Mashup: 6 Strategies to Develop More Gratitude in Your Life

The more time you spend on stupid, meaningless things, the less time for noticing meaningful things isn't true. That's why we need you to get rid of gossip. Gossip is filler. And if there's filler of stupid in your life, of stupid conversations, of stupid gossip about other people, or of reading those dumb magazines that add no value to your life or no value to education, every little thing that you're pulling from that, it is feeding your heart and your soul. Six uncommon strategies for developing greater gratitude. Right. Six uncommon strategies for developing greater, greater gratitude. Hopefully, some of these are common sense. But I'm going to ask you to do something today, and that is to rate yourself on how well you've been doing at these things. And when I ask you to rate yourself, I'm going to ask you to rate yourself on a scale of 1 to 10. One, you suck at these things. You know you're terrible and you know it. 10, you're so good at this, other people see you as a role model. They're like, wow, this person's really figured out this part of their life. And so that's how I want you to rate yourself on each of these. We're going to jump into the very first uncommon strategy for developing greater gratitude right now. And here it is. Notice your complaints. Now, it's hard to be grateful for something and complaining at the same time. I know you know that, but what you'll also see is that it's easy today to get trapped into this cycle that everybody's in of complaining, right? We complain about our leaders, we complain about our team. We complain about social media, we complain about television. We complain about the media, we complain about the traffic, we complain about the goals, we complain about the things not working. We complain about the inconveniences. And if you actually listen, and I want you to really encourage you to do this, if you actually start listening for how often people complain, I think you'll be stunned. And I think if you'll start listening to how often you complained, you'll be disparaged. You'll start going, I never realized I complained so much. And I'm not. I know it's making an assumption because I don't know you, and maybe you actually are one of those people who you score a 10. Here you go. Look, I'm very aware of my complaining. I don't complain. I keep a positive mindset. But I'm curious about how often you complain. Speaking it out loud, but also internal, right? A lot of us complain all day long in our Brain. We might not say it to our spouse or our team, but we like, we think someone's talking to us and our mind goes, oh, here we go again. She's going to say it again. I know it. I cannot believe it. And maybe we're not expressing it to her, but our mind's like, I can't believe this person here. And you just. The complaint is inside. Those count. Notice you're complaining. It might not be what you're just saying. We always think of complaining as just the verbiage going out. It's also the thoughts spinning inside. So how often do you complain about your boss in your mind? How often do you complain about your work in your mind? How often do you complain about your spouse? How about those kids? How about the inconveniences that you have to face every day? How many times have you actually complain incessantly about politics in the last 12 months? My guess is it's been a lot because most of society is there. And, you know, I'm one of those people probably like you, who really loves human behavior. And so I'm one of those guys who I just love to sit and watch people at the airport or love to sit and watch people at cafes. And it is amazing how many people look and they're talking like this. That's their life. They look like that all the time. That's a complaining positive. You just know that is their complaining physiology. And I want to know what do you look like throughout the day? Do you look like you're complaining or did you look like you're happy? Because it's hard to do both at the same time. And so you need to notice your complaints. And when I say this, here's what I want you to do. Write down what are the three things you complain the most about? Is it traffic? Politicians? Your work? Garbage spouse. Garbage spouse. What is it? I want you to write it down. Just write it down like, these are the three things I complain the most about. And then I want you to set yourself a 10 day challenge. You don't get to complain about any of those things at, at all in the next 10 days. And if you do, if you hear yourself complaining about any of those things in the next 10 days, you need a consequence. And if you don't have one, a very popular one in behavioral dynamics or in behavioral change is to make you donate something to somebody you don't like. So let's say you are a staunch Republican, then, okay, you have to donate $100 per complaint to the Democratic Party. If you're a staunch Democrat, $100 for each complaint to the Republican Party. If you just absolutely hate eating kale, you just hate kale every single time you complain. Bowl of kale right down your throat. You gotta eat it. You don't get a choice. You need a negative consequence for all this complaining in your life because look, how easy is it to slip into complaining. But it's a slippery slope. You know it. There is a fine line between, you know, complaining once or twice a week to now complaining once or twice per day, to complaining once or twice per morning, to complaining once or twice per hour. Complaining is a very scary thing. It's kind of like if you start saying the F word a lot. Have you ever noticed, like, if you start. If you're around someone, they say the F word, they swear a lot, and now you do it so, like, casually. Well, complaining is like that. Number two. I like this one. Oh, it's so hard. Ready? Don't gossip. You gotta stop. Gossip is a little bit different than complaining, right? Complaining can just be negative. Blah, blah, blah. Gossip is speaking about other people. And usually when we're gossiping, we're speaking about other people with an element of drama. Did you see what this celebrity did? Oh, my God. Did you hear that? You know, these coworkers did this in the closet. Did you hear that? This happened