I wanted to ask you what your secret to success is, but I had the strangest feeling it is not a secret, and there is no hidden formula to become cool, and it's instead just me looking for an easy way out of the mess I'm in. Which is annoying because I really kind of wanted a "do this for 15 minutes and all your problems will be solved" sort of answer.  So how do you deal with it when you have to do stuff the hard way, constantly, because hard is the default setting?
i will tell you a good trick in finding what works for you. go on youtube and start watching all the videos you can find about success strategies, etc. then remember the golden rule, which is that everone is absolutely different, and you can be sure you will hear loads of advice which is absolutely contradictory to each other. (that's how you know this method is working .....) then, after watching for a couple days, try to recall which ones made you the most excited, and follow those. they will probably work, as long as you choose the ones that made you go "yeah!" and not the ones that made you go 'meh'