LET GO of Your PAST Self (it's time to MOVE ON and EVOLVE)

If I'm being honest here, this video is gonna be a little bit hypocritical, and that's because the message of this video is that the old momentum of your old reality may be playing itself out, and you may feel called to do things that are based on that old momentum simply because it feels safe, but that may be robbing you of a next level you. And I say that's hypocritical because I just spent 30 minutes trying to get in a flow state so that I can make this video for you because I'm in Tulum right now and it's like a high vibe place. It's kind of like a portal of energy and I feel like super inspired. At the same time, I'm realizing I've been trying to force myself for 30 minutes to make a video. And just now the energy's starting to flow through because I realize the intention behind this video isn't for me to talk about the old topics or, you know, like letting go and walking away and no contact. It's the old topics on my YouTube channel that have brought in like, you know, a lot of the views and all that stuff. It's like an old momentum that's just kind of still playing itself out. And there's like this desire, there's this energy inside of myself where I feel like I have to continue to be this old version of myself or like everything's going to fall apart. I'm gonna lose this thing that's been created, this YouTube channel and all the abundance that comes with it. If I put in less energy into this old reality, then what if everything just falls apart? And for me, that's been kind of scary to even think about. But yet I give myself, like I do have to be honest with myself, I've come a long way over the last like 3 to 6 months. Because for me, there's like, realize you get in life a reflection of who you are being. And there is a letting go that is scary when you're letting go of an old identity because with that identity comes a familiar life, a way of thinking, feeling, and acting. And back in 2017, 17, I shifted out of the identity of being a 9-to-5 job goer and then to being a YouTuber. And with that came a lot of abundance. I quit that 9-to-5 job I wasn't passionate about. I started making a lot more abundance. I started traveling the world. I worked for myself. And that completely shifted my reality. Letting go of the 9-to-5 job was only scary a little bit because I was afraid that maybe I would fall back. Like maybe what if this whole thing didn't work out? And honestly, it is also kind of scary because back in 2012, I went through an awakening, spiritual awakening, and I had like this kind of ungrounded spiritual perspective where like I became like, you know, one of those starseed Pleiadian dolphins that like wanted to ascend into the 9th dimension. And I like quit my job. I didn't wanna like, I didn't care about money. I was like, you know, I went vegan like this and I made all these rash like life choices that shifted me. And because I quit my job, I was like, and then I spent months just kind of in this in-between zone. And then eventually I got a job. I went from Nordstrom's to Barney's New York because I quit Nordstrom's. And then for 6 months I had no job. And then I eventually worked at Barney's New York. But it was a very rash decision for me to like quit everything, to let everything go. So I was like, when I started growing on YouTube, I was like, I need to be very slow about this process because I don't wanna make any rash decisions 'cause it honestly felt kind of embarrassing. Quit my job because I thought I was gonna ascend into a higher level of consciousness and then didn't happen. Maybe it did like not literally, but like it did energetically or something. but then I had to eventually get a job. And I think I was afraid of that. I was afraid of falling back into that old part of myself, that old pattern at least. But also there's like, I think there's a certain level of maybe safety that came from going to a job that I didn't enjoy, but having people tell me what to do, even though I didn't like it. Because if I go back to my childhood, I can see that I didn't like that I had an ex-stepmom that was controlling and manipulative, but in a weird way, it kind of felt safe. I knew what my box was. I knew what my boundary was. And we fight for familiar energy, familial, familiar and familial are very similar words. Familiar a lot of times is related to the familial childhood dynamics we had when we were kids. So what if in a weird way, having a 9-to-5 job was me fighting to have somebody tell me what to do because that felt safe, even though I didn't like it. I didn't like it when I was a kid either, but I did feel safe with it somehow. Like, which is interesting, safe is like a concept. Safe, is safe really a feeling? It's almost like we fight so that our nervous system can stay in whatever we are used to it feeling in, which is why I think the more you're actually around people that are good for your nervous system, more shit actually comes up. Isn't that interesting? You might actually meet people that are very safe for your nervous system, but you might actually like be like, this doesn't feel safe to me. So you'll go back to like