over there. And we start saying all these things about other people. And you know what? That happens. It starts. That is a slippery slope from gossip to complaining. It is such a fine line. And I've seen so many good people turning bad people through gossip because gossip quickly tilts over to negativity. If you've been around me, you'd know I rarely ever speak about other people at all unless it's a compliment. Very rarely do I talk about anything other people in my marketplace, other people in the major news or the media. I'm not a person that talks about other people unless I'm championing them. And I chose to do that because that was not what I was experiencing when I was first starting my career. There was so much gossip about other people in my industry. And I mean, from what they eat to where they're going out, to who they're hanging out with, to what they wear, to just the stupidest stuff. And listen, if you spend a lot of your time on stupid, you miss life's blessings. Isn't it true the more time you spend on stupid, meaningless things, the less time for noticing meaningful things? Isn't it true that's why we need you to get rid of gossip. Gossip is filler. And if there's filler of stupid in your life, of stupid conversations, of stupid gossip about other people, of reading those dumb magazines that add no value to your life or no value to education, and you're reading all the gossip rags and all the gossip tweeting and all the gossip social media, every little thing that you're pulling from that, it is feeding your heart and your soul, and it is a meal. And so if you're eating junk food all day, you have no room for health food. Make sense? And if you have no room for health food, you're never going to get healthier until you remove the unhealthy food. We can say all day long, cram kale down your throat. It's not going to make you healthier if you're still consuming the bad stuff. Well, this is what's happening for people. They're not feeling grateful and alive. They say, brendan, I just want to feel alive. And I say, well, then stop gossiping. Because gossip is junk food, right? It's filler. The more filler, the less room. So you got to think about it. Gossip is meaningless conversation about others, meaningless diatribes, conversations, interests, about things that don't matter. The more things in your life that don't matter, the less room for those that do. Okay, number three, ladies and gentlemen. Such an uncommon strategy for developing greater gratitude. Maybe one of my favorite one, and this is something that, gosh, I wish more people would do, and that is read historical biographies of great leaders. Read historical biographies. You're like, wow, Brendan, this is really heating up. This is exciting stuff right here, buddy. But listen, listen. Do you know the number one reason I believe people aren't more grateful? What do you think it is? What's yours? What's the number one reason most people aren't grateful? I want you to take a few minutes, a few moments, just think about it. My answer, if you ask me, is one simple word. Perspective. We lack gratitude because we lack perspective, right? We get caught in our comfortable lives where things aren't so dire for most people. Most people are getting through their day going by just fine. You know, they might be struggling, but maybe they're not suffering at levels other people are. And what I have found in being deeply connected to history is how far we've come. You know, it's pretty hard to complain about the world when you read history specifically. I like to read historical biographies of people because it shows you how far they came, how difficult of circumstances they were. Challenged with. And they kept rising up over and over and over again. It shows you their perspective of what they appreciated, what they fought and battled against. And it makes you realize that, you know, the traffic that you're facing in your nice, you know, relatively new suv and as you're taking the kids to a nice school ain't such a big deal. It shows you that, like, oh, you know, that tiny apartment that maybe you don't like, or you're not in love with that boy. It's a whole lot better than living in a tent city in a refugee camp. History gives us sort of perspective. It's, yeah, gosh, today was really stressful. We're not in war. There's not bombs dropping on our head. Right? There's so many. Gratitude gets deep with perspective. So here's another one. This will make you the happiest you've ever been in your entire life, and you're probably not doing it as much as you could. And that's this one. Volunteer. Americans used to volunteer a lot. Now very little. And outside of donations, you know, giving campaigns, Americans are volunteering less and less hours year after year after year after year. Now, some studies, by the way, would dispute that, but we do know that volunteer membership is down, right? Junior Achievement, Kiwanis, ymca, Rotary, Lions, all experiencing dramatic drops in membership over the last decades. And it's too bad, because community service and hours out in the community will make you happy. And so for you, you have to find what is something you can do in your community that allows you to volunteer for those who are less fortunate. Now, I'm not saying I want you to really listen to that, volunteer for those less fortunate. I know that we can say, well, Brendan, I volunteered at the Modern Museum of Art to admit people. And I'm like, so you waited and you helped people, rich people, get admittance to a fancy museum. I don't diminish that in terms of volunteer experience, but I'm not sure that's going to make you that much more of a grateful person. I think you need to get in a soup kitchen and you need to get around really poor people who are hungry and displaced and scared. Because when you get around that, you appreciate your secure life. So please don't make this a, you know, rich people versus poor people, poverty versus that. I'm just saying that for whatever level you're at, I guarantee there's a level there of those who are less fortunate than you are, get in their vicinity every single month in some type of volunteer activity, and you'll find yourself. You won't complain as much because sometimes we just got to see things