I wrote my book Elastic Habits because I discovered that flexibility was the main driver of behavior change. If behavior changes through consistent action, then whatever enables consistent action is the most valuable activator. That’s flexibility.

Everyone does well when they’re fully motivated and have enough time and energy to act. That’s what, 5% of the time? Real progress requires constantly overcoming internal and external resistance to action.

When you’re flexible, you gain significant power to overcome obstacles. If you will only go in a straight line, a big boulder will stop you. If you’re willing to go around, over, or under it, you can proceed! It’s a shame then, that most people pursue goals in a straight line method. Ironically, it’s done this way because it feels stronger (“No excuses, I’ll do this no matter what!”). It’s far weaker.

Imagine a boxer who only throws right jabs. How easy it would be to defend! It doesn’t matter how powerful he is if he gives you an easy defense. His power can be neutralized. But now imagine if he has a full arsenal of different punches. Uppercuts, hooks, jabs, and crosses. Now you’re in real trouble, because he has multiple ways to attack! Flexibility activates power.

Mental Flexibility = Mental and Emotional Power

If punch flexibility creates fighting power and behavioral flexibility creates the power to change, what can mental flexibility do? And what does it actually mean?

Mental flexibility, or flexibility of thought is the ability to think laterally. This idea is layered in the following ways.

• Creativity: Instead of assuming one way of doing something, do you ever consider alternative approaches?
• Problems: Instead of ruminating on issues, can you shift your focus to solutions or blessings instead?
• When you initially assume something, do you ever challenge it? If so, how quickly?

Mental flexibility’s main purpose is to prevent you from feeling stuck. When people feel stuck, in nearly every case, they are creating that reality with rigid thinking.

Rigid vs Flexible Thinking

I’ve felt stuck physically before, meaning that I’ve felt out of shape or in a fitness funk. But how does that make any sense when I can exercise in this instant? I make it reality when I let rigid thinking loop endlessly.

1. “I don’t feel like lifting weights.”
2. “I am in a funk.”
3. “I haven’t worked out yet.”
4. “That confirms I am in a funk.”
5. “I don’t feel like working out.”
6. …

Can you see how rigid thinking feeds on itself? Whatever rigid negative thought you have will generally compound unless you challenge it. Which number in the list do you think is the root of the problem?

It’s 2. “I am in a funk.” While this thought may seem innocent and merely observatory, it’s loaded with dreadful implications. First, it implies finality. A person in a funk can’t do much, can they? Thus, thinking you’re in a funk is like saying, “I’m thirsty, so I guess I can’t drink water.”

This is a common and harmful thought pattern. When you have a negative feeling, it does not have to result in any certain thought or action. In other words, the admission of a feeling is NOT a contract!

Mental flexibility allows us to escape these harmful thought patterns. Here’s how it’s different.

1. “I don’t feel like lifting weights.”
2. “I could go for a short walk instead.” (flexible idea, positive emotional shift)
3. “That felt good!”

A short walk might not be the type of progress you envisioned initially, but look at how positive this sequence is compared to the rigid thinker. And it matters even more for the next instance. The next time you have the idea to lift weights, think of the difference. With rigid thinking, you’d’ remember where you left off: “Oh right, I’ve been in a funk,” and you will likely continue to feel that way, feeding the thoughts and emotions that enable it.

With flexible thinking, however, you will remember your last attempt as a pivot to success.

Thinking Patterns and Emotional Health

The prior example shows how flexible thinking and ideas helps create behavioral success. But it’s much more than that. It’s absolutely essential to your emotional health to be able to shift your thoughts and behavior when necessary.

Emotions are cyclical just like thought patterns, and they feed each other. Thus, the flexible thinker is able to “catch” the beginnings of a negative cycle before it gets bad. It’s amazing to think that a rigid thinker can turn one bad day or event into a bad week, month, or life. That sounds absurd, but think about what rigid thinking is and does. By its nature, it doesn’t change, it embeds itself deeper and deeper into your habits and psyche.

Today, I encourage you to monitor your self-talk. Challenge negative thoughts for veracity. Look for opportunities to pivot your thinking to a more useful place. The first step to increasing your flexibility of thought is awareness. Ask yourself questions about recurring thoughts and ideas, such as what purpose they serve, and if they are accurate.

Your thoughts are your world. Take care of them. Think with flexibility, and then you can keep the thoughts and ideas that serve you best. Challenge rigid thoughts that feed themselves, trap you, and steal your life force. Like anything else, the more you practice challenging your thought patterns, the better you’ll get at recognizing them and pivoting to better ideas.

The ultimate guide to flexible thinking and behaviors is my book Elastic Habits. It has a new low price. You can check it out here on Amazon!

The post Is Flexible Thinking the Key to a Happy Life? appeared first on minihabits.com.

In case you don’t know, there’s evil in this world. Beyond that, humans experience tragedy that can’t be explained. Life can get awfully dark when the tide turns against you.

Enter my favorite movie series, The Lord of the Rings, based on the classic books by J.R.R. Tolkien. Like many, I instantly fell in love with these movies when I first saw them. And besides the incredible soundtrack from Howard Shore, I think it’s the deep, powerful themes they present.

Broadly, the main characters are tasked with a long and difficult journey which could represent a human life with all its ups, downs, dangers, and evils; we get to see the character use all of the tools we have to fight for our best lives—friendship, perseverance, love, and hope to name a few.

There’s one scene that always strikes me, and I’ll explain why.

The Tales That Really Mattered

It’s in the second of three movies—right in the middle. And this is perfect, because while beginnings and climaxes are the most interesting or intense parts of films and perhaps life, it’s the middle part where the most important stuff happens. It’s in the middle part where we decide what path(s) we take that will determine our fate tomorrow and beyond.

In this scene, Frodo becomes instantly relatable. Exhausted and with little hope, he says a simple, disheartening phrase.

“I can’t do this, Sam.”

Who can’t relate to that? How many times have I felt this way in the past couple of years alone? Too many to count. I’ve been or at least felt constantly attacked by circumstances beyond my control. I get it, Frodo. I know that feeling. That feeling is human.

Of course, this is an inspirational story, not a depressing one, and Frodo’s best friend Sam really delivers in this time of need. He responds,

“I know. It’s all wrong. By rights we shouldn’t even be here. But we are. It’s like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness, and danger, they were. And sometimes you didn’t want to know the end, because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened?

But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines, it’ll shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something. Even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back only they didn’t. They kept going. Because they were holding on to something.”

I mean, that’s just beautiful, isn’t it? It inspires without pandering. Quite a bit better than “hang in there.”

I’ve written before about the temporal nature of things in life. It’s one of the most important lessons I’ve ever learned.

Good and bad things pass. All of them. Thus, we mustn’t get too comfortable in the good times or too distraught in the bad times.

What Are We Holding On To?

After Sam’s speech, Frodo asks, “What are we holding on to, Sam?”

At this point, having watched many movies, I can predict Sam’s cheesy and vapid response. “We’re holding on to each other.” Yawn. But alas! This book was written by Mr. Tolkien, and he knows better. Here’s the actual reply from Sam.

