Yesterday’s post about the dangers of positive thinking sure hit a nerve with a lot of people – especially those who see through “The Secret” for the insane marketing madness that it is.  Looking on the bright side of life can get you feeling better about your situation, but there’s no substitute for action. As Brett points out in today’s Viking Fridays post, there’s “no lamb for the lazy wolf.”  Indeed.

“But Dave, The Law Of Attraction Really Worked For Me!”

I’m sure at least one of my readers is going to chime up “But Dave, you just don’t understand … the Law of Attraction really works!  I focused on <insert thing> and it happened the next day!”

I’m certainly not going to argue that sometimes the this seems to work – in fact, it’s “worked” for me over and over again in my life – but not because of any quantum physics magic.  It’s “worked” for simple, provable reasons I’ll go into in a second.  For now, let’s get clear on what the Law Of Attraction is all about.

Our dear friend Wikipedia says that in order to use the Law of Attraction you must do four things:

1. Know what one desires and ask the “universe” for it.
2. Focus one’s thought upon the thing desired with great feeling such as enthusiasm or gratitude.
3. Feel and behave as if the object of one’s desire is already acquired.
4. Be open to receiving it.

Super, all I have to do is ask for what I want, focus on getting all warm and fuzzy and act like I already have it?  Wow, that’s so profound, so incredibly deep and magical that … it’s not magical at all.  It’s an illusion that makes it seem like the universe is doing the work for you.  Let’s break it down.

Step 1: Know what one desires and ask the “universe” for it.
Step 1: Get clear on what you want.  (You don’t need the universe’s permission.)

This is so simple it’s common sense.  When you get clear on something you can start taking definitive action on it – and more importantly, you start making distinctions and decisions that move you towards it.  If you decide you want to lose 20 pounds this year, and you get really clear on that, then you’re more likely to take action to do so.  You become more conscious of what you eat – and you find yourself making smarter decisions.  There’s an expression – “awareness is curative.”  This is what’s happening here.

Forget “asking the universe.”  When you try this step of the Law of Attraction, all you are doing is mentally raising the priority of what you want. You decide it’s worth wanting, and you create a “pull” that increases your chances of taking that all important goal-stompin’ action.

Step 2: Focus one’s thought upon the thing desired with great feeling such as enthusiasm or gratitude.
Step 2: Think about what you want, and get emotionally attached to achieving it.

Let’s imagine this – you want to lose 20 pounds, or make more money, or attract the person of your dreams.  Now, if you spent a great deal of time focusing on how incredible it would feel to have that thing, how lucky you feel to have that in your life, don’t you think that maybe – just maybe – you might find yourself more likely to take significant levels of action to make it happen?

When you create strong emotional attachments to what you want, it becomes harder and harder to act contrary to that.  Advertisers make billions off of this. If they can get you to make a powerful emotional connection with their product and your idea of happiness, you are sold. You will most certainly take action.  When you can do it to yourself, you own your life again. No magic required.

Step 3: Feel and behave as if the object of one’s desire is already acquired.
Step 3: Disassociate from self-doubt and begin acting the part.
You’ve heard the phrase “Fake it ’till you make it.”  It works.  If you act with certainty that you have something (or that you’re going to be getting something), you boost your chances of acquiring it for three key reasons.

• First, you break the hold of self-doubt and free yourself to take bolder actions.  You stop worrying about “what if” and focus on what to do next instead.  Certainty is a great motivator – if you believe you already have what you want, you’re going to take stronger action to achieve it.

• Second, you notice opportunities you didn’t track before when you believe that something is coming to you.  Just like when you buy a car, you suddenly notice that car everywhere.  Those cars were always there – it’s just now you notice them because you’ve mentally given it priority.  When they say “When the student is ready, the teacher appears” there’s no magic there.  The teacher was always present – now you just notice her.  (And she’s hot.)

• Third, people smell confidence and certainty the same way that animals smell fear. We gravitate towards people who are confident and give off an air of certainty, because we want that for ourselves.  When you act as if you already have something, people will notice you more – and realize that they might have a resource to help you achieve what you want.

Step 4: Be open to receiving it.
Step 4: Be open to receiving it.
Ok, this one I should have just left alone, because it’s basic psychology.  If you feel like you don’t deserve something, or that something is impossible for you to attain, then you absolutely will never allow yourself to take it when it’s available to you.  It’s like a guy and a girl who have strong feelings for each other but never act on them because they believe the other person is out of their league and would reject them.  Or the victim who refuses help because he believes he’s beyond helping (or not worth helping).

You can’t invite someone (or something) through a locked door.  When you are willing to put aside the self-doubt, anxieties and human hang-ups that make you hold back, you’re willing to accept the fact that hey, maybe you’re worth it.  Maybe you can have that (or be that).  You stop sabotaging the opportunities that are working in your favor.