to really feel them. And I think that the happiest people that I've met my entire life, we were volunteers. Next up. This is a good one. I like this one. Someone told me these two things, and it made a big difference. It was one of my first bosses, if I remember right. They said, how many of your discussions do you address luck and beauty? And this was their two things they gave me, and I really liked it. Luck and beauty. So how often do you say, I'm so lucky, Honey, we're so lucky. We're so blessed. You know, look at. How did that turn out? That was so lucky to acknowledge the coincidences of life that are blessings, because there were things that came into your life that you didn't draw, you didn't attract. Nice, positive, wonderful things that are there for you. And people go, some people say, there's no luck. There's no coincidence. I'm like, that's cool. But you can still talk about it that way. You can still acknowledge luck. You know, my wife and I are constantly, matter of fact, every time I get on a plane, right before the plane takes off, I'm always texting my wife and telling her that I feel like the luckiest man on the planet. And she always writes back, you know, hashtag, luckiest. That's like, we always are doing that with each other because we want each other to know that in any given circumstance, imagine. Imagine if that plane I'm on crashes. I want her to know that I feel lucky for my life, that I felt blessed every moment that I was here on this planet. And it's important to me because that luck draws reference for life, right? Really important. But then beauty, too. Like, my wife is really good at pointing out beautiful things, you know, whether it's a beautiful floral display or beautiful trees or beautiful sunset or a beautiful rainbow. I mean, literally last night when I left this office, she texts a picture of a rainbow outside of our house. And she's really good at calling that out. But you could do that. Simple things, Little design things that are beautiful, point those out. But here's the operative word. Discuss. There's one thing noticing the rainbow, and then there's another one telling 10 people, hey, guys, you see the rainbow different, right? One is just intellectual. Oh, it's pretty. The other one is putting the expression in. Into the observation. And once you express the observation, remember, an expression is emotion. You feel more reverence for life. So think about all the Conversations you had in the last six months. How often do you talk about luck? How often did you talk about beauty? And if those aren't there, how could you expect to have a deeper level of gratitude? This is my last advanced strategy. And. And it's something that, ironically, I thought most people still did. And then I found out that most people don't. And that is write love letters. I want you to write love letters to your spouse, to your kids, to your aunts and to your uncles and to anyone you care about in your life. And I want you to write it with your hand. And. And they still make these things. What are they called? It's like this tube. And the tube's usually about yay long. And in the tube, there's a liquid. And what happens when you press this metal part of the liquid against this parchment paper? What happens is the liquid comes out onto the paper. I mean, it's amazing. Most people don't know that because they can't hold it because their hands are like this all the time. So if we could get you to stop typing because, you know when you're like this all the time, right? Or like this all the time, it's hard to hold a pen when you just can't. You ever talk to someone, you're still thumbing through something but you're not holding the phone? Yeah, I know you're like that. Lots of people are doing that. Put the phone down. Put the computer aside. Don't email them a thank you letter or a love letter. Write a letter to them. Like a love letter. Like, tell them why you appreciate them, why they're amazing, why they're extraordinary, why you're thankful for them. And write it. And no, don't just do what I just said in five sentences. I'm appreciative of you. I'm thankful for you. Heart your name. No, do a little bit more than that. Write a letter. Write a love letter. You know, there's something about the act of writing that changes people, and they know this from psychology tests too, is that when you make somebody write a letter of gratitude or a letter of love, it's very different brain activity than it is just typing it. It's very different when you're writing it. You're feeling it, right? And it's your art, it's your words. And on a piece of paper, it changes the game. So I want to challenge you to think about that. When's the last time you wrote a love letter to. If you have parents and they're still alive, and you love them, write them a letter. If you have somebody who has really served you and taken care of you or role model something for you, write them a letter. If you've got that spouse and you haven't dropped her or him that note for a long time, stop waiting to write half a card on Valentine's and write them a real letter and do it more consistently. You'll feel it. It will make you happy. And what happens? For a lot of people, the reason they're not gratitude is they lost the language of thankfulness. Because what do they do? They go, thank you, comma, and write their name. And that's their language of gratitude. So if you challenge yourself to write a 1, 2, 3, 4 page love letter to people, it broadens. It's like a challenge. And as you do that, more and more and more as a challenge, it grows that muscle of gratitude and you get better at being grateful. I honor you for your continuing education, for your commitment to living the best life for you, your family, your career, that sense that inside you know you're very lucky to be here, that this moment is blessed. That we should all be grateful for every breath that we take in. And that we should all be grateful for our family, our friends, and our opportunities to serve in the world. Go out there every single day and serve gratefully. High performance training, action mindset. This is important. How do you develop the action mindset? But actually, also here, I should just add this in here. How do you actually get the action mindset and then make it a discipline? Here it is. First thing, you got to adopt your 30 minute daily block. People tell me all the time, bren, I got this dream or this goal. I'm like, great, what 30 minute period of day are you going to work on it today? What do you mean? You said you have a big goal, right? Yeah. Big idea, right? Yeah. Okay, show me when's the 30 minute block that that thing gets? Today. It's a new idea you say, right? Yeah. Okay, where is it? Is it 130 to 2? Is it 4 to 4? 