“That there’s some good in this world, Mr. Frodo… and it’s worth fighting for.”

…

How profound!

That is indeed THE answer to many of our struggles, wouldn’t you say? It’s so good that it even encapsulates the aforementioned cheesy response that I expected (“holding on to each other”). The people we love are a big part of the good in this world worth fighting for.

And it captures the purest essence of perseverance. We go on because there are things that matter to us. We go on because there are things worth fighting for! Not to show we’re strong, or to merely survive another day.

The worst thing that can happen to a person is loss of purpose. I truly believe that, because when you lose your purpose, you no longer see what it is you’re fighting for. It makes the battles you face feel like punishment instead of a challenge you face in your exciting and meaningful journey to destroy the ring and save a beautiful world.

What in your world are you fighting for?

Happiness? A friend? Your family? Your future? An important cause? A hobby or passion?

Whatever it is, don’t forget it.

The post It’s only a passing thing, this shadow appeared first on minihabits.com.

Alcoholism and gambling addiction often go together, as do smoking and gambling. There’s something about doubling your vices that makes for a good time. And for about a decade, I drank alcohol and gambled frequently. Now? I don’t gamble or drink.

If you currently drink and/or gamble too much, you’re going to want to read this.

I’m boring now. I don’t go to Vegas on a whim for a gambling and booze bender. But the effect on my life has been the opposite of boring. My life actually feels more exciting, bigger, and full of possibilities.

I’m not preaching to you, or trying to convince you to drop any of your bad habits. But I do want you to consider if you actually want your current vices or not. Because you might be like me—I thought that I wanted them, and I was very wrong.

A Fascinating Heroin Addict Interview

I watched a video of a homeless heroin addict talking coherently about his situation. He said some interesting things.

“That’s part of the reason why I’m not ready to quit yet. It’s going to be pure hell (withdrawal). I know that right now, there’s no way I could do it (quit) because I don’t wanna do it yet.”

“I still like it too much.”

Obviously, heroin addiction is on another level compared to a “bad habit.” Their neurological “hook” is way, way deeper. I’m only going to point out structural similarities between the two, because the most extreme cases sometimes present the clearest examples.

From these responses, I see a lot of similarities to my experiences with drinking and gambling. Basically, I was deceived into thinking I liked them and that they were worth it to me. But for all the fun they gave me, they took away much more from me. In the case of the heroin addict, his addiction took away his entire life. He said he even had a family, and this substance replaced everything. It consumes him and simultaneously blinds him to alternative lifestyles.

Bad Habits Often “Solve” the Problems THEY Created

Bad habits often trick us into thinking they’re necessary. But more often than not, the only thing they do is mask the negative symptoms they created in the first place.

For example, people drink alcohol to calm their anxiety, either in social situations or in general. It’s relaxing and fun to drink. But because of how alcohol creates relaxation, you’re effectively borrowing relaxation from a future date, or even depriving yourself of it altogether when you drink excessively.

Let me put it to you this way: I don’t have much anxiety now. I had a lot of anxiety when I drank alcohol daily.

Alcoholism: The Relaxing Drink That… Stresses Us Out?

Alcohol stresses us out in multiple ways.

“At least in some people, chronic alcohol use apparently can lead to chronically elevated cortisol levels with all the associated symptoms.” (source)

Cortisol is known as the “stress hormone.” For most people, drinking makes the body produce more cortisol.

GABA is the neurotransmitter responsible for reducing neuronal excitability. It’s calming. GABA is good! Unfortunately, alcohol also abuses our GABA receptors to the point that they quit responding in the same way.

“Alcohol stimulates GABA receptors, and thereby dampens activity in the brain. It is thought that this is why it produces an immediate reduction of anxiety, and overdoses can lead to coma…

If there is a constant supply of alcohol, the brain receptors adapt by reducing GABA receptors.” (source)

So the net effect of alcohol consumption is immediate calm and long-term stress. We notice the calming effect while drinking, but we don’t connect the stress (or the need for the calming effect) to the alcohol. It’s simply not obvious unless you research how it works.

I don’t know if I’ve quit either of my aforementioned vices “forever.” I can pick them back up at any time and overconfidence isn’t a great idea. But I can say that this feels way different than any other time I’ve paused because the DESIRE is gone. I’ve not forbidden either of these behaviors, I’ve not wanted to do them. And in case you’re skeptical of some vices in your life, and whether they’re worth it or not, here’s how I got to this point.

You Need 3 Things to Quit a Bad Habit

I’ve found that I need all three of these things, or else I can’t quit a bad habit or addiction.

1) Complete Theoretical Understanding of the Bad Habit

You must first fully understand all effect(s) of your bad habit. Know why, what, how, and when everything happens. This was my first step for quitting alcohol. I educated myself about exactly how it works and what it does to the human body. The science is deep and overwhelming, but I’m going to link to a two hour video that summarizes it very well.

What you’ll find is that very often, the perceived benefit of the bad habit is directly related to its negative effects.

• Drugs make us feel good (benefit) because they hijack our brain chemistry in harmful ways and/or poison us (drawback).
• Gambling activates dopamine through variability of reward, which is extremely exciting (benefit), but generally requires chasing to maintain and makes all other activities less exciting (drawback).
• Binge eating is pleasurable (benefit), but you feel bad afterwards physically at a minimum, and possibly emotionally. Furthermore, it leads to weight gain and health problems that can even become life-threatening (drawback).

Give yourself the full picture of the behavior, and learn the process of how it works with your body and brain. Once you learn the mechanism of the behavior, you can break its “magic” appeal down into something tangible and less desirable. This essentially takes a hammer to the glass house of “ignorance is bliss.”

It’s in our best interest as individuals and a society to increase awareness about the science of habits, specific and general. I’m good at drawing concepts like this article out of specific examples, which is why Dr. Huberman’s video about alcohol opened my eyes to more than just alcohol. That video helped me quit gambling, too!

2) Experiential Understanding of Quitting Upside

Once you know the theory of how something works, you must then validate it with experience. If you don’t take this step, the information will become as useful to you as knowing that mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell (woot!). Who cares about theory when this bad habit feels so great right now? You must test theories to know they are true.

When I quit drinking, initially I felt more stressed out. But after 2-4 weeks, I felt significantly calmer. I stopped clenching my jaw constantly. My anxiety plummeted. It worked exactly as the science of alcohol consumption suggested it would.

This is tricky to say it’s necessary to “quit” the habit to gain experience… to quit the habit. But all it means is that you need a trial run of sorts to experience life without the behavior. And importantly, you need to maximize the benefits of quitting during this time.

• If you quit gambling, don’t sit in bed all day. Go out and have fun doing other things. Spend money you would have lost gambling on worthwhile items and experiences.
• If you quit drinking, start working out. One of the biggest downsides to alcohol for me is how it would disrupt my workout routines. Working out while hungover isn’t even a good idea! Or take advantage of decreased social anxiety by going places. Yes, I said decreased anxiety!