The Real Secret: The Law Of AttrAction

The secret is out: You don’t need to have a magic genie to have more of what you want in life.  You just have to get clear on what you want, get emotionally invested in achieving it, act from a position of certainty, and keep yourself from self-sabotage.

So where does that leave “the universe?”  That I leave up to you to decide.  I’m only human – and there are plenty of things outside my understanding.  Prayer, meditation, faith and belief in that higher power – I can’t dispute that there are factors outside of our physical actions that shape how things get done in this universe. But I can tell you one thing:  Believing that all of existence is a vending machine that’s just waiting to give you a sugary fix without the work?  That’s just plain nuts.

And that’s no secret.

One powerful action you can take right now is to subscribe to this blog for more straight-up, own-your-life tips. Or if you’ve already done that, join the Rock Your Day newsletter.  It’s genie-free stuff you can actually use.

Recharging Is Different Than Sleeping

For a lot of people, “sleeping” happens every night, but “recharging” doesn’t.  How do you know if this is happening to you?  If you wake up as tired (or more tired) than you were before you went to sleep, then you didn’t recharge.  You just took a breather, but you’re still exhausted.  Naturally, you want more than that out of your night.

The key to restful, recharging sleep is to do the same thing I do to the AA batteries I have at home when I want them to recharge – unplug them first.  Unplug your mind from the stress of the day, from all your worries and obligations, and give your mental wheels a chance to spin down and cool off for the night.

Easier said than done?  Perhaps so.  But perhaps the real issue people have isn’t that “unplugging” is difficult as much as they don’t have a plan for doing so.  When you’re stressed and exhausted, winging it isn’t the most effective way to do things successfully.  You need a plan.

5 Simple Ways To Beat Insomnia And Sleep Like A Baby

Here are 5 easy tips you can use tonight to unwind and prep yourself for a truly recharging night of sleep.  All you need is a notebook, a pen, and a few minutes devoted to taking care of yourself.  Here’s what to do:

• Make peace with the end of the day. As unusual as that may sound, this makes a huge difference in your ability to unwind.  Think back over the events of the day and reflect upon all the things you did get done.  Feel good about that.  (Smile, dammit.)  And if you totally blew the day vegging out, don’t kick yourself.  Remind yourself that we all need “mental health days” and accept that you had a good one.  If the day was pure hell, however, at least take a moment to be glad that it’s coming to a close.  Find something to be thankful for, and focus on that for a minute.

• Empty your mental pockets. Many people suffer from insomnia or other sleep disorders in part because they can’t mentally let their to-do lists go.  You’ve got to be able to shift your attention away from the 1,000 things that aren’t done so that you can sleep in peace.  The simplest thing to do is just to take 5 minutes and scribble them all out into a notebook, or type them out, or whatever works for you.  Just get them out of your head, tell yourself you’ll deal with them tomorrow, and give yourself permission to relax.

• Schedule out tomorrow. You’ll be more likely to let yourself let go of the worries of tomorrow if you know up front that you’re going to be taking care of them.  Take a few minutes to schedule out what you’ll be doing tomorrow, so that when your head hits the pillow, you can enjoy the sense of certainty that comes with knowing what lies ahead.  5 minutes doing this can more than pay for itself by means of a more restful sleep – and give you a clearer reason to hit the ground running in the morning.

• Go for the gold. Olympic athletes close their eyes and visualize every aspect of what they will do in their moment of glory.  They see themselves winning, they prepare their body and mind by getting “in the moment,” and they grab the Gold.  You can do the same thing.  Take 2 minutes to close your eyes and visualize how good you are going to feel as you unwind into sleep, how deeply you will rest, and how incredibly refreshed you’ll feel in the morning.  Give it a shot and see why it works so well.

• Loosen up. Take 3 minutes and do a few simple stretches to loosen up your shoulders, neck and back.  I’ll go over a few of these in an upcoming post, but you don’t have to wait for me to tell you what you can do.  Just listen to your body; see what muscles feel tight and give them a few gentle, 15-30 second stretches before bed.  You’ll be surprised how many satisfying pops and cracks are followed by sweet, sweet relief.

You Know What To Do – Now Make It Happen

Give these tips a shot – see how they work for you over the next 3 days and let me know your results in the comments.  I look forward to hearing your success stories.  And if you’ve struggled with making other sleep tips work in the past, check out the Becoming an Early Riser program – you won’t be disappointed.

See you next post,

Dave

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We’ve talked about a lot of things in the last week’s worth of posts.  Things like why I wake up early and the 5 things that become easier when you do so.  We’ve talked about sleep problems and even asked if you should try to wake up early in the first place.  I’ve also received a few great emails in response to the better sleep challenge, so I’m looking forward to this week’s series.  So let’s start with the important stuff – how to actually get more restful sleep in the first place.