30? Is he going to check it at 5? Right after work? Till 5:30, then get on the commute a little later. Like when new ideas must have new blocks of time. Write it down. New ideas must have new blocks of time. If you had a new idea someday, someday, Big dream. And it doesn't land in the calendar, at least listen, daily, 30 minute daily block of time. Of course you're not going to get momentum. It's got to be. Look, if you won't give something 30 minutes a day, it don't matter to you. Just be honest. Like, any good parent will tell you this. Like, if you don't spend 30 minutes with your kids a day, I mean, good luck in having that connection. Good luck in forging that future. Good luck in helping that person feel loved and supported. I mean, if something is important to you, you give it time. Is it true? So if this idea is important to you, immediately, mindset. This is what I immediately do. 30 minutes. And if it's a completely new idea, it's got to get at least 30 minutes. If I want it to actually come true. And it's important from the time I set the idea, the next day, it gets 30 minutes. Big new idea. Must do it. If it's important to me, the next day, it gets 30 minutes. Not four years from now. Like, right now, I have a big partnership I'm working on. Like, it completely came into my life, totally interrupted my life. I don't have any time. But it's important. I found 30 more minutes a day. Right? 30 more minutes is easy to find for everybody. People don't think they can. It's possible. I just had a friend, and I get in a huge argument over lunch about this. Not Everybody can find 30 minutes. And I'm like, who can't find 30 minutes more a day? Like, show me. Which. A little more discipline, a little more planning and preparation. Who can't find 30 more minutes a day? Well, I'm busy, and I have all these things you don't understand. I'm like, oh, okay. Well, walk me through your day. Well, I have to get up. I got to get everything, you know, get the kids ready for work. I got to get in the car. I got to commute. That commute's an hour every single day. I can't take away that. I got to do this and this and this. And I'm like, well, what if you didn't drive? What do you mean? Well, what if you didn't drive the car so that your focus and attention could be doing something else? Well, I got to do the commute. I don't know. I've noticed that a lot of cars have a passenger seat and some of them even have a back seat. And if you sit in one of those, you don't have to do this. And I just got you an hour a day. So many people are so. They believe so deeply that they are managing their time so great. I'm like, no. Most people have so much free time, they have no Idea, it's that they are distracted and unprepared or addicted to consuming that they're losing little pieces. And especially here in the United States, you guys have heard me rail on this. The average American, four hours of television a day. Don't tell me you don't have 30 minutes a day. I don't know anyone who can't find 30 more minutes a day for a great new idea that can change their life. You got a new idea that can change your Life? Find your 30 minutes every single day. Number two, remember the first output rule. First output rule says this and got a big new dream, big new goal, big new idea. Don't think that you have to do what we've all been taught, which is begin with the end in mind. Because sometimes you don't know what the end in mind is. But you know the first step. So what I tell people is like, I got a big new idea. I go, great. What's the first output that you would have to create on that immediately? What's like the first output that would start you on the path? I don't know. Okay, figure that out. First step. First output, right? First step is not the research. What's the first output? Let me give you an example. When I began my career, I said, one day I'm going to do video courses. And in mind, you can do all my online courses. That was the big idea. I, Brendon Burchard, am going to do online courses. Guess what I didn't do? I didn't say, well, I better figure out the whole curriculum for all the courses for the rest of my life. Begin with the end in mind. Didn't do that. I said, what's the first step that would allow me to start doing that? Okay, first step, get in front of camera, teach and post it on the Internet. That's the first output one, teaching video on the Internet. So I went and I got my stupid little at the time, flip video camera. Some of you guys know about those. Got a flip video camera. I duct taped it to a box. I put on my cleanest shirt at the time and I stared at the camera and I taught. And I pulled off the flip video camera and I spent four hours uploading it on the Internet. You remember that? Probably not, but you remember that? Yeah. Upload, upload, upload, upload. And then it wouldn't play because it wouldn't stream fast enough. But I spent the time, the first output to me, building an online course, Empire one video. What's your first output? Do that. Now that's how you maintain momentum. The reason people don't stick to their habits is because they're waiting to create the output someday. I'm like, what's the first output? Do it. That's the thing to work on right now. When you got that 30 minute daily block, work towards that first output. Because you get the first output, you got real momentum. You get the first output, your dream, your idea is realized, it's tangible. It's like, ooh, I did that thing. First output. If you don't know the first output of what you have to create, you don't even have a dream. You don't even have a fully thought out idea. First output, make it, do it, create it, post it, do the thing. That's it. I want to write a book, Brendan, but I don't know what the whole book