an ex-girlfriend or ex-boyfriend that actually is maybe more toxic because at a certain level it's like, oh, this feels familiar, this feels like mom and dad. But the truth is when you're around people that you really can feel safe around and you can really express yourself with, more stuff actually comes up. and as it comes up, then you're like, you may look to the person and say, you're causing this, but really it's just the safety that's allowing that energy to come up. So in a weird way, I was fighting, and even after, like I've said this like a billion times on YouTube, I know, but after my stepmom left my life when I was 17, I kept attracting women into my life that were controlling and manipulative like her, because in a weird way, I was probably fighting for that familiarity. It felt normal, normal from childhood, familiar, familial. And the key for me was becoming aware of that energy and letting go of the known. There's a quote by Anthony de Mello, one of my favorite authors, wrote the book Awareness, says that humans think they fear the unknown. It's not so much that they fear the unknown as much as they fear the loss of the known. We're afraid of losing the familial energy patterns that we experienced growing up because there's something, we're attracted to it as well, I think, because we're trying to recreate the same familiar dynamics because we're trying to heal from our childhoods. That's why you'll attract somebody that's very much like your mommy or dad. Subconsciously, you're attracted to them because it could bring up energy within you so that you can then heal and then look at it. I mean, that's the hope. Or you could say, Maybe, you know, you, you feel it to heal it. You let that energy go and then maybe you're gonna attract in a new energy. But subconsciously on the autopilot, we attract people that are very similar to the past because we wanna heal. Our nervous system wants to feel it to heal it. And then once we do feel it, then we can heal it and we can let it go. So when it comes to this whole letting go of the old identity, a lot of it is just becoming aware of the pattern itself. Like I'm aware that when I was sitting down or I was standing here making this YouTube video for like 20 minutes and nothing, it wasn't flowing, I was becoming aware that like, dude, this is like the old identity, the old version of you that feels like you have to do this, you have to make the video 'cause you have to get the views, you have to keep this treadmill going. Being here in Tulum, one of the things I was talking to my team about 'cause I had my team come out here because we, you know, call it, do live events, which is like the new thing. When becoming aware and brainstorming, what I realized is there's so much shit that I believe I have to do just because maybe other people do it, or there's so many things I've always done. I've always done certain number of 21-day challenges in a year. I've always done a certain number of, you know, 5 videos a week on YouTube. I've always done all of this stuff that's like my old identity. And what I realized is that What I wanna do is trim the fat of the things that don't bring me, like that don't either put me in my zone of genius or don't bring me a lot of like high vibe fulfillment. And what I wanna do is let those things go even though it's scary, even though it's known, even though I'm very aware that like if I'm forcing content or forcing videos and it's not as high vibe of when I'm in a new space, when I'm in a new energy and I'm passionate about what I'm talking about. So in a weird way, if you trim the fat of the things you don't enjoy as much, you make room for new things and new energy in your life and new frequency to come in. So a lot of this process for myself has been becoming aware of this energy dynamic, becoming aware of this attachment to the old, this belief also, the story about it, that it has to be a certain way and I have to embody it in a certain way or everything's gonna go to shit, but then also being aware that I can have the courage to just let it go and then to do what I enjoy. Enjoy. I can do what brings me and puts me in joy. And right now I think that this is like, as I make this video at least, there's a lot of people that in my life especially that are going through a very similar theme where things don't feel very clear right now. My buddy Victor, for example, is writing a book and he goes back and forth. He goes through this whole process where he starts writing the book and he feels super inspired and then all of a sudden it's not flowing as easy and it's like, screw this, I don't know about this. And then it's like, he might feel like, I don't know exactly how the abundance from this book is gonna come because he normally makes YouTube videos. And then what he'll do is he'll go, you know, think he's gotta launch something in order to like bring in his abundance because it's like, it's like, how can I trust this? And the interesting part about it is this going back and forth is very normal. I think sometimes we beat ourselves up and we think we should just like get it all right on the first take. Like for 3 to 4 months