Kind: captions
Language: en
[Music]
hey everybody welcome to another episode
of impact theory today we're going to be
talking all about
time management procrastination a little
bit about value system how we take all
these amazing things we're trying to
accomplish in our lives deal with the
stresses sticking points the things that
hold us back and figure out how to
optimize and really make the most of our
time and our energies i'm going to be
answering your questions we're going to
get to some really tactical things on
exactly how to move forward all right
without further ado here's the first
question is procrastination simply a
habit or is it a mild symptom of anxiety
are there signs that point towards
procrastination that i should recognize
so i can pattern interrupt more quickly
okay so first of all procrastination
certainly can be a habit but it's
probably more than likely it is just the
natural friction that exists when you
take a species and you give them two
competing impulses impulse number one be
active
work hard go dominate your environment
right go hunt gather protect all that
good stuff and then the other one is the
brain is so calorically demanding and
the odds of you being without food at
some point are so high that we have to
make sure that as a species you don't
just constantly want to spend energy
that you find yourself in a position of
like i don't know when i'm going to get
my next meal so i'm i'm constantly
wanting to go do my thing but also at
the same time i want to relax so when
that's in a natural environment and
we're on the plains of africa and we've
got hunger pushing us in there rarely
are you know lions coming into the camp
there's no time to procrastinate it's
like that stuff is here it's got to be
dealt with i'm hungry and so
procrastinating doesn't even occur to me
and so
the like chill lay back thing is when i
have all the things that i need problem
is in a modern context we often have all
of those basic needs already met
and on top of that so not only do i you
know i have shelter
i've got food
i am not worried about where my next
meal is going to come from i don't have
to worry about a tiger coming into my
house
and on top of that you add the friction
of anxiety or stress or fear of failure
all of that that's where this then
really becomes problematic but i think
it first starts with just understanding
that you have this impulse as a human
having a
you know human experience you've got the
dual impulses to go out and do something
and to hang back so once i understood
okay evolution has given me
this imperative
to relax
to chill
now i know
it's also given me the imperative to go
work hard
to do things meaning and purpose and so
what i need to do is given in a modern
context that i won't have literal hunger
to propel me forward
then the thing that's going to propel me
forward is a focus on meaning and
purpose or a goal that i'm just super
excited about achieving
or
bright lines where we just tell
ourselves we're going to do this
and we don't violate our bright lines
okay so putting it in that context now
we understand how do you pattern
interrupt that more quickly one i think
instead of worrying about the pattern
interrupt and waiting until it's
actually already a problem you use these
bright lines to say like for instance
what i say to myself monday through
friday if i'm awake i'm either working
or working out
now i know if i'm chilling
on a monday at 1 pm i know i have a
problem i'm outside of the bright lines
that i have drawn for myself which is
monday through friday if i'm awake i'm
either working or working out so now it
is very easy to know if i'm acting in
accordance with what i said i was going
to do or not and since congruence is
this huge driver we want to be congruent
with the things we said we're going to
do and what we do so for me i have a
goal i'm obsessed with that goal i want
it i'm really excited about it chasing
it is like the great joy of my life
outside of my marriage and so
i actually want that thing like i
actually want to not only have the end
state but i want to pursue it i want the
act of going for it and so because i
want both the end state and the act of
pursuing it it becomes very easy to then
put those bright lines in place and then
actually go after it so i don't need the
pattern interrupt i need the rules in my
life that make sure that i conform to
the behaviors that will be necessary for
me to go after what i want
now since you're asking specifically
about anxiety i will assume that you
have that extra layer of friction and so
making sure that you're getting past
that extra layer of friction is going to
be incredibly important and the way that
you're going to get past it is by having
those bright lines is by understanding
that you should only be pursuing things
you're really excited about that get you
really amped about the future and so you
want them badly enough to push through
that extra pushback that you're getting
on that and because you know that you're
prone to procrastinating you'll put
those rules in place
you'll focus on how much you want the
thing and then that's going to allow you
to move forward and then of course
there's just actually dealing with the
anxiety what that's caused by whether
it's you worrying about what other
people think or whatever the case may be
so
address that and that will take more of
that pressure off
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all right next what steps can i take to
bring my focus to the one thing i'm
working on while blocking out all else
all right
so
the real key is you've got to learn to
compartmentalize so what i do to begin
my compartmentalization is i create a
list
of all the important things that i
should be working on
i put that list in order this is very
important getting good at prioritizing
is an art form it is critically
important that you get good at that art
form and as you begin to break things
down and put them in order now you can
tell yourself hey this is what i should