Quality, Not Quantity Is What Matters Most

If you want to get a better night’s sleep, then you need to step back and think about what “a better night’s sleep” really means.  It doesn’t mean that you make sure you get “your full eight hours.”  In fact, a 2002 study involving over a million people indicated that people who slept less than 8 hours of night lived longer than those who got 8 hours or more of shut-eye (But that’s irrelevant, because I’m not advocating that you should sleep less).

What I am talking about is ending the practice of looking at sleep as a numbers game.  It’s not the number of hours you sleep that matters as much as the rest you actually achieve in each of those hours.  It’s like life – it doesn’t matter how much you “have,” if you can’t enjoy it.

If you sleep 10 hours a day but you’re physically and emotionally a wreck, you’re never going to feel rested, because stress and physical tensions are going to be taking their toll on you even after you drift off to sleep.  But if you begin making simple adjustments in your daily routine and invest even just a little bit of time into preparing to rest rather than just hitting the pillow, you might just find yourself waking up feeling refreshed for a change.

Treating Sleep Like The Special Event That It Is

Many people who suffer from insomnia, sleep disorders or just a plain stressed-out lifestyle wish they could get a better night’s rest.  However, for most of them, all they do is wish for it and roll the dice.  They close their eyes and hope that they will magically wake up refreshed.  Sometimes this happens, but more often than not the morning comes and that tired feeling hasn’t gone away.  Sleep?  Check.  Rest?  Houston, we have a problem.

A big part of this comes from treating sleep as a “have to,” such as brushing your teeth, cleaning your ears, or using the bathroom.  Sleep becomes just another function of the body, and given that approach it’s no wonder many people get results like … crap.

But what if you treated sleep differently?  What if you treated it like something special you were doing for yourself, something that would truly give you relief, enjoyment and satisfaction?  While these may seem like odd words to use when talking about sleep, stick with me and you’ll catch my meaning.

Sleep Is Like A Box Of Chocolates

Think back to the last extravagant food you put in your mouth – a gourmet chocolate, a rich dessert, a juicy ribeye … whatever.  Something expensive.  Something you didn’t get every day.  Did you wolf it down like any other piece of food that day?  Or did you savor it, taking slow bites and enjoying the flavors, textures and aromas flooding your senses?  Yeah, that’s what I’m talking about.

When you savor something, you enjoy it.  You take your time with it. You draw out the enjoyment you get from it, and because of that, you remember it long after it’s gone.  You get as much as you can out of it, and the experience energizes you. And you make the time to enjoy it (you don’t eat ribeye at a drive thru, right?).

You do the same thing when you take the time to pamper yourself.  Maybe you draw a warm bath, close the door and relax to some peaceful music to unwind and refresh yourself.  Maybe you pour yourself a scotch on the rocks, slip on the headphones and sink into your chair as the sounds of jazz fill your ears.  You know what I mean here – when you want to do something for yourself you prepare for it, you make the time and you ease into it.

What If You Approached Sleep This Way?

What if you savored your sleep?  What if, instead of just crawling under the covers you did something to truly unwind, refresh and prepare yourself to be as relaxed as possible?  Do you think you would get a more restful night’s sleep?  You already know the answer.

Tomorrow we’re going to talk about some first steps to making that all happen so that the time you spend with your eyes closed actually recharges your body (rather than just giving you enough energy to “get by”).  Making this psychological shift is the first step.  You must decide you are going to savor your sleep. This is a foreign concept to our rushed culture, so if it feels weird to think this way, don’t be surprised.  But roll this thought around in your head today: I am going to savor my sleep tonight.

Stay tuned for more tomorrow.  Just take at least three moments to yourself today and focus on that thought, and remember how good it felt the last time you took time for yourself.  Relive the satisfaction, relief and enjoyment … and get ready to make those feelings part of your everyday life rather than just on a special occasion.

See you next post,

Dave

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Yesterday we talked about what you would do with an extra 30 or 60 minutes a day (180 – 365 hours a year!), and we had a few good comments (drop by and add your own when you get a chance).  Now it’s time for a challenge – I dare you to make it happen next week.

The best part is that you can do this even if you’re not interested in becoming an early riser – if you’re a night owl, just block off 30 minutes a night to tackle something meaningful in life you’ve been putting off.  The goal here is to add something that has long-term importance to your life so it can become a habit.

This is a lead-in to some of the tips I’ll give you next week on how to pack more actual rest into the sleep you get every night.  For today, however, I want you to just think of what you’re going to do with your 30 minutes each day and block it out on your calendar.  This in itself will help you get better sleep tonight.  Why?