is. I'm like, great. First output, first page, write it. What do you mean? I don't know what the book is? Write the first page. But I don't know what the book is. Write the first page. First output would be the first page of the book, right? Write the first page. But I don't know what the five chapters are. I don't write the first page. See, you don't have to know the whole picture. First step, do the first output. Because you get that first page done, you'll probably get that next page done. You probably get the next page done and you'll start getting clarity of the project. A lot of the creativity of life comes in motion, not beginning in speculation. Okay, next up, number C. 90 day challenge. I can't believe how many people have a big dream or big goal and they don't set up their own 90 day challenge. Like, okay, what's your first output? Good job, appreciate you. But you got 30 minutes every single day in 90 days. Where are we? 90 days, 3 months, let's go. Because, see, what most people are, they're scared to commit to the big idea and dream. And I go, oh, don't commit to the first big idea. Dream not for life. Just like you won't ruin your life forever. Don't commit to your new idea or dream forever. I need 90 days. Give me 90 days, man. Commit to that thing. 90 days and get at it for 90 days. Reevaluate after the 90 days where you're at. Don't think. See, most people don't take an action because they think, well, I'll have to do this action forever. Just like they worry I'll be ruined forever. There's no forever. There Just isn't. There's just now. None of us are guaranteed anything. So if what we have is right this moment and we're looking to the future and we're working towards that, good job. I want in 90 days, where are you? That's it. What'd you do in 90 days? Did you lose five pounds? Great. You don't have to say, I'm going to be completely life transformed. I'm going to have six pack abs and still drink pina coladas on the beach with 40 people in bikini. No, no, no, no, no, dude, lose five pounds, you got 90 days. Go like, just set the 90 day challenge for yourself and get at that and then worry about the next series of goals after that. So if you've got a big idea or dream and you're really committed to it, commit to a 90 day challenge. And what does that mean for you specifically what's going to happen at the end of 90 days? How you think, how you feel, how you move, what you achieve, what outputs are created. Get really clear on those types of things. You'll be so happy you did. Without these things, there is no idea into action, there is no momentum. It's why you didn't stick to your habit because you didn't give it 30 minutes a day. You didn't stick to your habit because you didn't even know what you were supposed to do. You didn't stick to your habit because you didn't at least set a time period that was realistic for yourself, that was doable. D you gotta have your drop list. There is no new idea in your life without a drop list of things to stop doing a drop list. I'm dropping these things. I'm not doing these things, I'm saying no to these things. I'm getting this off the agenda. I'm letting that responsibility go. It's the things you aren't going to do that help you do the things that you're going to do. So you got to spring clean a little bit. If you got new dreams in your life, spring clean, what are you going to stop doing? Right? I'm very, very, very disciplined about this. For me personally, I have one of my own personal practices. On the 1st of every month, I make my drop list every month. Not once a year, every month I go, okay, this month, what do I need to drop? Because inevitably I'm moving so fast. I pick up new things. I'm doing all the time, some new idea, new dream, new thought. Because I'm trying to innovate. I'm trying to be up front, I'm trying to lead, I'm trying to change things. And then what ends up happening is throughout the month, other people also do what other people give you responsibilities, give you ideas, give you programs they're adding onto your plate. All month long, you're collecting a bigger and bigger plate, Right? Some months I start, I go, okay, well, this month I'm going to do these five new things. And the end of that month, I realize, you know what? I'm not going to be able to maintain five. I'm going to drop two of them. I'll stick with three, but I can't do all five. That's a drop list. Without a drop list, I have no idea how you can keep adding new things. Make sense? Some of the biggest breakthroughs in our life is when we just stop doing the things that we know or aren't right for us. Next up, big important one, the Friday friend status call. Everything that we know from goal setting comes back to sociology. If you don't have someone you're doing something with actively, if you don't have an accountability partner, you don't have a coach, you don't have a friend you go to lunch with or someone you talk it through, then the odds of that happening for you are so low. Because you know what the. We're social beings. We need processing time with other people. And the more processing time we have, usually the more progress we get, right? It's why therapy's so powerful in unlocking people, or coaching's so powerful in unlocking people. It's like, oh, I'm processing. Oh, I'm getting distinction. I'm getting more progress. You need that Friday friend status call. If you got a big new goal or dream. All I want you to do every Friday at the end of the day, literally 5 minute, 10 minute, 15, 30 minute call, whatever it is, pick it up, call your friend and say, I did this this week, struggled with this. This worked. That went well. You, now you go, how did you do? And just. You got one person in your life every week. You're talking about momentum with, I don't care if it's your mom. I prefer this as a human. So not the cat, but a human that you, every single week, you talk through things with, like, where are you? I don't care if it's a librarian. I don't care if it's your social worker. I don't care if it's your brother. I don't care who it is. It can be the stranger across the street. Don't talk to strangers if you're PG13. But everybody else have that conversation and just on a Friday go, hey man, this is where I'm at. Because if you