be working on right now so rather than
trying to digest all the different
things that have to be done it's i'm
focused on this one thing right now and
my only job right now is to focus on
that thing and so by not letting your
mind wander and this meditation is very
good at bringing your focus back to the
breath which teaches you to bring your
focus back to whatever so i've got a lot
of things many things competing for my
attention but i know what my important
things are i'm working on the number one
thing right now let's say and so up this
is my entire world and if i find myself
wandering i bring myself back now part
of the reason that i can invest so
heavily in that is because i have the
belief that that's the most effective
way to work so
since behaviors follow beliefs you want
to make sure that you put that belief in
place which is true by the way that you
can do everything that you want to do
just not all of it at once so everything
has to be done sequentially you can't do
everything at the same time and this is
why you have to prioritize things out so
if we know
that multitasking is actually a myth and
that you can put people in brain
scanners and what you're seeing people
who seem like they can multitask what
they're doing is called rapid switching
so they don't have what i have which is
high switching costs when i get in a
flow man i can go and go and go but
if i try to bounce back and forth
between things then i pay this high
price and inefficiency between the
switching costs of moving from switching
from that task to this task so i focus i
stay on one thing i have them in order i
know what i'm working on i remind myself
that i only have one job in that moment
that is to work on that thing i know
that that's the most efficient way to
work and i know that i'm good at
prioritizing things so it becomes very
easy boom boom boom and then you just
hold yourself accountable to actually
doing that
practice makes perfect you might have a
difficult time in the beginning start
meditating if you need to to train
yourself to come back to the breath over
and over and over and then you can just
apply that to whatever you're working on
come back to the project
all right
i'm currently working on three awesome
projects right now i'm struggling with
shifting from one to the next my urge is
to work until i drop and then crash my
world and health start to fall apart
when i do that any suggestions on steps
that i can take to manage my hectic
workload
okay so first of all you're going to
need some rules so we don't want to work
until we crash that doesn't make sense
so we're going to take that off the
table because that's like
running a marathon and saying i'm gonna
run the first mile at a four minute mile
pace and
then whatever the rest will take care of
itself that doesn't make any sense
you're going to end up burning out and
odds are that you're not going to end up
finishing so you want to be very
thoughtful about okay
i've got this big project it's going to
take i mean
most projects take a very long time the
shorter projects merely are feeding into
a bigger project so assuming that this
is going to take weeks months or years
it doesn't make sense for us to just go
go go go go ignore all the signs that
we're reaching a tipping point go oh god
crash and burn right so we need to
understand what are the signs is it that
you stop having fun
is it that you start losing sleep is it
that you no longer want to eat what are
the signs of the
early
overstressed where we're now going into
a point where it's not stress that like
keeps us in the fight and going it's
beginning to deteriorate us okay when we
get that signal and maybe we measure it
in hours per week
in fact that might be a very easy way
for you to tackle it like i know that
for me 93 hours a week is a rate that i
can sustain for the rest of my
productive life i don't know if that's
40 years 50 years whatever but i've been
doing it now for 20 years it's very easy
for me to hit that pace when i'm doing
it towards something that i love and
care about okay so if i know hey i'm
working 100 hours 110 hours i know i
have a problem i know i'm now in sprint
territory and i know that i need to be
consciously working to dial that back
because working that much is going to be
deleterious to my health which means it
will be deleterious to my cognition
which means now instead of working 93
hours and getting 93 hours of
productivity i'm working 110 hours and i
might be getting 70 hours of
productivity that is a very bad trade so
you want to be super thoughtful about
just the realities of your cognition and
what's happening on a biological level
when you make those kind of choices to
just push yourself beyond reason so i
would start making you know rules is
like lisa has rules about what time she
stops during the day so unlike me who if
i'm awake i'm either working or working
out monday through friday lisa has
earlier times that she's going to quit
now she still works an obscene amount
but she knows if she doesn't quit a few
hours before going to bed she's going to
have trouble sleeping
so then remember
doing less
is always an option now i'm the go
hardcore the push push push guy i love
hustle porn all of that but i'm telling
you nothing matters more than
fulfillment and joy and if you're
burning yourself out in your stress and
you're crashing that's not joyful
there's no fun to be had way better to
back off
remember that doing less is always an
option meaning you shouldn't feel bad if
you're doing it less you shouldn't be
beating yourself up or kicking yourself
just be honest i'm doing less and i'm
doing it for this reason and as long as
you're being honest with yourself hey
i'm doing less because i don't want to
crash and burn which wouldn't make any
sense because the punch line of life is
not success
it's join fulfillment that really is
success so once you
really wrap your head around that then
it should become very easy to feel good
about yourself when you're sincerely
moving towards your goal but being
respectful