Whatever the habit is, you have to give it some time. You won’t likely experience day one bliss. Your brain will need time to adjust away from the bad habit, and in the meantime, it may throw a temper tantrum (withdrawal). With alcoholism, it’s extremely important to note that quitting suddenly (if you’re an alcoholic) can be very dangerous, so check with your doctor on that one.

3) Embrace An Important Value That Conflicts with the Habit

When the heroin addict said, “I still like it too much,” I knew he was missing this third requirement (and the second as well). If you like your bad habit more than any of the benefits you’ll get from quitting it, you will NEVER quit it. In other words, you must have a compelling reason to quit. (The first two steps help you identify all of those reasons and “activate” dormant values.)

There are plenty of people who drink or gamble or do drugs who may genuinely prefer that lifestyle. That’s their choice, and if done in moderation, it’s possible that these vices are a net positive to them.

I care about my health a lot. Health is wealth, as they say. I’m always researching, and everything finally clicked to me. I understood in theory and experience what alcohol did to my mind and body, and I lost my desire for it. Just like that. (I’m not saying this works for alcoholics, this is just my personal experience. I had a small glass of champagne for my nephew turning 21 and had no issues or relapses. I also have an unopened bottle of wine in my kitchen and it’s not a temptation.)

Gambling took me a lot longer to figure out. And who knows if I’m truly done, as bad habits never stop campaigning for your time, but I can say the desire to gamble has been gone for over a month (and four months for alcohol as of writing). This is different than saying “I’m on day X and it’s tough, but one day at a time.” I’m saying that I allow myself to go gambling or drink a full bottle of wine right now and I don’t want to do either. This is different.

Throughout my gambling years, I constantly read about it. I read about gambling addiction, and about how all of the games work. I played everything, too. I know every slot machine in a casino by name, every table game, everything. In addition, I tracked every gambling trip. I gained considerable theoretical knowledge. Combined with my values of having fun, seeing humor in the little things, and not wasting money, the decision to quit was automatic, rather than a struggle.

My experience after quitting gambling confirmed all of the theoretical knowledge I gained. I quickly became happier, more relaxed, had more fun in everyday life, and of course, saved money. Why would I go back?

Alcoholism and Gambling Addiction Labels

It’s tough to know what label to use, because it’s not easy to standardize human behavior and labels have such different ramifications. I don’t know if I ever qualified as an addict, or was just a “problem gambler.” I gambled too much, and didn’t want to quit for some time. Whatever label you want to use, it was a problem.

As for alcohol, I don’t think I have the “alcoholic gene” that some do. But I drank several drinks every day for periods of time. It was also a big problem!

The bad habit versus addiction discussion is important. The line between bad habit and addiction can be blurry. And there’s significant power in what label you decide to use. If you label something a bad habit, that’s pretty light; Label it alcoholism or gambling addiction, and that’s heavy and serious (which may be what some people need, as that admission is the first step of GA and AA programs). Either way, be careful. I think over or under labeling your behaviors can be extremely damaging.

If you don’t know what label to use, either hold off or ask for guidance. I think the most useful label difference is between “problem” and “bad habit.” If something is at the level that you can label it as a problem, it suggests that you should attempt to make a change or seek professional help if necessary.

Why Gambling Addicts Are Blind

Gambling is notoriously one of the most difficult addictions to kick for a reason. First, it isn’t a math problem. I’ve excelled at math since a young age. I know the house edge of every single game in a casino, down to decimal places. I never expected to win long-term. But the atmosphere of a casino was alluring. The thought of big (short-term) wins was thrilling. The stakes of betting real money made the experience feel meaningful and important. Plus, I don’t go to bars or clubs, so it was a fun way to get out of the house.

That all sounds pretty fun, doesn’t it? Well, that’s the facade.

Gambling addicts quickly become blind to what gambling actually does to them. Gambling had hijacked my brain into thinking that it was fun and most other stuff was boring and lame. Gambling may be fun, but hey, so is other stuff! What could explain this?

Because I was gambling so much, it raised my dopamine threshold to unrealistic levels. The games are designed to delight the human brain. The lights, sounds, excitement. It’s not unlike taking a drug! And like drug addicts, gambling addicts want more and more of their drug and less of everything else in the world.

When I stopped gambling, my life was like a black and white movie slowly turning back into full 3D color. I started seeing the humor in everyday life again. Truly, I laugh probably four times as much now! I’ll never forget that first big belly laugh, maybe two or three weeks after I quit gambling. I suddenly realized I hadn’t belly laughed in a long time. It was a subtle, yet extremely powerful realization; it was a microcosm of me coming back to life.

This is Key: Replace It With Something Equal or Better

As gambling drained my life force, I thought it was giving me life. That’s like Gollum’s relationship with the Ring of Power. It consumes him; it takes his humanity away. He loves it only because he’s blind to its evil power over him, both in theory and experience. He can’t imagine a life without it because he doesn’t understand life without it.

I couldn’t fully understand a life without gambling until I tried living without it for some time in a way that satisfied some of the same desires.

I regained interest in video games, and they were and will continue to be a key replacement activity. I might be addicted to a video game now, but I’ll take that over gambling any day. It’s a lot cheaper and more fun. I fell in love with gambling in the first place because I LOVE games, and gambling is just (rigged) gaming for adults. Video games are fun without the massive downsides of gambling. That makes them better!

You’ll be able to quit your bad habit when theory, experience, and your values agree that you want to quit. But none of these steps can be shallow. You have to dig deep with each one.

1. Know every negative and positive aspect of the behavior. Know how it affects your mental, physical, and emotional health, down to the most minute details. A lot of people drink alcohol because they have no idea how it works. They have no idea that the buzz from alcohol is the direct result of their body processing poison. Curious? Watch this two hour video from Andrew Huberman to see what alcohol does. It’s not judgy, just the science of booze.
2. Turn that theory into experience. Test what you learn fairly by choosing fun replacement activities that thrive without the behavior (being active and healthier without alcohol, playing other games without gambling). Once you do something for several years, it’s easy to forget how you felt before you took that first sip or stepped into your first casino. You need to experience life without it again to destroy the lie that you “need” it.
3. Addictions can hijack people’s values. Think about the gambling addicts who rob their employers or friends just to gamble more. Are these people evil, or have they lost touch with who they are like Gollum when he found the one ring? I think the latter is more often true. Rediscover the values you lost in this bad habit. The first two steps will help, as they work in conjunction with this one.

This is my experience, and it could be the exact formula I need for my unique brain chemistry and DNA. But it makes sense to me that this formula would work for many people.

Where I’m At Now and Final Thoughts

I’m not scared of alcohol. I can and will have a drink on a special occasion, but if it’s a neutral day and choice, I’m not drinking because I don’t want to drink. I value my health and awareness more than feeling buzzed.