Knowing You’re Moving Forward Helps You Unwind

Mentally, you’re telling yourself that you’re going to be doing something that will make your life more fulfilling and balanced, and because of that, you’ll feel better overall.  A little less stressed.  A little happier with where your life is going.  And that will help you sleep easier at night, period.

Because I want to see you have the highest chances of success, here’s what I suggest you do over the weekend:  Get an extra 30-60 minutes of sleep on Saturday and Sunday, just to make sure you start Monday out right.   The world will not end if you catch a little extra sleep this weekend, whether it’s packing in early or sleeping just a little later. If you take on this challenge you’re going to have a hella great week, so set yourself up for success.

So What Will You Do During The Challenge?

If you haven’t already decided to step up and stop putting that important “something” off any longer, put  your goal on yesterday’s post.  Get some rest this weekend.  And prepare for a week you’ll really enjoy and remember for a long time.  I’ll field all your questions on how to make it easier to wake up ready for action and I’m sure the 300 or so people who read this blog daily will chime in with some words of encouragement.

It’s your life.  Take control of it.

See you on Monday -

Dave

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Michael Martine of Remarkablogger raised an important point in a recent post about the benefits of waking up early:

I find the biggest difference in getting up early only happens if I don’t check my email, comments, and social media feeds. It only benefits me when I use that time to write blog posts for Remarkablogger or lessons for Gateway Blogging.  Checking messages, etc, is a big waste of that early morning creative time.

That’s an important point: There’s no use in working at becoming an early riser if you’re not going to put it to good use.  But what constitutes “good use?”  Time spent on business?  Reading a good book?  Planning fun things to do with your family?  Exercising?  Praying? Studying for that big test?

To be sure, each person reading this can come up with their own answer for what’s meaningful to them.  The question is, have you?

What Would You Do With An Extra Hour A Day?

For those of you working on waking up early, this is an important question to ask yourself (though it’s equally important for those who take the night owl route).  If you suddenly had an extra hour a day, what would you do with it?  What would be meaningful enough for you to consider it time well spent?  What have you been putting off for weeks / months / years / forever that you just don’t want to put off any longer?

This is a big question.  A potentially life-altering question.  Take a good moment to think about it.

An hour a day = 7 hours a week= 365 hours a year … the equivalent of just over 2 months of 40-hour work weeks. That’s a lot of time, whether you tack it on the beginning or the end of your day.  Hell, even a half-hour a day would give you 180 hours of so of dedicated time over the course of the year.

What could you do with that much time allotted to something that’s truly meaningful to you?  Think long term here, people.  Let your mind wander wherever it wants to.  Think big.  Or think really, really small, if what you’re considering is one of the “little things” that add so much to life.

Food for thought.  Tell me what you’re thinking of in the comments.

Because, tomorrow, I have a challenge for you.  Be ready.

I’ll see you in the comments.

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While I’m pleased to see I’m not the only one to wake up early and enjoy the benefits of doing so, I know from bitter experience that for a lot of people, it’s not an easy path to take.  There’s resistance, both internal and external that can make it difficult.  Becoming an early riser wasn’t something I nailed on the first try, and if you’ve tried it you may have had some of the same struggles as well.  Let’s take a look at a few of those obstacles to better sleep and early rising and talk about some workarounds.

Obstacle #1 – Jumping Mt. Everest In One Step

I can’t say it any better than the fine folks at Trizle: It’s easy to fail when you try and climb Mt. Everest in one step.  Even really smart, successful people fall prey to this.  If you’re trying to develop a new habit that’s strength based (such as getting better at something as opposed to breaking a habit that’s an addiction), you can’t go wrong with the slow and steady approach (even if our instant-gratification culture views that as the weak way to do things).  If you get up at 8am and your goal is 6am, don’t try 6am the first day.  Ratchet back a bit at a time.

Obstacle #2 -You’re Just Not That Into It

Face it – when you want something – you really want it – you do what it takes to make it happen (assuming you know how to make it happen, that is).  When you have an exciting vacation planned, waking up early to hit the road is easy.  If you don’t have a compelling reason to want get up early, if you’re not emotionally and mentally invested in it, then it’s going to be really hard.  You’ve got to get your reasons clear in mind, and you’ve got to be able to tap into that emotion when the alarm goes off.   Forget willpower – think want-power.  Do you want it strongly enough?

Obstacle #3 – Staying Up Really, Really Late

As much as we’d like to, we can’t burn our candle at both ends.  Often people try to start the early riser habit without making any change in the time their head hits the pillow.  But waking up early involves shifting your sleep schedule, not simply shortening it.  If you’re looking to get up earlier in the morning, you’ve got to give a little to get a little.  Remember, waking up early frees up time in the beginning of the day, so if you’re hesitant to go to bed earlier because you have too much to do, don’t forget that you’re simply shifting time, not giving it up.

