There are things about ourselves we seemingly are incapable of understanding. We don’t know why we might think in particular ways, or in what ways we’re predisposed to think in, or we struggle to find out what the cause of our problems is. It becomes difficult to identify where all the parts of ourselves actually stem from. We can endlessly search for answers but come up empty handed. We can think we understand why something is, or why something isn’t, but it could actually go far deeper than we’re capable of comprehending. Therefore, getting to the bottom of it, whatever it may be, within ourselves or others, actually ends up being quite a difficult and ambiguous task that isn’t always quite clear to the one searching. Generally, asking questions can help us dig deeper into finding how we made it to a particular place, or type of thinking, or feeling, but further questioning is always available. We can forever ask questions trying to find answers. We can always get deeper within ourselves, until we find the seed or the core of whatever the thing is. Questions can be more specific, more directed, or filled with intent, or they can be general, gray, or something in between. In order to work down the pipeline of why something is or isn’t, you can begin in a gray area, but in order to target a particular area, it’s necessary to be specific. Once you become specific with your questioning, you can further particularize; even down to specific roots. In your searching, there will be other roots that split off, of which likely have participated in the way you feel or think. However, these are merely another aspect or quality of the core, and you have to move back to an earlier question in order to find another root which is also playing a part in whatever the thing is. I can give examples to my own personal experience doing this, but my experience is limited, because I’m not completely certain of the cause of anything. Unfortunately, I can’t be completely sure, because there could be roots that I’m overlooking, and these still participate in the way I’m thinking or feeling. Additionally, identification of the roots will not necessarily result in a change in feeling or thinking. Rather, doing something about that root, like accepting it, and then moving forward with it, will actually bring a change, if that’s what you seek.
Asking questions is a great place to begin when you want to understand or solve anything. We all do some amount of questioning, but becoming an investigator is a role necessary in order to get down to the bottom of things. Questioning why you got somewhere or why you think a certain way will start vague, and this means you can be led astray from the roots you are looking for. This can and is okay, but at what point will you notice when to stop? How would you know? You could end up reaching roots, but only then do you realize these roots are not the roots you were searching for. A personal example would be my lack of connections. I used to believe that the reason I had very few connections was because I was an undesirable person to be around, and so I had to change myself fundamentally in order for people to be interested in me. However, I never acknowledged the fact that I had a system of categorization that only allowed me to connect with certain types of people that I considered acceptable. The two qualities I wanted these people to have were: high intelligence and a particular goal they wanted to achieve. However, while in my search for connections, I never thought this, or considered it, despite it being so obvious to me today. I didn’t consider it because I thought I had it figured out already. I had confidence in the belief that I was the issue. I didn’t ask others, whom I had connection with already, and so I went about changing myself. Sure, I have changed myself in ways I would consider desirable today, but I also hold that view because I am that person, so I’m clearly biased towards being me, because I don’t want to die. However, had I asked other questions, I may have found that I was not the only problem, and I may have recognized the issue in my system of categorization. I may have changed less and made more connections, but things have not turned out that way. And still, to this day, I am too particular in what connections I’m willing to have, which plays into the loneliness I occasionally experience, because of my own unwillingness to allow a variety of people in my life. Still, in recognizing this, I can change the system if I wish to. The questions that were asked led me to these conclusions, of which, began vague but grew more specific as I progressed in my internal search.
Asking random questions can bring us to places but without intent we won’t know where we are. Asking intentful questions can bring us to specific places which will bring us closer to our desired destination. Even when being intentful, we still can’t be completely sure of the roots and the truth of what actually is or isn’t. Then, how would we actually find the answers we’re looking for? How do we get there? In trying to solve or understand anything complex, you have to accept that it will take a lot of time to fully digest and understand even a small sliver of the thing. Solving issues or understanding yourself is not something that can be done in a day and then promptly moved on from. Introspection takes an entire lifetime, and even then, you still won’t understand everything about yourself. Although I’d hope at one point or another there is a feeling of content with this reality. Asking questions directed towards things that cause you harm or that you believe to pull you down are what I’d suggest for someone to focus on. If it isn’t causing, or you don’t believe it isn’t causing, any particular problem or issue, or the system of thinking seems okay, then it’s probably fine. However, some people have systems that have been around for long enough periods of time that they are blinded to their own dysfunction. They don’t realize it because that’s how it always has been, so they aren’t aware that it should be changed. Even the systems you believe to be fine or okay, might actually not be, like my system of categorization, which stopped me from making connections. How would you go about identifying these things by yourself? How could you ever know to search for errors if you believe things are functioning as they should, or as they always have been?