I don’t have an ounce of resentment or condemnation for those who drink alcohol, or those with alcoholism and gambling addiction. I used to drink a lot, and now I don’t. I don’t condemn my past self for it. Nor do I see myself as “enlightened” compared to regular drinkers. It’s not my place to tell anyone what to do. Every person’s body chemistry is unique, and alcohol affects people differently.

My only thought is to wonder if some long-term drinkers are curious to learn what I’ve learned. We get curious about change when something causes us pain, but as I said, it can be difficult to locate the source of pain when the treatment is the source.

The absolute worst thing we can do is bring judgment and morality into this discussion. Regardless of whether or not those are appropriate for a behavior, such as religious considerations, judgment unequivocally turns people off. It shuts down communication. It prevents learning. People do not generally heal from being judged for their damaging behavior. Sometimes they can learn, yes, but even then, judgment is usually only accepted and learned from when it comes from authority figures (going to prison for a crime, etc).

So I leave you with this thought: Think about the sources of pain in your life, and ask yourself if perhaps they might be caused by the very thing or things you are using to cope with them. This is our principle blind spot. We don’t suspect the treatment could possibly be the disease. But when it comes to bad habits, that’s very often true!

I gambled to have fun. Gambling sucked the fun out of the other areas of my life. The treatment was the disease.

I drank to relax. Alcohol stressed me out more than anything I’ve ever experienced. The treatment was the disease.

It seems so obvious now, but it only became obvious when I applied theory, experience, and my values to break the hold these behaviors had on me. Whether you’re struggling with alcoholism or gambling addiction or something else, I encourage you to consider these three steps that helped me to quit. The best part about this method is that if successful, quitting will be your naturally preferred choice, and not something you have to suffer through.

Good luck!

The post Alcoholism and Gambling Addiction Ruin Lives: I Quit Both In 3 Steps appeared first on minihabits.com.

This is my blood test before and (5 months) after magnesium oil application.

Disclaimer: I’m not a doctor. Check with your doctor if you have any questions or concerns about adding magnesium oil to your routine.

Let’s start here: I have no incentive to sell you magnesium oil.

I understand that using “[blank] oil” and “miraculous” together gives snake oil salesman vibes. But I have ZERO incentive to sell you anything, except for my desire for you to discover this. While I’m going to recommend a certain brand because it has worked for me better than others, I have never even communicated with them. Nor do I have financial incentives with magnesium oil in general. I’m not even going to use Amazon affiliate links in this post like I typically would, because I want you to have zero doubts that I’m telling you this out of pure belief in what this incredible liquid does for the human body and nothing else.

If you do try magnesium oil and want to help me out because you love it, just share this article with your friends. That will help them out, too!

Magnesium Is Not a Fad… It’s Essential for Life!

I have some amazing anecdotal experiences with magnesium oil, but let’s start with science. Magnesium shouldn’t need any introduction. It’s a mineral that humans need, not a “product.” Yes, there are products containing it, but magnesium is involved in so many critical processes that it would be very difficult to overstate its importance to us.

“Magnesium is the fourth most abundant cation in the body and is present in more than 300 enzymatic systems, where it is crucial for adenosine triphosphate (ATP) metabolism.” (source, emphasis mine)

What are the top three cations? Who cares. Magnesium gets the spotlight today. We generally get magnesium from the food we eat, but it’s estimated that more than half of people don’t get enough of it. That’s associated with a lot of diseases, including all four of the biggest killers of humans, as I wrote about on the Dumb Little Man blog.

That’s one reason why we do have magnesium supplements, like any other vitamin and mineral. Magnesium supplements are more confusing than most, though. There’s magnesium oxide, magnesium citrate, magnesium bisglycinate, magnesium sulfate (epsom salt) and several others. But why so many?

Did you take chemistry in high school? I’m not sure if this cool of an experiment was allowed in your school, but pure elemental magnesium explodes in water! And the human body is 70% water. It just doesn’t seem like a good idea. So magnesium is bound to other elements to create safe, consumable forms of magnesium.

You get it. Magnesium is really important and healthy. But people drink alcohol and smoke and don’t drink enough water. So what’s the big deal with being a little bit low in magnesium and why should you care about magnesium oil in particular? Because it isn’t just about health, it’ll make you feel amazing.

Magnesium Oil Can Dramatically Improve Your Quality of Life

Not everyone cares to live the perfect robotic healthy lifestyle. But people do like to feel good, especially when it doesn’t require much effort. That’s why magnesium oil is so awesome. All you do is apply it to your skin. That’s a lot easier than working out or choosing to eat kale!

Magnesium oil isn’t really an “oil,” but rather a magnesium chloride brine. Magnesium chloride salt is also found in ocean water, which I find very interesting. Have you noticed that you feel extra relaxed after swimming in the ocean? Part of that is the swimming, sure, but another part could be the magnesium chloride your skin absorbs from the sea.

The Three Miraculous Effects of Magnesium Oil

1. Deep Muscular Relaxation

The main therapeutic benefit of magnesium is muscle relaxation. Muscle relaxation is one of magnesiums’ main functions in the body. Calcium contracts muscles and magnesium relaxes them. (This doesn’t mean you should avoid calcium. Both are important, but most Americans are lower in magnesium.)

My experience: I’ve stopped tension headaches with magnesium oil. Sometimes I’ll unconsciously clench my jaw and tense my shoulders. Magnesium oil “resets” them both in a way nothing else has before.

2. Enhanced Healing

Magnesium doesn’t just relax muscles. It’s involved in activating enzymes that heal the body. Magnesium oil is my go-to for all joint, ligament, and muscle injuries. It even seems to help with the most challenging issues like cartilage.

“Magnesium can enhance the formation of chondrocytes from synovial mesenchymal stem cells, promote chondrocyte proliferation and improve the effect of growth factor through continuous effects in the process of cartilage formation.” (study)

My experience: I jammed my finger playing basketball. It turned purple shortly after. Within three minutes of applying magnesium oil to it, the purple color faded noticeably (and it felt better). My aunt felt better within minutes of applying it to an ankle injury. I’ve read many reports of people with arthritis experiencing significant relief. The spot treatment aspect of magnesium oil and its super fast absorption makes it seem like magic when you apply it to areas of need. It’s not going to heal a broken bone overnight or anything, but it can make a big difference with minor injuries.

3. Incredible sleep

There’s sleep, and then there’s sleep with magnesium oil. I’ve experienced relaxation with mag citrate and bisglycinate (oral magnesium), but they pale in comparison to the impact of my magnesium oil routine. I think it’s just a more direct and efficient way to deliver magnesium to your tense muscles.

My experience: If you want to sleep like a baby again, do this. As a disclaimer, test magnesium oil on a small area of your skin first. This isn’t a “gentle” liquid and some people with sensitive skin could get a bad reaction from it. In addition, it might be better to start with a smaller dose than what I recommend here. If you’re ready to proceed, get naked.

