Hi @Felix,
You are making some good observations.
Felix: One thing I think now is that if I want to be actually free, it follows that I wouldn’t choose to put myself in high pressure situations again and again …
I think it’s quite common to slip from an unnoticed “so so” state to a worse state - it’s quite natural in fact because it’s just a more developed version of feeling so so. That’s why it’s much better to catch it early and really develop the familiarity within a substantial feeling good. That’s what I’m working on at the moment. (link)
As you have reported that you have lived a long time in this intensity of stress it’s obvious that your sensors (like heat-sensors in the kitchen) need readjusting. Feeling “so so” is already a warning sight, it being on the slope to feeling bad, and you can adjust your sensors, i.e. your affective awareness, about how you experience this moment of being alive, to recognize this as the point to pay immediate attention to.
With some sincere (and often fascinating) contemplation (from the vantage point of feeling good) why you developed this stressful habit in the first place you can work out why you were compelled, again and again, “to put myself in high pressure situations again and again”.
Long-standing habits like this often have deep roots (for instance a survival strategy once deemed vital but which is no longer needed or even sensible/ salubrious now).
Once you experientially understand the affective/ instinctual root of this compulsive past habit, and thus expose it to the bright light of awareness, it loses its previously gripping influence so much so that you eventually will forget you ever had this habit/attitude in the first place. It is quite magical.
Cheers Vineeto