won't do that, I promise if you don't socialize your learning, you will not achieve your dreams. You must socialize. What am I learning? Where am I at? How's it going? What am I struggling with? You gotta ask for help. But you need a consistent basis. What? Big dreams require weekly check ins. Write it down. Big dreams require weekly check ins. So who's going to be your weekly check in? Accountability coach, Friend, mentor? Who every week check in. And if you're like, well, I don't know anybody, everybody hates me. You know what? Go on your Facebook page every Friday at 5 and go, this is what I learned this week. This is what I tried. What did you guys try? And all the people who make fun of you, delete them. And everybody else say, good for you. So easy. Life's very simple. Next, create motivation triggers. When I walked in this door today, it's the same when I walk in the doors of my conference rooms, when I'm doing my seminars, that when I usually my doorway trigger, meaning that's what a motivation trigger is. A trigger is something physical or tangible happens and you attach either a statement or an action to it. Okay. Trigger is something tangible that you say or do when something else happens. So when I walk through a door, and that's every door of my life, I walk through a door, my mind almost always says, because I'm just conditioned it over and over and over doing this. I walk through the door, my mind says, I am a happy man entering this space, ready to serve. I'm a happy man entering the space, ready to serve. It's been since I was like 20 years old one because I always want to remind myself I'm happy. I have so much to be grateful for. So do you. So how are you reminding yourself that you're grateful, that you're happy, that you're good? And then I remind myself, I'm entering the space, ready to serve. Not hoping to serve, not. Maybe one day I'll deserve to serve. I'm ready right now. Whatever. I know I believe in my ability to figure things out. I'm ready to serve now. I don't need permission, I don't need more money, I don't need more team. I'm ready to whatever I got. I'm ready. Let's go. I don't need new things, more things, better things. Tons of things. I'm ready to serve right now. Let's go. I'm not ever waiting to provide service to the world, ever. You don't have to have the big stuff, the fancy stuff. Just go. I didn't have big fancy cameras and lights and fancy big flip charts when I started this. It was me in a really dirty shirt with the thing, the buttons too hung open. Like, you know, it's like, it was so nasty and gnarly and bad. It was awesome. And I was ready to serve. You don't have to have everything. I was watching this documentary recently on Usain Bolt, one of the greatest. Well, he is the greatest sprinter of all time, right? And you see the scene of him and he's doing sprints in a field with like this sort of little belt tied around his waist, tied to a chain, tied to. We would call it a weight sled, but you could barely call it that. A little metal sled where you put on like, you know, weights, like a 45 pound weight from like lifting. And it's like. So he would sprint with this little things. When you go to the NFL or I work with my, you know, my major teams, they usually got. They got the fancy sleds, these longer sleds that glide when you take off, that release proportionate amount of tension along with the weight as you speed up. Like very fancy contraptions. Now this dude, the best ever, is down in Jamaica in a hot field with this huge belt on with like one coach, not 12 coaches, one coach standing there next to him. He ties this thing, and when he takes off, this thing is bouncing along behind him. It's like the. Just like, you're like. And he's the world's best. Because he's not waiting to have everything to train. He's training. I'm not waiting to have everything to serve. I'm serving so many of my people. Well, one day when I have a following, I'll post some stuff. I'm like, start posting stuff now. One day when I'm ready, I'll put myself. No, there is no one day to be ready. You're ready now. Go. It is a mindset you must have. You're ready to go. So that's one of my triggers. Walk through a door. I'm entering the space as a happy man. Ready to serve. Let's go. That's just one trigger. I have all sorts of other triggers. I have different doorway triggers. When I walk in my house, I say something a little different to myself than when I walk in My office. But other triggers I have when a door closes in a car. Every time a door closes in a car, I say something else to myself. When I walk into my office, I take a first action that triggers momentum for me. Like, you need to have first actions or space triggers that help you stay your best. They're ultimately all geared towards one thing. How can you remind yourself to be at your best? And how do you use physical objects, time periods, situations to get yourself there? That's the question. That's your job. These are motivation triggers. Because if you're not triggering yourself, the world's doing it for you. And if the world's doing it, you know what the world's gonna trigger you towards? Angst, outrage, distraction, consumption. It's not gonna trigger you towards you being your best self. So if you didn't maintain your habits this year, go on my YouTube channel and type in the word. You know, type in the power of habits and you'll see a video that will teach you how to set some more of those examples. Right? If you look in a mirror, you should have a mirror trigger. See your reflection of yourself. Say something to yourself. I know that sounds like just like positive thinking kind of stuff. And you know what it is, because what's the alternative? Stupid thinking, negative thinking, scarcity thinking? You need to have a little bit more triggers set up to make you work. And sometimes if it's not just you, get somebody else to do it, get a coach to do it, a mentor to do it, a friend to do it. But you need to be triggered to be your best. How are you currently triggering yourself to be your best? Many of you know you've been with me for years. You know, we kind of now everybody does it, but we were the first one to do it. When the smartphone came out and the first alarm was available to be set a