of enjoying the ride since getting there
cannot be guaranteed but the struggle is
guaranteed what we're trying to optimize
for is struggling well
and part of struggling well is knowing
when to back off
so check yourself if you
think that you might be
not pushing hard because you're
just being a little lazy you want to
procrastinate you have to be honest with
yourself about that
but
once you recognize the difference
between
you know what i just need the day off
i'm feeling burned out
and uh
i'm just lazy and i don't want to work
any days like as you begin to figure
that out within yourself
then you'll get to a point where you'll
completely trust yourself when you know
you know what today i need to go easy
because you leave it all out on the
field on all the other days it's very
easy to let yourself off the hook so
earn your credibility with yourself do
what you say you're gonna do prioritize
for fulfillment enjoy not for hours
worked not for hustle porn none of that
optimize for fulfillment and joy
mental health is a huge priority in my
life and i encourage everyone to
prioritize it and one of the best ways
to follow through on healthy mental
health habits is by working with a
licensed therapist better help is
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impact take care and be legendary
okay
i can never find a way to stay
disciplined and commit to my plans of
action for the day or week or month so
i'm always playing catch-up rather than
staying ahead and being proactive how
can someone who has spent their whole
life with poor time management and
discipline develop and commit to
developing time management skills okay
so one self-awareness that's huge looks
like you already have that you
understand that the way that you're
doing things is delivering a sub-optimal
result
once you understand that you're getting
a sub-optimal result then we should be
looking according to the physics of
progress for a new thing to try that new
thing that we're going to try is
discipline now we're not doing
discipline because our parents tell us
to we're doing discipline as a test to
see if it work to get us towards our
goal now if you have historically
struggled with putting discipline in
place in your life right now you're
going to say but tom i can't stick to
discipline so why would this work this
time that's when we realize one
fundamental truth
this is a desire problem masquerading as
a discipline problem
once you want your goal
the way that a drowning man wants his
next breath
you will find discipline very easy to
stick to
and so learning to build your desire
for the goal that you have set for
yourself that becomes the incredibly
important part and the way to dial that
desire up is to do a loop and it goes
like this you're going to tell yourself
that you're very excited about this goal
you're going to tell other people that
you're very excited about this goal
and then you're going to embody
the feeling the amplitude that you want
to feel when you think about that goal
now there's a mechanism in the human
mind where it will justify the way that
you act no matter what i won't waste
time explaining some of the studies but
they are utterly fascinating about how
even people with damaged areas of the
brain will end up making up
random ass stories because the brain
aborts a lack of reason so the the brain
will always and forever make up some
story about why you're doing what you're
doing and so if you're responding hugely
to something oh my god i'm so excited
about doing this thing like i'm really
amped up about it and you're saying that
to yourself and you're saying it to
other people and you're saying it just
like that
then the brain goes
there must really be something here
we've got this elevated level of emotion
amazing let's leverage that
and the brain doesn't say let's leverage
that but the brain will say okay we've
got this elevated level you're going to
leverage the fact that the brain says
that to repeat it to reinforce and over
time you actually just will feel that
heightened level of emotion it's the way
the brain works what you repeat you
become
neurons that fire together wire together
things you do frequently including
embodying that amplitude of emotion
right lisa feldman barrett's book
how emotions are made talks about how it
starts with the body and then the brain
applies meaning to it so if you're
getting amped up you're excited the body
is saying to the brain yo like we're
amped we're excited we're doing these
things and the brain goes oh amazing it
must be because this really matters and
once you get the brain saying hey
we're this excited because it matters
you're firing those neurons together
the excitement around this thing so the
excitement and the pursuit of that thing
begin to mesh
and now we just over time have a an
actual desire to pull this off once we
have the actual desire to pull this off
then all the sudden putting that
discipline in place becomes very easy
and that's the name of the game
you want to make it such that you want
it badly enough that the discipline
becomes easy to stick to because it's
going to move you towards that thing
that you really want
but you've got to learn
you've got to learn to want that thing
now
i'll give my typical disclaimer
this trick works incredibly well now it
only works on things you actually have a
legitimate interest in you couldn't
get yourself excited about something
that you truly just find stupid but
something where you actually do get a
natural response you actually are
naturally into that thing all we're
doing is dialing it up right so if it's
already a dial tone there's nothing you
can do to change the amplitude but if
the amplitude is already there and you
get this reaction we can really
exaggerate that reaction and build that
desire to get where we're going now
since that is the case you need to be
very careful what you apply this to
because you can end up really wanting
some stupid i know from experience
i dialed the dial on my desire for money
i cranked that to a 20.