Obstacle #4 – Hanging On To Late Night Entertainment

Certainly, there’s a trade-off that has to occur when you wake up early and go to sleep earlier to compensate.  Maybe there’s a show you want to watch or an online game / community you want to interact with.  But you’ve got to make the call – if the benefits of waking up early are worth it to you, set the VCR / DVR to record those shows.  Save the online stuff or evening face time for a different time slot.  Make a conscious decision that you’re trading something “good” for something that’s “better.”  I’m not saying it’s easy – just that it’s worthwhile.

Note: You may be in the place where the people you really want to interact with are only available later at night, and shifting that isn’t an option that is worth it to you.  There’s nothing wrong with that. Early rising isn’t the ideal choice for everyone.  If that’s the case, keep your eye on this series as I discuss things that can help make the sleep you’re already getting more restful.

Obstacle #5 – Only You Know This One …

I’m positive that there are other obstacles to waking up early that I haven’t covered in this short post, and I’d love to hear your input in the comments.  In my Becoming an Early Riser program I have 20 mini-workshops that help build habits that make it easier to get better sleep and wake up energized, but I’d be very interested to see if there are obstacles I haven’t included that I could work into the program as bonus material.

I’ll tell you what – lay out your biggest obstacle(s) in the comments below, and if I haven’t covered it in my program, I’ll work on developing a mini-workshop to help you move past it and I’ll send it to you via email so you can blast it out of the water.  If I have covered it, I’ll let you know.  (And if you just want to dive in now, you can get the program here).

I’ll see you in the comments!

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Now, there’s nothing wrong with being a night owl if you’re doing it for all the right reasons, but when you focus on getting better sleep and waking up early you tap into a number of benefits that most people don’t get by staying up late.  Busy workdays often lead to weary evenings, and in the rush to keep up important things can fall by the wayside.  It’s not easy for anyone to keep it all balanced, but waking up early can give you a definite advantage when it comes to getting more of what you want out of life.  Let’s look at 5 things that get easier when you give waking up early a chance.

#1 – It’s Easier To Feel Good About Your Day

Most of us live lives that are pretty damned busy.  Sometimes way, way too busy.  Because of that, it’s easy to be frazzled, hurried and stressed when you wake up after hitting the snooze button and realize that you have to hit the ground running if you hope to get going in time.  That rushed feeling doesn’t go away easily for most of us, and we carry that stress throughout the day (and night).  But when you wake up early, you get to start the day on your own terms.  You get time to “warm up,” to let your thoughts settle, and relax before it’s time to spring into action. You get to be proactive – rather than reactive, which gives you a greater feeling of control (and cuts your stress during the day).

#2 – It’s Easier To Keep Your Life Balanced

The greatest thing about waking up early is that almost nobody else does.   This means you have a chunk of time where you’re likely to be free of interruptions and demands – and you can finally do some things for yourself (for a change!).  The things you’ve been putting off – exercise, journaling, reading, relaxing, attending to your personal or spiritual growth – these are all things that you can start making time for “under the radar” of a day that crouches in wait with infinite urgencies and demands.  By setting aside a slice of your day for you, a more balanced life becomes something you’re actually working for, rather than hoping for.

#3 – It’s Easier To Sleep Well At Night

When you know that the next morning will give you a chance to meet the day on your own terms, and that you’ll have an opportunity to bring more balance to your life, you’ll feel a lot better when you put your head down on the pillow.  You won’t feel so rushed, so overwhelmed, so running behind … and you’ll be able to relax more at the end of the day, knowing progress awaits in the morning.  And while that’s not a guaranteed cure for insomnia or other sleep disorders, it certainly can’t hurt.

#4 – It’s Easier to Stay Focused And Productive

This is a given (and that’s why it’s towards the bottom of the list).  Tasks tend to expand to meet whatever time limits we set for them, and that can be dangerous late at night, when you’re geared up to “just work a little longer ’till it’s done.”  But when you block out time in the morning to do something, the deadline becomes more real.  You’ve got to get a task done before the kids get up, or before it’s time to go to work, and you hustle more to get it done.  You resist distraction and stay more focused.  And that’s a good thing to have going for you.

#5 – It’s Easier to … (you fill in the blank)

The “teaser” post for the Better Sleep series received a lot of great comments from all of you, and I’d love to hear more.  If you’re an early riser already, add to the list via the comments below.  If you’re an early riser-in-training, comment on what you’re planning to “make easier” when you start meeting the day on your own terms.  And if you need some help waking up early, click here to get it.