Still with me? Okay, go ahead and spray and rub magnesium oil all over your body. Make sure to get your torso, shoulders, neck, arms, jaw, and bottoms of your feet. Avoid sensitive areas like the genitals, eyes, nose, and mouth. Also avoid recently shaved areas and small cuts. That would be literal salt in the would! I even put it on my forehead and head (bald perk). Rest assured, it is normal for it to sting and burn some. And some areas will be worse than others. The back of my neck seems especially sensitive to it and stings like crazy, but I also need it there and find it worthwhile.

Once you’ve applied it all over your body, you’re going to want to wait 20 minutes. I usually watch a YouTube video (watch one of mine!) or show in the bathroom while I wait. Then take a shower to rinse it off. The burning and stinging sensation you may feel will go away quickly when you wash it off (in my experience, but it may depend on how sensitive your skin is). You can dilute the product with water if it’s too intense as it is water soluble.

Do this, and you will sleep like a log, wake up feeling refreshed, and tell everyone you know about this article (right?!).

Conclusion

Magnesium supplements are quite popular, but most of them are oral. Magnesium citrate and bisglycinate are fine supplements (which I also have and take). But while magnesium oil is less popular than oral powders, it’s better. Way better. It has changed my life more than any other supplement.

• Magnesium oil is absorbed faster into the skin and body than oral supplements.
• Magnesium oil doesn’t go through the digestive system, and so avoids the potential laxative effect of oral magnesium supplements.
• Magnesium oil can be used as a spot treatment to aid tight muscles and minor injuries.

Oh, and I have evidence that magnesium oil is absorbed. Remember the image from the top of this article? I took blood tests 5 months apart testing my serum magnesium levels. Between the tests, I applied magnesium oil just about every night. My second test resulted in more than a 10% increase! (I felt a lot better, too.)

The best part about all of this is that unlike a pharmaceutical drug that kills your symptoms while not necessarily being “good for you,” magnesium is as healthy as anything could possibly be for you. All of the positive effects you feel will be real. Your body will feel better because it is better than it was before you applied magnesium oil. Your body wants, needs, and craves magnesium (and probably doesn’t get enough of it).

The brand I use is Ancient Minerals. I thought it would all be the same, but I actually felt a difference with this (more expensive) brand. And look, I’ve bought 7 bottles of it!

They have other variations for sensitive skin and stuff, but this plain version has the highest concentration of magnesium. That’s what delivers the results, so I recommend trying this one first.

The post Magnesium Oil: The Miraculous Liquid You’ve (Probably) Never Heard of appeared first on minihabits.com.

Alcohol and Smoking Went in Opposite Directions

From the earliest days of human civilization, alcohol has flowed through our veins. And it’s no surprise. Alcohol serves multiple purposes. It’s a “social lubricant,” helping Anxious Andys become Cool Craigs in just a few sips. It feels great, because consumption triggers a release of dopamine and increases GABA production. And before Bob Vance of Vance Refrigeration changed the world, American colonists drank alcohol because it’s a natural preservative.

Speaking of colonists, they were into all kinds of substances. Tobacco, for example. And smoking was quite popular for a long time in America. Until science improved and we realized that cigarettes were quite harmful to our health. Here’s what happened to smoking rates.

There’s a clear and steady decline in smoking rates from the 1960s until present day. This is partly due to education about smoking and how it damages the human body, and partly due to societal views of smoking. Smoking used to be seen as “cool.” Now, not so much. When we look at drinking rates, it’s a different story.

Drinking rates have stayed relatively flat for decades. And more than 50% of people have consumed alcohol every year since 1941. Drinkers have outnumbered nondrinkers approximately two to one for the last 80 years.

With the trends we see, one would imagine that alcohol is quite a bit healthier than smoking. After all, it was the data on smoking being bad for health that kickstarted the decline of smoking. But what does the data say about alcohol? Well, I don’t think it has mattered much.

Why Alcohol is Immune to Negative Data

Smoking has never surpassed 45% usage since the 1960s. It has only decreased since then.Speaking of the USA, alcohol is deeply cultural. The cultural significance of alcohol combined with the political and advertising power of beverage companies has effectively blinded the public to the full truth of alcohol. For example, right now, I would estimate that a majority of people see low-to-moderate drinking as neutral to health or even healthy. That’s not what the data shows.

We hear about things like antioxidants in red wine, but this only distracts from the whole truth of what alcohol is and does to our bodies. As for the aforementioned data, I’m going to link to a video by a neuroscientist that goes into great detail. This article will focus on my personal experience.

And let me be clear that I am NOT anti-alcohol. I’m not trying to convince anyone else to give it up. I don’t care if you drink or not. I’ve consumed plenty of alcohol in the past and may still drink it on occasion in the future (I have an upcoming trip to Vegas!). What I’m against is misinformation, and I’m pro-experimentation.

Why I Stopped Drinking

In short, I didn’t feel very good. I was an anxious mess. I was constantly bloated. My sleep quality was extremely poor. Plus, alcohol made me make poor decisions; I don’t mean life-ending poor decisions like drunk driving, just small-but-frequent poor decisions that shaped the entire trajectory of my life. Those are still a huge deal!

I was a moderate to heavy drinker. I had 10-20 drinks a week, and over 14 is considered “heavy drinking” by the NIAAA. When I stopped drinking, it wasn’t a grand plan to change. It was experimental, a curiosity-driven decision. I remembered how I felt the last time I stopped drinking and thought, “That was really good, I should try that again.”

A Timeline of Benefits I Experienced

Since I didn’t plan to stop drinking for a long time, I kept extending my streak because I wanted to. The benefits that kept rolling in and I wanted more.

First week: Increased clarity of mind. I could think clearly without that lingering haze alcohol gives you. This haze is something I and others love about alcohol. It kind of “muffles” your thoughts and lets you relax (while it lasts). But the day after drinking and longer term, you’re left with a mental fog that lacks pleasure.

Second week: Less bloating and no less diarrhea (sorry). I don’t think I tolerate alcohol very well, so constant drinking meant constant bloating. In the second week, I noticed a big improvement here.

Third week: Muscle and joint pain decreased. I’ve spent many thousands of dollars managing my back and neck pain. Massages, chiropractic care, massage chairs, rollers, massage guns. I have done everything. Apparently, alcohol was a major factor, because three weeks in, my back and neck issues went away. I think there are other factors at play here, too, like exercise and lifestyle. But that’s the thing about alcohol. It affects every aspect of your life, from your individual cells to your routines.

1 month: Easier sleep and dramatically reduced anxiety: I think I had some withdrawal insomnia initially. Once I broke through that, I found my sleep quality increased. But I was still oversleeping. Perhaps my brain was still adjusting. My general level of anxiety plummeted around this time. Alcohol increases baseline cortisol levels, so this wasn’t a surprise.

1.5 months: Normal digestion, sleep, and breathing. For something that sounds so plain, this feels incredible. And I was absolutely floored that it took 1.5 months to get here. People don’t talk enough about how long it can take to realize the benefits of sobriety.

It’s possible that alcohol gave me sleep apnea, which is insane. My Oura ring tracks my blood oxygen during sleep, and here’s what it was like when drinking regularly (even on days I didn’t drink). I’ll show you February 21 (drinking) and also April 16 (sober). Not all days were as bad as this one on February, but I would always have some blood oxygen variations.

