you, too, sometimes unintentionally become a “granny”, you will find it much easier to negotiate boundaries with others.

I can not say no!

I’d say one of the main reasons people find it difficult to say “No” (even when they really want to) is the fear of loneliness.

Here’s one possible chain of thoughts that unfolds in a person’s head (primarily in their subconscious) when they’re torn between the answers “Yes” or “No”:

If I answer “No” => then I won’t be meeting the other person’s demands and expectations at this moment => and that means I:

a) will be demoted, fired, or disadvantaged (if I say “no” to my boss)

b) will be a bad or unfaithful friend (if I say “no” to a friend)

c) will be the reason my loved ones are upset (if I say “no” to someone in my family). This means that the thin thread of trust that previously connected us could break.

And if you look at all three consequences (a, b, c), you’ll notice that they all share a sense of loneliness.

Loneliness is a state everyone is familiar with. It doesn’t refer to the absence of people around you, but to an internal state when you realize that you need to do almost everything in life by yourself.

If you’re ready to face loneliness, say “No.” If you’re not, continue to be the good guy, agreeable, and complaisant.

If you’re ready, here are some thoughts to support you:

– You can’t get enough air before death. And you can’t escape loneliness. Accept loneliness as a given. No, don’t get 40 cats.

– Loneliness itself serves a very important function.

You can tell those you don’t like to fuck off.

Yes, you’ll probably upset someone and lose them along the way (comrades or friends). But there’s no need to be afraid, because the people who are loyal and love you will stay with you no matter what.

To start saying “No,” you don’t have to immediately and loudly refuse everyone everything. Change the course of events the first time. How exactly you refuse shouldn’t matter. The main thing is to answer the way you want to answer.

When your “No” takes effect, you can take a calculator and calculate how much time in your life you saved by doing it. Otherwise, you’d had to do something you don’t want again.

Feel the difference in emotions… Saying “No” feels good, doesn’t it? But agreeing to everything is depressing.

***

When you’re hesitant and find it hard to say “no”, but you don’t want to say “yes”, you can try to detect the manipulation your interlocutor is directing at you.

How can you recognize it?

– They might praise you, noticing the most tantalizing details about your personality, and only then casually ask for one small favor. Wake up. They do it only to get a “Yes” from you and then dump their problems on you.

– or they hint at your guilt. They say that if you don’t do what they ask, everyone will die. And the first to die is the person asking you. But not just die, they’ll die a painful death. And who’s to blame? Wake up.

A manipulator always has several options in reserve. So, if you refuse completely, they don’t die, but move on to Plan B, and pester someone else. If Plan B doesn’t work, then to Plan C, D, and so on.

I don’t know whether people should be beaten for such manipulation or not. However, I do know that manipulation is roughly divided into “everyday” and “professional”.

Everyday manipulation is something people are used to. There’s little or no malicious intent. That’s just the way it is. Professional manipulation, on the other hand, has an intent that’s hidden from our eyes. This is the kind of manipulation used in the media, politics, and marketing. Here I was talking more about everyday manipulation.