Kind: captions
Language: en
in your pursuit of a goal that you care
about you are going to end up getting in
a rut in that moment most people give up
I'm going to tell you what you need to
do if you want to be part of the 8% that
actually sees their goals through if you
struggle getting up and getting your day
started early even though you want to
and know that you should be doing it
this comes down to two things one it's
all mechanism all the time what are you
doing with your night routine to make
sure that you're getting to bed on time
because the reality is if you're TI TI
you're not going to want to get up the
reason so many people lack motivation is
because of as Vince lardi said fatigue
makes cowards of us all if you're tired
you just don't have what you need to
face the day life is hard being a human
is difficult life is going to kick you
in the face the second law of
Thermodynamics makes abundantly clear
that life moves inextricably towards one
thing chaos and the only way to tame the
chaos and create order in your life is
by pouring energy into the system to
pour that energy into the system you
need energy at two levels at the
cellular level and psychological energy
now it's easy enough to get yourself
pumped up
psychologically but to get yourself
pumped up at a cellular level you have
to make sure that you are getting to bed
on time getting plenty of sleep eating
right and getting exercise and
meditating if you're not doing those
things and you're not going to be primed
at a cellular level now to get the
psychological energy we get to the
second thing you just don't want it
badly enough most people don't want the
thing that they're pursuing in their
life for two reasons reason number one
you don't realize that desire is a
process you build desire for things you
were not born with some intense and
satiable desire you do have imperatives
that Evolution has given us but you
don't have these intense desires other
than like hunger thirst sexual
drive but you certainly don't have a
drive to go to the gym you don't have
have a drive to be more successful at
work that's actually only minorly true
certainly for guys you probably do have
a pretty strong imperative to gain
access to resources but it will not
direct you towards the thing that you're
specifically going to pursue so you'll
have a vague sense of I want to do more
I want to be more I want to be admired I
want to be at the top but the top of
what that's where people get themselves
into trouble because they lack that
Clarity they lack that Clarity because
they don't realize that you just have to
pick something that you already respond
positively to naturally you encountered
it it gave you more energy than it took
you're naturally drawn to that thing you
want to do it okay but it's not going to
be like oh my God I need to dedicate the
rest of my life to this I spring out of
bed in the morning because I'm so
excited about this thing that is not how
it works you'll just be like oh that's
cool I dig that thing now if you go put
time and energy into build building
desire which is basically the process of
explaining to yourself why that thing
matters to you and as you repeat that in
an embodied way meaning you embody the
enthusiasm for that thing that you want
to feel and you loop around it and you
actually go and get better at that and
do it in the world and people are like
oh man that's so cool I love that you
can do that thing and you get that
positive feedback and it was already
energizing to you and you loop around
why it matters why am I investing in
this so much and you do that over and
over in an embodied way now all of a
sudden 6 months later a year later it
really is this raging Inferno at the
center of your soul something that you
care about and want incredibly deeply
but you have to go down that process of
gaining Mastery of really pushing
yourself around why you're going to love
this thing so much and then it actually
becomes real you become what you repeat
so if you're repeating that you're an
idiot that you don't love yourself that
will become true now self-worth is a
very complicated topic that is beyond
the scope of this conversation but just
know that you do become what you repeat
so be very thoughtful all right those
really are the two reasons that people
are going to struggle so you have to
focus on making sure that you're getting
yourself energized for this thing that
you're pursuing and then you have to
make sure that mechanistically you're
doing the things that you need to do so
you're not tired all the time but most
people fail to get enough sleep they go
to bed with such wild swings that it's
like having jet leg like everybody goes
oh yeah if I traveled to the east coast
from the west coast and I had three
hours of jet leg of course I'm going to
be tired well what do you think happens
when your bedtime swings by an hour 2
hours 3 hours you're going to experience
that same kind of disruption in your
sleep cycle also people do a lot of
things
to have poor sleep hygiene from
breathing through their mouth taking in
blue light going to bed at different
times watching TV right before they go
to bed checking their text messages
reading emails working on stressful
things all of this stuff are things that
are going to disrupt your sleep and and
and the biggest one which we haven't
even talked about how close to your
bedtime do you eat
food I have roughly 7 hours between my
last meal and my bedtime and it's
amazing and I have found that if I even
eat within 3 hours of going to bed I can
feel the difference now 3 hours is I
would say good if you got 3 hours of
distance between the last moment you
were chewing so not when you start the
meal the last moment you were chewing
and when you go to bed you're in pretty
good shape I think you will find that
you sleep better the longer that you
stretch that period out there's of
course also a lot of individual
variability I've heard some very
interesting information around
carbohydrates and if you have uh your
last meal has a fair amount of
carbohydrates that you will sleep better
now I find for me that that actually is
true if I have carbohydrates but they're
not high
sugar wear a glucose monitor it's very
enlightening but if I have something
that doesn't Spike my glucose massively
so think about um doing a lot of greens
things like that leafy greens that I
actually will sleep better but I need to
have a pretty big distance still between
between my last meal and when I go to
bed you going have to experiment with
the stuff when it comes to diet there is
so much individual variability it's
absolutely terrifying so try it run that
but I find that most people eat within
an hour maybe 90 minutes before they go
to bed that's going to disrupt your
sleep massively so be very thoughtful
about trying that and experimenting once
you get all of that down and you hold
yourself accountable to doing all of
this stuff then I think you're going to
find getting up is very easy but if you
don't address how badly you want the
thing you're getting out of bed
for and your physiology it's going to be
a struggle forever and last but not
least I'll throw in a little bonus here
and that is you have to have standards
I'm angry with myself if I don't get out
of bed in 10 minutes or less I'm angry
at myself if I don't go to bed on time
because I really want the things that
I'm pursuing so be really thoughtful of
about that don't do it because you ought
to find a way to get excited about it
then build rules in your life around
that and so you're doing it because it's
what you want for yourself and so the
reason that you're upset with yourself
when you don't do it isn't because
you're worried about disappointing other
people it's because you really want it
and you're not acting in accordance with
that that's it get after it if you have
a goal to get up early and you find that
you don't and you're feeling badly about
yourself you have to be very thoughtful
about how you react in that moment I may
big fan of rewarding and punishing
yourself but you have to be very good at
how you go about that so when you do
what you're supposed to do of course you
want to Pat yourself on the back you
want to give yourself that
emotional uplift of recognizing a job
well done and when you don't you
definitely want to face Square on you
said you were going to do it and you
didn't do it and that is a black mark on
your day now the problem is that when
you continue to beat yourself up now
you're going to begin to diminish sense
of self I advise you never do anything
that diminishes your sense of self you
want to hold yourself accountable you
want to have a standard you want to live
up to it I think that's incredibly
important and I think so many people
fail to get where they want to go in
life because they fail to hold
themselves accountable so you want to
set a standard you want to hold yourself
accountable to that standard but you
also want to make sure that you only do
and believe that which moves you towards
your goals I have a rule in my life that
I only do that I'm not trying to live in
a post-truth world this isn't isn't me
just deciding that I'm going to believe
in whatever I want to believe in in fact
I Define truth as the thing that most
efficiently moves you towards your goal
I think that you're most closely aligned
to what is true when you're able to
predict the outcome of your behaviors
and when you're able to predict the
outcome of your behaviors I think you're
on to what is true so we're not going to
sit there and belittle ourselves and
tear ourselves apart we're going to
acknowledge that what we did it breaks
our rule that we had that rule in the
first place because it is the set of
behaviors that most effectively moves us
towards our goal so we want to get back
on track because we actually care about
our goal and we want to do the thing
that's moving us towards our goal we're
not going to get back on track because
we think we're a bad person or we're
worried what the world is going to think
this all needs to be intrinsic
motivation you need to care you need to
have some reason why you want this thing
so badly that you've put all these rules
around s in the first place all the
rules that I have the amount of work
that I do how hardcore I am the standard
that I hold myself to rewarding myself
punishing myself it's all in service of
what I want so make sure that you want
something that is legitimately exciting
to you make sure that you've spent the
time to build that desire in yourself
and then make sure that you recognize
that the most important thing that you
can do to bounce back is to bounce back
right away to not beat yourself up any
more than is useful to bouncing back to
getting back on track and then when you
get back on track and you say okay cool
this happens to me all the time I have a
rule I get out of bed in 10 minutes or
less and sometimes uh my feet will hit
the floor right as it clicks over into
the 11th minute now I never miss it by
much but when I'm due one I confess I
tell my wife I'll go on camera I'll tell
people ah I didn't make it today I like
to hold myself accountable and I feel
good when I hold myself accountable
because I'm willing to stare nakedly at
my inadequacy IES I didn't do it today I
said I was going to and I didn't but my
willingness to own that to admit it to
not lie to myself to not lie to other
people to say hey I didn't do it today
that act makes me feel good because I
know how effective it is I know how much
I've gotten out of my Life by being
honest when I don't do the things that I
wanted to do by reminding myself why I
want to do them by reminding myself why
I have these rules in place and then
living in accordance with that and when
I don't to give myself that reminder
that hey you said you were going to do
it and you didn't not making excuses
owning everything completely and
reminding myself that my life is an
exact reflection of my choices and that
I made my day a little bit worse by not
doing what I said I was going to do but
at the same time that if I just sat
there and beat myself up on what a loser
I am that I'm not going to get done the
things that I need to get done in order
to make meaningful progress towards my
goals so I do it just enough to kick
myself in the ass and then I stop I get
back on track I reward myself for
getting back on track and boom it's all
systems go the most important thing that
you can do to wake up early is to get
your night routine on point my night
routine really begins at 2: p.m. this is
all true so what I found was the number
one thing that disrupted my sleep was I
would wake up in the middle of the night
to pee and then my mind would start
worrying around all the problems that I
have to solve and I would be up for two
2 and 1 half hours in the middle of the
night every single night and so I was
like okay what would I need to do in
order to make sure that I never wake up
to pee and at first I thought well if I
just stop drinking water in the you know
late afternoons Orly evening I should be
fine that didn't work and then I
realized ah this is a food problem if I
stop eating food earlier then I can kill
two birds with one stone one I can
elongate my intermittent fasting window
which is already incredibly powerful but
two I'm also not going to have a bunch
of water being extracted from the food
as I lead up to bedtime so what I do is
I have my last meal I start eating at
about 1:15 I'm usually done chewing by
about
2:00 then by the time I go to bed at 900
p.m. I've had 7 hours without eating and
I also I don't drink I have one sort of
final sip right at right before I go to
bed at call at 850 855 but from 2 to
then I don't have any water so I'm able
to sleep through the night perfectly
well I'm able to drink as much water as
I need during cuz I wake up at say 3:30
to 4:30 somewhere in there so I'm able
to get a ton of water on my system
before 2 p.m. and so everything works
perfectly so that's the first thing that
I start doing the next thing I do is uh
going to the food thing I want to make
sure that I have a minimum of 3 hours of
not eating before I go to bed for
reasons of digestion so even if I didn't
have the water problem not eating eating
not having food in my digestion is
hugely important now the reason that I
know that this actually makes a
difference is if on the weekend I'm
having a cheap meal I can actually drink
water I don't have to stop drinking
water because the carbohydrate intake
will cause me to retain water so I'm not
going to have that problem even if I eat
close to bedtime and keep drinking
throughout the day it's actually
wonderful I love it I can pound water
right before I go to bed something about
water at night tastes so good uh I don't
have to worry about that if I've had a
high carbohydrate meal so what I found
though is that even by eating let's say
3 hours before I go to bed I can still
tell the difference in my sleep but 3
hours is sort of that maximum where it's
not truly disruptive so no matter what
whether you have trouble uh with peeing
at night or not you want to make sure
that starting 3 hours before you go to
bed you finished all of your food intake
that's really important also 3 hours
before I go to bed I will avoid blue
light so I wear blue blocking glasses
and I make make sure that my computer um
shifts over into night mode so that it
actually turns the screen uh warmer
colors I dim the lights I try not to get
bright lights in my eyes all of this
stuff makes a really big difference also
I don't do any stressful work at least
an hour before I go to bed so even
though I'll keep working up until I go
to bed at 9:00 as I get later into the
evening I do things that are far more
predictable and less stressful so for
instance I have um an episode to prepare
for today and so tonight as I start
getting ready for bed that will be one
of the last things that I do literally
right up until I go to bed because it's
something that isn't about problem
solving it's not stressful I'm not going
to be surprised by some problem that
exists in the business right as I'm
about to go to bed I realized you know
huge Spike of adrenaline and cortisol
because oh my God I just realized we
have some problem that needs to be
solved so it's something that's based
around learning in it's usually exciting
it puts my brain in a different mode and
so that is really useful to helping me
begin to um move my brain out of problem
solving mode and get into a mode that's
going to allow me to fall asleep also I
tend to 30 to 40 minutes before I I fall
asleep I'll get into bed now I know a
lot of people say don't take work to bed
with you I have not found that to be
problematic at all as long as it's a
certain type of work like doing research
as my go-to for being in bed so I can
really begin to relax and calm down I
will also if I've had a particularly
stressful day in that last hour I might
do some meditation to really make sure
that I'm calming myself down and then
right as I'm about to lay in bed and
this is the one thing that I'm
conflicted about recommending to people
um is I put headphones in and I begin
reading a book right as I go to bed so
uh as I lay down to fall asleep I put
headphones in and I put a book on I've
used fiction in the past I'm using
non-fiction currently but it's a certain
type of book one it's a very long book
so often biographies about a moment in
time or a given person I guess
technically a biography is about a
person uh or a moment in time and the
books often are like 20 hours 30 hours
so you know that you're not going to get
woken up in the middle of the night by
the book ending which has happened to me
unfortunately with shorter books and so
I will um listen to those books they're
not where I'm trying to learn something
so it's just something that's
interesting and that puts my brain into
a certain Zone and I tend to fall asleep
very quickly I'm talking like five
minutes quickly or less I'll wake up in
the middle of the night and I'll rewind
the book back to a part that makes sense
but because it's such a big topic it
tends to be something where ah whether I
get exactly to where I was was or not I
can still get the gist it's not like a
story where man if you miss anything
you're going to be completely lost what
happened it's disorienting so that has
been really really useful and then the
last thing that I do is I tape my mouth
closed because if you breathe through
your nose it can actually dry out your
throat disrupt your sleep there's a
whole book on this called Breathe by
James Nester if I'm remembering
correctly and it's really been
transformative to my sleep because I
used to wake up with a dry throat and
it would pull me out of sleep and you
know your lip smacking you need like
something to drink it's terrible so by
taping my mouth I'm able to sleep
through the night much better really was
a game changer I highly recommend that
you guys try not only that but all of
the things that I just talked about I
think that they will radically improve
your sleep hygiene which will allow you
to sleep much better you will be far
more rested and able to get to the Holy
Grail which is not setting an alarm so
you wake up naturally right at the
perfect part of your sleep cycle having
gotten as much sleep as your body needs
if you find that despite having really
good sleep hygiene that you're still
getting tired later in the day a lot of
people wonder if they can take a nap or
if they should avoid it and to be honest
I think that it's completely up to the
person there are times where I'm so
tired that if I don't allow myself to at
least completely let go meaning I lay
down I close my eyes and I give myself
permission to sleep I just I can't focus
I can't concentrate and I have found
that sometimes even just letting myself
go like that even though I don't fall
asleep for 10 or 15 minutes can be
extremely
rejuvenating other times I find that
falling asleep for 10 or 15 minutes is
completely rejuvenating and other times
I have no idea why I feel super groggy
and even sleeping for an hour may make
me feel worse than just staying awake
that that's always super bizarre where
you lay down you don't set an alarm you
just give yourself permission to sleep
as long as you need you wake up one
would think that you got a full sleep
cycle but for whatever reason man when I
wake up I'm like God I just feel awful I
feel sluggish I have a little bit of a
headache the just the whole rest of the
day I feel off so to be honest it's
pretty rare that I take a nap even times
where because if I get five hours of
sleep that I hate that I I can get by if
it's one day but I really really really
don't like doing it I would much rather
get 6 hours 6 hours is magical seven is
unbeatable so if I've gotten five I will
give myself the chance to lay down and
take it nap but I often find that it's
like man the whole rest of the day just
