Why You Care So Much ► Explained With Dark Souls

The worst pain is when you care too much and it backfires. You give your all not because you have to, but because it’s who you are. You check on people who never check on you. You worry about how you’re perceived by others, stress over tiny inconveniences, and suddenly your effort becomes expected until one day you just stop showing up the same way you used to. And that’s when someone finally asks, “What’s wrong?” But by then, you’re already drained. But then I

Played the game Dark Souls and it made me realize something. The worst pain actually isn’t caring too much. It’s caring in the wrong direction. I want you to imagine that you’re this character from Dark Souls. Imagine that you were born for the sole purpose of being a god of war, powerful and able to conquer anything you want. Your dad has expectations of you only to do as he wants and conquer what he wants. Whatever your dad wants, you do it. Your

Whole childhood, your dad was totally racist towards dragons. He hated them. He wanted to get rid of the dragons because he wanted to end the age of ancients and establish his new age of fire, allowing him to rule as the supreme deity over everyone. And he saw these immortal dragons as obstacles to his goal. Your dad would even go as far as making an alliance with the dragon in order to destroy the dragons and find out their weaknesses. Now you’re fully

Grown, you’ve done as your dad wanted you to do and killed many dragons and even became known as a dragon slayer. But now you’re old enough to see the Why are we killing these creatures? So that my dad can be the ruler of everything and continue his age of fire? The age of fire won’t even last. The fire will fade eventually and no amount of supreme power is going to stop it. My dad is just clinging on to

His power while he has it. He’s greedy. You actually kind of admire the dragons’ endurance and everlasting strength. You don’t want to see them die for no good reason. You’re actually compelled to transcend your own mortality by following the path of the dragon. It just doesn’t make sense to you why things are the way they are. So you leave. You decide that you don’t want to fight the dragons anymore. Actually, you’d like to understand them. And in

Taking the side of the dragons, your dad disowns you. It was a betrayal to leave and be with the dragons, and any memory or record of you is removed from history. Any statues or books mentioning your name have now been erased. You are now following the path of the dragon. You go to the home of the dragons at Archdragon Peak. There you find refuge and a new purpose, becoming an ally and protector of the ancient dragons. This

Character from Dark Souls, the Nameless King, made a decision. And you know what? It’s not in the the lore of Dark Souls or anything like that. But I’m absolutely positive that the Nameless King was sitting on that feeling for a long time. He was thinking about doing that for a while. He must have noticed very early on, like, “Why are we killing these dragons? What did they do to us?” Something like a grand betrayal just doesn’t happen suddenly. It grows and

Manifests over time until it just can’t be hidden anymore. He was probably thinking about that for a long, long time before ever actually doing anything about it. But he also must have known what would happen if he decided to act on his thoughts. He must have already known he would be disowned. And no matter how strong the God of War was on the battlefield, was he really prepared to abandon everything? In the end, he just decided to do it anyway. He decided

That regardless of what his dad thinks, regardless of status, regardless of being known as this grand betrayer, it was still what he needed to do. Once you’re totally sure of yourself, then those thoughts won’t just go away. They start to change the way you are and the way you act around people. Even if you try to hide how you really feel inside, it will still be obvious that you’re conflicted. But now I want to ask you something. If you know what you

Want to do, but you’re scared to do it because of the consequences, will you still do it eventually anyway? The Nameless King knew in his heart that this was the right choice for him to make, and it was still scary, but he knew that eventually he would still make that decision. And when you have something like that in your life, when you know that eventually, yeah, I’ll get to it. It’s not just a whim, like, “Hmm,

Yeah, I guess I’ll do it if I feel like it.” No, it’s like, “I know I’ll do it someday when I’m strong enough, but right now I feel scared and weak. I want to tell you that it’s okay to be scared to make changes in your life. But, if you’re going to have to deal with the consequences of your actions regardless, then what’s the difference if you act on it now versus later? You’re really not going to be more prepared later.

