As I finished fishing and walked away from the pond I had been coming to since I was about ten years old, I was accosted by a middle-aged woman wearing a tight, pink, expensive-looking running outfit and matching knee-high compression-sleeve things. They looked really stupid. She looked really stupid. And she looked like she wanted to get in somebody else's business to tell them what to do. After living out West in High Country for so long, I had forgotten the tendency of people on the East Coast to act this way, so I was surprised when she did indeed come up to me and ask in a quick, squeaky, high-pitched voice "Excuse me! Are you a MEMBER here?!" You see, after I left for college, the area continued to be developed (as has the entirety of the area around my parents house), resulting in fences surrounding the pond that exclaim 'MEMBERS ONLY". "Yeah!" I calmly lied, and went about my business. This was unsatisfactory for her. She stepped right in front of my face and said "where do you live - I want to cross-check with the pond committee" I could have easily lied again since I knew so many of the people around the area. I could have told her I lived at one of their houses. She was clearly one of the new, rich housewives with nothing better to do but accost people that came to the pond, and I doubted she knew everybody in the rapidly growing neighborhood, especially the long-time residents who went about their business without getting too involved in other peoples business. But, I felt bad about lying. So I just told the truth - they lived the next neighborhood over from this one. She confirmed that those people are not members. "Oh really!?" I exclaimed "I talked to a few of our neighbors who all think both neighborhoods are included in the membership, so I will have to check with all of them to make sure they know they are not!" and I continued to flip sides so that I was on her side by confirming my understanding for the ill-effects too many visitors can have on an ecosystem. She quickly warmed up, and also seemed to be taken aback by my use of large words, confirming that I was more than some redneck who wanted to fish in the pond. People are so shallow sometimes, eh? Anyway, I thought about the interaction all day. At first, it pissed me off that she was so clearly unsatisfied with her life that she needed to give her life such a meaningless purpose. It pissed me off that rich people moving into an area could take over a once-community resource and call it a "members only" area. I thought of all the lies I could have made up to get off the hook as well. But eventually I realized that I was wasting my energy thinking about the interaction, and that I could have gotten myself in some REALLY deep shiiiiii if I had continued to lie. Perhaps she would have actually known the long-term families that I could have mentioned and called me out on my lie. Perhaps she would have called the police - who knows! I decided that day to stop all of the white lies, and develop a policy of total truth and transparency. I would have told pink-sportswear lady "No, I am not a member - I saw the signs and because I have been coming here since before the signs existed I decided to ignore them." Perhaps I will get in trouble for a few of my actions as a result - but maybe I will also hold off on doing the things I know I shouldn't be doing anyway. And, the power of having a clean conscience and total faith in my character, beliefs, and actions is totally worth it. *Total Transparency Disclaimer: If I have the chance to play a funny joke on someone, I will still tell a white lie for an hour or so. So watch out!
"You will never outperform your inner circle" ― John Wooden “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” ― Jim Rohn Did you know that there is a statistic out there right now that 80% of people don't like the work they do? They aren't excited to get to work everyday and share what they have to offer with the world, and they aren't inspired to make themselves better in order to give more of themselves to the world. What does that mean for you? Well, if you are surrounding yourself with those types of people, then you will never outperform them - you will become the average of them. They will encourage complacency in your life by making it acceptable to not chase your dreams. In fact, most of the time these people will put down your willingness to chase your dreams as a result of the fact that they see you doing the things that they wish they had the courage to do. So what do podcasts have to do with this? Well, pop in some earbuds and listen to a podcast about a topic that you have stake in... and see. When you listen to podcasts on the way to work, while cooking, while running, or cycling, you constantly surround yourself with people who are inspiring - whether you are listening to an entrepreneurial podcast or a diet and health podcast, you are going to be listening to people all day who are doing and exploring the things and types of lifestyles you want to live. They are encouraging you to chase your dreams, even if it flies in the face of conventional wisdom. You will be greatly raising the bar of your inner circle. Now that's a powerful lifehack. Notes: 1. Make sure you understand the dangers and benefits of half-work before listening while participating in other activities. 2. Check out The Brave Monkeys Speak Podcast, obviously! So what are you monkeying around for? Check out the Campaign Rewards here!
