Micro Class - +1 or -1 (Which Way Are You Headed?!)

You're listening to Optimize with Bryan Johnson.

More wisdom in less time.

Hey guys, what's up? This is Brian. We've got another one of my favorite ideas. This one's called plus one or minus one. Plus one or minus one. Which way are you headed? So Abraham Maslow tells us that in any given moment we are either stepping forward into growth, it's a plus one, or back into safety. Right? Plus one or minus one. So we're either going forward into growth, plus one, or we're going back into safety any given moment. Plus one or minus one, plus one or minus one. Now, what's interesting about this is that when we decide to go to that plus one spot, we're at our plus one, right? That's a good thing. Now, if we had gone to negative one, oops. And we could have gone to the plus one, we just created a two unit gap, right? So we've talked about this whole. Here's what you're capable of doing. Capable, and here's what you're actually doing. If there's a gap between that, that is where the sad face exists. You close the gap, you actually do what you're capable of doing, which we call arete in the prior videos, right? We live with virtue, we live with excellence. This exos, this unhappiness goes away. What exists, what remains in its place, joy, happiness, enthusiasm, vibrancy, et cetera. So when we take a step forward into growth, we're experiencing this sense of arte in any given moment. And when we take the step back into safety, minus one, we experience this gap. And it's not just one unit, it's two units away now. So let's make it real. Let's say this morning you woke up and you said you were going to do something this morning and you didn't do it minus one. And then you said you're going to do something else and you didn't do it minus two. Now, you could have been here, but you're now here. And if that goes on throughout the day and you keep on moving down and down and down, and you could have been here and here and here and here, there's kind of like there's a subconscious computer that's keeping track. And at the end of the day, you know that you could have been here, you wound up here and that hurts. There's a lot of pain there. And all you want to do if you've been doing this is to turn on the TV or to go open a bottle of wine or whatever you can do to numb yourself from this pain. But the solution is actually really, really simple. And it is obviously not found in a can of beer or a bottle of wine or obsessive Facebooking or whatever. It's found in taking consistent, impeccable action by living with arete and virtue. And you can do that in any moment. You can change the tide from the negative stepping back into safety again and again and again to the positive stepping forward into growth again and again and again. And when you do that, it feels so good and it feels especially different from what you're used to feeling if you've consistently gone this way and you don't need to wait for weeks or months or even days to experience how good this feels. You feel it this moment. There's something right about doing what we're here to do and you get the reward instantaneously. Now, of course, if we've taken a lot of negative steps, we may have some cleaning up to do in our lives, but the process feels so liberating when we make that choice. Moment to moment to moment to moment. And again, every moment is presenting us with the opportunity to either step forward, forward into growth or to move back into safety. So which way are you headed today, this moment, etc. And here's to a bunch of number ones. We're going to keep this one short and sweet. Plus one, minus one. Which way are you headed? Maslow tells us in any given moment, forward into growth or back into safety. Plus one, minus one. We want to pay attention, close that gap between what we're capable of doing, what we're actually doing by living with all arete, living with virtue and excellence. Feel the goodness as you move forward in the direction of your highest potential and celebrate life more and more and more. There you go. Plus one or minus one. Compliments yesterday's what are your number ones? Go check that one out if you're feeling it. And here's to a bunch of plus ones today and every day going forward. Have an awesome day. Look forward to sharing more with you soon. Let me know what you think and what else you'd like me to cover. Let know me. See ya.

Hi, this is Brian. I hope you enjoyed that micro class. If so, I think you'll enjoy everything else we offer at BrianJohnson.

Me.

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