Obviously, every person reacts differently to alcohol. But this is sobering to see, isn’t it? I’m 37 years old and in pretty good shape physically, and alcohol wrecked my nervous system to the point that I had breathing difficulties during sleep!

Ancillary benefits of Sobriety

The best part about quitting alcohol could be how it changes your lifestyle. I exercise a lot more, because who wants to drink AND exercise, and who wants to exercise with a hangover? When you quit drinking, your opportunities to exercise explode. And exercise improves nearly every bodily function.

I’m happier. When they say alcohol is a depressant, believe them. It makes you happy for those few hours, but really puts a dent in your mood for the rest of them.

I’m more excited about the future. I see more opportunities for health and wealth because I’m stronger in every way without alcohol. Simply put, I’m a more capable and durable person now than I was a couple months ago. I promise I’m not embellishing, the difference has been staggering.

The Bottom Line: Alcohol is a Poison

No, that’s not meant to shock anyone. It’s a simple fact. Alcohol is a poison that happens to be more fun than most poisons. All of my experiences match up with the fact that I was poisoning myself and stopped. It isn’t that I feel superhuman without booze, I just feel like my normal, healthy self again.

As I experienced these changes, I came across this video by Dr. Andrew Huberman. It really helped me see the full picture. Huberman is a neuroscientist, and he calmly and non-judgmentally lays out the many, many ways alcohol affects the brain, body, and human health. He gives you the hard data. After watching this, I was left wondering why nobody had told me this before. To warn you, it is two hours long, but if you intend to drink alcohol for decades, it’s worth it to take the time to understand how it actually affects you.

My personal experience is that I couldn’t understand how alcohol affected me until I went without it completely for a couple of months. And who knows, maybe there’s more for me to learn. But I do have that Vegas trip coming up shortly.

I haven’t decided if I’m going to drink or not in Vegas. But I do know this: whatever drinking routines I choose for Vegas are going to stay in Vegas. At home, I’m quite happy sober.

The post 50 Days Without Drinking Alcohol (Life-Changing) appeared first on minihabits.com.

Life is temporary, as are all things in it.

“Enter the Dragon” was a critically and commercially successful film released in 1973. Notably, this martial arts film was backed by Warner Brothers, a first and a big win for the genre. These films were popular in China since the 1920s, but it took someone special to popularize them in the United States. Warner Brothers took a chance on “Enter the Dragon” because it starred Bruce Lee.

Lee is of the most recognized martial artists in history, and also had great success as an actor. His acting career, however, did not detract from his training. Many of his movie scenes had to be reshot because his punches and kicks were too fast for the cameras to capture. He was a martial arts machine!

Bruce Lee developed otherworldly skill and strength. He could do 50 one-handed chin ups in a row; he could throw a punch in five one hundredths of a second. But Lee, like every other person, was mortal. He died shortly after Enter the Dragon finished filming at only 32 years old.

Everything’s Changing All the Time

Bruce Lee died at 32. How bizarre for someone who seemed superhuman! Life is temporary, and we don’t know how long we have. A person’s lifespan mirrors the nature of its components.

Just for fun, let’s imagine that someone finds the key to immortality next year after asking ChatGPT. Even if we lived forever, consider that nearly all of our life experiences would still be temporary.

• Career: It’s exceedingly rare to have one career your entire life. Even when people do, they almost all retire, making it temporary all the same.
• Emotions: Human emotion fluctuates constantly by moment. Sad, happy, angry, anxious, excited, afraid. The highest emotions can be crushed by bad news. The lowest emotions can be conquered by time, a good friend, or ice cream (temporarily of course).
• Relationships: People move. People change. Even the closest relationships can be temporary. Marriage is “til’ death do us part,” and it’s so special when it lasts that long because that’s more rare than common.
• Health: Even someone in perfect health can experience surprise illness or injury. If the person then recovers, it makes their perfect health and setback both temporary experiences.

Life is a temporary experience full of temporary experiences.

It can feel disheartening to think that exerting effort for any result is just going to be temporary. It recently happened to me…

In 2022, I put all of my knowledge and experience about building habits and momentum together to create the best personal run of my life. I was exercising once or even twice a day. My diet was impeccable. I didn’t drink or gamble. I was a machine for several months in a row. I felt unstoppable. I was wrong.

My mom called me, and she told me that my dad was having back pain. I didn’t know it then, but that pain was from his lung cancer, which had progressed. The next two months were a whirlwind of pain, stress, and trauma for our family. My dad died. I felt emotionally crushed. I don’t believe anything can prepare you for losing a parent.

Losing my dad made me lose my purpose (temporarily), and my good and bad habits suddenly reversed. Without purpose, people generally turn to life’s cheapest and most basic pleasures (bad habits). My great run turned into a bad run. My invincible run turned out to be somewhat fragile.

In my struggle, which probably looked like Gandalf spiralling down the chasm as he fought with Balrog, I finally understood the surprising-yet-true path to strength…

If everything is temporary, everything is reversible, for worse and for better.

One Thing in Life That Is NOT Temporary

Real power is intermittent. Think of the most powerful person in the world, and consider that they need to lie unconscious for hours every day (sleep) to regain energy. Or look at the picture above: Gandalf is a very powerful wizard in the LOTR universe, and yet, here he is fleeing! This doesn’t mean Gandalf is weak, it’s just the reality of living in a world with surprise Balrog attacks. Later, Gandalf conquers Balrog and comes out stronger than before (Grey to White!).

A figurative Balrog can knock you down at any time, no matter how strong you feel. Real power is knowing that you can recover from it. And you can recover from it by using the only thing that you will always have. Choice.

You can always choose. Even in cases in which you have no control over your situation, you can choose how you respond emotionally, what you say, how you act within the scenario. For the vast majority of people, thankfully, their power to choose goes well beyond that. You can choose to start a business, to apply for your dream job, to treat yourself to a day off, or whatever else you need to advance your life.

After my dad died, my emotional spiral took my behavior down with it. But in the midst of this turmoil, which lasted months, I noticed something interesting. I still had choice. The whole time. I had the power to choose a new direction in any moment. And at times, I did choose that! Now, don’t get me wrong. I was spiralling in general, but I would sometimes decide to work out or eat a healthy meal. I would occasionally decide to invest in my future.

These were the same choices that built my great winning streak to start the year, I just wasn’t making them often enough.

The power of choice is the one aspect of the human experience that isn’t temporary. We can always choose our next move.

When a traumatic event or unexpected setback strikes you down, you might not bounce back up right away. That’s okay. Even if it’s not okay, it’s still reality. Balrogs are everywhere. It may take longer than you want to heal and adjust, as I’ve recently experienced.

As your world crumbles, remind yourself that you can choose what to do next. It sounds obvious, I know. But when your emotions and behavior begin to spiral, life starts to feel like you’re on rails. You may feel like you’re doomed to repeat behaviors that continue the cycle. It’s easy to forget that you have choice, so remind yourself that you can choose a new direction at any time.