In many cases, if you’re a questioner, you can get to the bottom of things you’re aware of. Though, not all people are questioners, nor does that include all the things you’re blinded to. I’ve come to the conclusion that you need other people. The only time in which you would change yourself or question yourself without knowing why would be because you are someone who questions everything. You ask questions, you get to the bottom of things, purely on the basis of asking questions. However, not everyone functions this way, and the questioning wouldn’t be specific. So, there would be many chances that your questions could bring you somewhere unexpected, and that has probably happened if you’re that type of person. Arguably though, there can be cases where you observe other people searching within themselves, or talking about themselves, and you comparatively perceive that person and yourself. You might compare your methods of acting or thinking, and you may realize you prefer their method over your own, but you don’t know quite why that is, and you go on searching within yourself in order to find out why. From that point on, you can ask specific questions in order to understand your thoughts or feelings. Even in this situation, it’s under the assumption that you are willing and accepting of change.
I think that being accepting of change will be another important factor to getting to the bottom of anything. If you are reluctant to change, how could you even consider the fact that something needs to change, or rather, how would you know you want to get to the bottom of something? Why would you feel the need to get to the bottom of something in the first place? You must want change, but you need to accept that’s what you want, rather than circling around it. I have found myself in situations where I wanted change, and knew what I needed to do, but was always unwilling to do it. There would always be something stopping me, some barrier, and that barrier would be the thing that would stop me from actually going about the change. Some things will hurt, some things will be incredibly painful, and that pain might seem like it’s far worse than continuing things as they are. However, enduring that pain in order to learn yourself and work through a problem will actually do a lot more for you than you could ever realize. At some points, it might seem like the pain is far too unbearable to handle on your own. What I told you there were individuals who had careers based on solving these types of issues?
Before moving onto questions I’ve asked myself and anecdotes about my own experience, I could not help myself but mention that there are people who exist in order to help you get to the bottom of it. Whether you want to speak to a therapist, psychologist, or psychiatrist, these people are actually good at asking questions and getting to the bottom of things. Sure, they may deal with things they believe to be the problem, which aren’t, and they can be and will be wrong at times, but if you have no experience yourself, these types of people will be able to help you. Suppose you can’t afford this type of specialist, what then? Lean on friends, if you have some. Friends, especially good ones, can act as therapists, but you have to be careful not to use them like tools. These are people not specialized in therapy nor are they being paid for their service. They help you because they care about you, and there will be times where they cannot expend the energy to help you. They’re a person living their own life, whatever that may entail. If you feel desperate, feel free to reach out to someone you love or trust. If you want to do a checkup, just ask questions and question them in return. Go back and forth, verify each other, if you want. Try to learn what’s going on inside you with their responses and maybe do some comparing and contrasting between you and the other individual. I don’t mean say you should compare who is better or worse, but consider both sides of thinking, or feeling, or whatever it is. In this, maybe you will realize your system doesn’t work properly, or it is in need of adjustment, or something along those lines.
If I need to get down to the bottom of something, I will use various methods in order to figure out why something is the way it is. Generally, I do some comparing of myself to others, asking my friends directed questions, asking myself questions, and, in the past, substances. For me, these are all important actions to getting down to the bottom of something, with the exception of substances. A relevant example would be my past perception on how I thought I was viewed by others. This can actually become quite complex, but simply, I was in a state of belief that others were viewing me as if I were naked, and that I was being stared at by all those I was around. Obviously, that’s absurd and untrue, and never has been. However, I held this belief because I was in an environment which lacked privacy, and the people present in that environment were unreasonably investigative about my actions, and so I actually experienced what I mentioned. What I lacked to see was the difference between my home environment and the world external of that. These thoughts weren’t applicable to outside of that environment, and so when I was, the system of thought became illogical. How did I come to this conclusion? Well, I had others point it out to me. I compared myself to others in different environments. I also found that when I was talking about these feelings with people, they realized after enough talk, especially about my environment, that the environment was the core of the issue, and only after that was changed, I could begin work on reversing the illogical system.
This might have sounded simple, but it didn’t occur to me so easily like I’ve described here. I would instead try to believe anything other than my environment was the cause of the thoughts or feelings. I was always actively avoiding the real reason for my feelings or actions. I have a tendency to do this, and I think most people do, because acknowledging that something that’s been static your whole life must be changed, is not only scary but also can feel unbelievable. Change is something that does not come easily for many things, especially the things so deep within you that they have seemingly been there from the beginning. Finding the root, or in this case, acknowledging it, required outside help, my own dedicated questioning, and my willingness to change. These things aren’t necessary for getting to the core of all things, but there should be an expectation of time and energy expenditure. Especially when it comes to things deep within you. However, some things are actually quite easy to change because they sit on the surface. These things are relatively easy to find and change compared to something deep within you, especially something that’s been around for years.
