688. Increase Your Productivity With These Happiness Hacks

When you actually look for the gold, you find more and more of it. You forget that you also accomplished this fourth thing today. And you forget that you actually, you know, checked off the list this fifth thing today, and you end up focusing on all the good that happened instead of all the bad that happened.

Welcome to the earn your happy podcast. I'm Lori Harder, founder of The Bliss Project, 3 Time Fitness World champion, fitness expert and cover model, turned self love junkie, lifestyle entrepreneur and author. Each week I'll bring you a guest or a thought that will help you bust through your fears, connect to your soul, and get focused and clear so you can elevate your life, business, and relationships. We don't wait until we're ready for someone to tell us we're good enough. We take what we want and we anoint ourselves, get ready to earn, own, and unapologetically rock your happiness every single day. Are you with me? Here we go.

And we're back.

We are back. And we were just discussing our topic. We were both kind of listening to different videos, I think, this morning, and.

Listening to Ryan Saran and Gary B. Oh, what were you listening to?

Cool. I want to hear that one. Is that a podcast?

Yep.

Oh, awesome.

It's Ryan's new show.

What?

Big money energy.

No.

Huh?

Oh, man.

Yep. Got new favorite.

I just got real excited, you guys. I listen to podcasts on. On my runs, six mile runs, and I. They're kind of like church. It's like business, church life, church. I literally feel like I've had a makeover afterward if I listen to a podcast. Okay. Today we are going to talk about how to increase productivity through happiness. So I was listening to a TED talk by Sean Achor. It's an old one, but I'm obsessed. Every single time I hear it, I die laughing. But I also noticed that I really absorb everything that he's saying because you laugh the entire time and you're so open to all of the info that's coming in. And he talks so much about that in this talk, about how happiness increases your odds of productivity by 31% and it also increases your ability to learn. So what Chris and I did is we wrote down five things, and these are also. Some of these are from the talk. Five things that increase your productivity and also make you happier. So it's kind of like a double whammy. And we really notice that in our life when we do these five things, when Chris and I do these five things, we truly have the energy to move through our business in the way that we want.

So I just want to jump in there real quick. So you're telling me he said, if you're happy increases, it increases your productivity by 31%? Right.

It has the odds to increase your productivity by 31%.

So productivity means efficiency. So people need to actually understand this means a 30% raise in income or a 30% raise in time that you get back, or 31% extra time spent or being extra present with your family. Like, that's a really big fact for people to latch onto.

If somebody sat me down and said, do you want 30% more of good things? I'd be like, 30% is a lot. Like, that's a shitload of like. Like you said, time and money that you could get back that could really change your life.

To quantify for somebody, if you make 80 grand a year and you get a 30% raise, that now means you're making $104,000 a year. That's a big jump.

And the crazy part is, is, like, all we're doing is asking people to do things that make them happier. And, you know, to. To really summarize how. What, like how crazy this is. It makes you realize that that's something that everybody should say yes to. Except the version of normal that the world wants you to see is the baseline is not necessarily happy. So you're actually like, we're fighting against what the world views as normal. So if you feel weird, if you feel like the black sheep of your family, if you feel like this is a challenge, that is because the world is trying to tell you that it is not normal to be happy. Because, you know, it's kind of like when I was younger, Chris, and. And I was told that I had bad genetics and that it was just our family, that we couldn't lose weight or that we were always gonna be overweight. And that's just what I heard. So I believed it until I started learning that my family wasn't doing the things that actually made you healthy or fit. Like, it was that moment of, like, wait, we're not actually doing the actions that can make us feel this way or make us feel healthy or make us a healthy family. And so this might be the moment for you, which. A good moment, if you're not feeling happy or very productive, to realize you're not doing the things that actually can make you happy and increase productivity. Somebody said to me once, because my podcast is earn your happy. They were like, you shouldn't have to earn your happy. Like, it's your birthright and you should just wake up with it. And I was like, okay, tell me someone who sits all year long and does nothing.

Let me know if that person wakes up happy every day. I think with a comment like that, I hope they're listening. I think with a comment like that, you're not waking up happy every day.

So I was like, you know, earn your happy came from that place of saying this. Some of these things that are proven scientifically to make a human happy. And I really think that if, if God, universe, whatever, didn't want you to or, you know, didn't want you to be happy, it would just be like, okay, well, you don't have to work, you don't have to eat delicious food. Okay, you can just sit. Like, we would just sit here and soak up the sun, I guess. I don't know.

Be happy by default.