that I went from 5 videos a week to 3 videos a week to 1 video a week, it wasn't an easy process for me because I was letting go of an old identity. Now I make 1 video a week. It's much easier. And at the same time, I could have said in the moment, I'm not where I need to be, I need to figure this all out. Instead of just realizing that sometimes a lack of clarity is a part of the process, especially if you can sit with that lack of clarity, if you can be in the tension of not knowing. Because in a way, I think reality, if we put, half energy, if we put like half-ass energy into a certain part of our life, we get half-ass energy response. But if we go all in and we embrace and we have courage, then we get a different response. Like on YouTube, when I was in 2017, I only got results when I started going all in on YouTube. While I had a 9-to-5 job. Didn't mean I quit my job and did it. It's like I literally treated YouTube as my full-time. I thought, what would the full-time YouTuber version of Aaron think, feel, act? What kind of habits would he have? How would he learn marketing or like thumbnails, like editing? Like I just, I started being it. And once I treated it like my full-time, it became my full-time reality. And for myself and my team, what we know is we wanna be doing live events. Live in-person events and then record those live events and then maybe put them on YouTube. But because I'm in a high vibe state 'cause I'm on stage and I'm passionate about that, I think that people will feel that in the videos more and that then I can repurpose it and do a whole bunch of stuff on YouTube. So maybe there's a new way, an evolution for me to create content that requires letting go of the unknown, letting go of the known to then embrace the unknown. But realizing that it's okay that you don't have to, you don't have to have it all figured out is a part of the process. And knowing that it will come, the more you can sit with the tension, the more I sit with the tension of not knowing and I stop thinking it's a problem and that I need to figure it all out, the more awareness and the more insights come and the more clear it becomes. But realizing, for me, it's been very powerful for me to realize that a lot of times the things I fight for, I fight, here's the insight. Growing up, I had the whole ex-stepmom where I had a box and it felt very safe for me to be in the box. There was all these rules about what I was allowed to do, what I wasn't allowed to do, and there was more of what I just wasn't allowed to do, wasn't allowed to have friends, had to like sneak to get enough food to eat, given a TV dinner at night and a bowl of cereal in the morning, being very malnourished. Normally locked outside doing yard work. I'm not saying all this to like pity me or anything. I'm just explaining like rules. And in a weird way, those rules felt safe to me. And I know that because when my dad divorced my ex-stepmom when I was 15, finally, it felt like anxiety to be able to eat the food I wanted, to be able to watch TV, be able to have friends. Like that felt very, it was exciting but also anxiety-ridden. And I remember thinking like, huh, Sometimes I kind of miss just being in my little room. Didn't even have a bed. I had like this little fold-out '90s thing. You guys remember those little '90s blocks where like they fold out? I had one of those little cushions. That was my bed. And I, in a weird twisted way, I kind of missed that because it felt safe and comfortable. Well, then what happened is my ex-stepmom left my life and then I would either attract people into my life that would give me that box because it felt safe. I'd have a job of that box because it felt safe. And now in a weird way, I've had to come at terms with, realizing that my YouTube channel, the rules I put on myself is a box. I put myself in the box. I've done this before in many ways in my life where I'm not the most compassionate. I'm almost controlling on myself. Like my ex-stepmom wasn't me, I control myself that way. I've done this with my diet. I used to count calories down to the calorie. And only let myself eat a certain amount a day and then work out a certain amount of time and then always push myself even when my body, even like if my body was saying like, bro, you need a break. No, you will do it. That mentality. 5 to 7 videos a week on YouTube. At one point I was making 7 videos a week on YouTube. I was writing emails 5 times a week and sending that out to my email list. I was going live almost every day on Instagram and I was making an Instagram video every single day. That was my life for like a year back in 2018, 2019. And somehow I did it. And in a weird way, I was like addicted to this box. And if I even went to like, I remember one time I went to Costa Rica to drink plant medicine. I'm sitting there going through processes and then the next morning I'm like, I gotta, I like not feeling it, but like I gotta get up and make a video. It's part of my identity. And then I'd force myself to make a video. I'd force myself to be in the box. So basically the message of this video is become aware of what your box is. Don't beat yourself up because you're