never feels like I quite get back on and
if I've gotten 5 hours of sleep the only
time I will give myself a chance to take
a nap is before 700 a.m. so that I'm
still getting that sleep early the sun
typically for most of the year is still
down and so so I'm able to sleep while
it's still dark cuz remember if I only
got 5 hours of sleep chances are I woke
up around
2:30ish so I can by that point I have
gone worked out I've started working for
a few hours and then I find that just
wave of fatigue really hitting me then I
will lay down but if the Sun is up and
my day is going the odds of me taking a
nap are virtually zero again there's a
lot of self-experimentation that you
should do figure out what works for you
learning those rhythms figuring out what
are the times like can you notice a
pattern when you end up getting sleepy
and and are unable to bounce back for me
it's like if the day is really going and
the Sun is up and if I've had caffeine
or anything like that the odds of me
feeling better after I take a nap are
very very low but this really is
something that you should experiment
with because there are going to be times
where you may have gotten so little
sleep that the only way to function is
to get that rest is to allow yourself to
lay down and take a nap so I certainly
don't have any moral judgment on taking
a nap I think some people do I don't
like for one if I'm flying there's
something about flying if I'm flying and
I'm just like I cannot keep my eyes open
I'm like I'll take a nap I've heard
people like oh my God like I'd never
take a nap that's crazy to me you want
to cognitively optimize you want to make
sure that you are performing at your
best and if taking a nap is going to be
the thing that lets you perform at your
best then take the nap you're far better
to if you let's say you're going to work
for three hours you're far better or you
have three hours to work I should say
you're far better napping for an hour
and a half and being really sharp that
last hour and a half than you are just
like struggling through not being at
your best and trying to get something
done now everything is on balance I work
so hard I leave everything out on the
field I just don't think twice about
taking a nap if that's what I need
because I know that I'm not doing it out
of laziness and I think that's where a
lot of people get conflicted is they
know that taking the nap is something
that they do as a way to avoid doing the
work and that they do that kind of thing
a lot and that they probably were
feeling tired because they stayed up too
late watching something on Netflix or
playing video games or hanging out
whatever or they had a few too many
drinks they've done something dumb that
is counter to the goals if those things
are your goals by all means do them I
don't pass any moral judgment on
watching Netflix playing video games get
as drunk as you want if that's your goal
but if it's not your goal and you did
those things something tells me that now
you're beating yourself up over being
lazy and part of the reason that you
don't want to take the nap is because
you feel guilty if you play all out all
the time and you know that you've earned
that respect with yourself then taking a
nap is a no-brainer if that's going to
be the thing that cognitively optimizes
you just a reminder PSA enjoy your life
and if taking a nap is going to let you
enjoy it do it if it doesn't and it's
going to mess up your Rhythm then don't
just grind it out if you let me control
your life for the next 7 days here is
exactly what I would have you do I'm
actually thinking about turning this
into a challenge because I think that
this would be amazingly impactful for
people and it goes like this our goal is
to get up early and really attack the
day so that we can get a lot of momentum
going so that we can outperform other
people remember I am super competitive
when it comes to doing the things that I
most want in life now I do that from a
place of joy and abundance think
everybody can have what they want but
it's actually fun to go hard to compete
against other people and really see how
far you can push your life all right it
goes like this this is the ultimate life
routine number one we're going to go to
bed at 9900 p.m. like it's a religion no
if hands or butts and we're going to as
you see as we go through the day when we
wake up we're going to do a lot of
things to make sure that we are ready
for bed at 9:00 p.m. but we go to bed at
9:00 p.m. like it's a religion we do not
set an alarm clock you can have an
emergency alarm clock if you've got a
meeting or a flight to catch or
something like that so that you just
don't have it on your mind cuz I know
some people are so paranoid they're
going to over sleep it actually
interrupts their sleep by all means set
an emergency alarm but the goal would be
to have at least 9 hours before our
emergency alarm would have to go off
most people are not going to sleep for 9
hours unless they've been chronically
sleep deprived so no alarm go to bed at
9: or eight if you have kids or seven if
you have kids whatever but we're going
to go to bed early enough that we don't
need to set an alarm for me that's nine
you're going to go to bed at that time
you're going to wake up when you wake up
you get out of bed in 10 minutes or less
your feet are on the floor next to your
bed is your gym clothes you're going to
put your gym clothes on immediately you
don't have to go to the gym you can work
out at home I don't care we can do all
body weight workouts or we can go to the
gym and go ham whatever works for you
but we are going to work out we are
going to get our blood pumping no one
and I mean no one hates going to the gym
more than me I don't whatever the
endorphin rush is that other people get
I don't get but it does allow me to
cognitively optimize if you haven't read
the book spark read it study show that
if you have a hard problem to solve you
want to tackle that hard problem
immediately after working out they did
all these crazy studies where they had
kids go in and uh do like these
incredibly hard workouts where your
grade was based on your heart rate so it
was like you didn't have to run a mile
in under 6 minutes but you had to get
your heart rate up to whatever 140 150
and maintain that for I forget how long
let's call it 15 20 minutes and then if
they had their hardest class immediately
following that so for me it would have
been like Calculus if I had had that
immediately following gym class where I
got my heart rate up into that ideal
Zone I would perform better there
because you're cognitively optimizing so
I'm going to work out I'm going to get
my heart rate up that is key I'm also
going to be intermittent fasting so
we're going to get to when I clock that
change but I'm not going to eat before I
work out so I'm going to work out fasted
then I'm going to go and I'm going to
meditate by the way I work out for about
30 to 45 minutes by all means work out
longer I wouldn't work out a lot shorter
I'm going to sit down and I'm going to
meditate I'm going to meditate for about
20 minutes I'm trying to get myself into
a place where I'm completely relaxed no
stress no anxiety it is very possible no
matter what is going on in your life to
get to the point where you have no
stress no anxiety now if you're really
going through something and you the
thought of trying to sit down and
meditate is just unbelievably torturous
give yourself 7 Minutes of Doom
scrolling cats it will put your brain in
a certain place it's very interesting it
is the art of distraction there is a
reason from an evolutionary standpoint
that distraction exists go for it 7
minutes only at the end of the 7 minutes
then we're going to go into meditation
and you're going to meditate if you did
s minutes of Doom scrolling cats and you
just don't have extra time fine 13
minutes of meditation so be it but I
think you're better off making it 27
minutes 7 Minutes Doom scrolling cats
and then 20 minutes of meditation the
goal of meditation is to just breathe
you're not trying to have any Grand
epiphanies you're just trying to breathe
your mind is going to wander like crazy
and it's going to happen a lot to the
point where it's going to distress you
and you're going to think you're doing
something wrong you are not the whole
point is to just come back to the breath
come back to the breath back to the
breath back to the breath getting
yourself in that calm creative state no
stress no anxiety lengthening the period
of time where you can focus on the
breath incredibly powerful now if you
haven't done this for an extended period
of time yet the next thing I want you to
do is take a cold
shower we're doing all of this to
accomplish two goals you can reboot your
life your health even your career
anything you want all you need is
discipline I can teach you the tactics
that I learned while growing a billion
dooll business that will allow you to
see your goals through whether you want
better health stronger relationships a
more successful career any of that is
possible with the mindset and business
programs and impact Theory University
join the thousands of students who have
already accomplished amazing things tap
now for a free trial and get started
today toughen up
buttercup and cognitively optimized so
working out as much as it's good for the
brain it's also to show you that you can
do hard things because in your life you
need to be doing hard things the other
hard thing that you're going to do
that's also good for your brain and good
for a whole host of other things
including
anti-inflammatory um getting uh all the
effects of longevity that come from cold
exposure you're going to get in the cold
shower now the amount of time you need
to stay in the cold shower is going to
depend on the time of year and where you
live because let me tell you Minnesota
in February is very different than La in
August the cold temperature in La in
August not that cold so and compared to
and I've actually done this was it in
Minnesota no it was Chicago I did
Chicago in the winter I can't remember
exactly what month and the water hitting
my forehead gave me a headache I was
like damn this is a whole another level
of cold so doing that versus in La was a
world of difference but in La I would
keep myself in the shower I think my
record was like oh God it was somewhere
between 12 and 17 minutes I can't
remember but for uh what was it 13
months I did this every single shower
weekend no weekend actually that might
be a lie every shower Monday through
Friday that's correct I think on the
weekends I allowed myself a warm shower
don't hold me to that I can't remember
but for 13 months
I took so many cold showers it was
horrifying in fact I stopped I promised
myself I'd do it for 30 days I did it
for 13 months I began to resent my
shower but it is extremely powerful for
doing things that are difficult so we're
going to do the cold challenge expose
yourself for the cold as long as you can
possibly bear extend that period of time
you should be shivering before you get
out of the shower like uncontrollably
shivering that is a good way of knowing
if you've been in long enough now again
Minnesota in February it's going to
happen a lot faster than a warm climate
later in the year but get cold exposure
after that we're going to go to our
important things list and we're going to
work our way down the most important
things that we could be doing in order
to make meaningful progress towards our
goals once we finish all of that I know
you're going to have to do a lot of work
to pay bills and all that good stuff
fair enough go to your job crush it
then we're going to get into the
intermittent fasting zone so there are
two ways to handle this way number one
is that you can stop eating really early
and then you're going to eat breakfast
or you can stop eating a little bit
later call it 5 6:00 at night but then
you can't have your first meal until
much later in the next much later the
next day the rule of thumb is 16 hours
of fasting is about right I try to push
that to on average about 17
172 hours when averaged over a full week
but during the week that tends to mean
that I'm um not having a meal for about
18 to 19 hours and then on the weekend
it's closer to 15 16 hours so I tracked
that over a year and a half and that's
what it came out to be on average if you
do all of those things your life will be
unrecognizable and I hope that if you do
that for seven days that you're not
going to want to quit because it really
will transform your entire life once you
get initially started in the pursuit of
your goal of trying to improve yourself
and become something more something
better the key is consistency and follow
through consistency and follow through
you become what you repeat the reason
that anybody successful becomes
successful is because to quote Winston
Churchill they can go from failure to
failure without a loss of enthusiasm the
problem is the human animal has chosen a
tactic of using culture in order to have
generational progress so a horse will
come out doing all the things that a
horse can do in 20 minutes but horse
culture doesn't progress because they
come hardwired with everything and they
have for thousands of years and they
make no progress whereas humans a
generation 10,000 years ago invented the
wheel and we're all still using it now
but in taking that strategy what ends up
happening is that you really do become
the thing that you repeat the thing that
you do consistently and if you begin
slacking off of that then you don't end
up making that progress you certainly
can't maintain that progress so you have
to be very very thoughtful about what
you repeat because it is going to have a
profound impact on your life now the
vast majority of people end up just
breaking they end up quitting the reason
that I've had the kind of success that
I've had in my life is simply because I
understand that iteration is how we make
cultural progress it's what I call the
physics of progress most people when
they're running the physics of progress
when they get to the point where they
have to evaluate their results they end
up lying to themselves and making it
somebody else's fault now the physics of
progress are really simple it's the
scientific method recontextualized for
whatever goal goal you're trying to
achieve and it goes like this you come
up with a hypothesis if you have
information that can inform that
hypothesis that is much better but if
you don't when you're beginning call it
your best guess you're taking your best
guess as how you go from where you are
to achieving your goal there is
inevitably going to be an obstacle in
your way and your best guess is about
what do I need to do to overcome that
obstacle to make meaningful progress
towards my goal then you're going to
turn that hypothesis into something
something that you can actually do then
you're going to turn that you're going
to actually go do that thing and then
you're going to get a result from that
thing it is almost certainly going to
fail to some extent which is fine
because failure is the most
information-rich data stream on planet
Earth but you have to learn from the
failure to learn from the failure you
have to be willing to admit that you
made one most people will not admit that
they made a mistake and so they get
stuck at that level and in that moment
they say it was the world it's because I
was born in the wrong time my parents
were dumb the world doesn't want
somebody who looks like me to succeed
whatever excuse they use to make it
somebody else's fault now remember the
most terrifying thing about excuses is
that they are valid I'm not saying that
those things aren't real I'm not saying
that the world isn't trying to hold some
people back I'm just saying it doesn't
matter you have to overcome it no matter
what so in the moment where you tried
this thing and it didn't work don't
spend your time and energy Focus on how
something else stopped you even though I
will grant you it's true the world is
trying to stop everybody from doing
everything it just is the reality
accomplishing something meaningful is
freakishly difficult so don't focus on
that it's more difficult for you it just
doesn't matter you're just going to have
to work harder you either want to
accomplish that thing in your life or
you don't and you're going to give up
that's the reality the people that get
what they want are the people that
absolutely demand that they're going to
keep going until they get that thing so
in that moment when you're very tempted
to focus on how other things have
stopped you you're not going to what you
need to do is be consistent so in that
moment you're going to say what could I
have done differently to get a better
result and that's when the physics of
progress Loops now you come up with a
more informed hypothesis you learned
your lesson you figure out what you need
to do that's going to be a little bit
better than last time you turn that into
a thing that you can do you do that
thing it will fail to some extent you
stare nakedly at your inadequacies you
figure out what you need to do
to make it a little bit better and the
process begins again that is why you
have to be consistent but the reality is
that most people break most people
cannot go from failure to failure
without a loss of enthusiasm they end up
breaking they end up thinking that
either there's something wrong with them
or that the world is against them and
because they don't want to deal with the
pain and suffering of having to face
their own inadequacies or they give up
because they just think that the world
is against them they don't make progress
because you have to be able to fail a
lot to learn from those failures if I'm
right that humans as a species have
chosen culture as the learning mechanism
then you have to run the loop that
culture demands which is to try
something it fails you iterate and you
get better that works at the societal
level over Millennia and it works at the
individual level in an acute thing where
you just have to figure out why didn't
that work and keep going but the truth
is difficult
boredom struggle pain breaks almost
everyone that it touches and I will
remind us all 92% of people fail to
achieve the goal they set for themselves
and the reason is that all of that
difficulty just stops people because
they don't have the right mindset they
don't realize that they need to fail
they don't realize that failure does not
make them a failure so you're going to
have a ton of failure in your life you
have to Contex talize it as the most
advantageous thing that could happen to
you so when I fail it stings it sucks I
hate it I want everything that I do to
work the first time and I want to make
maximum progress as fast as humanly
possible but once I realized that just
isn't the way that things work and even
people like Elon Musk who I think are
abnormally intelligent they realize oh I
have to fail a lot I have to try things
and see what works and what didn't there
is no way around being in the messy
middle there's no no way to think or
hypothesize your way to what's going to
work the best you have to get in there
and try things even somebody that's
thinking philosophically has to be able
to get in there and battle their ideas
and take their ideas out to other people
even Einstein went out and made sure
that his ideas were battle tested not
only through experimental physicists but
also just his friends that were other
people that were able to beat up his
ideas and poke holes in them and if
you're not willing to put your ideas to
the test if you're not willing to try
things and see what fails then you you
will forever be stuck thinking and not
making any progress you really want to
be doing be a doing machine somebody
that's out there trying but that means
you have to risk embarrassment and
embarrassment is one of the things that
destroys so many goals because people
don't want to admit that they were
struggling people don't want to admit
that they were having a hard time and so
they either don't tell people about the
goal which is a huge mistake you want to
tell as many people as you can it's part
of the process of building desire you
want to tell people I'm going to do this
thing and it really matters to me and
I'm going to accomplish it by this date
now all eyes are on you but that's one
of the ways you're going to stick to
what you're doing and if the whole point
is that you have to repeat repeat repeat
be resilient be gritty stick with it try
fail try fail over and over and over as
you get better at overcoming those
obstacles then you have to be willing to
push through all of that difficulty to
know why you're doing the things you're
doing and to understand that that's just
the process so guys I'm telling you if
you really want to achieve something
absolutely powerful in your life you've
got to be persistent if you haven't