Actually, you might even be more scared the longer you put it off. If something is sitting inside your heart and it actually kind of pains you physically to like try to just keep it hidden, why not just get it out there you don’t have to sit in this feeling of like sickness inside and like anger and like frustration. The people that you’re scared are going to find out are just going to find out anyway eventually. So,

I say that if it’s important to you, then get it out there. For some reason I imagine the Nameless King as a little boy and I imagine like what if he went to his dad and was like, “Why are we killing these dragons?” What if he kept showing his concern and almost disapproval of his dad’s actions? Then would it have changed the trajectory of the events of Dark Souls? And if he’s just a little boy and not a full-grown

God of War, Gwyn would see it as less of a grand betrayal for having these thoughts and instead more like he just needs to correct his son’s philosophy now. Or maybe Gwyn would have been like, “Shut up, boy. You don’t know anything.” And then he thinks about it more and then his heart starts to change too and he stops trying to kill the dragons and maybe even stops being so hyper-fixated on his Age of Fire. Or

Maybe he’s the kind of dad that just didn’t care what anyone said. But in that case, if little Nameless King said things to him and still let him know he didn’t feel good about killing these dragons, then at the very least his son leaving to be with the dragons wouldn’t be such a grand betrayal. It would be more like, “Yeah, I kind of saw that coming actually.” If you know your truth and it’s not just a whim and it’s not

Something with bad intentions, then nobody is going to be able to keep you quiet about it. It doesn’t matter if it’s your dad or the mass of people around you. If you believe something to be true deep in your heart, then at that point you’re not even trying to not give a what they think. You actually still do care what they think, but at a certain point of trying to hide it, it just comes out of you and it’s almost

Like you’re forced to not care anymore because caring is literally killing you on the inside. In the 1400s and 1500s, there was this guy named Martin Luther. No, no, not that one. A different guy. He was a deeply devout monk who genuinely feared God and desperately wanted to be obedient, orthodox, and correct. He didn’t want to rebel or betray authority and spent years trying not to act on what was growing inside of him. When he started noticing

Contradictions between scripture and the church’s practice of selling stuff, essentially turning forgiveness into a transaction, his first feeling inside wasn’t outrage, it was self-doubt. He assumed he must be wrong, so he stayed quiet. He prayed more, confessed obsessively, fasted, and tried to crush the discomfort rather than express it. But the longer he remained silent, the heavier it became. What started as a religious internal concern turned into physical anxiety and moral suffocation. Silence itself started to feel like a

Lie. By the time he finally wrote and published his book in 1517, it wasn’t an act of rage or ambition. It was the moment when not speaking felt worse than exile, punishment, or death. His so-called betrayal or act against what everyone else is doing wasn’t driven by ego or hatred, but by the realization that loyalty to an institution had come into conflict with loyalty to truth and that continuing to hide what was in his heart was no longer survivable. Now, I

Know you might be thinking like, “Well, yeah, if I was the Nameless King, then obviously I would do the same thing. Obviously I would betray my father, too. That’s a big important thing and it makes sense why he did it.” But what about someone like me? Someone that just kind of goes through life and I don’t really have the same big problems like the Nameless King did, but I still feel like I care too much. Well, everything

Seems obvious when you’re looking back, doesn’t it? Life can only be understood backwards, but must be lived forwards. We’re not Gods of War, but the feeling is still the same. You go to class and there’s a girl you have a crush on, but you just get so nervous you can’t go up and talk to her. You don’t want to say something stupid and she’s too pretty anyway. I can’t talk to her. And every day you don’t act, you’re already living

Through the rejection in your head. You know what you want to do, but you feel your chest tighten because you’re already imagining the consequences. You don’t speak up in class even though you know the answer. You stay quiet around your family because it’s easier than explaining yourself. You keep doing something you don’t respect because stopping would disappoint people. But why do we keep doing this to ourselves? It’s validation. If you’re like me, you probably seek permission to do anything

In your life. Permission to do this thing, permission to be accepted, permission to just be okay. You’re always looking to someone else to tell you like, “Yeah, sure. Yes, do it. Yes, you’re good.” That’s what happened with the Nameless King, too. He didn’t act on his heart until he was ready to accept that he would not be validated anymore. He would not be accepted by his father. Everyone would disapprove of what he was doing. But at a certain point, the pain

Of not doing it was greater than the pain of doing it. So, knowing this, that our thoughts of always caring too much about what other people think comes from seeking validation from others, we can start to do things that directly counteract the need for validation. I want you to get rid of this idea in your head that the scale of the problem makes a difference in how much you should care. I mean to say that just because