Happy by default. I've never really met that person. I've met people who, whose baselines are like, you know, I'm just, I'm good every day, but they also, when I dig deeper, have a life that they love. So that's interesting.

Let's dive into these. So what's the first one?

Number one, and I took this right out of the Sean Acorn TED Talk, which you guys trust me, you gotta go, listen, you're gonna, you're gonna laugh and learn. Number one is see stress as a challenge and not a threat. So I also want to add, see stress as an opportunity to grow. Because growth, we know, Chris, is something that actually makes you happy when you are expanding and you're challenging yourself.

About six months ago, you and I did a podcast and we talked about the difference between pressure and stress. And what I really think Sean means here, and I don't know, because I don't know him, is pressure, not stress. So he's saying, you know, see stress as opportunity or see stress as. What does it say?

See stress as a challenge.

Okay. I think it means pressure. So stress means that, like, the world is bogging down on us. Pressure is different. Pressure is what moves things forward. Pressure is like, I have a deadline, or I need to accomplish this thing, or I need to hit this goal.

Or I owe this much money or I owe this much money, which is a challenge.

Totally. Or. And pressure helps move you forward. And people need to stop classifying pressure as stress. And when you stop classifying pressure as stress, you realize it's actually a good thing. AKA what you said, an opportunity to move you forward.

It's a catalyst.

It's a catalyst.

It's a starter. When you don't have pressure. When I don't have pressure, Chris, you know what I do? I don't do the thing that I want to do. So we talk about this is creating those pressure points, right? Like manufacturing pain points. And that's what we do all of the time with this. So I love that. So today I am going to see these moments of like, I have to get this done or whatever, as thank God I have these deadlines to get this done so that I can experience what it's like to be my higher self.

One more thing that we know about pressure is it condenses things down to a smaller piece, right? So, for example, you put pressure on coal turns into a diamond. And I'm not going to use that metaphor, but I just wanted to give that example how if pressure condenses things down to something better, then when your schedule is packed, that is simply pressure condensing your to do list down into shorter, faster actions. You can get more done. Like that is proof right there that pressure is a good thing and we got to stop classifying it as bad.

Wait, I, I gotta talk about this for a second on this point, because you and I say all the time now, we're like, wow, our past selves. Like, the things we do now in one day are what we used to do in a week or even two weeks, you guys. And I think the reason for that is we stopped viewing pressure as something challenging and stopped creat creating so much resistance before the activity. So instead of us being like, oh, I have to go record podcasts again or tonight or oh my God, I have to go speak. And, and I have this, and I have this, and I have this. We don't even say that anymore. Like, we try not to. We. We just do the thing, which means we get the time back in between and we also get more done.

Think about it. If you add 10 minutes of resistance and complaining to a 20 minute activity, you now made it a half hour activity. And now if you've got eight of those half hour activity or eight of those 20 minute activities throughout a day, you just actually extended that out by an extra four hours. That's insane.

I used to do this before workouts, you know, it was like, oh, I don't want to do that. Now I'm like, just go, just go. And I get that 30, 40 minutes back of putzing around, like wasting time, not going, you know, doing all these little things that don't matter. So, okay, let's get into Number two. Number two is gratitude and three wins. Now these, I just want to point out that these are also things that Sean mentions. Like this, literally this scientifically, a lot of these that are in here is proven to make you happier. This is. They did these tests, they did this at different colleges. They literally made people do this and watched them be happier and watch their productivity go up. So, Chris, tell me about gratitude and three wins and how we incorporate these.

Okay, so first of all, I start my day with gratitude. You start your day with gratitude. You guys, I wake Lori up to a mantra. And you've heard this. If you listen to our show, you've heard this, that I wake her up to, I am happier, healthier, wealthier, more fit than I was yesterday. But this isn't just like when we're conveniently together. Lori, I just got back from a five day ski trip with the guys. What text did you wake up to every single morning?

I'm happier, healthier, wealthier, more fit than I was yet yesterday.

What you, what do you do? You copy and paste it and send.

It back to me because that's way too much to text at like six in the morning.

But the whole point is our gratitude practices don't stop just because we're away on the road. It's an all the time thing. And every little piece of gratitude ends up into these dopamine hits that redirects what you're focusing on. So you could be focusing on, oh, I have to do something. And you can quickly shift it to I get to do something. And those small little adjustments throughout the day add up into an incredible day full of gratitude. One more thing that we do that's awesome is, as you guys know, if you've been listening to us, every single night, we go for a walk at the end of the evening. It's a mandatory walk. And trust me, there's a lot of times we don't want to go. But on this walk, we started implementing three wins. So we're walking right out the front of the door and instead of going down the rabbit hole of, oh, this happened today or that happened today, or it was so busy, which I want.