Waking up early isn’t as grueling as most people think – but there are some very real obstacles, which I’ll discuss in the next post, Why Waking Up Early Can Be So Hard. Sign up for RSS or email updates and don’t miss a post in the Better Sleep series.

Why the hell would I want to wake up early?  I’d much rather stay up late and get things done then.  What’s wrong with being a night owl?

Why Night Owls Are So Much Less Productive Than Early Risers

Just kidding. That headline isn’t true at all.  There’s nothing wrong with being a night owl and there’s no magical reason that waking up early is better than staying up late (so no flame wars in the comments please).  If you’re staying up late and getting a lot of truly meaningful things done, then keep on keepin’ on.  There is no shortage of people who are burning the midnight oil and creating the life that they want.  More power to them (or ‘More power to you’ if you’re one of them).

But, consider this …

Working Late Could Be A Sign Of A Bigger Problem

Whether you’re working late, you have to ask yourself why you are choosing to do that.  Is it because you’re setting meaningful goals, blocking out time, and tackling them?  Or is it because you are trying to “catch up” or cram things in to an overworked lifestyle?  I spent a lot of my life in the latter, and I can tell you, it’s no fun.  When you’re living a life of reaction – trying to figure out how to handle it all – you open yourself up to “working the problem” rather than working through the problem.

Here’s what I mean.  If you’re falling behind, or you have more goals than time, the simplest answer is to stay up later and try and get more done.  It’s the easiest answer.  But just because it’s easy doesn’t mean it’s right.  Staying up later to “get it all done” may essentially be an enabling behavior.  Maybe the problem isn’t that you’ve fallen behind – maybe the real issue is that your daily habits don’t set you up for getting ahead. In other words, the issue isn’t that you’re not bailing water fast enough, it’s that you have holes in the bottom of your boat.

And if that’s the case, staying up later to bail faster isn’t the solution.  Patching those holes is.  And doing that might require:

• Changing poor work habits

• Improving your time management skills

• Resisting the temptation to engage in time-wasting distractions

• Reducing the number of commitments / goals you manage

• Telling people ‘no,’ even when it’s inconvenient / uncomfortable

• Making a life change (for example, new job / career)

• Etc., etc., etc.

Working Late Could Be Taking The Easy Way Out

Again, if you’re a night owl who is making consistent progress on a life of balanced, meaningful goals, then more power to you.  But if this article has been making you squirm (and truth be told, it’s making me squirm as well as I think of some habits I need to work on), then your spidey-sense is telling you that you might need to start patching holes instead of playing catch up.

Working late is all well and good, but may simply be a way of distracting yourself with the problem rather than facing the discomfort that comes with trying to fix it.  Listen to your gut.  What’s it telling you?

Why I Became An Early Riser – And Why You Might Want To As Well

When I realized that working late wasn’t getting me ahead, I decided to start getting up early instead.  Why?  Because there’s a different dynamic that exists in those early hours, a special kind of time that lends itself more strongly towards getting ahead rather than just “doing stuff.”  There’s something about building that habit that just makes it easier to think about making changes that really do improve your life.

Getting up early has given me time to think abut what I want to do with my life without the distractions of the world.  I can think more clearly and make decisions more objectively, and on top of that, it just feels good to get into a waking groove earlier.  In the next post – the beginning of a series of articles about getting better sleep – I’ll talk more about the specific benefits that come with making the shift to an early riser routine.

Until then, I’ll see you in the comments, and I do hope you’ll subscribe to this blog to catch the “better sleep” series.

Sure, we’ve all heard motivational quotes that tell us how success is just picking yourself up one more time than you fall down, but in reality, when you fail at beating a bad habit that’s plagued you for years, you don’t just “fall down.”  You get knocked down, punched out, kicked to the curb, beaten to a pulp … hell, pardon my French, but you get your frigging ass kicked emotionally and psychologically, big time.  Rocky’s Clubber Lang is standing over your bloody, TKO’d body, saying “I pity the fool, and I will destroy any man who tries to take what I got!”

Ok, maybe it’s not that dramatic, but playing the sumbissive role to a dominating bad habit sucks.  Agreed?  We all want to be Rocky, but you gotta remember he didn’t win in the first movie – he coughed up blood and nursed a couple of broken ribs and some brutal bruising.  Clubber Lang even kicked his ass in the beginning of Rocky III – but the Italian Stallion came back. And no matter how many title bouts you have lost against your own bad habit, you’re going to learn how to win in the end, black eyes and all.  I’ll tell you how, after the opening act.

It All Starts With Declaring One Word: War.

Rocky didn’t go the distance by saying, “Gee, it sure would be nice to win,” or “Wow, I’ve got a great goal, check it out! (yippee!)”  No, Rocky did what everyone does when they tackle something that requires a hell of a lot more guts and power than they’re currently packing – they declare war and commit themselves fully to it.  They don’t hold back.  They decide they are going to do whatever it takes, that they will expend every resource possible, that they will crush every excuse … and in the end, they win.  They may go through hell, they may fail a lot along the way, but they come out champions.