already be sure to read the book grit by
Angela Duckworth it's an amazing expose
on how to be gritty if you're not
already the process that I use for
achieving my goals is really simple
first and foremost you want to make sure
that you cognitively optimize I cannot
stress said enough so much of my life is
about doing things to make sure that my
brain is working well they look like
this number one get sleep do not use an
alarm most people set an alarm stop I
built three multi-million dollar
companies one of those being a billion
dollar company all without setting an
alarm do I occasionally set an emergency
alarm for something like a 4 a.m flight
yes but for the most part I don't use an
alarm I'm talking like
99% of my days I do not set an alarm I
want to make sure sure that I get all of
the sleep that my body needs why because
I'm able to be more efficient people
mistake grinding around the clock and
becoming less efficient because they're
tired with actually getting more done
what you want to do is make sure that
you have a very high output of
achievement per waking hour so I check
in with myself about every three hours
to make sure that I'm being productive
if you're not being productive nothing
else matters so go to bed early I go to
bed at 9:00 p.m. I don't use an alarm I
typically sleep 6 to 7 hours that's
changed if you've heard other content
where I say 5 to 6 hours right now I'm
in a cycle where I'm sleeping closer to
my average is probably just under seven
hours so I never know what that's going
to be it tends to be regulated by the
amount of stress in my life so I'm
getting roughly seven hours of sleep so
that means that if I go to bed at 9:00
p.m. I'm up at 4:00 a. I have a rule in
my life that if I'm awake Monday through
Friday I'm either working or working out
I give myself only 10 10 minutes to get
out of bed why because I struggle to get
out of bed just is a thing it's always
been a thing for me from the time I was
a kid my dad would have to drag me out
of bed in the morning to there was a
period in my early to mid 20s where I
was laying in bed four to five hours a
day and just could not bear to get out
of bed it's absolutely ridiculous even I
am completely scandalized by the reality
that to this day despite all of the
things that I've accomplished I have to
fight myself just to get out of bed so
that's a ity I accept that so I gave
myself a rule that I had to be out of
bed in 10 minutes or less right next to
my bed I keep headphones so I put my
headphones on I begin researching the
second I wake up so I'm researching uh
technically this gets into a long thing
right now I'm in a phase where I
actually read while I sleep long story I
don't think you get things subliminally
that's not that but I do find that it
helps me stay asleep I don't necessarily
recommend that for everybody but just by
way of being completely transparent in
terms of what my routine looks like for
achieving my goals from the second I
wake up I am researching something that
matters to me I immediately put on my
gym clothes I head to the gym right away
I work out I then meditate after I
meditate I do something I called think
itating the reason that I do these two
things one meditation is a good way to
get your stress and your anxiety down to
zero the reason you want to do this is
cognitive optimization if you are
feeling frantic if you are constantly in
fight or flight your brain is not going
to function as well as it could what is
happening when you go into fight or
flight is the blood is literally leaving
your prefrontal cortex the prefrontal
cortex is the seat of higher level
cognition it's where you future plan
it's where you maintain your discipline
and so when you're in that fight ORF
flight stage you don't have the blood in
the prefrontal cortex in the way that
you need to which is why people end up
cheating on their diet it's why they end
up not sticking with their goals and
persevering so you want to make make
sure that you're taking the time to
meditate to lower your stress lower your
anxiety and then there's a hidden
benefit to meditation which is why I
follow that sort of almost seamlessly
into think itation which is where I stay
in that meditative posture I keep my
meditative breathing going I'm staying
in that cognitive space because when you
are meditating if you're just coming
back to the breath very simple practice
my meditation practice is dead simple
it's literally what I call just breathe
so as my mind wanders I remind myself to
come back to the breath to just breathe
my mind wanders again back to the breath
wanders back to the breath wanders back
to the breath it's tragic how rapidly my
brain begins to wander but I just keep
bringing it back now when I do that
enough I get into a calm and creative
state when I'm in a calm and creative
state unique areas of my brain begin to
talk to each other and so I will come up
with very interesting solutions to
problems that I won't get when I'm not
in that state so this is why people will
often say I need to sleep on that
problem because your brain goes through
that cycle that's very much like a
meditative State as you're falling
asleep and then waking up again you pass
through a very similar state so I will
call that calm and creative so once I'm
in that calm and creative state now I
begin to get these I give myself a
problem to solve before I sit down to
meditate so I know what I'm working on
it's tied to my import important things
which we'll get to in a minute but I sit
there and I know what the problem is
going to be that I'm going to start
working on when I'm in that calm and
creative state and then I'll will allow
myself to take notes as interesting
ideas come up I'm going to journal on
that which I would not do during the
meditative part where I'm just coming
back to the breath back to the breath
back to the breath and I do that for as
long as I need to to get to zero stress
zero anxiety calm creative once I'm
there maybe 5 minutes maybe 20 minutes
maybe 45 minutes if I'm really stressed
out but once I'm there then I move over
into think itation and I begin noodling
on those hard problems once I finish
that then I'm going to go into my
important things now how do I know when
to stop thotting and move on to
important things I have found that at
some point I begin running out of really
fruitful novel ideas and once I feel
like I'm kind of trying to force it then
I'm like all right let's just now move
into executing on my important things so
now that I'm in my important things
which is a list that I keep constantly
maintained so I know what the top things
are that I should be working on so I'm
not spending that time thinking about
what I should be doing I just go
straight into execution mode so then I
start going down the list doing them in
order now the way to execute on
something is very much in order so first
thing you're going to do everything on
that thing that you can do until you've
pushed it as far as you can go and now
you're waiting on other people and then
you're going to move on to the next
thing you're going to do everything that
you can on that until you're waiting on
other people and then you're going to
push it off so on and so forth down your
list now my important things list is
predicated on my goals so the very
important thing to understand about the
nature of goals is that they make
demands if you want to win a
championship in swimming then you need
to do the things that a swimmer trying
to win a gold medal by a certain date
would need to do it's going to dictate
how you eat how you sleep how you train
who you talk to how you think all of
that stuff and so you have to one get
good at identifying what your goals
demand and then two you have to be good
at actually sticking to the things your
goals demand which this is where most
people fall down because it gets boring
it gets difficult so you've got to be
able to push through all right so I work
my way down my important things list
once I finish doing that then I because
I'm the CEO of a company at that point
then I'm going to begin to engage with
my team I'm usually working for about
four to five hours on the things that I
know that I should be doing to have the
highest most efficient impact on the
company and then because I know a big
part of my job is orchestrating people
making sure that they're focused on the
things that they should be answering
questions and the like then I go and I
engage with the company and then I take
meetings based on what's important and
how time aligns it just is what it is I
take meetings until 6: PM I try to cut
off there's one meeting that I have a
week because we're dealing with a
company in China that goes until 7:30 at
7:30 uh it's only one day a week that I
do that most of the time my last meeting
ends at 6 and then for the rest of the
time for the next three hours I go back
into my mode of controlling my time
making sure that I'm working on things
that I need to do including making sure
that my important things list is up to
date and that I'm working on all the
loose ends for the day to make sure that
everybody has what they need to start
the next day all that good stuff which
gives me the ability in the morning to
take advantage of my Peak cognitive
ability now one of the reasons that I've
ended up structuring my day like that is
because I found that in the morning I'm
super sharp I've got these creative
ideas I'm able to really make progress
create space for myself whereas in the
evenings I'm a little bit slower I'm not
quite as efficient as I am early in the
day and so it remains easy for me to be
reactive but it's much harder for me to
be proactive that's just me maybe you're
the complete opposite structure your day
around you so in the evenings I can
remain very useful as I respond to
people's questions and things like that
as I comb over my important things list
all of those things I find much easier
to do in the evenings and then the last
hour before I go to bed whenever I can
and this unfortunately breaks apart
sometimes but whenever I can I want that
last hour to be work but to be something
I'm really excited about now you want to
be very thoughtful about how you
structure your life because you should
love what you're working on now I know
that that can be very difficult as
somebody who has at periods in my life
absolutely hated my job I completely
understand but you want to push yourself
to get to the point where you at least
have a part of your job that you
absolutely love so that's how I spend
that last hour of my day is only working
on when I can something that I'm really
excited about and that helps combat
fatigue and it also helps me get ready
for bed because you don't want to be
dealing with something super stressful
as you're getting ready for bed and
another thing that I do just by way of
sleep hygiene is that I make sure that I
am not getting blue light into my eyes
towards the evenings I think that's very
important so starting 3 hours before I
go to bed I'm wearing blue blocking
glasses my computer is set to go into
night mode so at
Sunrise the blue light comes back on and
at sunet the blue light turns off I
think that kind of thing can be very
advantageous as for my diet which is
another key part of cognitively
optimizing I do intermittent fasting
seven days a week 365 days a year
including Christmas Day and I do that
because it makes me feel better so it's
not even for or to be cool it's just I
feel better when I do that so uh I do I
average I I track this for about 18
months every day and it averaged 17
hours including weekends holidays and
all that so there are of course times
where that window is more narrow but the
least man the least I knowingly uh go to
is 14 hours so that's the least amount
of time that I'll go between my last
meal and my first meal the next day like
I said even on a Christmas day or
something like that I'm going to have at
least a 14-hour window again just to
protect my stomach and make sure that I
feel great and that will on the week
days mean that I'll go sometimes 18 19
sometimes 20 hours uh without a meal
before I eat and I eat my last meal at
about 2 p.m. sometimes a little before
sometimes a little after but that's
roughly there and then I don't have my
next meal till 89 sometimes 10 11
o'clock so that is my process and I
think that that there's a lot of things
that virtually everybody could use from
that uh to build a very effective
process if you want to really make
progress in your life one of the keys is
going to be to track that process now
the way to think about getting better is
you want to get incrementally better the
problem is if you're trying to get
incrementally better you're basically
going to stand still so you want to be
asking the famous question that Peter
teal asked which is how do I make my
10-year plan happen in the next 6 months
when you start thinking like that it
really does shift your thinking into
having a radically different approach I
think one of the big problems that
people have when they're trying to make
progress is they set a goal that's quote
unquote realistic and when it's
realistic it's not very exciting I teach
a whole class on the process of setting
goals and one of the things that I tell
people is you have to set goals that are
exciting there's a whole bunch of
research on this that shows the people
that are most likely to stick with their
goals are the people that set a goal
that is truly EXC exciting to them the
goals that are going to be exciting are
going to be big goals that's just the
way the human mind is wired I'm telling
you right now there is an evolutionary
imperative that has been embedded in
your brain and there's no way around it
that demands that you do hard things I
think from an evolutionary perspective
that makes sense because Staying Alive
was hard and if we didn't get an
intrinsic emotional reward from doing
hard things we would have died out so we
are all the ancestors of people that God
off a little bit on doing hard things so
when you don't do hard things you don't
get that positive feedback loop you feel
a sense of disease and so many people
have that sense of unease and they think
that I need to go retire and my life
needs to be more relaxed I need to be in
a beach somewhere this all sucks it's
not true at all I'm telling you right
now the thing that you need to do is
find meaning and purpose and go after it
go after it in a big way set yourself a
crazy goal that you really believe in
that you really think life would be
better if I do this thing if I achieve
this and even if I fail man I would have
spent my life well trying to contribute
to that if you build your life around
that and go all out man trying to make
something that you really believe and
come true to bend the world to your will
to close your eyes and imagine a world
that is better than this one open your
eyes and then execute to make that world
come true you will love your life that's
the key to find something that you
really believe and then go all out after
it now to track all of this progress you
really do want to be journaling writing
things down checking things off how many
days did you stick to what you said you
were going to do this can be such a an
amazing way to gamify your own life is
to just have a calendar digital or
physical go through and mark off the day
did you do what you said you were going
to do yes or no and then tally up for
the week for the month for the year what
percent percentage of days did I do what
I said I was going to do now in this
moment you can lie 100% you can lie but
if you lie when you look at that
calendar you're not going to feel the
way you want to feel you're going to
feel like a liar you're going to know
that you're a fraud the whole idea is to
feel a certain way when you look at that
calendar to be like I did the thing that
I said I was going to do and I feel
really awesome about that so it is truly
one of those things the only person that
you're going to cheat if you're lying
about this is yourself so come up with
whatever way you can to track this stuff
whether it's a spreadsheet whether it's
checking things off in a calendar if I'm
completely honest about what I do I
check in with myself every three hours I
don't keep a written tally but I do
reward myself emotionally whenever I do
the thing I said I was going to do so
the first one for me is did I get out of
bed in 10 minutes or less if I did I get
to feel good about myself if I didn't
two things happen one I don't get to
feel good about myself and I give myself
that jab in the ribs of you said you
were going to do it and you did not do
it and then number two I will confess to
my wife or here to the community out
there that I didn't do that day I didn't
meet my goal and so by checking in with
myself in real time I'm able to see the
other is when you're setting goals it is
absolutely critical that all of your
goals have a metric associated with them
so that you know the exact metric that
you want to hit so you know if you're
making progress so often when people get
into the physics of progress they didn't
set a metric by which they're going to
judge their goal so they don't actually
know if they're making progress you want
your goals to be specific you want your
goals to have metrics the reason that I
emphasize that so much is most people
avoid metrics they avoid dates they
avoid those specifics because then they
and others will know if they're actually
making progress if you don't want the
specifics it means you're not actually
interested in the actual prog ress
you're interested in the fiction of
feeling better about yourself by saying
that you have this really cool goal and
so one of the things that I'm constantly
checking with myself is did I live up to
the rhetoric meaning I'm telling people
I want to do this cool thing or did I
actually show up and play to win did I
leave it all out on the field so do not
think that rhetoric is actual
achievement talking about something is
nothing did you actually make progress
and to be honest even trying even though
I actually do think this is complex but
I actually do think you should
emotionally reward yourself only for the
sincere Pursuit but when you're thinking
about tracking progress you need to be
naked and raw about whether you're
actually making progress now the reason
it's so important to do that is if
you're not making progress you need to
adjust this goes back to the physics of
progress you're staring nakedly at your
inadequacies you're asking what could I
have done differently to get a better
result and if in that moment you don't
have a metric to judge yourself against
you don't know how to better inform your
next hypothesis so the goal of trying
something is to learn something that
gives you a better thing to do and when
you do that you make more meaningful
progress and when you don't make that
meaningful progress you need to
understand why but it really does come
down to what gets measured gets improved
what gets measured gets improved if you
don't have the measurement you won't
know whether you're making progress you
won't have the emotional sting that you
need to force yourself to actually dig
in and figure this out so gamify and
make sure that you have metrics you do
those two things and you will make
massive progress if you want to know if
you're setting the bar too high or too
low when it comes to goal setting I will
just tell you this right now you're
setting the bar too low everybody's
setting the bar too low if you think
about the crazy things that people have
accomplished whether it's in I think
it's 64 years or something we went from
the right Brothers flying a plane for
the first time to landing on the moon 64
years it it that's an impossibly small
amount of time to think that somebody
would have been alive at the time like
you could have been 20 at the time the
wri brothers flown and said we're going
to go to the Moon by the time I'm 85 and
been right but imagine how many people
would have told you that you were out of
your mind there is so much literature on
this it's just beyond reproach the
people that set the most aggressive
goals are the ones that end up achieving
their goals now the reason is because
there is complexity here the reason is
is that it gets you excited enough to go
out and pursue this thing to be able to
attract other people to your goal that's
a huge thing that you're going to learn
if you have a goal that's really
exciting and when people think about
getting meaning and purpose in their
life and they think about oh my God I
could be a part of a team that that
takes us to the moon or I could be a
part of a team that terraforms Mars or I
could be a part of a team that ends
world hunger or deals with climate
change whatever the thing is it gets you
excited when it is a gigantic goal it
actually motivates people people now you