You all know about the Ultimate Lifehack - Interventures. Interventures, or intermittent adventures, allow you to intermittently disengage from whatever you are working on and recover, allowing you to come back stronger and more passionate about the task at hand. Well, there is a second lifehack that is just as powerful, or could perhaps be considered even more powerful since it can indeed influence the frequency with which you take interventures. The hack? Start a blog. Yes, seriously, starting a blog is the second ultimate adventurous habit. How could that be!? Well, it can be chalked up to the Paradox of Technology. Not Why, but Why Not? Here’s the deal - when you create a blog, you are putting yourself out there to the world. That’s scary! It’s an adventure in itself; but the fact of the matter is that you are also putting yourself out there to the world with Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, email, text messaging, etc. And, those platforms are probably not crafting an image of yourself that you like that much anyway, professionally speaking at least. So what gives? Furthermore, a blog is different from these social platforms because it:
Creating a Personal Brand Now, I am no expert in personal branding, but essentially you are asking the question - what comes up when someone out there Google's your name? By having a blog, you will be able to shape that personal brand a WHOLE lot more than whatever you are putting out there on Facebook. Since I am not the personal branding expert, I will tell you that there are a whole host of resources out there... I would begin with Gary Vaynerchuck’s Crush It and Michael Hiatt's Platform: Get Noticed in a Noisy World. I would suggest at least listening to the audiobook version of one of these while cooking or on a long road trip! It is important to note here that it doesn't matter if no one cares what you have to say - what's important is that you are saying something, because this will keep you doing, thinking, and learning and will take you down new paths to novel, exciting places. Finding Out What You Care About To paraphrase Tim Ferriss, the goal of life (for the New Rich) is not inactivity, but rather doing what excites them. In terms of work, I like to use the phrase 'what do you care about'. Passion and excitement are used often, but at the end of the day you want to be working on something that you genuinely care about. Yet, I have talked to so many people who aren't quite sure what the care about. How do you find it? Start a blog. A blog is just a medium for self-expression, and whether or not people are reading your blog, it will help you to find out what it is you care about. However, as long as one or two people are reading, then you are going to be held accountable for doing epic things - and writing about it. Helping Other People Who doesn't want to help other people? A blog will allow you to analyze what unique skills you hold that will help other people. Who knows, you may even be able to monetize it at the end of the day. But, worst comes to worst, you will just make a lot of friends and score a lot of good Karma. So what are you waiting for? Let's hear what you got! Maybe your blog will get popular - maybe it won't. That's not really the point. The point is, at the end of the day, you will have learned a heck of a lot about yourself, met and helped awesome people, built a personal brand that you can forever leverage, and most importantly dared to be more than mediocre - you dared to be great. Awesome resources for getting started can be found below:
Born to Run was one of about four books - in my entire life - that I simply could not put down. Christopher McDougall blended every component necessary for a legendary story into the text while also explaining the science behind a theory that would start a revolution. Amazing. As you probably know about me, I LOVE running in minimalist sandals now. However, there is something the book forgot to mention: the ‘other’ secret to amazing endurance, a love of running, and blissful, effortless miles. I call it Meditation in Motion. The principal tenets of Meditation in Motion are simple: breath only through your nose while running, accessing the total capacities of your lungs. If you cannot do this at your current pace, slow down. Now, we could get a lot more complex on this topic, but for now I will give you the four main steps you can use to Meditate in Motion... this is assuming you already have a good meditation practice and potentially that you quantify it with an HRV device (not required). Step 1: If you are using an HRV training system (the Heartmath Emwave2 or InnerBalance Sensor), try to maintain high coherence even with your eyes open. You will find that on the medium and high coherence levels, it is much easier to achieve high coherence with your eyes closed, so training with your eyes open allows you to begin to stay in high coherence even while active. If you master this, try to maintain high coherence while writing or doing n-back training. Step 2: Work on consciously breathing deeply through your nose at all times - whenever you catch yourself not doing so, correct it. Step 3 (Optional): A powerlung trainer can be used to strengthen your lungs. Basically, you will breathe in deeply through the mouth and exhale forcefully with this device, which serves two purposes: It strengthens your lungs much like weight lifting strengthens your muscles, which will allow your lungs to access more fresh air when your body is using oxygen quickly (running, exercising). It calms the nervous system response. The lizard brain in your head - that part of the brain that controls instinctual responses faster than you are able to think - will immediately freak out if it is not used to breathing under any sort of restrictions, and the Powerlung will help you to control that response so that when you apply this technique to an athletic pursuit, it already knows that you will be just fine. Step 4: Go on a hike or get on a treadmill. Breathe only through your nose. If you can do this effectively at the current speed, then speed up gradually until you can no longer maintain your current level of activity while still breathing through your nose, at which point you will slow down. Repeat the process until you are running - this may take hours or a few weeks so be patient! Ultimately, you will find that you are able to go on runs or bike rides at the same pace that you were able to before... but you can go much longer. After a long run, you may find that you don’t want to stop... you are in a happy place. Take it from me... I hated running until I discovered the wonders of Meditation in Motion. |
Adventure Academy -
the course that will teach you to use the science of adventure to become awesome at your day job. The Quote Manifesto:
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