With each passing year, you might decide to make a change.
You promise yourself that you won’t repeat the same mistakes you did last year.
You tackle 75 Hard or go on a ‘better me’ boot camp for a few weeks.
And then…
You lose motivation after about a month.
Everything goes back to the way it was.
Why?
You’re attempting to fix internal problems with external solutions.
If you view yourself as an undisciplined person you will stay undisciplined.
If you view yourself as a successful person you will become successful.
Your behavior depends upon the self-image you have created in your mind.
According to the author of the book Atomic Habits:
“All lasting change is an identity shift.”
This simply means that you need to change the way you view yourself.
But how can you do that?
Well the “internet people” as I like to call them, say you should stare at yourself and repeat affirmations in the mirror…
Or write down your vision on a piece of paper and read it 10 times a day.
But I’ll tell you something that’s much more useful –
Take action.
I know this sounds oversimplified, but I’ll explain in a moment.
Instead of telling yourself that you can do it:
Show yourself that you are the person you say you are.
And you will start to believe it.
Here’s the perfect example:
As you probably know by now, I found myself in a very difficult situation towards the end of last year:
Over $220,000 in debt.
If you didn’t know that, you can get caught up on that story here.
I haven’t explained this anywhere publicly quite yet, but after my relationship of almost 9 years came to an end, I found myself spiraling.
For almost 2 years things plummeted.
I became depressed.
I neglected my business and my relationships.
I felt like I had failed, because I did.
Nothing seemed important anymore.
To try and get my spirit back:
- I traveled
- I journaled
- I hired a therapist
- I cut back on drinking
And although that helped – none of it made me feel like ‘myself’ again.
The only thing that truly helped me, was getting so frustrated with myself and the way I was feeling, that I just had to force myself to take action.
But what do I mean by that? How does someone just ‘take action’, like wtf does that mean?
Well, this is what worked for me:
I mapped out what a ‘perfect day’ would look like for me, and then I replicated that.
I ‘faked’ it.
I made a daily schedule of what my day would look like if I was the perfect version of myself.
The version that I could see in my head, but did not see in the mirror.
So, I made a non-negotiable list, and stuck to it no matter what, daily for 60 days:
- Wake up before 8am
- Journal and meditate
- Outdoor exposure
- Workout / exercise
- Read / audiobook
- Focused work (2 hours)
- 18 minutes of hobbies
- Social interaction (M-F)
- No alcohol
- 1 coffee or less
- No pornography
- 20 pushups & 20 situps
I wrote in detail about this experience and how you can implement something like this for yourself in my full article Life Seasons: How to Embrace It When Things Don’t Go Your Way.
I named this challenge ‘Commit 60’ and it’s now become part of the Project Resurgence cohort so that others can implement it as well.
Moral of the story: You can’t sit around and wait until you feel better, or feel ready. You simply have to do the uncomfortable and force yourself to do the things you’ve been putting off.
Come up with a vision of what it looks like in your mind, and then fake it. Fake it until it becomes real.