also the people that achieve their goals
have a path to getting there so it can't
be a pipe dream you have to actually
know how you're going to March towards
that thing and if it's a business you
need to know how you're going to
generate Revenue all along the way it is
incredibly difficult but you do want to
make sure that you're setting a bar that
is within the realm of physics you don't
want to be throwing something so far
into the trees that it is literally
impossible if you have to invalidate the
laws of physics I will tell you that
that's not very interesting and then one
thing that you want to also think
through is is it something that you
could achieve in your lifetime and if
it's not something you could achieve in
your lifetime are you okay being
somebody that's going to lay a brick
towards building that thing and there's
that old adage that you want to plant
trees under whose shade you will never
sit so there is very many honorable
things that people could do that they're
not going to reap the ultimate benefits
of that they understand that there only
going to be one brick in that wall think
about all the people that have given
their entire professional careers to
solving cancer which remains unsolved
countless amazing Brilliant Minds have
given themselves over to that completely
knowing all they're going to do is Lay
one brick in what will ultimately be the
you know the building that is that
solution but be honest think about that
but make sure that you have a path to
get there that's the key it's got to be
exciting and you've got to see a path
but you want to make sure that you're
really going after something that's
going to inspire you for the long run
because remember the reason that most
people quit is because they are broken
by how boring and difficult things get
so when you ask yourself in the grips of
that difficulty that suffering that
comes along with pursuing a goal you
actually care about you are going to ask
yourself why am I doing this why am I
doing this and if the answer isn't
compelling you're going to quit so make
sure that you come up with a goal that's
big enough that when you ask why you
know exactly why and you'll keep pushing
it's inevitable when you're pursuing
your goals that you're going to find
yourself in a rut and you are not going
to want to stick to what you're doing
the most important thing is to identify
is this a pattern in your life so many
people love the beginning of something
they love that excitement that initial
Fascination when everything is new and
it just feels Limitless and everything
feels possible they haven't gotten that
first punch in the mouth that comes with
really trying to get good at something
and accomplish something when life is
going to get complex it's going to get
in your way you're going to fail you're
going to embarrass yourself all that
stuff so in that moment you've got to
make sure that you are going to push
yourself through that get out and get to
the other side it is inevitable that in
your pursuit of a goal that you care
about you are going to end up getting in
a rut in that moment most people give up
I'm going to tell you what you need to
do if you want to be part of the 8% that
actually sees their goals through you
need to fall back on process so many
people want to fall back on motivation
but the reality is that motivation is
not going to be there for you just the
vast majority of the time the vast
majority of the time you're going to be
bored things are going to be hard you're
going to be tired it's going to be
complex and in that moment you just need
to run a process you need to have habits
that you can rely on to get you through
I've talked about them before but just
to recap you want to make sure that
you're cognitively optimizing you want
to make sure that you have your
important things list you want to make
sure that you're doing things in order
you want to make sure that you have
rules in your life that you stick to you
want to be leveraging your identity that
you're the kind of person that sticks
with things and then you want to have
habits and routines that you're just
going to loop around day after day after
day that you know are moving you towards
your goal to get to your goal it really
is about persistence
consistency metrics so you know whether
or not you're making progress and then
just running the physics of progress
over and over and over you have a
hypothesis about how you're going to
overcome the obstacle that stands
between you and what you're trying to
accomplish you're going to do something
to accomplish that thing and you're
going to see how much progress you made
which is going to give you more
information for you to reformulate that
hypothesis if you fall back on that
process that is going to be the thing
that carries you through never count a
motivation because motivation really
does come and go so make sure that you
have an air type process and then
everything else will fall into line
there are almost certainly a lot of
things that you're doing that are going
to keep you broke the first is what we
were talking about in the last question
it's all about financial literacy do you
know how money actually works as
somebody who came to this game really
late I understand how easy it is to be
educated to be dare I say intelligent
and still not actually understand how
money actually functions and so you want
to make sure that you're taking time
time to get financially literate the
next thing is and some of these are
going to be so basic and people don't do
them you need to stop spending so much
money most people live paycheck to
paycheck even people that are making six
figures live paycheck to paycheck it's
something like 2third of people that
make
$250,000 a year still live paycheck to
paycheck so the goal is instead of
flexing on how much money you make you
want to make sure that you're living
below your means if you want to
dramatically reduce the amount of stress
in your life and set yourself up for
Success you want to make sure that
you're living below your means now as
you begin to live below your means first
the first habit you're going to want to
introduce is that you're going to start
saving some of your money so of course
there's going to be amount that you're
going to allocate towards your living
expenses your house payment or your rent
your car payment insurance all of that
stuff food but then you want to make
sure that automatically you're saving
money if you're not automatically saving
money then you're walking down the path
of remaining broke so you want to make
sure that you're living below your means
and you want to make sure that you're
automatically saving money now once you
have saved up enough money that you have
somewhere between six and 12 months of
emergency cash on
hand if you get sick if you hate your
job any of that stuff is exacerbated a
thousandfold if you're living paycheck
to paycheck because now you've got
nowhere to go there's no way for you to
be able to weather that storm and so
it's what's known as a threshold event
everything in your life may seem like
it's going well until you hurt your back
and you're unable to go to work for uh
two months and you were living paycheck
to paycheck and now you're in financial
ruin or God forbid you get get a
diagnosis uh and you end up with medical
bills and you go bankrupt from that that
happens so frequently so you want to
make sure that you have six to 12 months
saved up now once you have six to 12
months saved up now we want to start
thinking about investing now if you're
not investing you're going to be getting
eaten alive by inflation now a lot of
people are not thinking about inflation
and the reality is even in a good
economy you're looking at inflation
being around 2% now right now as we're
recording this inflation is about 8 and
a half percent so you don't want to
count on it being as low as 2% because
that's not always going to be the case
now the crazy thing is most people don't
understand what inflation actually is so
inflation is your ability to buy
something goes down every year that's
the same as losing money every every
year so imagine if you have
$100 inflation if inflation is 88.5%
like it is now the next year by the next
year because it's happening every day by
the next year you don't have $100 even
even if you saved it didn't touch it
it's locked away in your bank account
you now have the equivalent it'll still
say $100 but that $100 now only buys you
the equivalent of
$91.00 okay that's inflation so your
buying power even though the number
stays the same the buying power is going
down so as of right now as we're
recording this you would need to make
$85 dollar every year in order to stay
at the buying power of your
$100 okay so saving money even though I
just told you to save six to 12 months
you want to make sure that you
understand that you can't just sock all
of your money away and think that it's
going to stay
and this doesn't haunt anyone more than
me I get it because investing is
nerve-wracking but if you don't invest
you're not going to be able to keep up
with inflation if you don't keep up with
inflation you're going to be losing
money over time and if you're losing
money over time that nest egg that
you're going to Hope takes care of you
at the end of the day isn't going to be
there for you and so you really have to
be thoughtful about how you invest now
I'm going to give you the most basic
advice on investing now why am I giving
you basic advice because all the
smartest investors in the world are
saying if you don't know anything about
investing this is what you want to do
and because I do not consider myself a
good investor this is the only advice
that I feel like I can give you that's
actually sound advice and that is to
invest in passive things so you're going
to be investing in ETFs uh in index
funds now index funds are the easiest to
explain an index fund is a group of
companies so rather than you saying I'm
so smart I know what companies are going
to do well I would say don't do that
because even the smartest people that do
this for a living have a hard time being
right over a long period of time here is
a fact that most investors don't want
you to know most investors over a
10-year period are going to lose to an
index fund so the really smart people
with all the algorithms they're all
going to lose to just picking a big
basket of companies and invest in those
and not touching the money and then
doing something called dollar cost
averaging so rather than thinking that
you're so smart that you're going to
beat the market right I'm going to time
it I know when the bottom is right
because the best advice on investing
you're ever going to get is the
following Buy Low sell high now I I
don't mean that as a joke that really is
the best advice you're ever going to get
the problem is most people can't do it
and the reason they can't do it is they
get get emotional or they don't have
enough knowledge and so I see so many
people making these big bets because
it's sexy it's cool and when it hits you
feel like a king the problem is The
House Always Wins and the odds of you on
a long timeline winning like that are
virtually zero and Ray diio made this
really clear to me so Ray Dalo runs the
largest hedge fund in the world it's
called Bridgewater and Associates and he
says Tom look I'm spending hundreds of
millions of dollars on Research I've
spent probably even more than that
building the best algorithms in the
world I have a talent pipeline where I'm
recruiting the best and the brightest
people from across the entire world I
have fiber optic cables that allow me to
make transactions that are measured in
milliseconds and you're competing
against me if you're trying to actively
trade in the market and so that's why
people like him who understand how this
system works are saying for the average
person that's not the game that you want
to play the odds of you losing border on
100% but if you go with something like
an index fund which is there's one
called the S&P 500 the S&P 500 is
effectively the 500 biggest companies on
the stock market now the odds that you
become one of the biggest companies on
the stock market and stay there you're
going to stay there for some I think the
average company stays on the S&P 500 for
like 16 years right now now it's been
declining but still that's a long time
and the way that the S&P 500 works is
when one finally gets down to the bottom
and it gets booted off then they replace
that with another one and so you always
have the top 500 companies in the stock
market at that time and there's a whole
bunch of different index funds it could
be grow stocks it could be stocks in
foreign markets and whatever one you're
comfortable with but at least it's a
basket of stocks and your dollar cost
averaging in which just means that every
day or every Wednesday or whatever
you're putting in a certain amount of
money that you want to invest and you're
just going to leave it you're not going
to panic when the market goes down and
you're not going to when prices are up
you're not going to buy into the
Euphoria now why would you not want to
do that
the reason that you don't want to buy
into the Euphoria is because when price
when people are euphoric prices are
going Skyhigh now in those moments and I
have now lived through my first cycle
where I was really paying attention to
the market and it got euphoric so now I
know what it feels like and what it
feels like is it's always going to go up
that you're a genius you're making all
this money hand over fist now the good
news is when it all crashed I didn't
sell I didn't buy like a fiend it was
going up and I didn't sell when it went
down which means that I don't have any
realized gains or losses now of course
when things are going up if you want to
take money off the table by all means do
that you then bought low and you sold
High makes all the sense in the world
but the last thing you want to do is buy
like crazy as the price is going up and
then Panic as the price drops because
now you've bought high and sold low but
that's what most people do because the
Euphoria is so exciting and people feel
like oh there's no way that I can lose
and then when the bottom falls out they
feel like oh my God it's only going down
this is all going to go to zero and the
reality is it
might but if you follow the principle of
never investing more than you can afford
to lose then you can ride out the market
and if you're in a passive fund like the
S&P
500 then it's just your dollar cost
averaging you're just buying at that
steady interval now when the price drops
you might buy more right if you know
what a good deal looks like like hey if
the S&P 500 is down 20% Then maybe what
I'm going to do is buy instead of my
$100 a week I'm going to put in 150 or
200 if you have the capital to spare now
you're getting things at a discount
right I've heard it said I think it was
by just breit Singh that a recession is
basically just a Black Friday deal for
assets because now everybody's panicking
prices are falling but if you've been
passively investing into something as
stable as the S&P 500 now you're just
able to get more of that at a discount
it can be very advantageous and this is
why they say more millionaires will be
made in the recession than in any other
time because all of these assets are on
discount now the question is what's an
asset and so this is another habit that
ke keeps people broke is they're not
learning about money they're not taking
this time to figure out F out the
difference between an asset and a
liability people are spending all of
their money death habit number one
you're spending all of your money on
liabilities and not assets so the key is
to understand what an asset is to
understand what a liability is and to
buy appropriately an asset is something
that when you buy it's going to go up in
value and not cost you money or even
pays you money more money obviously than
it costs you if you have a liability
it's the exact opposite so the classic
example of a liability is a car payment
the second you drive a car off the lot
it's going down in value and with very
rare exception it is never going to go
back up so it's going down in value and
you've got to keep making those payments
so you've got money going out while
value is declining another one that
people often think of as an asset but is
usually a liability is your own home now
the reason that your own home is so
frequently a liability is odds are you
have a mortgage odds are it's the most
expensive thing in your life and it's
not like you can just get out from under
that liability especially if the bottom
falls out you're going to have property
tax depending on where you live and
you're going to have upkeep no matter
where you live so now you're pouring
money into this thing and maybe the
value is going up but maybe not always
and between the property taxes and the
upkeep you may be paying more than the
value is going up over time
especially if you account for
opportunity cost so the odds of your
house after taxes fees uh upkeep all of
that being a better use of capital if
you're living in it being a better use
of capital than taking that same money
and putting it into uh an index fund or
something like that a diversified
portfolio let's say the the odds of the
house returning more on that are very
low unless obviously if you get into
rental properties and things like that
and you're not living in it so now it
can actually generate cash flow well
then it's just a math equation this is
how much I spend on average per month
for um
Insurance uh property tax upkeep all of
that and if on average the rent that
you're getting is more than the money
that you have going out then it's very
simple every month I'm making more off
of this property then I'm losing cool
now you've got an asset so that is the
difference if you're paying for
something it's a liability if you're
making money off of something it's an
asset now most people don't have the
discipline to buy assets because
liabilities are usually the fun things
it's the cool clothes it's the car it's
the fancy house all of that stuff and so
people get themselves into a difficult
situation because now the vast majority
of their capital is going out and this
is how people end up
in a position where they're living
paycheck to paycheck okay another thing
I want to talk about that's a bad habit
is that people are on a career path now
why is that bad you ask I have so many
people around me at my company that are
on a career path and they're amazing
people but the people that really make
money are the people that get so good at
something that they can solve the most
difficult problem s that the company
faces so rather than thinking oh I am an
editor and so I'm going to get good at
editing and I'm going to work my way up
that way you can basically predict what
your salary is going to be you're more
or less going to get a 2 to 5% raise
year-over-year there'll be a couple
times where maybe you're promoted into
uh a role within that lane that has more
UH responsibilities and therefore you
get paid more money but you can just
look at that career path and say what is
the person that's the highest in in this
chain that I'm working my way up what do
they make that's what you're going to
make plus the sort of annual
increases on the other hand if you look
at who's the person in the company
making the most money full stop now you
begin to understand that just following
that one career trajectory is not
necessarily going to be as lucrative as
solving those very difficult problems
that the highest paid people in the
company are solving so I'll give you one
example if you want to get wealthy in a
company go into sales I me that's just
like the classic path to making money
because now if you're getting a
commission off of what you sell you're
only hemmed in by how much you can sell
and the price of the thing that you sell
so now you've got a lot more flexibility
so be very thoughtful as you're
exchanging time for money don't forget
that you also want to be in a position
where you can exchange skill set for
money efficiency for money all of those
things allow you to break the basic time
for money equation and that is going to
be far more lucrative and now as you're
making that extra Capital if you keep
your cost of living low now you're able
to invest into those assets and as you
invest into Assets Now you're kicking
off either cash flow or you're building
up wealth over time and something that
can be sold for way more than you bought
it for okay if you do all of that you
can finally break these habits that are
keeping you broke there are certain
habits basically all wealthy people have
in common that you guys can put to use
in your life
and the first one is going to be the
most controversial but I could not feel
more strongly about this they make no