A problem that changed for me on the surface level, or what I would consider surface level, would be an obsession over using old technology instead of new. I mean this in the sense that I used to have this belief that I must use old technology, or at least used technology, instead of new technology because it was the right thing to do morally, and, secondarily, because I’d consider the older technology “cozier” or something along those lines. Some of this is still true, however, at that time, I would also be intentionally seeking out the old technology instead of the new technology, and in many cases, I already owned the equivalent item, but I would still seek out an older variant for the above reasons. Thus, it becomes obvious that my thinking was contradictory. I wouldn’t be actively doing better for the environment by buying more product, even if the product was used, because in many cases, I already had the product necessary for the task, so buying something else would just add to the things I don’t actually need. Eventually, at one point or another, I would throw out some piece of technology, thus creating waste, instead of keeping what I already had, invalidating my moral justification.
I consider this a surface level problem, because the roots didn’t require help from an outsider. Aside from questioning my actions, perceiving someone else do the same thing helped me realize what I was doing was pretty silly. I didn’t need the old technology, like I would make myself believe, and I wasn’t doing anything “good” as a result of buying and using that technology. However, I don’t find it unfair to consider it “cozier,” but my reasons for those feelings have changed. I genuinely thought things were better back then. Then, describing however old the technology was, and sometimes it was genuinely true, but in other cases, I was just being nostalgic for the past, because I didn’t like the present. I realized this when I started to perceive all the circular aspects of my own thinking, and the world in general, and I realized I was partaking in a cycle that I find commonly with my age range. After my change in perception, I stopped the consumptive activity, and that was done with for the most part. Today, I do get thoughts of buying things that are old, but I’m actively aware that what I’m thinking is silly and going to be pointless. I know I’m not going to get actual usage out of whatever I’m buying. This may have been surface level for me, but for someone else it could have been something more deeply rooted. Looking internally upon yourself is one thing, but looking inside someone else is another.
Identification of something surface-level will generally be quick. Although it depends upon whether or not you feel like you understand the thing and then can do something about it. How difficult it is to change will help you identify how deeply rooted the thing is. Of course, this is within the context of getting the bottom of something within yourself. Getting to the bottom of something that applies to your internal world is different from getting to the bottom of a thing in someone else’s internal world. This brings upon a plethora of challenges and a willingness to understand what you previously would consider incomprehensible.
Trying to get to the bottom of a thing within another individual can become quite difficult. It’s not the same as you attempting to get to the bottom of a thing within yourself, because you don’t know the other person like you know yourself. In fact, no person knows another person more than their own person. I’m certain there are many methods to going about looking within yourself and others, but I think one particular method I’ve mentioned already, asking questions, is applicable to both yourself and others. The types of questions being asked are dependent upon how deeply you know the person, and from your perspective, how deep the thing is within them. For the other individual, it might feel like something deep within their core that they can’t find, or maybe they want to work around it because they are unwilling the accept the thing, for what reasons they might have. However, for you, it might seem simple and quick, but you have no idea how deep it is for that other individual. You can imagine, but you can never truly know. This is important to remember because you might be able to help the other person get down to the root of whatever the thing is, and then you both are able to acknowledge it, but that doesn’t mean you can force them to change. They have to be willing to work through it themselves. They probably will have to feel through a lot of pain, similar to yourself. There are times where you might feel like others are unable to understand what you’re feeling, which is true, because no one else is you, but people can get close to understanding similar feelings. That type of closeness takes a lot of time and energy, and people that get that close, or are capable of getting that close, don’t always come by so frequently.
Knowing your limits of understanding can help you stay within your lane when working through someone else’s internal world. You can’t push too hard on another person, or convince them of what they don’t want to be convinced of. If they can’t see something yet, then you have to accept that, and be patient enough for them to catch up with themselves. All you can do is lead them to what you believe to be the root of their problem, and allow them to see it for themselves, for it is only them who can actually do something about it, or fully understand it.
I’ve only talked about getting to the bottom of things dealing with the internal world of yourself or others. The internal world has more to do with feelings, there is logic, but there are reasons for things that are illogical, and feelings help identify these things. I’ve decided to stray away from getting to the bottom of things that aren’t within the internal world. If you wanted to do something like that, I’d point you towards the scientific world. I’d suggest you explore the type of reasoning that helps oneself inch closer to understanding a thing in the external world. You’ll notice some overlap between what I’ve described here and that type of reasoning, like asking questions, and you might find types of reasoning present there that are also applicable within your internal world that I haven’t mentioned.
All people have problems. The problems within them can range from deep within their core to their immediate exterior. Working through these problems helps one attain a level of understanding why and how they act in certain ways. Identifying these things can help one ease their mental strain or configure themselves to act in a particular way. For whatever reason, getting to the bottom of it, whatever it is, is an important step towards self-acceptance. In this self-acceptance, one can find how they came to be, to a limited extent, and from there, decide what parts of themselves they wish to change or keep. I hope that I will continue to understand myself more deeply, and I hope you do too.