label. I created this training and put it out about saying, hey, use this alarm label on your phone to send yourself reminders to tell you to be awesome. Put your three words in here that pop up and remind you who to be. Use this as a trigger to be your best instead of a box of consumption. Because this can be a weapon for good or a weapon that takes you into distraction. But it's up to you. Just like the rest of life, self reliance. It's up to you. Hey guys, it's Brandon. I'm jumping in here real quick. First I want to make sure you've gone to progressmode.com to join the newsletter because I have a resource for you related to this episode and I have an upcoming meetup with my private group, Ultra. If you've ever liked to be in a private group with me where I help you get more progress towards your passion projects or to build your business or your brand in a bigger way, just go to progressmo.com click on private group to apply to See you can get into Ultra and we can take it to the next level by getting in person and meeting up virtually once a month online as well. Just go to progressmode.com all right, let's rock and roll. Five steps to having more confidence in your life. Number one, decide you need no reason whatsoever to be more confident. Just make the decision to be confident. You don't need a reason. You don't need 50 people to tell you you're amazing or you're beautiful or we love you. You just have to say, you know what? Today, today I'm lift my head up a little bit, you know, today I'm going to give myself a little bit of credit. Today I'm just going to be confident. I'm going to walk into this room, I'm going to stand tall as if I was an incredibly confident person for no other reason than that's my intention right now. That's it. That's the power of intention. It's the power of the self directed human being that we just get to choose how we want to feel. You could be happy right now for no reason, right? For no reason at all. You could just say, you know what, I'm decided to be happy in my life. You don't need 50 things to make you happy. Just sense the moment, feel grateful for life, you're good to go. We over complicate these things. We think we have to have some big long psychological story and build up to suddenly one day wake up and be more confident. No, we don't. We have to wake up one more day and say, today I'm be confident. Just like we decide when we wake up. If you ever had a day where you just, I mean, you just crushed it. You know, you got so much done. You were like, wow. At the end of the day you're like, man, I just crushed it today. That happened because when you woke up in the morning, you said, I'm gonna get some stuff done today. You had the intention to be a productive human being that day. So why not set the intention to be a confident human being that day? Why not set the intention to be a loving person or an ambitious person or a fun person or a flirty person or a sexy person or whatever kind of person that you want to be. Just decide you don't need a bunch of stuff. People really get this one wrong. And what happens is, if you don't have the intention in the moment to say, I'm going to be confident. I'm just going to allow that to come up. I'm going to feel that sense and feeling what confidence is for me and express that genuinely and real for myself. In the vacuum of intention arises impulse. And often from that impulse through our brainstem, up comes worry, concern, fear, the paying attention to what is wrong so that we can fix it or flee or escape, Right? So we have to have the intention of who we are and what we're going to be. It begins with you simply deciding to be a confident person. Changed my life when I did that. I realized and described, this was way back in college for me. I just thought, I want to be a confident person. How's this going to happen? Do I have to wait till I'm 50 after I've achieved everything? I've made some money or maybe people like me somewhere, Come on, get over it. We should get over our stuff and one day just realize real confidence is simply having the ability to genuinely express who we truly are and to pursue things that we truly desire. That's confidence. Confidence doesn't have to mean you're leaping over tall buildings. Confidence means you're being who you are authentically for no other reason. No one gave you permission. You just decided to be who you are. You decided to chase your dreams. That's confidence, right? Believing in yourself and believing in where you're going, that's confidence. It doesn't take a whole lot of magic. That's confidence from that decision to be confident just because. Just because we want to feel that sense of strength in our own bodies, that sense of energy and joy of expressing who we are and chasing what we want. Everything rolls from there. You know, the human develops in its psyche. We develop a real sense of competence or confidence coming from a sense of integrity for ourselves. You know, integrity is, I know who I am and I am being that consistently. I know what I want and I am chasing that consistently. Integrity. Being aligned with who you are, your values, your beliefs and your dreams. Having integrity, that gives us confidence in self, right? That our self can stand on its own and be itself and do what it desires. That gives us a sense of confidence. So how have you been doing that? Depending on. Have you been really demonstrating who you are to the world? Have you allowed yourself to do that. Because if you do that over a period of time, the self, and I would argue the soul, senses a coherence. You know, there's a cohesive sense of identity that comes from being consistent to the best of who we are. Confidence comes from that. And that too is will, it is decision. It is a desire to want to be a person of integrity and confidence. And that's where it stems from. I think if you decide to be confident, you have integrity in who you are being and what it is you're seeking in life and your values. I think the third one from there, it really comes down to competency. I mentioned that word earlier, competency, which means, you know, psychologists often call it the confidence competence loop. As you become more competent in something, you learn how to do it. You're more confident