excuses they take total responsibility
for their lives in fact many people that
fall into that category will take
responsibility for things that clearly
don't even have anything to do with
themselves I have said many times this
is arguably the most controversial thing
I've ever said but I'm telling you if
you adopt this in your soul and act
accordingly it will change your life
forever you will be become an
Unstoppable
machine if I tomu were hit by a drunk
driver I would blame myself not because
I don't think that the drunk driver
caused the accident because blaming the
drunk driver gives all my power away and
I can't do anything about them I can't
stop people from drinking I can't
control the way other people drive but I
can control whether or not I'm on the
road I can control how good I get at
defensive driving how much I pay
attention and looking out all of that
all of those things I control so if you
take control of your life and make no
excuses now you're in a solution
oriented mindset and people that get
wealthy let me tell you right now all
they think about are solutions how do I
solve this problem because you are if
you're wealthy you must remember you're
you're paid in direct proportion to the
difficulty of the problems you solve and
if that's true you better get very good
at solving very difficult problems and
if you have something that's holding you
back like I'm not as smart as a lot of
people and that really pisses me off but
the reality is pissing a moaning about
it is not going to make me any smarter
all I can do is go make the most of what
I have I can go learn now I could get
pissed off at my mom I could be angry at
my dad but the reality is that I am
where I'm at from either uh how I was
impacted as a kid in the developmental
years how I impacted in the womb my
genetics all of that stuff but it's all
done the D is cast was I can do about it
but there's 50% of my life that's
completely malleable and so I'm going to
focus on that and I'm going to like
other wealthy people be obsessed with
learning you've got to be obsessed with
learning so you're not making any
excuses you take total responsibility
for your life and one of the ways you
take responsibility for your life is
even if circumstances are against you
even if you really have been dealt a bad
hand you know that you can get better at
things you have the only belief that
matters the only belief that matters is
if I put energy and effort into getting
better I will actually get better now
why does that matter because skills have
utility now why does that matter because
skills let you do something other people
can't do and that thing that it lets you
do is solve problems that people want
solved what have I said like eight times
in this episode that people will pay you
in direct proportion to the difficulty
of the problems you solve so going out
learning getting skills that have
utility allows you to do things other
people can't do you're going to be able
to get money other people can't get that
is something that wealthy people
understand maybe it's not fair but who
gives a [ __ ] nobody's coming to save you
nobody's going to solve these problems
for you and if you're turning to people
for a handout all you will ever get is
what they're willing to put in your
hand but if on the other hand you're
willing to go hey what's the hardest
problem you have to solve I'm going to
make that problem go away for you and
all I ask ask in return is money and I'm
going to ask the amount of money that's
either equal to the exchange for you or
less so that you're tripping over
yourself to buy this thing and that is
precisely how you end up breaking the
time for money equation because wealthy
people
understand you just can't charge enough
for your time in order to make it worth
it so as you can imagine there are
people that offer to pay me a lot of
money for one-on-one coaching but I
don't do it and why don't I do it
because unless you're willing to give me
equity in your company to do it I just
can't charge enough to make it worth the
time so you have to break that time for
money equation you have to be getting
ownership in something and that's
another thing that people understand
wealthy
people that real wealth is going to come
from owning something you own something
that other people consider
extraordinarily valuable that is going
up over time time now the reason that
ownership matters is because you want to
buy low and sell High the reason that
entrepreneurs end up making a lot of
money in success obviously is because
they start with something that's worth
nothing and they get very clever and
they build something that over time goes
from worth nothing to worth whatever the
market values it at so to give you an
example in my own life talked about this
earlier we took Quest from a product I
couldn't give away literally I know that
seems ridiculous now but when we first
launched I would stand at trade shows
and tell bodybuilders who ended up
becoming like the most Ardent purchasers
of quest and I would say free protein
bar it's a free Quest Bar I will give it
to you right now we didn't even in the
beginning we didn't even ask for an
email all you had to do was extend your
hand grasp bar that was the sum total of
the payment that we were asking for and
people wouldn't do
it so we had to take it from figuring
out the formulation building out the
manufacturing uh all the things that
we've talked about convincing people to
try it and we went from that to
something that people were willing to
pay a billion dollars for but in the
beginning it was worth nothing and so
the amount of money that we had to put
in to get profitable and then we
reinvested all that money and then
ultimately we were able to sell it for
that extraordinary sum of money and it
was a huge win lifechanging for all of
us
involved because we started with nothing
and we owned it and we built value in it
that's the key you have to own something
that goes up in value over time so
whether you bought low and you're going
to sell high or whether you were the one
that created all the value and so you
didn't even have to buy anything you
just created value in this thing that
later people wanted to own so ownership
is a huge key for people that end up
generating wealth you want to want to
own you want to hold and so um Warren
Buffett talks about this a lot selling
makes you rich holding makes you wealthy
now what does he mean by that if you
want to sell something you can get that
influx of cash and you will have
whatever that cash is now but now you're
fighting against inflation right so
you've got the money but what the hell
do you do with it what are you going to
do with it that doesn't allow it to get
chipped Away by inflation you're going
to have to find somewhere to put that
money that's earning you more money than
inflation is taking and so that's why
holding really becomes the ultimate play
if you're holding the right thing
because it's going up up up up up over
time and then you can either borrow
against that this is something that
wealthy people understand you can borrow
against your assets you don't even have
to sell them you use the asset as
collateral you go to a bank and let's
say that your collateral sorry it is
your collateral but your asset is what I
meant to say your asset is going up
let's say 5% 7% year over every year and
inflation is 2% or like right now 8
88.5% is the current inflation hopefully
by the time you watch this that won't be
true uh and your assets going up by 10%
so now you're in a situation where even
though inflation is chipping away at
most people's ability to buy and
whatever you have in savings is going
down by that amount amount of
inflation you've got this asset that's
going up more than that cost now if
you've got a bank that's willing to give
you a loan with that asset is collateral
and the loan is let's say three or 4%
but you're making five 7% off of that
money that you're either using to
reinvest in your company or buying
stocks or whatever you're doing you have
to be very careful buying stocks on debt
which I'm actually I advise people not
to do but just so you understand how
money
Works wealthy people that know how to
use debt effectively that's what they're
doing they don't sell the asset they
borrow against the asset and as long as
there's a Delta between the cost of the
loan and the amount that the asset goes
up you now never have to sell the asset
you can just keep borrowing against it
this is how real wealth is made real
generational wealth so yes you can sell
the asset and you can make that money
and you will have to do that uh over
time in order to pay back the loan and
all that stuff but again there's a Delta
so even as you're selling pieces you're
making more than you have to pay back
it's really crazy and it's freakish how
long it took me to understand even basic
things like that so trust me when I say
I deep empathize with people who are
hearing that for the first
time so understand that they understand
they have to own something they have to
own something that goes up in value over
time and that they want to own something
ideally that they can borrow against and
so that's how selling makes you rich but
owning and holding can make you truly
wealthy all right those are the habits
if you follow those habits you really
can turn things around in your life be
hyper careful about using debt that's
like the the advanced level stuff but
just by way of making sure you
understand how the system works it can
be a very powerful tool in the right
hands I know a lot of people are asking
the question do I have a spending
problem or do I have an earning problem
now the great news is you've identified
the only two levers that there are you
can either spend less money or you can
make more money those are your two
options but I would say that most people
have a problem with both the odds that
you're spending too much money are
virtually 100% unless you you're really
able to Sock away money week after week
month after month year after year and so
the easy way to figure out is how much
money more money do you have at the end
of the year than you have at the
beginning and if that number is going up
and it's going well amazing now remember
the goal isn't just to save a ton of
money you want to save six to 12 months
beyond that you want to be finding a way
to invest now look there are certain
economies because I feel bad saying this
right now knowing that I have a huge
portion of of my wealth right now in
cash so some of this has to do with
Seasons the reason is I think that we're
in a very bizarre period of volatility
right now that I don't expect to last I
am now beginning to look more seriously
at different assets because I do think
that things are relatively depressed
right now be aware though I am not a
financial adviser this is not Financial
advice you should be very careful who
you take Financial advice from so when
it comes into the specifics I would say
go find somebody that knows way more
about what I'm talking about but just
getting you to understand I was feeling
weird not admitting that right now I
have a ton more uh in cash than I would
normally so anyway there are different
seasons but for the most part you don't
want to have a bunch of money in cash
you want to have your six to 12 months
and then you want to have the rest
invested in something that is very
passive you're not in there actively
trading going up against people like R
Delio um you're taking a basket of
things you're not trying to time the
market you're not trying to outsmart the
market you're saying this is how I say
to myself I'm not smart enough to pull
this off so I'm going to take a
diversified approach to buying low
selling High I can't time the market so
I'm going to dollar cost average in and
then I'm just going to make sure that my
assets are going up over a long period
of time I'm not going to panic about
little blips so and I'm talking like
three to four year movements so I'm not
worried about something going down over
a three-year period I'm just thinking
okay I want to make sure that I have a
very robust Diversified portfolio and
that it's going up over longer periods
of time and just look at historicals how
is it performed historically there are
no guarantees of course but if something
has done well over the last 100 120
years odds are that you can roughly
count on something like that moving
forward and so that is um the very basic
approach that I would take you want to
make sure that at the end of the month
that you've got more coming in than you
have going out and it really is that
base basic and then just remember there
are two levers to pull you can either
spend less which is always an option
don't think yourself cool because you
have a fancy car fancy house fancy watch
fancy clothes none of that I buy most of
my clothes on Amazon obviously I could
afford a lot more but I just don't tie I
actually do tie myself to my sense of
style which I actually do like but I
don't tie that to whether the clothes
are expensive or not and I remind myself
constantly I could wake up broke
tomorrow so don't tie your identity to
that don't be afraid to pull back your
expenses as just breit Singh has said
many times if you can't buy something
five times don't buy it once I think
that is very good advice so be super
thoughtful about your spending and then
go crazy on figuring out ways to make
more money because personally I couldn't
live in a world where all I was doing
was saving I want to be excited about my
potential upside opportunities and so
for a lot of you figuring out a way to
invest in yourself to take it a chance
on yourself as either um uh having a
side hustle or being a full-blown
entrepreneur will be the greatest
journey of your life even if it doesn't
end up paying off financially it will be
an incredible journey and if you love it
you love that hustle as long as you're
not investing so much money into the
bank that it into the into the business
that it becomes stressful if you lose it
then hey that first one fails try try
try again until you find one that
succeeds successful entrepreneurs almost
always always have a Litany of failures
behind them so don't stress yourself
over that just make sure that you're in
a position where you don't need a lot of
money to survive and then you can do a
lot of cool and exciting things for
those people who do maybe they aren't
aware or they understand but have so
much dopamine and just like H habitual
of just going to Tik Tok Instagram
Twitter just scrolling for days uh to
pass the time to do whatever how do you
go about he like changing that behavior
if you're already so entren in it I come
down to one thing George like you're
young so I really want you to hear me
your life is a confusing mess right now
and that will manifest as negative
emotion it's all going to pass I've
glimpsed your future it all works out
it's amazing your life becomes wonderful
because as you get older you're going to
gain control of your emotions as you
gain control of your emotions you're
going to gain control of your time as
you gain control of your time you're
going to acquire skills as you acquire
skills you're going to be able to do
things that other people can't do like
that really is the loop and so as people
get older the reason that they tend to
be happier and more self- assured is
they realize the rules of the game that
you can just really get better at this
stuff and you can get good and so I want
people to hear that but my thing is like
dude you've really got to be obsessed
with what you want to accomplish and so
if I could get you to understand bro all
your dreams that maybe the scale will be
off maybe you want to be the greatest
and you become from you know
1,142 but out a 7.4 billion that's
really pretty cool and so that's going
to be the ride of your life but you have
to get obsessed and the only reason that
obsession is fun is because you actually
know you're going to make progress It's
when you're obsessed and things aren't
going well and you don't realize it's
just a matter of time and so like right
now dude I I am really emotionally
worried for people that don't understand
the economy is going to turn back around
Wars end like they're devastating I
don't wished on anybody but this too
shall pass it's like the great buest
phrase of all time this two shall pass
if you knew that yeah the next three
years are going to suck but after that
it's going to be dope man and there's
going to be a stretch of seven years
that are nothing but awesomeness but
then you're going to go through an
18-month period your you know one of
your loved ones is going to pass away
and that's going to be brutal but then
you're going to have a stretch of six
years it's going to be awesome then
you're going to have four years of just
total suck but through it all you're
going to be getting better and better at
managing your emotions so through it all
you know all is going to be well that's
the joy man and so the thing I'm always
trying to get people to understand
you'll never get what you want out of
life you're never going to accomplish
the things that you want unless you are
obsessed obsession will hurt and it will
be unhealthy unless you realize that you
can get better and if you value yourself
for already being good right better
faster stronger life will be a misery no
matter what and so far better to focus
on did I leave it all out on the field
today right so value yourself for how
hard you went after something not for
what you accomplished and then let
yourself get obsessed with something
because you'll get better over time and
then with that Obsession what if it's an
obsession with something that's not
productive or unhealthy like video games
for example who said that's not
productive and who said it's unhealthy
so there's only that which moves me
towards my goals and that which moves me
away from my goals now I'll make one
caveat your goals should be honorable
I'll Define honorable an honorable goal
is something that uplifts you and other
people that's about as simple as I can
make it so if you have a goal that
uplifts you and other people then why
not go just absolutely Bonkers to make
it come true if you want to be a
professional gamer then that's going to
be playing a lot of video games and I
actually I never would believed this is
true but I enjoy watching other people
play video games it's fun and so if
that's the way that you want to
contribute that for people that want to
watch you play they can amazing so now
it's uplifting you and other people
you'll be able to get into the passion
Loop so that you're both the shout and
the echo the shout being you playing the
echo being people enjoying watching you
play or maybe you're like playing video
games so you can help build video games
right so there's many ways you can do
something like that so I just want
people to have an honorable goal and
then ask themselves of everything you do
did this movie toward your goal yes or
no if if yes keep doing it if no stop
doing it and that's it and that
literally is the easiest way to steer
but people let things complicate that
because their parents tell them that
they should be doing something that
maybe they do or don't want to do they
think that they should be making a ton
of money and the thing that they love
doesn't make them a lot of money they
want to be the best and they trick
themselves into thinking this is only
fun if I'm the greatest of all time I
will tell you right now I play the video
game Destiny 2 and I would laugh I'm
sure if I saw the people that are
spanking me I mean just embarrassing me
but I still love it and so I try to
remind myself that it's about getting
better when I play because I love to
improve and it's just video games are
designed to squeeze the brain centers
that evolution is giving you for
progression and goal acquisition and all
that stuff so it is a very fun microcosm
so I think people have to be very
careful casting aspersions moral
judgments on any goal that is uplifting
you and other people
do you think that there is a a way to
incorporate your passion which could be
video games into purpose and also
providing service and have that work for
you or do you think you have to
sacrifice one or like you know focus on
on a certain thing first like does is
there a perfect world where all three
can exist I think all three can exist
but greatness makes demands so hiding in
that meaning and purpose will all but
break you because the world is
constantly moving towards entropy so
from the moment of the Big Bang
everything is moving towards chaos now
when you introduce humans Jesus you
magnify the amount of chaos uh 10,000
fold I mean it's just absolutely insane
we ourselves are complicated bumping
into all people that are complicated as
well and so to achieve something great
you are really going to fail a lot you
are going to run into more obstacles