And, this is important… continue to remind yourself of your power to choose even if you don’t take action on it. Plant the seed. Water the seed daily. It will grow when you’re ready! You will rise again! The more you practice, the faster and stronger you’ll bounce back from hardship next time.

We’re talking about two sources of power. First, the power TO choose your direction gives you a way out and a way forward. Second, the power OF choosing your direction is what transforms lives. Every success, every comeback, every great story is the result of someone choosing to make a change, take a chance, or bet on themselves.

Everyone can and will be bruised, beaten, and knocked down by life. Everyone can also recover from it.

Take ownership of your greatest power. What will you choose to do today?

Be sure to watch the video of Gandalf vs. Balrog. Look at how he chooses to respond after being taken into the abyss!

The post Everything in Life Is Temporary, Except for One Thing appeared first on minihabits.com.

1. Be Lighthearted and Make Others Smile

Life is too short to be overly serious and stressed out. My dad certainly thought so. He was a master at delivering canned jokes and sayings at an alarming rate.

“Take the rest of the day off.”
“I want a full report on my desk by Monday.”
“I’m taking a nap. I’m leaving you in charge.”
“I thought you said this was gonna be fun and easy.”

Those are just a few of many. We (his kids) heard them all 392,139 times and would often roll our eyes, but others hearing them for the first time would often smile and laugh. They’re all lighthearted and put people at ease.

As I grew older, I realized that dad didn’t say these strictly to annoy us, he also said them because he saw how they made others smile. And you would be surprised at the impact a smile can have on a person who’s down. It’s so easy to focus inward, but I’ve seen that the more I open up and see what I can do for others, the better they AND I feel.

2. Use Your Imagination

I told the following story at my dad’s celebration of life with family and friends.

Dad was a frequent jogger in his 30s and 40s, and would often take several of the kids and cousins with him. On those jogs and elsewhere in nature, he developed a “Brave Warrior” points system in which we would get rewarded for doing brave things. For example, he would offer my sister and I 100 Brave warrior points for jumping into freezing cold water. And we would do it! These points were worth roughly one cent each, plus bragging rights. I’m not sure which one was more valuable.

On one now-famous walk, he awarded a group of us brave warrior points for saving a skunk who had fallen into a gated drain. We created a makeshift ramp for him and surprisingly, we all smelled okay afterwards.

Dad just made up these “brave warrior” points, and we loved them! There’s a big difference between “jump into that cold water” and “jump into that cold water to earn brave warrior points!” They were essentially the same thing plus or minus a dollar, yet the latter filled a child’s mind with wonder and excitement.

Imagination is a powerful tool. Use it to make life more exciting and to reach your goals.

3. Nobody is Better Than Anyone Else

This is what my sister focused on in her speech about dad. Dad didn’t merely tell us this with words, he lived it. Whenever we came across homeless or needy people, he would give them money or food. It’s easy to be cynical these days and say, “they’re just going to buy cigarettes and booze with it.” And indeed, I once had a homeless man turn me down when I offered my lunch. I thought, “he’s supposedly hungry and yet the lunch I was excited to eat isn’t good enough for him?”

Bad actors and fakers aside, there are genuine people of need out there. And these are fellow humans. I think there are two ways to perceive humanity. One way is to see people as equally human and deserving of happiness, food, and shelter. The other way is to measure a person’s worth by their accomplishments, social status, looks, or net worth. My dad valued others as much as or more than himself, and I think he was right to do so.

Giving is fraught with risk. How many charities are corrupt fronts to make executives wealthy? How many fake panhandlers are swindling as a full-time job? Do your due diligence, of course. But also consider that giving is not an exchange. When you give, you shouldn’t necessarily expect a return, including the person or company using the funds in the exact way you desire. Giving just to give is good.

If you want to give wisely, check out charity watch’s list to find responsible organizations.

Conclusion: Lessons My Father Taught Me

As a final aside to honor my father, I want to mention that he was a firefighter (truck driver) for 20 years and lifeguard for several more. He saved a lot of lives. He was a hero to his family and a real life hero!

It’s strange to lose a parent. You know them for as long as you exist and then suddenly they are gone. And your perspective of them changes a lot as you grow older. Those who are raised well and with love tend to get more thankful in retrospect as they mature.

Death is never pretty. In my dad’s final days, his lung cancer had spread and created intense pain. It was brutal, but dad still found the strength to frequently thank us for helping him. I’ll never forget that. And here come the tears. I love you, dad.

What lessons has your father taught you? Even if you consider your father a net negative in your life, there are plenty of lessons to be learned. Some of the lessons my father taught me are what not to do. That’s how it is with parents, right? We try to learn from what they do right and also from their mistakes. Keep the good stuff and avoid the mistakes!

The post 3 Lessons My Father Taught Me appeared first on minihabits.com.

The only thing we can be certain of is that life will bring us heaps of uncertainty. Life stability is not a matter of preventing uncertainty, but dealing with it appropriately and effectively.

Don’t Fight Insecurity, Get Comfortable with It

There’s a lot to love about life. For example, I just ate a delicious breakfast. But life is also dark and miserable at times. Furthermore, father time eventually crushes every person, and it’s never pretty.

With how fragile our lives are, insecurity about the future is inevitable. Some may think that the best response is to fight it, to do everything in their power to get to a point of complete comfort and security. Don’t do this.

If you fight against feelings of insecurity, doubt, and uncertainty, all you do is increase their impact on your life. To give you a stupid example, what if you hated grass more than anything in the world? What if you obsessed over destroying all of the grass you saw? Well, grass would become a HUGE problem in your life because there’s more grass than you can ever remove.

You will never remove all of the uncertainties of the future. You must live with them.

It’s best for grass and uncertainty haters to learn to live with them. Furthermore, what else do you think a grass hater would do? They would probably stay inside because the grass outside overwhelms them. In the same way, people who won’t tolerate uncertainty avoid it at a great cost.

Anyone who avoids uncertainty avoids life itself! It means you won’t take chances. You won’t travel. You won’t ask yourself or others uncomfortable questions. You will shelter yourself to the point of internal death of your soul.

What if, instead of that, you learned to tolerate uncertainty? Ironically, that would increase your life stability.

What Life Stability Actually Is

It’s reasonable but incorrect to think of life stability as we think of stability in physics. Stable things in physics are defined by their predictability and lack of mobility. Life stability, however, is an internal barometer that is more defined by our thoughts and feelings than our objective circumstances (though both matter).

Our actions don’t have a direct relationship with life stability. Consider traveling.

Traveling is a risk. It’s more dangerous than staying at home, expensive, and you’re more vulnerable away than you would be staying at home. Traveling sounds like the precise opposite of life stability. And in one sense, that’s true. But the inherent instability of travel is exactly why it can improve your sense of internal stability!

Traveling when you could stay home is a statement. You have chosen to coexist with uncertainty and even embrace it. Think about how many people feel when they travel…

• Free
• Alive
• Connected
• Happy
• Confident
• and even… Stable!