To point out that it's easy for me. Like, I actually catch myself or you catch me all the time complaining first. So I just want to say, like, if that feel feels like you're like, how do they, how are they always so happy? I'm like, because, like, we, we catch each other or I catch myself or you catch me.

Well, I really believe in what you Practice on a regular basis will make or break you. And that's why every time that we walk out the door, if you're like. And I see you start going to rabbit hole, I'm like, lori, nope. We start with three wins.

Yep.

And what does it end up doing for every single walk?

Oh, my God. It changes everything for me. I'm focusing on that, and I'm. I realize that if I'm feeling bad because my kind of like a default, which I'm trying to change, is to look at what I didn't do instead of, holy crap, what I did, move forward right now because it feels very. The company feels very big and overwhelming. So it. It shifts my focus right away.

And so, guys, even if you don't go for a walk like we do, at the end of the day, this would take you 10 minutes to sit down with your. Your friend or your partner or your spouse and to say, hey, three wins. What are they? And so what we do is I'll say, lori, three wins. And you have to say, okay, number one. And, you know, whatever it is, number two, whatever it is, number three. And then I'll go and I'll say, all right, my first win was this. Second one was this. Third one was this. And then what typically happens, we usually get a fourth win, and we're like, oh, yeah, wait, wait, I got a fifth one.

Wait, I got a lot.

And here's what happens, guys. When you actually look for the gold, you find more and more of it. You forget that you also accomplished this fourth thing today, and you forget that you actually, you know, checked off the list this fifth thing today, and you end up focusing on all the good that happened instead of all the bad that happened.

And you guys, if you. If you don't have somebody to talk about this with, if you're not to that place yet, like, write it in a journal. Definitely write it down in a journal. Three wins sometimes is even easier than gratitude for me, because it's like, okay, where did I do something today that maybe I was, like, not wanting to do? So sometimes they're small. Sometimes it's like, you know what? Today I exercised, and it was 20 minutes, and I'm just so proud I did that, you know? Or today I cut myself off at half of that bag of nuts instead of the whole bag. I mean, sometimes they're really small, right? But you have to recognize that in order to get them repeated, and then you'll notice that they start increasing. Okay, number three, exercise.

I mean, we don't go A day without it, even if it's just walking, we are constantly moving our bodies.

You know, I think the biggest thing for me is I talk to myself. I'm like, do this for you because you know how you act when you don't get your exercise and you know how the whole day is going to feel. So I always do this, like, mental trade of like, okay, 30 to 60 minutes right now equals like, 23 hours that I actually enjoy instead of 23 hours of guilt and feeling bad and not getting my dopamine and maybe feeling tired or lethargic. Like, there is a direct. I actually interviewed Gabby Reese, the pro volleyball player, yesterday, and I said, you know, what do you want people to know? Like, what. What do you wish that more people knew about just, like, life and, you know, being happy and being successful or whatever that looks like. And she said, you know, you have to take care of yourself. She's like, if you. If you want to get the messages of what you're here to do, if you want to, you know, if you want to feel good, if you want to have the energy to be, you know, a productive mother, if you want to have the energy to be a good partner, if you want to have the energy to run your business, she's like, the first thing you have to do is exercise and take care of yourself. And I think that we forget that, especially as we get busier. It's very easy to be like, that's not important. But you're actually that moment of productivity that you think is going to happen by skipping your workout is actually going to start taking away from the overall productivity and success slowly, but it chips away. You can't see it right away. You think you're being more productive by getting that time back, and you're not.

And the ultimate goal is to work out every single day. But I think that intimidates people. I think maybe the word exercise for someone who's not doing anything right now. Yeah. So I really think number three here is move, move daily. Like, move daily. And just let that be your baseline to begin with. And then movement will turn into exercise and exercise will turn into working out. Totally.

We. I think your mom's a really good example. Like, we see what happens even when she's like, okay, I'm doing 20 minutes. You know, it's like a whole different person comes out when she's on her, you know, 20 minute walks.

Ironically, I have a walk scheduled with her right after this.

Look at that. All right, number four is acts of kindness. And you have to give what you want to get to get that thing. Help me.