than you can count but the problem is
that fulfillment requires that you work
hard partly because that for humans to
become the most dominant predator of the
world has ever seen we' to be very good
at ordering the world to order the world
you have to pour a tremendous amount of
energy to stop the chaos and move it
towards order because that's the other
part of that equation to bring order to
a system you must pour energy into it
literal energy and so that's the battle
that all of us are are fighting against
and so if we know that meaning and
purpose is is the only thing that will
ever serve you long term that is how you
get to fulfillment and to do meaning and
purpose we know it's going to be
brutally difficult then the very thing
that makes life worth living is going to
be very hard it will bring you to your
knees I I have literally been brought to
my knees but as you get back up which I
encourage everyone to do because we're
all going to get brought to our knees
but not everybody's going to get back up
so if you get brought to your knees
don't worry about that doesn't make you
a loser but it does mean that you're on
your knees and it does mean you owe
yourself getting back up now when you
get back up that's going to make you
feel some kind of way about yourself you
going be like yo that didn't break me
that's incredible so having meaning and
purpose means by definition you are
going to be brought to your knees at
some point you are going to fail to have
the impact you want to have on the world
and if you're ever going to have that
and feel the way you want to feel you
have to get back up and keep going we've
been talking a lot about like ambition
and drive and getting your goals I know
another big part of your life is your
relationship so how does your
relationship fit into uh your good life
with your ambition and um yeah how does
that all cocktail work in your life the
good life how to live it step one you're
having a biological experience what does
that mean you are an animal that's been
shaped by Evolution the more you
understand the organ of the brain really
the whole body the microbes in it all of
it the more you understand that
biological system the more you're going
to be able to predict the outcome of
your thoughts and actions and so if
you're trying to have a good life one
you're going to want to Define it which
I will say the good life is fulfillment
it's the only emotional state that is
resilient to everything from anger loss
and grief through all of that you can be
fulfilled you may be devastated and when
you love a lose a loved one it's
devastating it sucks there's nothing fun
about it that doesn't mean that I'm not
fulfilled as a human it just means that
I'm a fulfilled human going through
something brutal conversely if I'm
momentarily happy but nothing is going
right in my life I'm not contributing in
any meaningful way I can laugh for five
minutes and still be depressed so
fulfillment I would say is the only
thing that's resilient you're not going
to be depressed and fulfilled at the
same time like it's just not now that we
have a definition for what the good life
is now we can actually begin moving
towards it now the reason I say that
step one is recognizing that you're
having a biological experience is I
understand that things that are going to
lead to fulfillment one of them is
working really hard another one is
following or developing a passion that
lets you contribute that's number three
to the group and to yourself so if those
are the rough ingredients that make up
this cocktail of fulfillment we have to
figure out this idea of contributing to
the group what's that all about that's
about being a social animal now what's
the ultimate iteration of being a social
animal it is love now why is love so
potent because Nature has one aim and
one aim only the reason you are a social
animal is because of this one reason the
reason that you have drive and ambition
is because of this one reason Nature's
only goal this is it this is the
punchline of everything every your
motivation for sitting here right now my
motivation for answering these questions
the reason that we put these cameras
together built this Channel all of it is
for one thing because nature wants to
make sure that you have kids that have
kids that's it
and now everything in your brain is
nature pulling levers to make sure that
you live long enough to have kids to
have kids and that you actually have
kids so love which I will say is a
neurochemical state is Nature's Way of
going yo I want to make sure you do this
thing so it's this incredible cocktail
of I mean obviously the there's
different kinds of love I will assume
you mean romantic love since you
referenced my relationship so romantic
love is like the thing it is the thing
that when you think about how people
want to feel in fact when they have
people describe how they want to feel
and they look at that neurochemistry you
know what it most closely matches even
though this isn't the word that people
put to it do you have a guess like looks
like you're on drugs or something it's
an
orgasm and so it makes sense that if
Nature's job is to make sure that you
stay alive long enough to have kids that
have kids that the neurochemical
cocktail of an orgasm be pretty high on
people's list so as people are
describing it they're like oh yeah
that's the neurochemical you state you
feel right after an orgasm so
technically it isn't the orgasm itself
but it's that cocktail afterwards all
the bonding hormones are secreted after
that you can actually predict I don't
know with what degree of accuracy but
I'm going to guess it is extraordinarily
high that you can predict who will stay
married by the number of receptors that
they have for I think it's vasopressin
which is one of the U Bond hormones so
there's oxytocin and vasopressin are the
two biggest the ones where you're it's
like the cuddle hormones so that's the
kind of feeling over time that you want
to have for somebody why because then
you're more likely to have kids and then
you're likely to raise them long enough
that they have kids because it's not
just having kids it's having kids that
have kids so you have to keep them alive
and all of the crazy things that nature
does to do that are incredible but
nature only has two levers Pleasure and
Pain and one of those tremendous
Pleasures that nature will give you that
is extraordinarily resilient to
suffering and loss and sadness and all
that is that really deep love not the
early Lusty stuff that's super fun but
like that really deep I have shared a
life I don't know who I am without this
person love that you can have with
another person if you're leveraging all
of that neurochemical cocktail of
soaking in the bonding so that over time
time that sense of love is like nothing
can touch it nothing can give me that
right I've made a lot of money in a
single day right nine figures in a
single day I'll let people go put in a
calculator nine figures of see just how
much that is in a single day okay it's a
dope feeling but it's not love love
trumps everything I've ever been through
in my life when it's sustained and so I
put a lot of energy into it a lot of
energy because it gives me back more
than anything else in my life so you
mentioned how nature is programmed you
to have kids who have kids and you made
a personal decision not to do that
uh why did you opt out of what nature
wants why I opted out of it we'll get to
in a second but the fact that we can all
opt out is fun because I'm like ha I got
you [ __ ] it's like nature thought she
had me but I you know I'm not I'm not
playing that game uh so here's the thing
I really want kids to this day I really
want kids there are Still Moments where
I'll see that thing that's like oo man
it triggers all of my desire to have
kids and I'm like man I am very sad that
I can't both have the life that I'm
living and have the life where I have
kids but I looked at my life from
several different Vantage points what my
wife calls the average Wednesday so what
would an average Wednesday look like if
I had kids and I Know Myself and I feel
a
tremendous amount of obligation in fact
part of the reason that I work as hard
as I do at impact theory is I feel an
obligation to you guys I feel an
obligation to the team and I really I
take that seriously in ways that I think
most people would be distressed by and
so for me it's like okay I really need
to think about that if I had kids I
would feel a huge OB obligation to them
to come home and so one thing that I
like about work is that I don't feel
conflicted Lisa and I are building it
together so as I put energy into this
I'm putting energy into something that
I'm doing with my wife so that doesn't
feel like it's fragmented energy it
feels like it's coming together that was
obviously on purpose I'm building a
company that brings many of my passions
not all of them but many of my passions
together so even as I pursue things that
I would do no matter what I'm also
building the business and I do that
because I know I'm gonna feel that sense
of obligation so let me make sure that
I'm doing things that I love to satisfy
the obligation if I had kids now when
I'm at work I would feel like I should
be with my kids when I'm with my kids I
should feel like I I would feel like I
should be at work I just know that about
myself so I want to be really honest and
then you don't miss what you don't have
so it's not like I had a seven-year-old
and they died just never had kids right
so kids are a thought so I can think and
I'll have those moments sometimes really
intense like oh dude like you see that
moment like have you guys seen that Tik
Tok Trend where it's like they record
they do like the little the there's a
song and they like propose to their
daughter and they have the daughter
recording she doesn't realize she's
recording herself and she's like looking
at them with like a enjoy I'm like oh
God like that hits me right in the
fields and I'm like oh man I want to
have a daughter or like that Jordan
Peterson one did you know that one when
they have like kids will not always be
kids they'll grow up and this I haven't
seen it and it's just like people
videoing their kids growing up from like
a kid to like 5 years old even hearing
about that kicks me in the fields yeah
you makes a Som assault like Lisa says
yes oh yeah yeah yeah my my suddenly I
have a uterus as well yeah exactly it
that kind of thing like they really
really hit me so but anyway I can set
that aside because I'm like my marriage
is amazing I fully understand Nature's
trick which is when you have a kid the
child will be your number one priority
and right now Lisa is my number one
priority I don't know that this is a
stat but I'd be willing to bet that
relationships are more likely to break
up or be dysfunctional that's a better
way to say it relationships are more
likely to be dysfunctional if you have
kids so even people that stay together I
think it's a higher likelihood that that
stop being a very um thriving emotional
and sexual relationship if you have kids
so I'm super thoughtful about that and
then again average Wednesday don't
really like I hate like doing things
that kids want to do and stuff like that
I have so little time it's like I want
to do the things I want to do uh and
then when I look back on my life and
walk through all the different moments
because all of our lives are broken into
phases I look at the different phases
it's not until I'm in my 60s that I
start to go oo I think that having kids
will like be pretty important to me and
by the time I'm 0 I will regret it
there's no doubt about that but because
I've thought through it I'll know how to
deal with that frame of reference when I
get there so that I don't get destroyed
by it because it's when people are
caught off guard by a frame of reference
and explaining a frame of reference is
beyond the scope of this conversation
but when you get to that frame of
reference you see life through that and
when you get caught off guard like by
having a kid and you didn't think
through that well or not having kids and
you didn't think through that well uh at
last check the most unhappy people in
America are
mid-30s female
lawyers because they've chosen career
over children and they are now at that
moment where it's like whoa is this
really what I want for my life now maybe
other occupations they love it and it's
not a problem but for whatever reason 35
year-old
women uh
attorneys it's emotional implosion time
so that's somebody who did not think
through what are the different phases of
my life like it's dope in my early 20s
where I'm like yo I'm proving I can do
anything I set my mind to I'm grinding
I'm making a ton of money this is rad
and then you realize oh wait a second
maybe there are other things that I
didn't think through but if you think
through that and you're like oh in my
mid-30s I may want kids but you know
what I'd actually rather play my career
out now at least you're not taking by
surprise so you can plan around okay I
better have a career that gives me those
things thinking through that I think is
very important I know when I get to 80
that I will be very grateful that I
thought through how my frame of
reference will change and so I will make
plans to be able to Mentor people to
have in fact I'm starting to do that now
even just in the way that I shift my own
thinking thinking about myself more as
like a father trying to like hey I've
suffered in my life I want other people
to learn easily what I have learn
through great suffering which is of
course what one of the things that makes
being a parent cool it's like hey I can
help you hopefully make your life a
little bit better and so that part of
being a parent I can express in a lesser
way I'm very well aware of that through
the people in the company through the
people that watch the content so being
aware of the how the frames of reference
shift is important but anyway that how I
have the way I've thought about pulling
a fast one on mother nature to the
extent that you can but it's a trade-off
and then the last question I had was
what are like three behaviors that you
do to reinforce your love for Lisa that
other people can put into their
relationships okay so this is huge one
don't criticize compliment so when I was
young and you get together and you're in
that relationship and everything is
great but then you start living together
and like that super
druglike early days starts to wear off
and all of the sudden it's all the
things that they do that drive you crazy
and you're like hey could you not do
that you know when you do that it really
bugs me hey God stop why are you doing
it like that and I was like wow when she
does it to me that drives me crazy so I
was like you know what every time I have
an Impulse to criticize her instead I'm
going to reach for a real compliment I'm
never going to lie I'm not going to BS
but I'm going to reach for a real
compliment what that does is it pattern
interrupts in my own brain so I'm not
reinforcing the negative thing because
it really is negative like the person
really is doing something that drives
you crazy and it probably really is a
dumb thing that if you could wave a wand
to make go away you would and so it's
not even like I'm saying that annoying
thing isn't actually annoying it is but
if I obsess over it all I'm going to see
is the Annoying Thing whereas that
positive thing is also real so I want to
make sure I'm spending my time thinking
about the positive thing so don't
criticize compliment always make it
real but spend your time in the
compliment have a lot of sex just real
like even now in my 40s it is so funny
in my late 40s I can think back to what
I was like in my early 20s my poor wife
and like going through that and thinking
oh it's going to be like this forever
it's not like as your hormones change
and I know that I'm only one
testosterone injection from being right
back there but it feels more manageable
whereas before I felt like a drug addict
who couldn't focus it's like now I feel
like hey I have a healthy relationship
with this drug uh I'm a recreational
user now instead of an addict which is
way better and so being in that space
though I've realized it's still
critically important it is a thing that
is unlike anything else in your life
it's the only person that you have that
relationship with if if you're
monogamous and that's not an over vote
for monogamy but monogamy has a really
potent upside and so being in uh a
monogamous relationship and knowing that
that's my one outlet for that it you
realize that sex is this fascinating
thing that is a mode that we all go into
and Going Back To Nature wants to make
sure that you have kids that have kids
it's like nature made sure that that was
an awesome thing that is unlike anything
else and so I'm legitimately freaked out
by how much less sex young people are
having now because they're missing out
on something incredibly potent now I'm
only vouching for sex with connection I
won't say that it has to be uh a
marriage because I've had had my share
of non-marital sex and it was awesome
and I'm not denigrating that at all but
I've always found that it's way more
enjoyable if it's somebody that you have
a real connection with so but thinking
about it like that it is this mode that
you don't get anywhere else if you have
a spouse and you have what they call Bed
Death that relationship is going to
become dry and brittle that's metaphoric
obviously but that you that you'll get
the right idea in your head whereas if
you maintain a sexual relationship
you're constantly Crossing this weird
boundary into like this this completely
unique space that you only have with
that person and nature is squeezing this
neurochemistry that constantly bonds you
brings you back together so that's
hugely important I cannot stress that
enough and then number three you have to
be a highle communicator you've got to
invest in saying things that you don't
want to say and I think one of the
biggest breakthroughs in my marriage was
when I finally realized that I had to
say out loud anytime insecurity was
driving me because then my wife could
help me and as long as she never
weaponized the insecurity against me now
it's not my wife's problem to solve now
hopefully she can help me overcome that
that would be amazing but it's not she
doesn't need to solve that problem
that's my problem to solve but she can't
weaponize my insecurities against me and
by me articulating them now we know
what's actually going on so we're not
arguing about a surface level thing we
get to the real issue that's driving it
we can both process through that
together and so so now you don't have
stupid fights that last forever you're
getting to the root cause of the issue I
mean this is exactly like in medicine
don't treat the symptom find the
underlying cause but when you are
arguing you have friction in your
marriage you have to figure out the
underlying cause and I promise you it's
either a collision of values so you just
you both understand each other you just
disagree that that's how the world
should be it's misaligned base
assumptions so you are viewing the world
in a way that you don't even realize
you're doing it so people don't realize
what their Bas assumption is it's just
it's what they call an axiom you just
live by it like oh I assume that that
emotion is very distressful for you so
why wouldn't you want to solve the
problem you assume that I know that it's
not uncomfortable to sit in a negative
emotion those are base assumptions but
in reality my base assumption is you're
in so much pain right now from this
emotion the only thing that makes sense
is for us to solve that problem and your
base assumption is dude how can I solve
a problem if I haven't had a chance to
sit in it yet but if we don't say that
I'm trying to solve the problem you're
like [ __ ] just listen right and so
when two smart people are colliding they
need to check their base assumptions
first like what's your base assumption
that I need to sit with this emotion
before I can problem solve I need to
problem solve to to even think straight
cool now we can begin to understand each
other so it's either values it's
misaligned base assumptions or you've
got an insecurity that's driving you and
you either aren't aware of it or you're
not being honest about it and so if you
get that stack right then all of a
sudden communication becomes very easy
but man you've got to be emotionally
naked and that is very very difficult
but it is hyper rewarding if you have a
partner that doesn't use it against you
so everybody sees how strong you know
your relationship is with Lisa how
amazing it is how deep but then also
people see how amazing your the career
side of it is like your business impact
theory is growing it's thriving and I
just want to know how you balance that