in it. Realize that it maybe has brought you some level of safety, but then still you can make the choice to embrace the unknown. You can make the choice to realize you don't have to have it all figured out right now. You can let go of trying to have it all figured out and realize that maybe part of the process is you sitting in the tension of not actually understanding exactly how this is gonna bring you this new reality. But in a weird way, you can trust that, you can trust an internal barometer that you have. Over the mind. That's where this whole balance is. Are you trusting the mind that gives you the box? Are you trusting the heart that's like a soul's calling that's pulling you in a certain direction? And it doesn't have to make sense on paper, but realize the more you follow that heart energy, the more magic will come in your life. Like right now I'm going through, just to be vulnerable, I'm going through like a really powerful, like, third eye awakening in a way. I know it sounds kind of esoteric and stuff, but like I'm realizing how magical life can be. I've had experiences in the last week or two that are beyond anything I thought possible. Almost like shit that I would read in like Paramahansa Yogananda's book, "Autobiography of a Yogi," with like these weird things that would happen. I've like had reference experiences of these weird things that's like showing me like, hey bro, reality is much more, magical than you can even imagine. Once you surrender to the magic, once you surrender to the flow, once you surrender to the feeling, once you surrender to doing what brings you into your zone of genius, once you surrender to the passion frequency, you don't have to at all figure it out. Just let go of the old pattern. Let go of the old dynamic. That's like the old way of doing things. And the more you do, the more you can then embrace this magic, even if it doesn't make sense in the moment right now. Like a lot of the things with running live events, by the way, doesn't make as much sense from the mind because let's look at it, me doing like virtual things online, I could have a lot of people on those, tens of thousands of people because I can just get a Zoom account and like broadcast to all the people. And then focusing there, there's very little expenses. I do a live event in person. I gotta book out a place, more expenses. I have my team that helps me. We've got helpers, we got all this like volunteer, we got all these things going on, all these systems. And on paper, from the sense point of view, it doesn't feel as abundant from the past paradigm, but that's not taking into account what kind of awesome experiences hundreds, if not thousands of people can have in person that then spreads the message even more because they've had a physical experience instead of just like a virtual experience. What if also those live experiences experiences can also be virtual, and there's an energy to that? What if over time those events grow? I look at someone like Joe Dispenza who runs like events, you know, over 1,000 people that are paying like $1,000 or $2,000 to be there to go through a transformation. What if eventually we could do something like that? You see what I mean? There's like— doesn't make sense on paper, but there's an energy, there's a feeling of trust Not have it all figured out, and to sit in the unknown and be curious, be curious with the unknown. Where can this take me? Where can this take me? How can this thread take me to the next thing and somewhere magical? Because I believe reality becomes magical the more we surrender to the divine, the more we surrender to the unknown, and the more we let go of what has to make sense from the mind, the belief that we're not there already, the belief that we have to have it all figured out. So realize you are where you're supposed to be right now. This is a part of the process. And that as you embrace in that energy, you'll find that it's like reality can become more magical in ways you can't even imagine. But follow that passion frequency. Realize that will bring you to the next best thing, to the next best thing, to the next best thing. Now also, I'm gonna be doing a 7-day challenge coming up in the next month or two. I'm gonna go ahead and click the link below. It's gonna be on emotional freedom, 7 days to let go. So the idea is to let go of your past and become emotionally free in 7 days or less. We're gonna be doing breathwork, somatic release exercises, becoming aware of subconscious patterns, how to release that energy from the body, how to feel higher vibrational emotions by integrating the past. If you want to experience this, all you gotta do is click the link below or go to AaronDoughty.com. AaronDoughty.com/7DayChallenge. Check it out, join. And other than that, if you want a video that will help you, uh, like a, like a meditation to raise your vibration permanently that will help you be in this state and really wire this concept in, check this video out right here. This meditation will change your dominant vibration permanently. Your vibration is a combination of how you think, feel, and act, and it has been on autopilot. This meditation