Travel is just one example of this vital concept: Actions that demonstrate comfort with uncertainty or instability are key to maintaining internal life stability. It’s surprising, but life stability can be improved by purposefully taking chances.

The surprising key to life stability is to embrace all of the insecurities, doubts, and instability that will always be part of our existence.

Instability comes when we fight against an immovable object. No matter how hard we fight, uncertainty persists. This strains our emotional and mental resources for a pointless fight. It seems logical to fight for something as desirable as certainty, but how logical is it to fight a fight you can never win?

I’m not saying you need to get excited about uncertainty. Obviously it isn’t fun to have financial uncertainty, or health problems for example. It’s more about gaining a respect and understanding of how uncertain all of life is, and doing your best with that information instead of trying to deny it or change its nature.

The post The Surprising Key to Life Stability appeared first on minihabits.com.

Chasing success is like bathing in oil. Everyone does it, but nobody likes to admit it. Chasing success, however, is a dangerous game, and here’s why.

When Chasing Success, Be Careful Not to Compromise Your Values

It has happened many times throughout history. A person desires success so much that it becomes a dominant fixation. Anything that gets in the way of it is an unacceptable threat. Before you know it, they are bending their values to get the result they want.

Problem: if you compromise your values for success, you automatically lose because your values are always worth more than money, fame, and power. This is especially important because success is possible without compromising your values. In my experience, I admit honesty can be a detriment to success in the short-term (at least in publishing), but there are other benefits to doing business with integrity. And there is a big benefit to integrity that powers long-term success.

Consider these quotes by famed investor Warren Buffett (source):

“It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently.”

“Lose money for the firm, and I will be understanding. Lose a shred of reputation for the firm, and I will be ruthless.”

~ Warren Buffett

The Key to Honest Success: Provide Value

“Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.”

Albert Einstein

I’ve written about circumstances vs the process before, and that same principle applies here. You get results by focusing on the process and you get success by focusing on providing value.

I did marketing jobs for a time. I clearly remember handing out promotional coupons in grocery stores. There’s nothing wrong with the job, but it certainly wasn’t changing anyone’s life (including mine). I experienced far more success once I found a way to provide exponentially greater value to the world with my books. Instead of giving people a slight discount on their groceries, I showed people how to change their behavior. That’s far more valuable, and I earned more because of it.

Whenever I worry about the future of my business and career, I am careful to remind myself that success comes through providing genuine value. Thus, if I desire greater success, I need to find out how to provide more value.

When you fixate only on the money, you won’t provide as much value.

This may surprise you, but marketing provides incredible value to others. Marketing can be seen as salesy and money-focused as it is a way to create sales and income, but if done right, marketing provides incredible value to others. Think about the last time a product or book changed your life. The marketing that led you to that product was an essential part of the equation!

Conclusion

Chasing success isn’t always a problem, but it can be if you pursue it at all costs. The end does not justify the means when it comes to finances, fame, and power. Aim to provide as much value to the world with your skills and gifts. That path to success benefits the world and you, and most importantly, it will help you sleep at night knowing you’re a net positive in the world.

The final point is something I feel compelled to admit. I’ve seen a lot of people cheat their way to the top. Get rich scams still exist because people fall for them. But think about why. People who chase success at all costs will ignore clear red flags as greed blinds them.

I learned this lesson in a crypto scam once and it cost me $5000. Ouch. A valuable lesson, I suppose.

If you like youtube, there’s a guy named CoffeeZilla who exposes scammy people. This video of his explores some cases of celebrities scamming their biggest fans out of millions of dollars. They all made a lot of money from it, but at what cost? When they are on their death bed, will they think about how much money they have, or perhaps the fact that they ruined the lives of the people who trusted them and looked up to them the most?

Chasing success without considering how you do it is not only a path that can hurt others, it can hurt you now or later.

The post The Problem with Chasing Success appeared first on minihabits.com.

Life can really beat you up, I’ve noticed. When you’re beaten up, on the ground, how can you find the courage to get up and fight again? It’s easier said than done when it seems like all of your efforts are met with shapeless hostility from the world.

Courage Matters, and You Must Believe It Does

When enough things go wrong in a row, it’s tempting to throw your hands up and stop trying. After all, nothing you do has seemed to help thus far, so why would it suddenly start working? Because that’s how life works!

There are two types of failure. One type of failure is permanent. No matter how many times you try to operate an electronic device without a power source, you will fail every time. The other type, the one we face most often in life, is chance-based. For example, a qualified candidate can be turned down for a job. A talented writer can write a great book that doesn’t sell. An excellent parent can raise a dysfunctional child. A healthy person can face health problems at any time.

We need to find the courage to keep trying because it takes a lot of attempts to get one victory in this unforgiving world. It is worth the effort! If you can believe that your effort and courage to move forward matter, they will. And there’s another thing that will help guide you…

Courage Is the Only Way

When Ernest Shackleton’s crew on the ship Endurance became trapped in pack ice on an expedition in 1915, they were hundreds of miles away from civilization. It was a veritable death sentence given the circumstances. But incredibly, all 28 men survived after a grueling year fighting against the elements.

After floating aimlessly in the pack ice, Ernest Shackleton ordered the crew to abandon ship on October 27, 1915. It was a concession of defeat of their original expedition intent, but also a new beginning of courage.

You will naturally find the courage to move forward when there is no alternative. Courage is often the only way forward. So you must simply choose to move forward instead of giving up or moving backwards.

Before they abandoned ship, the crew of the Endurance were in limbo. Could they escape the pack ice and sail their way to safety? Would they be trapped in the ice until they died? Would they abandon ship? They welcomed the most dire outcome because it gave them clarity and courage.

If you are in a difficult place, do whatever you can to gain clarity about your situation. Without clarity about what to do next, you will struggle to find the courage to move forward simply because you won’t know what that looks like. The Endurance crew gained clarity and courage when they accepted how dire their situation was and abandoned ship.

Some people think that denial is courage. If you deny the harshness of your reality, however, you won’t find the courage to face it and make progress. Take an honest inventory of your situation. The worst of it will create the best opportunities to show your true strength in adversity.

Humans are Tough

Humans are tough and resilient by nature. But you won’t find out just how courageous you are until you’re in a position in which you have to be. Thus, you may wonder if you are courageous. You may fear that you will crumble under the pressure. But I know you won’t.

Courage is a choice, above all, to move forward. Think of the men of the Endurance. How incredible that all 28 of them were courageous! What are the odds of that? Well, it speaks to the innate courage of humans. They had no choice but to be courageous and move forward, as will you when the time comes, whether that is now or later.

This is not to say that cowardice is impossible or that all people are equally courageous. It’s more the fact that all humans have the innate ability to be courageous. To find the courage is to understand what it means. Courageous people move forward in the midst of storms. Courageous people continue to try even when the whole world is against them. It’s that simple.

Take a step forward today, even if you’re afraid. Don’t give up. You’re closer than you think.

The post How to Find the Courage You Need appeared first on minihabits.com.