Holy Crap, Dave, Do I Have To Have All This Drama?

No.  In fact, you’ve probably done this many times before when wanting to overcome a bad habit, and there was no drama involved.  Let me give you an example that most of you can relate to (and if you can’t, you’ll be able to conjure up some experience that’s close enough): Waking up really, really early to catch a plane.  Let’s say you had to wake up at 3am, and you know that ain’t easy.  But because you only had one shot, you decided you were going to do whatever it took to make it happen.

• Maybe you said “Crap, it’s hard to get up early,” and so you decided to go to bed a few hours early.
• Then you said, “Ugh, I hate running late because I forgot something,” and so you packed ahead of time.
• Then you said, “Hey, what if my alarm clock doesn’t go off?” and so you check your alarm three times to make sure it works.
• Then you said, “Uh-oh, what if I sleep through that alarm?” and so you set a second alarm to cover your back.
• Then you said, “Hell, I sleep through double alarms all the time,” and so you arranged a wake up call from a real live person.

Do You See The Pattern Here?  You Planned Ahead.

When you really, really had to wake up early – even if was against your nature – you did it by thinking through the obstacles that you might encounter and coming up with strategies to make all of them non-issues.  You decided you simply had to get up at 3am, and that nothing was going to be a permissible excuse.  You asked “What could get in my way?” and then followed that up with a “How can I plan around that?”

Notice how this differs from a lot of typical goal setting:

• You decide “Hell yeah, I’m doing X!”
• You discover that X is actually very hard to do and that things keep getting in the way (or screwing you up).
• You decide “Hell, this just isn’t working out.  Maybe I should rethink doing X.  I don’t have the willpower to make this work.”

No, No, NO, NO, NO.  Don’t let this happen.  Don’t confuse lack of progress in overcoming a habit with the actual difficulty of doing it. If you’re not making progress, it’s likely that it’s because you aren’t deciding up front to anticipate obstacles and so you’re not planning your way around it.  You’re banking on willpower alone to carry you through, and you’re seeing how far it gets you.

How To Get The Upper Hand Over Your Bad Habits

People want the easy answer on this one, but there’s no easy answer.  It takes work.  But the good news is that it’s completely do-able.  Here’s what you need to know to get started.

First, accept the fact that this isn’t necessarily going to be easy, and that there will be a lot of forces working against you. Forces like your own internal resistance, the resistance of others, the inevitabilty of crap happening to you when you least expect it … prep yourself for this reality ahead of time.  That way when things go all to hell, you won’t be feeling small and powerless – you’ll be saying “Hey, this is just the way it goes – the challenges are no surprise.”

This is the first critical step – if you don’t do that, you’re always going to be struggling with the emotional overwhelm that comes when you think something should be easier than it is.  Remember, this is war.  You have enemies – internal, external, and neutral – that will make things harder than they need to be.  Accept it, so you can fight against it.

Next, anticipate – on paper – all the things that might hinder your ability to overcome this bad habit and plan around them. Revisit the struggles you have had in the past because of self doubt, or lack of willpower, or simply lack of planning ahead.  Think about the resistance you got from other people, and how that drained you emotionally – and begin planning around that as well.  Look back at all the random, neutral things that happened that threw your grand plans out the window – things like emergencies, diversions and urgencies – and prepare yourself to roll with the punches.

This is equally critical – if you don’t do this, you don’t know your enemy.  He/She/You will underimine all that you are working towards, and it will be tragic because it would have been completely preventable if you’d just done this step.  If the habit change is important to you, you will find a way to make time for this.

Finally, build your battle plan and keep it in front of you every damned day until you’ve killed this habit for good. The personal behaviors which allow this bad habit to thrive aren’t going to loosen your grip on you “just because.”  They will fight you every step of the way.  So will other people, and so will life in general.  That’s just the way it goes.  But if you keep your plan in front of you each day, if you remind yourself to work it each and every day, then you’re golden.  You’re taking it seriously, and you will make progress.

This is where the rubber meets the road.  If you don’t focus yourself on the tactics you need to use to overcome this habit as often as necessary, you will forget about it and revert to your old behaviors.  War is hell.  You’ve got to fight like hell.  Like Clubber Lang, you’ve got to attack that habit and “kill it to death.”

And That’s It.  So Go Do It.  Now.

No need to sum this up.  You want to kill a bad habit bad enough, you’ve got to go in with all guns blazing.  Not half-assed, not half-hearted, not half-way … you’ve got to slam it until there ain’t nothing left to be slammed.