in doing it. As you learn how to ride a bike, and you rode the bike more and more and more, you became more skilled at it. You develop more confidence in your ability to ride the bike. Any area of your life. You're going to go into the for the first time, be okay with being uncertain, be okay with being uncomfortable, Be okay with not knowing how it's going to turn out because it's your first time, but stumble into it anyway. Because as you stumble into it, you develop skill, you develop comfort with it. And then suddenly one day, you wake up saying, I'm pretty confident doing this. Nothing changed in who you are. What changes your level of competency? Knowledge, skill and ability. That's what competency is. Knowledge, skill, ability and talent. And so when we finally realize, oh, wow, I just need to learn a little bit more here. I'll be more confident. I just need to apply this little bit more here. I'll be more confident. As you develop skills and abilities in your life, in your unique areas, you become more confident. To do that, it requires the fourth thing. And that fourth thing is momentum. You know, momentum is key to confidence. When we stop having any momentum in our life, we often feel lost or confused or down. You know, we start losing that confidence, connection with our strength and our self. And so we have to take more action to develop more confidence. That means we have to say, what is it I truly want? And start moving towards it on a consistent basis before we know the whole plan. Often a lot of people think that your decision is your destiny. And sometimes I'm like, I don't know about that. A lot of people decide to lose weight. A lot of people decide to be a loving spouse. A lot of people decide to do something good, but they don't. It's disciplined action that is your destiny, right? And often some of the best decisions in your life come after you have momentum at something, and then you've gained some more perspective, right? But a lot of us are waiting for the perfect plan, the perfect time, the perfect person, the perfect thing to pursue our goals or our dreams. And it's that waiting that often dampens our confidence because we're at the external. We're sort of at the whim of the world a little bit. Maybe we get lucky, maybe that person comes in, maybe the funding comes through. Whatever it is. We have to instead say, what can I do to begin this? What can I do now to begin? Because even if you begin and you're not sure, you don't have to know the whole path, right? Sometimes the whole stairway is not lumen until you take that first step. As we learned from Martin Luther King, right? It's like, what is that? Sometimes it's that first step, and then the staircase emerges, then we can see. And so for yourself, as soon as you take that first step, that says in your mind, hey, you know what? I took a step. Good for me. And then you start making better and better decisions because you're able to see more often. You don't know where you're going in life until you start jogging towards something. Just run in place, run somewhere. But as soon as you run, you start, things open up to you. Say, oh, look at this, look at this, look at this. People often say, I wish I had more vision for my life. Brendan. I said, it's hard to have vision for your life if you've never seen anything. Get outside of the house, turn off the tv, turn off the computer, go see the world a little bit. You'll gain a little bit more vision, and with more vision and momentum towards the thing you want, you will have more confidence. So he begins with deciding, really, you need nothing to be more confident. But if you need something, go with integrity. Be more of who you truly are. Chase what you truly desire. Be smart enough to know that you have to have to, have to, have to. Have to develop more competency at the things that you're interested in. More competency, more confidence, confidence. You have to realize, oh, my gosh, there is no reason in the world that you cannot yourself, with very simple moves, gain more momentum, more momentum, more progress, more progress, more confidence. And finally, the fifth thing of confidence, community. You know, we all need people around us who are supportive and positive and buoyant and who Appreciate our sense of aliveness and joy and happiness in life. And if we don't have that, you can't sit there and be a victim. Oh, I just have a bad set of parents and I got a bad set of friends, and I guess I'm destined to be around a bunch of duds. No, go find a new peer group. Go to a seminar. Go to the church. Go to a volunteer meeting. Go get around people who are positive and who are amazing. You know, a lot of people tell you, hey, you know what? Just get rid of all those negative people. Well, sometimes your negative people in your life are, you know, your mom or your dad or your lover or your spouse or one of your kids is just a little tyrant. You know, you can't just open the door and say, get out of here, you little bastard. It doesn't work like that. It's not about cutting loose all the negative people. Right. Of chopping off people and getting rid of them, though maybe there are some people you need to say, I don't need to associate with this person as much in my life anymore. Or if I do, I don't need to get so hooked up and trapped into their pools of pessimism. What you have to do is say instead, okay, if I don't have the supportive peer group, let me go create that. Let me go find those people and get around them. Because as people are cheering you on, you gain more confidence. As people are saying, hey, you're doing a good job, you say, yeah, I am doing a good job. And you allow yourself to. To feel that sense of success and that sense of integrity when other people recognize it in you. Sometimes our greatest confidence has come from having a community of supporters. And so you don't have to wait for those supporters to show up. Go find them. Go mix. Go mingle. Get outside of the house. Live life again. As you do that, as you live life again, what do you notice? More integrity, more momentum, more competency, more good people. And suddenly that thing you were hoping one day you found that you found confidence. No. One day you wake up and you found you created it.