to keep both of them leveled up so
evenly to keep them both growing and
what your advice would be to people who
don't know how to balance their
relationship and their business or their
work so if you want to balance things
you have to know thyself so just a few
days ago I sent Lisa a text that hurt
her feelings and I didn't mean it to I
said hey would you mind if we did this
business thing on a day that was special
for her and I and I even said you're
probably going to hate this idea
but CU remember I feel a tremendous
obligation to to work for you guys and
to make sure that the company thrives
and all that so I'm always thinking like
hey this would be really good for the
team now Lisa's role stated role it's
not like she would be confused if she
heard me say this she' be like yeah
that's my role her stated role is to be
the early warning system because I don't
see the problem coming in the
relationship as quickly as she does so
we refer to it as being disconnected
where I work so much that we start to
feel disconnect connected so thank you
for saying that people see my
relationship is thriving and I would say
that it is but it's because we have
these bumpers and I'll bump up against
it as I did just a few days ago and I
sent that thing and said hey let's do
this business I know this is that really
special day for us but let's do this
because I think it'd be good for the
team and she said hey that hurts my
feelings that you would even ask because
it makes me feel not heard and not
understood because 2022 was the hardest
year of my business life and for eight
months she let me work 120 hours hours a
week that's not even getting a full
night's sleep that's working around the
clock seven days a week I mean it's it's
pandemonium and I do not re recommend it
I'm not proud of myself for doing it it
was actually a result of mistakes do I
think I'm a badass for doing it yes but
do I think it was a problem of my own
making very much so so my wife was very
understanding through that now I
promised her that I would find my way
back to her which I did and so but now
she's very
gunshy31 eight months and now you want
to do a work thing on our special day
that makes me feel very unheard now if
either thing happens poorly in that
moment we have a problem but Lisa and I
do that movement well she speaks up and
says hey it bothered me that you even
asked and I'm like oh damn like I don't
like that it bothers you that I asked
because your role is to play that person
where I can say hey let's do this and
you say early warning don't do that so
she had to be graceful in that moment
and say cool I'm not going to double
down I'm not going to be angry let's not
do that as the early warning system I'm
telling you we can't do it and then if
in that moment I'm like yo what the [ __ ]
like come on this will be better for the
business I thought we were in this
together then she's going to feel
abandoned in the marriage so I'm like
hey your stated role is to be the one to
say nope that will lead to us feeling
disconnected and so when you say it even
though I have an Impulse to go in the
opposite direction and I'm not feeling
disconnected and that feels like a
really small thing to me that's your
role word so I'm going to immediately
back off totally I'm actually sorry that
I asked I didn't mean to upset you and I
totally get where you're coming from I
hear you like we're on it and so now we
just we move on I'm more thoughtful
about okay fair like the eight months is
pretty intense I totally get why she's
saying that next time I'm going to try
to catch myself before I ask but if I do
she's not going to be upset but she is
going to check it and say you can't do
that so it's one understanding it takes
constant maintenance there is no such
thing as oh my marriage is great and it
will remain great forever my marriage is
great because we work on it every single
day now balancing the business in that
it doesn't mean that I give more more
time to my marriage because I don't I
give more time to the business but it
does mean that I prioritize my marriage
so if my wife says hey we can't do that
thing then we're not going to do it like
I will just tell you the CFO pulled Lisa
and I aside was like yo two weeks at
Christmas Crazy Town can't do it and I
was like I'm just telling you right now
two weeks at Christmas every year from
now until the end of time because like
the rest of my life I make it about my
business for two weeks I'm not a
business man I'm a family man it is what
it is and he was like okay cool like
totally on board I get it but that's one
of those you you have to know like I
need to do this set of 32 things to make
sure that my marriage which is always
thriving and they don't always mean the
most time now it's not an accident that
Lisa and I build a company together I
would never be able to work as much as I
do if we didn't and I know this because
the first company that when I got into
entrepreneurship for eight years she
wasn't and it was a nightmare and even
though I worked less it was harder on
the marriage than when I'm working more
now because we're in it together and we
share you know the same stories and the
same people and wants and all that good
stuff I read feeling great you mentioned
it earlier um and I might inflame the
comment section by saying this but I
feel like if if that book exists then
like like why do people who read it like
don't suddenly like oh now I'm no longer
depressed or no longer feeling the
anxious in that sense because he lays
out all the steps very clearly um so
what do you think is the thing that
causes people to just not be like
transformed from reading a book is it
the the number three thing that you said
early in the beginning like just not
enough repetition it just hurts the
first time that they do it so they don't
follow through like what is the thing
that yeah the big reason that people
struggle to get out of depression even
if they've read a book like feeling
great is
that one they
aren't they don't believe the following
very inflammatory statement that you can
get control of your neurochemistry
and they think that it's all in the mind
and they don't realize that it's a far
more complicated Beast than that but
because they don't believe that they can
completely get control of it they will
try a few things early on and stop now
if you have depression and you are not
dealing with the body your microbiome
very specifically then the odds of you
getting out of that depression are
virtually zero and so even a book as
extraordinary as feeling great is only
dealing with the psychological component
of depression and it is far deeper than
that so your gut controls many of your
neurotransmitters and serotonin so ssris
are selective serotonin re-uptake
Inhibitors meaning they keep more
serotonin floating in your body now 70%
of the serotonin in your body is
produced and stored in the gut so if the
very chemical that they use to combat
depression is in your gut and you're not
dealing with your gut now you have a
problem but it goes back to what I call
the only belief that matters if people
don't think oh I can control this then
they won't keep going keep going keep
going keep going keep going keep going
until they find that root cause so they
think that this is oh this is that thing
that happened to me a tragedy befell me
and therefore I'm never going to be able
to get out of this this is because of
the trauma that I went through in
childhood yes partly but you can get out
of that you can unwind that stuff and I
am not an any way shape or form saying
this to be flipping I am not trying to
diminish the terrifying grip that is
depression I'm just saying you have to
believe that you can get your way out of
it and yes it is hyper complicated and
having watched Lisa go through an
extraordinary battle with her microbiome
and seeing how complicated it is to undo
all that the psychological side's
already bad enough especially if it's a
result of trauma abuse where that gets
hardwired in I mean that's in your
nervous system in a deep way that is
going to be very complex to unwind but
it starts with believing that you can
unwind it you can reboot your life your
health even your career anything you
want all you need is discipline I can
teach you the tactics that I learned
while growing a billion dooll business
that will allow you to see your goals
through whether you want better health
stronger relationships a more successful
career any of that is possible with the
mindset and business programs and impact
Theory University join the thousands of
students who have already accomplished
amazing in things tap now for a free
trial and get started
today and then doing something like
cognitive behavioral therapy where you
go through I forget how many like it's
like 13 steps and one of the steps is
like the 15 cognitive distortions I mean
it's crazy so it is already a very
complex book just cognitively
psychologically that takes a lot of
repetition which requires you to believe
that it's going to work but then it's
also the very difficult part of getting
your body right sleep exercise diet diet
you want to talk about hey let's really
like the comment fire on the comment
section on fire remind people that what
they eat is going to influence their
microbiome it's going to influence their
production of Serotonin it's going to
influence their sleep it's going to
influence depression anxiety all of it
it just is and if you're eating junk
food you are making everything worse not
a moral judgment it's just a biological
reality now if you can strip away the
moral judgment and realize you're not a
bad person if you eat junk food but you
are a person that's creating obstacles
for feeling good so all I'm saying is
remove the obstacles now there are
people in my life that I love that put
every food obstacle in their way humanly
possible they are actively in pain and
they actively tell me how much they're
suffering and they actively ask me what
they should do to stop suffering and
they keep doing it does that mean that I
think they are a worse person not in the
slightest I love them just as much I
think they're just as valuable as a
human being and I really wish that they
they would remove the moral judgment
from themselves because it is not a
moral question it is 100% entirely a
question of this path leads to one
outcome this path leads to a different
outcome pick the path where the you like
the outcome and then walk that path and
so people have to recognize I can do
that that there are it is cause and
effect there's nothing uh mythological
about this it's cause and effect but it
is hyper complicated it is both
Psychology and Physiology unwinding that
almost certainly require that you get
help from professionals and other people
and so the shortest answer in the world
to your question is it's complicated
rewatch this
episode but even that like now how do
you go in and do like Lisa had me by her
side and it still took five years to get
back to Baseline with her microbiome and
man when you're in the thick of it the
whole time you're asking is this
actually going to work because some days
it doesn't feel like it some days it
feels like this is going to be forever
and it's not until you look back a year
and go yeah wow that's right I actually
have 17 more foods that I can eat now
that I couldn't eat before but I still
three days a week have just absolute
agony in my gut and so it's still this
still sucks then two years you look back
and you're like oh wow I'm only having
that two days a week four years in
you're like oh that's right I only have
it occasionally and then 5 years in
you're like God this took a very long
time
but there's a lot of dark days for
somebody struggling with depression but
if you don't believe that you can unwind
it if you don't believe that you're in
control even though it's very
complicated then you'll never do it and
having been a victim of something would
be horrible but you now have to take
control and say okay this sucks I can't
undo the past but I always can control
how I react to that thing don't take my
word for it read man search for meaning
that is the ultimate form of abuse he
was in a concentration camp it's like
nobody's got a trump card to play on him
right and his punchline is it's all
about how you process it emotionally so
if if you can share what there in that
five years were there days that Lisa
just did not believe oh yeah well they
were the darkest days of my marriage
they were depression they were me being
afraid she was going to die because she
was so sick there was her being so fed
up I don't even want to try anymore why
Try why bother there's no point I like
wow that's hard there were times where
she would respond to love with just
rejection and anger I was like what is
happening and so it was brutal and we
didn't know I mean you had to have Blind
Faith that it was going to work but did
I know it was going to work no and there
were times where even I was like I have
to act as if this is going to work but
I've never been through this before and
this is early man we we as like a a
mainstream Society have only known about
the microbiome for like 10 years like a
year before Lisa got sick i' had never
even heard of the microbiome so it's
like dude this stuff is so complex that
it it does feel like a big question mark
but I will just say there is a solution
to every problem once you master this
and realize that you don't have to stay
in a bad job that you can either leave
or turn it into a rad job and that there
actually is a process to doing that
things will get a lot better I've seen
so many people live lives that they hate
because we spend so many of our working
hours at our job if you don't love your
job yikes it is brutal on the total
quality of your life all right so let's
dive into this topic and see what we can
do to help you guys make the most out of
whatever job you have so the key here is
recognizing that there really is only
one path to success and that is you're
going to have to set the bar ridic
ridiculously high and then surpass all
expectations you want to really show
people that you are capable of doing
things that other people cannot when you
can outperform other people and I know
nobody likes to think this is a
competition but the reality is when you
can do things that other people can't do
and if those things are valued by the
company you are going to move quickly
through that company even if your boss
is trying to steal your ideas which I
know is something that happens to a lot
of people if you really are the person
that's coming up with the ideas and your
boss wouldn't be able to get very far
without them you've got leverage and so
understanding that being able to
outperform people is always the right
answer that's where I would focus okay
then the next thing is so I've got this
amazing skill set then the next thing is
when I'm always going to be growing my
skill set day after day two I'm going to
take my job description and I'm going to
say all right this is the stuff that I
have to get done in the first half of my
day and do it extreme ex well and then
in the second half of my day I'm going
to go find other projects that the
company is trying to get accomplished
see what I can do to help help other
people take on responsibility for
projects that are beyond my job
description and then I'm going to do
them just as well as I do my actual main
job people that do that are worth their
weight in gold not only will you endear
yourself to the people that you're
helping but when you go to your boss and
say hey are there other projects that I
could take on maybe even things that are
outside of the exact Department that
you're in that's going to be a huge help
almost every company is looking for
people that um show initiative and are
able to be trusted with additional
projects and if you're in a company
where they just aren't interested in
that they don't want people that show
initiative which by the way I challenge
I think if you put me into a company
even with strict hierarchies even with
political Intrigue all that stuff that I
would find a way to be useful to other
people that I would find a way to help
other people uh oh there's a quote I'm
going to paraphrase it goes something
like this it's amazing what you can
accomplish when you don't care about the
credit so if you don't care about
getting the credit and you're just
helping people I think people are
definitely going to take that help now
the key is that you make yourself
indispensable to them once you're
indispensable to them now you have that
leverage and so being able to use that
leverage to illustrate that you have a
long track record of highlevel
performance within the company now when
you go and start asking for arrays
you're going to be much more likely to
get it and here is a secret to getting a
raise go to your boss or whatever
Department it is you're trying to move
into and ask them what would it look
like I want this title or I want to make
this much money what would I have to
deliver to you in order to get that and
if you get them to explain to you like
hey if you were able to do XYZ thing
that would be Nob brainer I would
definitely put you forward for that
promotion amazing now you know exactly
what you need to do now you just need to
go make sure that you get the skill set
that's going to allow you to do that
better than other people now my thing is
I'm always trying to reach beyond what
I'm getting paid to do because remember
I started out as an employee okay I've
not always owned my own companies so
when I was an employee that's what I was
thinking about like I want to be
indispensable I want to I want people to
have fear of loss with me I want them to
be afraid that I'm going to leave
because I am delivering so much value
I'm not saying that's not my job instead
I'm saying what does a company need and
then I'm helping the company get that
thing and so when you're able to assess
what problems a company is facing and
help make those problems go away you
become extraordinarily valuable when
you're communicating very directly about
what you want and finding out what you
would need to do to get there and then
delivering against that you're going to
find yourself going up when you're
constantly helping other people with
their projects and delivering a high
level of quality and not asking for the
credit for that you're just doing it
because you want to help people while I
have no doubt some people will take
advantage of you the vast majority of
people will not and you will find
yourself Meeting those people again and
again and people wanting to Champion you
and lift you up if you run that strategy
I'm telling you right now you will be
able to make things happen in your
current company what kinds of thought
practices can I Implement in order to
approach my job differently okay to
really answer that question I would have
to know how you're approaching your job
now but the best way to approach any job
is to again instead of asking what your
job description is to figure out what
problems the company faces and what role
can you play in helping make those
problems go away now the key to doing
that is to really getting into a
nitty-gritty tactical understanding of
what the high level goals for the
company are okay so you should be able
to find those out and if your company
isn't broadcasting those you have
another problem but find out what your
company's high level goals are find out
how your department has goals that are
feeding into the company level goals and
then figure out what you can do on an
individual level in order to help
yourself or help the company achieve
those goals so there should be a direct
line from what you're doing to what your
Department's trying to accomplish to
what the Company's trying to accomplish
so that you know as you're working on
that thing that you're actually
contributing in a meaningful way so that
you can point to something and say hey
that thing contributed to this project
contributed to that goal right and when
people can actually track your
deliverables and they see the things
that you worked on and how that fed into
these very meaningful goals that's how
you begin to develop that fear of loss
and get people to think of you a new so
as you're trying to think about your own
job differently you're trying to change
the way that people perceive you you
want them to perceive you as a problem
solver and if you were to ask me what is
one attribute that is just worth it's
weight and gold that I'm always looking
for in any team M here at impact Theory
it is problem solving I don't want to
have to solve all the problems by myself
I don't want to have to come up with all
the ideas people often think that their
boss wants to come up with all the ideas
I promise you even if your boss is
stealing all of your ideas they don't
want to have to think of them and so you