The good news?  You can do it.  In fact, I’m going to use this exact strategy to squash a bad habit which has come back full force this week because … why?  Because I beat it ‘most of the way’ and then took my eyes off of it. Never again.  This time I declare war on this bully of a habit and go fifteen rounds until it’s nothing but burger.

And I pity the fool who tries to stop me.

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People have goals for one primary reason: Because they want what they think is waiting on the other side.  It could be money, or power, or recognition, or simply the satisfaction of a job well done.  You pursue your goals because you want what’s on the other side.  But are the things you’re doing every day really driving you closer to that “other side?”  Or are you just spinning your wheels, operating under the illusion that you’re getting somewhere (when really, you aren’t)?  I’ve got 3 questions that will either make you smile or make you squirm  (after the opening act, of course).

When The Journey Isn’t Getting You Anywhere

When you set your goals, you have an idea of how you’re going to get there, but that idea alone may not be accurate.  For example, too many people devote their focus to climbing the corporate ladder so that they can have the money to enjoy their life, but find that they are only making their lives more complicated and stressful in the end.  It’s easy to do this, because society conditions us to believe we have to do X to get Y, and we take it at face value, doing X like crazy without asking if it’s really the best way to get to Y.  Time goes by, we’re not where we want to be, and we ask, “What the hell happened?  I was doing X, damn it!  Where’s my Y?”  Clay Collins gets this.

Do you? Riddle me these three questions, and let’s find out.

#1 – What Result Am I Really After?

When you take on a goal, are you crystal clear on what you’re really after, or are you settling for something so vague that it hinders you?  Vagueness can absolutely kill you, because it creates fertile ground for being sloppy.  For example, when I started my first blog, my goal was to build a “high-traffic blog that made me lots of money.”  Stupid goal.  Why?  Because it’s too damn vague.  It opened the door to spend a lot of hours doing the same things over and over again.   And it wasn’t really what I wanted, because I was focusing on the vehicle, not the result.

Once I got clearer on my real result – building a media property that would allow me to increase the amount of money I was making while not working as many hours, it all changed.  Instead of just “make more money” it became “make more money without increasing my hours.”  Having the other half of that phrase made the difference.  I became more discerning about how I spent my time, more precise with my strategies, and within 30 days of getting very, very focused I built an income stream that’s not sucking my time away anymore.

That’s the key here – it’s not enough to say what you want – you’ve got to understand why you want it.

• You want to make money as a freelance writer?   Or do you want to work from home writing so you can spend an extra 10 hours a week with your kids?

• Do you want to blog?  Or do you want to build a platform to communicate your ideas while selling your products and creating passive income?

• Do you want to start going to the gym?  Or do you want to boost your metabolism and increase your strength so you have the energy to enjoy your life? That second half makes the difference.

Ask yourself what you’re really after.  And ask in a way that’s measurable, so you’re not slaving away at it waiting to see results “someday.”

#2 – How long will it take me with my present course?

This is definitely a squirm-inducing question.  If you keep doing what you’re doing now, at the pace you’re doing it, with the intensity you’re doing it, how long will it really take to get where you want to be?  If you answer “I don’t know,” that’s a big red flag.

You might not like asking this question because it forces you to really look at the results you’re getting with your current efforts.  Are you just spinning your wheels, or are you actually making progress? Are you getting by, or getting ahead?  You don’t have to have a detailed answer here – and quite often, you can’t, because the future is uncertain – but you should be able to get a ballpark figure.

This is a tough question, but it can truly save your ass.  Maybe your present course isn’t the right one.  Maybe you need a dramatic shift in strategy.  Maybe you have no idea what the hell to do, and this question makes you freeze up.  But you need to know, and you need to know now.

I measure everything on this blog – subscribers, traffic sources, sales, everything – because I want to know how long it’s going to take me to get to where I want to be.  When it’s not moving fast enough, I get pissed and get determined to speed it up (again, without tacking on lots of extra hours).

Are you measuring your progress towards your goals?  Or are you just hoping it magically gets better?

#3 – Am I enjoying part of this goal right now?

Remember, you don’t have to have it all to have it now. If you’re trying to make more money so you can retire in style, then take a mini-retirement week off every now and then.  If you’re busting your ass so you can give your family what they want, make sure you’re stepping back and being there for them now. You don’t have to wait ’till you have the money to take them to Disneyland, just go to the damn park this weekend. You get the point.

Screw “one day.” What about now? Don’t make your goals far off things you have to wait for – find ways to enjoy a bit of the result in the here and now. It will keep you motivated, but more importantly, it will keep you from missing out on the important stuff of life.

And that’s it for today.  Ask these three questions, and kick your own ass until you get the answers you need to.  Your life is worth it – live it now, not later.

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