Yeah. Okay. Here's what Laurie's trying to say. The more acts of kindness that you do in the world, the more you're gonna have them reflected back on you. And I don't mean like some law of attraction type of thing. I simply mean people react to how you treat them. So if you're going around and you're not smiling first, or if you're not saying hi first, or if you're not opening and holding a door for somebody first, then they're not gonna do it for you. But when you interrupt somebody's busy day. Cause everyone's just in their own heads with a smile or a hello, or you're opening the door and holding it for them or waiting for them, then it quickly snaps them out of this trance that we're all in. And they smile back, they say hi back, or they hold the next door for you. And before you know it, you are now experiencing other people creating these acts of kindness right back to you.

You know, I always think about how you be is all you see. So if you're being like, you know, I'm not going to hold the door for them because they didn't hold it for me. It's a repeated cycle. If you are the person who just keeps showing up and shows up and is the person that you want to be, that's what you're going to start seeing. And don't get me wrong, there are times we hold the door for people and they don't even look at you. That has happened a lot to us. And it's really easy to be like, you know, want to stick it to them. I don't know what, how, but like, with a weird look or like you and I complaining about it. That's not the point. Like, do the thing without expecting anything in return and do it for yourself. Like, honestly, at the end of the day, do it because that's how you want to show up in the world and that's how you want to feel. Because when you do these things, it feels good and it creates this cycle of it returning to you. And I think that that's so important is if you want the thing, you know, if you want to feel love, give love. If you want to feel, you know, if you want to feel like people are kind, be kind to people and watch it change. So number five is environment. I love this. I've actually been just reading about different productivity and happiness hacks and so much of your environment is included in that. In fact, I believe it's everything. Your environment is stronger than your willpower. You'll hear me say that on just about every episode because it's true. And there's something called, and I talked about this last episode, but there's something called Medical Student syndrome where when they are infiltrated, when they are saturated, when they're surrounded in by all of these different people studying sicknesses and illnesses, they all start to think that they are sick or ill. So they all take on, they take on symptoms of the illness that they're studying. And so this, this isn't everybody, but it's actually a large majority of the population with this. So you guys can look it up. It's called Medical Student Syndrome. And that really makes me think about, you know, what is your symptom that you are getting from your environment. So if you're feeling tired, if you're feeling lethargic, if you're feeling depressed, anxious, that's because you are, quote unquote, studying something. Meaning you're studying. Maybe you are a Netflix binger of like true crime. Maybe you listen to true crime podcasts and now you're afraid everyone is out to kill you. There's a reason that is a symptom.

It's a good example, guys. Like, I am so strict about my environment. The people, the propaganda and the places. Right? Those three P's of my environment I control big time. I don't hang out with anyone that I don't like, period. That's not going to be good for me, AKA my environment. The places I surround myself with beautiful things and beautiful places to help boost my opinion and how I feel in my environment. And by the way, if you, this is not like you have to rush out buy a nice home. What it means is like go to the nicer park or go walk through the nicer neighbor or do whatever it is that's going to help you pay.

A little more to go to the nicer restaurant to be around successful people and see what that looks and feels like.

Yep. So people, places and then propaganda. I will not let any propaganda fall into my lap. At least I do my best not to. I choose what propaganda. So for example, this morning I chose what podcast I'm going to listen to. I do not turn on the news. I choose which book I'm going to read. I choose what music I'm going to listen to. Because propaganda is gonna seep into your brain one way or another. Why not control that piece of your environment? Because it's really gonna dictate how you see and feel in the world.

Oh man. I know sometimes when you and I have like found ourselves in different environments that we're not normally in, maybe, maybe we have to go to something, you know, for who knows what reason, a family reason or whatever. And there is such a distinct difference. Not just in the. Not in the environment. Here's what I wanna say. Not in like the things surrounding you, but I notice in the people who go to these environments that are maybe a little bit, you know, lower energy, whatever that looks like.

It's the conversations being held, it's the things being talked about, it's the energy that they're exchanging with each other. I mean, I'm just gonna say it like it is, it's low vibe. And they're all living the self fulfilling prophecy of encouraging more low vibe interactions with each other. When imagine if all the same people didn't tolerate a single low vibe comment. What if they said, nope, we don't say that. Here's the positive side of it. Nope. What are your three wins? Nope. What'd you do today? That's great. What if they didn't tolerate that and corrected it to that every single time? Could you imagine how much better their life would be day in and day out?

Oh my God. I won't say the person's name, but they're working really hard to change their environment, their actual workplace and where, who they're spending time with. And the person said to me, I just can't, I can't wait to be out of an environment where they don't. When I ask, how are you doing? They don't respond back. Live in the dream. In a sarcastic way, like. And that really hit me because I definitely spent a lot of my life in that. Where the responses back to how are you? Was very much like, life sucks. This is just what we're doing. We all have to grind and survive in these horrible jobs that we think we don't, you know, that we hate. And it was just a moment of remembering God, that was me. You know, people would ask me how I am. I'm like, you know, like just a really crappy answer, like believing it can't be better.