can make yourself indispensable and then
leverage being indispensable to either
get out from under a boss that's just
stealing your ideas to make it just
undeniable that you're the one coming up
with these
ideas but performance is always the key
now even if all you do is leverage that
performance to get another job at a
different company being able to say I
did this this this help with this this
and this and you can convey that in a
way that makes it pretty obvious that in
fact you were delivering a high level of
performance because you can articulate
it so clearly you really are able to
demonstrate that skill set you have a
free ticket to go wherever you want but
the key is don't think of yourself as
being bound by your job description
think of yourself as being bound by your
skill set by wanting to put that skill
set to use against the goals that the
company have when you do that now you've
got the right frame of reference for
what your job is what kinds of things
can you do to balance your job and
something you love without facing
burnout burnout out is a tricky Beast
burnout has a lot to do with the things
that
you I won't just say love
doing but they have a lot to do with
aligning the things that you're doing
with things that give you more energy so
whatever it is that you're engaging with
you want to find a way to really engage
with that in a meaningful way and so
there are a couple parts to that so
number one you want to make sure that
you understand the why that you're doing
this so that you can attach meaning and
purpose to it when you've got meaning
and purpose behind something Everything
Changes getting good at life being good
at your job succeeding paying the bills
all of this stuff is so hard that if you
don't have a why that you're able to
plug in so I'm paying my bills so that I
can support my family all right that's
an incredible why but you really want to
think about that you want to focus on
that and then the other is just making
sure that you're able to engage with it
in a way that allows you to experience
progress so getting better at something
and moving forward in your life is one
of the foundational pillars of human
happiness and so making sure that you
are finding ways to engage with what
you're doing in such a way that it
allows you to be fed while you're doing
this instead of having the energy
Stripped Away okay that's part one part
two in all of this is making sure that
you understand an idea that a lot of
people myself included who like to be
ultra Hardcore have to really learn and
that is doing less is always an option
okay doing less is always an option so
if you're starting to feel burned out
you need to pump the brakes and I always
tell myself I don't do
overwhelm now I don't say that because I
can carry an infinite weight I cannot I
have my limitations just like anybody
else but the reason that I don't burn
out is because as I feel myself getting
close to my limitations I don't tell
myself like come on like you can do
anything just keep going now I am
hardcore I'll be the first to admit that
I make sure that I'm leaving it out on
the field that I'm playing as hard as I
can but I make the demand that even hard
work is done in a joyful manner so I am
at all times pursuing fulfillment in a
joyful manner it just so happens that
fulfillment by nature is working really
hard to gain a set of skills that allow
you to serve not only yourself but other
people okay working really hard that's
part of it that's that's a directive
inside of our brains given to us by
Evolution so you have a directive in
your brain to work hard and if you don't
work hard there will be a sense of
disease in your life you won't feel
right something will feel like it's
missing you won't know what it is you'll
be grasping for something and it will
seem like it's going to be a thing you
need to get to attain whatever when in
reality you need to work
hard that working hard there's a reason
that working out leaves you with this
amazing feeling nature had to
incentivize that you would work hard
because going out hunting foraging
protecting your family all of that stuff
was brutally difficult when you you know
go back hundreds of thousands of years
and that's what we came up through and
so nature only has two tools Pleasure
and Pain if you're doing the right
things pleasure if you're doing the
wrong things or not doing something you
should be doing like working hard then
walloped with pain you get so that's a
key you want to be working hard towards
something that matters and allows you to
serve not only yourself but other people
when you start doing that now all of a
sudden you're back in that energizing
mode and you don't have to worry about
burning out but working hard is a key
part of this but when I get to the point
where it's like all right I'm I'm really
working hard but I'm now reaching a
limit where even with all the meaning
and purpose and all the joyful pursuit
of fulfillment I'm now reaching a point
where this isn't Fun you need to
acknowledge that and back
off that's not the time to keep pushing
right right you needed to gut check
yourself you needed to make sure that
you weren't just being lazy but when you
realize I'm not being lazy this is just
not fun I'm now at a point of
diminishing returns need to be honest
about that acknowledge it trust yourself
to have busted your ass that you don't
just grab for the oh what was me you
know I'm exhausted it's like no man I've
really played hard I've really gone
after this I've made sure that there's
meaning and purpose I've made sure that
I'm pursuing fulfillment I've made sure
that there's progress in my life but now
we've hit a point point it's not
enjoyable back off
relax take a Tuesday off meditate
daily find some
way to get calm and
creative prioritize your
sleep make sure you're eating right and
exercising all of these things matter a
lot when it comes to
burnout so be very thoughtful
that even something that you love that
you recognize there can be a point where
you just need space you need a minute
you need to take some downtime and that
you actually allow yourself to take
downtime but that you're checking
yourself to make sure you're not just
being lazy I'm not in love with my job
but I have no dream or passion to
succeed further I don't know what else
to do I feel like this job has taken all
creativity and Imagination away from me
what do you recommend for someone like
like me all right so first and foremost
we are going to have to figure out what
exactly has happened so is it that you
don't have a dream or passion because
you haven't taken the time to Define
that because let me be very clear
passion is not an archaeological dig
it's an architectural build so you don't
turn inwards look inside yourself and
find this glowing Ember of passion and
excitement that's been sitting there
since birth despite that some people
will tell you that that's how this works
but it is not if Steve Jobs were born a
thousand years ago he would not have
dreamed of making the iPhone what ends
up happening is you decide there is
something that you decide means enough
to you that you're going to invest in it
and then over time that investment turns
that thing into a
deep and abiding passion as you get
better and you get feedback from the
world that they value this thing that
you're getting better at but it isn't
just lying dormant within you and this
is like the number one confusion that I
encounter with people is they think that
either they're broken and other people
were born with a passion and they were
not
or they just think that you know if I do
enough
introspection I'm going to find
something sitting inside of me and
finally my life will be
amazing once you realize that in fact
what happens is when you look inside all
you're going to find are these um Sparks
of interest and from that spark of
Interest through pursuing it as a
process of gaining Mastery it will
become a passion when you're able to use
that skill set that you gained in the
pursuit of Mastery to serve not only
yourself but other people okay so doing
that now you're in this passion Loop of
you worked really hard you gained this
set of skills allows you to serve other
people they give you feedback oh my God
thank you this is so amazing I'm
grateful for what you've done built
created given me whatever the case may
be and that feels good which makes you
want to go get better and that's the
passion
Loop now as you're doing
that you're able to
really be energized by the things that
you're doing but it doesn't start by
looking Inward and finding something it
starts by realizing that you have to Fan
those flames of that spark of interest
to turn it into the Raging Inferno that
you want to feel of that passion but
that comes from that
Loop okay so that's the first thing to
obsess now if you already have or had a
passion but this job has somehow beaten
it out of you that's a very different
story and so if that's what's going on
we need to figure out what is it in the
structure of that that is robbing you of
that what's going on exactly that's
making this overwhelming or stressful or
not fun is it politics in the office is
it just the work environment is too
fast-paced is it that you're not being
honest with yourself about you know
going back to this idea 50% of you is
hardwired 50% of you is malleable if the
hardwired part is out of step with the
life that you're trying to lead there
can be a lot of frustration there so
having the self-awareness to understand
did you put yourself in the wrong
position are you trying to be Steve Jobs
when you should be Steve wnc that's a
really imperative thing to look at now I
find that a lot of times uh companies
have their own issues whenever you get a
large group of people together there are
going to be weird things that have to be
navigated but at the end of the day
while you can't control everything that
everybody does you can always control
how you react and so you can reorient
yourself within a company to figure out
one if there's a a path back to finding
that Joy but that comes from breaking
down what exactly happened that made you
stop feeling the joy and two are you
able to perform at a high enough level
that you're able to create the space for
you to get back on track because if
you're going to go in and try to move
things around and make some changes
within the company or within your role
or within how things work you're going
to need to be performing at a very high
level to have the credibility to make
that ask and this is where it gets
difficult nobody wants to hear this I
get it everybody wants to point fingers
and say this is just a toxic company but
in reality if it's that bad leave do not
waste time start find another job first
I'm not just saying quit find another
job but get out of there don't act like
you're actually in prison you are not
actually impr prison and yes I
understand that you have obligations and
you may be a single parent with kids and
huge responsibility I completely
understand and I have the most empathy
for that in the world but I want you to
understand
understand you are only as trapped as
you allow yourself to be if you have a
useful skill set you will be able to
find another job and now is the time to
go looking for that while you're still
getting
paid now if you don't have skill set
that's marketable that's where we have
to start and so building up this skill
set so that we can be marketable
somewhere else that's going to give us
the ability to perform where we are or
leave if it's too toxic but assuming
that we're going to stay now we need
that skill set to perform at a very high
level to create the credibility to make
the ask and go to your boss or whomever
is creating or maybe not even creating
the problem but who has the ability to
help you create the solution now you go
and say I'm performing at a high level
yes yes oh my God you're amazing okay
cool here are the things that I would
need to change so often people's first
instinct is just peace out and they
don't realize that there are many things
that they could have done to to
restructure the role to create more
space for themselves in order to stay
but what people end up letting happen is
they let themselves burn out and then
they want to leave and go somewhere else
not realizing that they will have the
same problem at the next job and instead
of doing the work themselves solving the
internal problem of how we ended up here
whether it's lack of skill set not
setting boundaries whatever the case may
be but keeping that ownership keeping
that responsibility recognizing that if
you make different choices you get
different outcomes so that you can go
ahead and change things there now again
if you want to leave leave by all means
take your skill set and go elsewhere but
make sure that you're not doing what I
was doing in my early 20s when I was
about to move to New York because I was
unhappy in LA and I thought the LA was a
problem in reality it was my mindset
once I changed my mindset suddenly La
was amazing because it wasn't about La
it was about me and I thought ah like
something's got to change and so I just
wanted to go as far away as I could but
it wouldn't have solved the problem I
would have gotten to New York only to
have the same issue again and again and
again I had to address my mindset and
once I did that then everything changed
so be very careful be very thoughtful
about how you approach unwinding this
problem if you're always blaming other
people you're not going to get where you
want to go because you're not looking
for the things that you can do
differently you're letting your
psychological immune system take over
make it other people's problems and then
you're not able to change and once you
realize that your life is an exact
reflection of your choices now it's not
so you feel bad it's so that you
remember if you make different choices
you get different outcomes and so now
you can make these changes or gain more
skills or whatever it is that's needed
to get the life that you want now no
matter where you go you will feel
completely comfortable that you can
shape things to your liking but you have
to know how the game works you have to
know that building skill set is the key
you have to know that communicating with
your boss what's working what's not
working and to have earned the
credibility to make the ask do all that
you'll have no problem I have Financial
Obligations to stay at my current job it
has made me feel more depressed than I
can say how do I find purpose and
fulfillment in a job like this okay we
have to figure out why you're feeling
depressed is it your financial
obligations is it that you hate this job
and really the question you should be
asking is how do I find another job so
let me ask you a question have you ever
written down in a single sentence what
your ideal job
is I find that often times the reason
that people's lives are not what they
want them to be is because they lack
Clarity there's a great Tony Robbins
quote if you don't know where you want
to be in five years you're already there
that one hit me so hard the first time I
heard
it if you don't know where you want to
be in five years you're already there
where you are now is where you're going
to be in 5 years 10 years because you
don't have the
clarity to steer towards something else
because ultimately this is a steering
problem we have to know where we want to
go we have to figure out how do we end
up here how did we end up in a job that
we hate is it that we chose the wrong
job is it that we let ourselves be the
boiled frog where it was just well that
decision wasn't so bad okay that I don't
love that but whatever it's fine and
it's just day after day month after
month year after year it's things like
that where things have gotten worse you
never set boundaries you never push back
you didn't gain new skills so that you
could demonstrate that you're capable of
more you didn't take on addition
responsibilities and carve your own path
through the company are you waiting for
people to come to you and tell you hey
you should apply for this new
role a lot of times people are waiting
because they don't have the clarity or a
lot of times they're afraid to go after
it they know what they want but they
either haven't built the skill set or
they're so afraid of rejection they
don't even
try on that you're GNA have to build
some I won't say fearlessness cuz you're
going to be afraid but you've got to be
willing to embarrass yourself you've got
to be willing to fail like you've got to
be able to sit in failure and be okay
with it because let me tell you the
people that end up succeeding are not
the ones that just never make a mistake
they're the ones that aren't afraid to
make a mistake or they're certainly not
paralyzed by it right there's that
amazing Michael Jordan commercial where
he's talking about you know I've missed
this many game-winning shots and I've
failed this many times and it's because
I have failed that many times that I've
had the successful career that I've had
now it sounds counterintuitive so you
need to understand what's really going
on what's really going on is that you
have to be willing to take those risks
it isn't that you will never fail it's
just that you miss 100% of the shots you
don't
take you are guaranteed to stay where
you are if you never try to reach for
anything more a guarantee it is a
guarantee it's guaranteed you're never
going anywhere else if you don't try you
are never going anywhere else it is 100%
guaranteed so you're going to embarrass
yourself you're going to make mistakes
you're going to look stupid and if you
can emotionally deal with that then
you'll actually get better because every
attempt that you make you get a little
bit better at least if you're willing to
be honest about the ones that failed why
they failed own that respon
responsibility so that you understand
next time I can make a different choice
and get a different
result you do that enough it's what I
call the physics of progress you take
your best guess you try it fail to some
degree improve start over again try
something new fail to some degree and
you just keep iterating like that until
you get better and better and better and
better and better and you make that
progress that's really the
key but you have to do the work you have
to be honest with yourself you have to
take responsibility you have to keep
trying you can't give up if you hate
your job and you want to find
fulfillment and you want
purpose you also have to assign meaning
and
purpose like a passion there is no
meaning and purpose hiding inside of you
there are things that you care about for
sure and your goal is to look inside of
yourself and to find one of those things
that matters to you and say say I'm
going to make this really matter I'm
going to make this the meaning and
purpose behind what I'm doing now again
if you haven't read the book man search
for meaning read it Victor Frankle talks
about exactly how you assign meaning and
purpose to something so that you can
suffer and go through difficult things
all the while knowing why you're doing
this why am I doing this when you have a
compelling answer to that question you
will move forward if you don't have a
compelling answer to that question you
will not move forward so we're going to
make sure that we figure out how we've
ended up here why we're depressed and
then we're going to assign meaning and
purpose we're going to work to get the
skill set that we need to make progress
towards this thing that matters right
because it's not enough to just have
something that matters you've taken the
time you've assigned meaning and purpose
to this thing that you're doing
but now you actually need to make
progress towards that and that's all
about skill acquisition so this requires
you to be very honest with yourself
about how you ended up here retain your
power by really looking at things from
what did I do to end up here versus
making this somebody else's problemo
it's a toxic work culture the
environment here is terrible my boss is
an idiot don't do even if those things
are true don't waste any time with that
because you can't control that what you
can control is what you do how you react
so focus on that assign that meaning and
purpose get the skill set you need in
order to make meaningful progress
towards that and it will turn you around
in terms of how you feel and then
remember you can always leave so if your
work really is that terrible then go
somewhere else just don't forget that
all of your problems are going to follow
you so solve the mindset issues first
and then see how that manifests every
time something goes wrong in my life I
am asking myself one simple question
what is it that I suck at I suck at
something there's something I'm doing
wrong by definition if I were doing it
right then I would be getting the
outcome that I
wanted