and then spent eight and a half years
pursuing money only to come out
completely miserable so
don't waste your time dialing that up on
something that isn't
exciting and honorable
meaning again honorable
it elevates you and other people not
just you
all right
be careful what you decide to want but
know that it's very powerful
all right
how do you structure the conversation
about scheduled time with your partner
so that they understand that what you're
doing is important and that you need to
manage your time
this is a hot button issue so
this is we could spend a whole episode
of relationship theory on this which by
the way if you guys aren't yet watching
relationship theory make sure you head
over check it out we've got a whole
youtube show called relationship theory
where we cover topics like this lisa and
i do it together okay so
first you're going to have to come up
with a value system that the two of you
share that's critically important once
you have the value system that you guys
share then in the conversation about
schedule time we're either going to know
that the schedule time is a shared value
or it's not because part of the
discrepancy i could see is that if you
guys disagree on how time should be
allocated if one of you feels like hey
the marriage is just so much more
important or the relationship is so much
more important whatever you're
scheduling your time for that hey when
these two collide don't bring me
something about you need to schedule
more time for this other stuff it's like
this is isn't a little more important
it's 100 times more important so if they
even slightly collide then schedule time
goes away
because that's how people end up talking
past each other they have not
established what their value system is
you must establish a value system
there's no right or wrong answer to your
values there's only things that either
move you towards your goal or move you
away from your goal so get that
established well so in lisa and i's
marriage
while i feel very strongly about my
ambition and all the things that i'm
trying to do meaning and purpose all of
that my marriage is my number one
priority now we've talked through it and
so there's
excuse me there's a lot of leeway
to where i can work and schedule time
and all of that but there's also lisa's
carte blanche to be able to say hey this
is now damaging the marriage or is in
danger of damaging the marriage we need
time and attention to connect and we
have just learned that by personality
she's the right canary in the coal mine
she will feel it sooner than i and so if
we wait until i feel it we might really
be in trouble so she'll speak up and i
will universally say cool
i will now set aside whatever it is that
i was going to do within the business
and she's very respectful about if
there's a once in a lifetime opportunity
or something like that she's going to
create a little bit of extra space but
at the same time you could have a string
of once in a lifetime opportunities at
some point one or more of them are going
to have to go away if your relationship
really is your highest priority like it
is for us lisa has that card she's very
thoughtful about when she plays it she
makes sure to play it soon enough that
we don't damage the relationship but she
makes sure that she doesn't play it so
often that i can't do the things that i
want to do from pursuing my ambitions
and quite frankly her as well so that
became this really important thing for
us to define what those values are
to rank order the values marriage first
ambition second for
example and the reason that they're in
that order by the way is i'm optimizing
for fulfillment and joy and nothing has
brought me more of those two things than
my marriage business is amazing
but nothing has brought me that level of
just like deep meaning purpose
connection that i'm working hard for
something that serves something bigger
than myself you know my relationship my
marriage my family it's incredibly
potent in a way that nothing else is and
so really putting that first and
prioritizing that is critically
important for us and so we've got those
value systems laid out in order and our
roles in terms of navigating that so
come to an agreement on what scheduled
time means make sure that the other
person feels super empowered to play a
card if they think that it's now getting
out of hand and beginning to
damage the relationship or get to a
point where it's untenable for them you
need to be incredibly respectful of that
right because you want this relationship
to work you don't want the ambition to
just steamroll over
that human connection which is so
important for all of us in our lives all
right that's the key
get to the real issue get to the base
assumptions get to the values what do
each of you believe say it out loud how
things should be come to an agreement on
that and everything else will get easy
all right guys that is it getting your
time management right understanding how
to overcome the stresses the
procrastination all of that is
critically important so making sure that
you're navigating things well by
understanding what it is exactly that
you want out of your life
making sure that you build that desire
and then making sure that you lay out
your values so that you can prioritize
things well all right everybody i hope
that this helps you actually implement
things in your life and speaking of
things you should be implementing in
your life if you haven't already be sure
to subscribe and until next time my
friends be legendary take care peace