Someone’s problems might seem bigger than yours, it doesn’t mean that they’re more important. I think that every problem, every issue in life should be dealt with with the utmost care and attention. I think that’s a big in living a good life. And that means not half-assing something or just letting it go just because it’s not as big as other things in your life. Everything in your life matters. Now, every time, no matter if it’s big or small, I want you to just

Notice when your body and your heart tells you to do something and you don’t do it and the way that it makes you feel. There have been a lot of times in my life when someone says something rude to me and I actually feel like something rises inside my chest, like I need to say this rude thing back to them, but I don’t. Or when you see that really pretty girl and you’re like your brain wants to go, but your body keeps you

From moving at all to go actually talk to her. I think it’s these kinds of times we need to pay the most attention to because just being aware of your feelings when they happen already helps you to act according to what you actually want to do. But the main advice I want to give you is just try to have fun with your life. I used to think too that the most important thing in my life was talking to this girl and then I’d be

Happy. But then you actually manage to talk to the girl and it’s like well, all of my problems didn’t go away. Whatever it is you’re chasing or that might give you anxiety just thinking about, once you finally achieve it, it’s going to be laughably anticlimactic. The things that gave you the most stress and that you lost sleep over thinking about way too much. They finally turn out the way you wanted them to and like nothing even

Changes. You’re still the same person. The reason I’m saying this is because if you can see how insignificant things really are and you know that once this thing that’s stressing you out is finally done, then it’s just going to mean nothing to you anymore. And what the heck is the point of stressing over something that you’ll forget about the actual second that you get it over with? Why would you let yourself suffer in that anxiety for longer instead of just

Ripping off the band-aid or accepting the feeling and allowing it to pass through you? If you already know that you’re going to do it eventually and it’s going to happen, then all you’re really choosing is how long you’re going to suffer beforehand. So just try to have some humor in your life. Look at your problems and just laugh at them like, I can’t believe I’m in this situation right now. Zoom out and imagine yourself in the future looking

Back at how you’re feeling right now. Like, oh, he used to be so stressed about this small thing that actually doesn’t mean anything to me anymore. When I say have humor in your life, I’m not saying don’t care. I’m saying care deeply, but just don’t panic because isn’t that like the main problem and maybe the reason you clicked on this video? It feels like you want to care and you think caring is a good thing, but doing it too much and stressing over

It is actually kind of hurting and draining you, isn’t it? But caring isn’t the problem. Panic is. Give things your best effort. Be honest. Say what you need to say. Do the thing you’re scared to do. But, once you’ve done it, don’t torture yourself with it. Just rip the band-aid off and then be done with it. Like that girl you have a crush on in your class. You’ve already lived through the rejection a hundred times in your

Head, and you haven’t even walked over yet. Stressing over something that hasn’t even happened and might not even happen. Learn the difference between noise and signs. Most of the things that give you anxiety are noise. One-off moments, imagine outcomes, social embarrassment, treating a single moment like it’s going to define your entire life. But, most of the time it won’t. You’ll do the thing and it’ll be anticlimactic. You’ll survive the embarrassment. You’ll forget the fear. That’s the stuff you can laugh off. But,

There are some feelings that don’t go away. The ones that come back every time you avoid something. The ones that sit in your chest when you stay quiet. The ones that keep showing up no matter how much you try to distract yourself. Those aren’t noise. That’s your sign. The Nameless King ignored that sign for probably years. Martin Luther ignored it for years, and most of us do the same thing. We don’t act because we’re waiting to feel ready. But, readiness

Doesn’t come before honesty. It comes after. Most things don’t deserve your anxiety. But, the feelings that keep coming back, those deserve your honesty. Anyway, that’s all I have to say for today. If you like Dark Souls and self-improvement, I have a new free community that you can join. It’s just going to be the link in the description. I also have a new course that I’ve just finished. It has like three hours of content inside of it. It’s how to

Genuinely fix your life, but like explain with Dark Souls. So, that’s also going to be a link in the description, just if you’re interested. I really hope that this helps, guys. You take care, okay? Don’t you dare go hollow.