And a lot of people will jump in here and they'll say, well, what do I do if that's the environment I'm stuck in and I can't change it. Here's an idea. Change it. Like have the balls to say, nope, I. From now on, I want to hear what's positive or have the balls to say, you know what? I don't want to talk about that. What's something that you're excited about or have the balls to say? Nope. No complaining, no justifying. No right. Like change the environment you're in. If you can't change like the physical location of your environment.

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And we're not saying that is easy at all.

That's why I said, have the balls. Because it's gonna feel crappy.

It's gonna feel awful. And those people are gonna make fun of you. They will. You'll start to be the outcast. And then it's crazy because you will, you know, and there will be some people who change, who change. And they like being around you. And one day you'll get a compliment that's like, wow, you're like the only person I love being around here. You make me feel so good.

They'll secretly come to you and right at lunch and they'll be like, hey, I'm so glad that you changed the conversation. I just hate how this happens every.

Time, happens every single time. And then what can happen is just watch the opportunities. Watch what happens when you start being really positive. Opportunities will start coming to you because big thinkers and people who are successful and people who create opportunities for others, look for people that are overly enthusiastic. That's what I. I'm like, I will spot that person and try to figure out how to work with them or just how to get to know them better. Or, you know, when I know someone super enthusiastic who's like, really making big changes in their life, you better believe that. I start thinking, who could I inter introduce them to? What would they be great for? How can we help pull them even faster into what they want? And this just. It just happens. It's how the world and the universe works.

This is why I joined Masterminds, right? And this is why we put them on. Because it's like creating an environment where everybody voluntarily signed up to grow and be positive and to see the opportunity instead of being by default stuck in an environment where People aren't doing that. Matter of fact, this is a great time for me to throw a shameless plug in here. We're a week away from starting to open up our famous Fast Foundations Mastermind. Now this is our all virtual one. This is for anybody out there with a newer business or maybe you're making your first a hundred grand or two hundred grand. This is the one where we paint a path on how to exceed 500 grand. And it's six months long. You get one on one coaching from business coaches we hire on your behalf. You get Q and A about your business, your specific business and your specific business challenges with Lori and I, bi weekly. You get, I mean, it's just hands down the fastest way to move the needle. And so if this is you, if you hear this right now and you want to change your environment and you want to be a part of this virtual Mastermind for six months, then it sells out really quick. And here's how to guarantee yourself to get a spot. Text me the word fast to 310-421-0416. I'm not kidding, like, don't text me if you're not sure you want to do this. But the ones that text me the word fast to 310-421-0416, we're doing two things for you as a reward for saying yes. I want to make sure I get a spot. We're giving you a 24 hour head start before the rest of our audience gets the link to sign up. That means before Instagram, before our email list, before anyone else gets it. Those who text me will get a 24 hour head start to guarantee that they get a spot. The second thing we're going to give you is $2,000 off the retail price of it. That's cheaper than Early Bird. It's cheaper than anybody else will get no matter where you are in our audience. And it's a, it's a way to recognize the people who raise their hand and say, damn it, I'm kicking down the door and I'm going to choose my environment from here on out. So if this is you, just text the word fast to me. It opens next week. It usually sells out in the first couple days. So text Word Fast to me at 310-421-0416.

Awesome, you guys. We're so grateful for you. Let us know your biggest takeaway. As always, it means the world to us to know who we're talking to. It's so much fun to actually be like, oh, oh, Melissa, listen. Oh, John, listen. This is so cool. Melissa and John, Melissa and hey, I guarantee there's a Melissa and John listening.

I guarantee it.

Maybe they're listening together. They're a couple.

Some couple right now is gonna be like, my God, we're Melissa, John.

We are.

All right, guys, thanks for listening. We appreciate you always tag us and share with us what you loved about it.

Bye, guys. Thank you guys so much for spending this time with me on the earn your happy podcast. I am so glad that you stopped by. If you could take one second to share this episode with someone you think would love it, that would be absolutely amazing and we would be forever grateful. Also, please leave us a review if you feel so moved by going to itunes and leaving us an honest thought and honest comment. Tell us what you think, tell us what you want to hear. More of it would really help us out on our journey to helping thousands and thousands of people. Until then, don't forget to earn your happy. Thanks again, guys.

Bye.

Bye.