The 1 Exercise That Will Change Your Year

I don't care who you are. Nobody can stick to a crazy, complex plan of a ton of new things that you think are going to change your life every single year. If you can just make like two to four new habits, I promise you, you will win the year.

And we're back with another episode of.

He Said, she Said.

Happy New Year, babe.

Happy New Year.

Happy New Year to everybody listening. This is the first podcast that we're actually recording in the new calendar year, isn't it?

It feels fresh.

How do you feel? How do you feel going in this year for real?

I feel for the first time, not overly frantic, not overly chaotic, not overly like, I need some massive shifting, crazy plans. It feels really good. I think it's taken me this long to really understand how I work, what my strengths are, what my weaknesses are, what I need. And I feel like I final am setting up a life that really supports my weaknesses and helps expand my strengths.

Yeah. Yeah. I feel like this is the best foundation or maybe the best starting place I've ever started a new year in. And by the way, I'd love to share with people. Like, it's not because I did anything radical or skipped celebrating New Year's or anything like that. I think it's the culmination of a lot of small things that we did in the second half of 2023 that made us feel really set up and really foundationally strong in 2024 here.

Yeah. I would also like to add that I think it is also coming off of 2020, 2021, and everything that happened that made us get more and more clear. Like, I think also getting older is a really huge part of getting more clear that you and I are just really committed to only doing things that light us up and only hanging out with people who expand us a lot of time to figure out.

Yeah, I wish there's a way to accelerate other than make people aware of it. Right. Like, I'm 46 at the time of this recording, when I was 29 or 30, I'm not sure somebody could have said something that would have landed on me to make me choose better people, if that makes sense. I would have been aware of choosing better people, but I don't know what would have made me, like, really be staunch about, you know, what, if you don't serve me, you're out of my life. If you don't add to it, you're out of my life. Because we've got, like, those huge muscles built now when it comes to those kind of boundaries. So Is that like, rite of passage? Is that something that you need over the years to develop, or is there something that somebody can say to you to accelerate that? Or is it a combination of both?

I don't think that you get that opportunity early on, because I do think you have to collect people to even understand who's for you and who's not for you. And I think in the beginning of the journey and your business journey in your 20s and 30s, I think you're figuring it all out. So as we've gotten older and we have it figured out, we can now we have these very clear guidelines in our heads and through conversation of who we want to be around now.

Yeah. So I think it's a combination of this. Somebody might say something to you. That's good advice. And now that becomes awareness. So that awareness might accelerate your journey towards that clarity or towards building that muscle that you want to build, but it's still a lot of trial and error, even though you have the awareness.

I just think we have years of trial and error under our belt to do it now.

We do, and that's one of the reasons that we have the beginning of each new year really dialed in. Right. Like, remember the spreadsheet I did with our goals, our finances, everything that was dialed in, the exercise that we just did recently that we're going to talk about today, that's really dialed in, and that's what we wanted to share with you guys, is there's some tools you can do to really narrow down and dial in how you want to feel and what actions it's going to take for you to feel that way throughout this next year.

Yeah. So I came up with something that's pretty simple. And the reason that it's simple is because I have done so many complex things through the years that actually end up making me feel bad. Because at the end of the day, I don't care who you are. Nobody can stick to a crazy, complex plan of a ton of new things that you think are going to change your life every single year. If you can just make like two to four new habits, I promise you, you will win the year and it'll get better and better and better until one year, you have a year like Chris and I just had, where we go, oh, my God. We don't feel like there's that much that needs to change. And we're getting really happy. Like, we're getting happier and happier and happier because we're figuring out what that means. So let's talk about this exercise yeah.

You know, we kind of, like, in a fun way, nicknamed it the Four Feelings, right?

Yeah.

And if you don't mind, I'm going to tell them what the four steps of the exercise is, and then we'll go and break it down. That way they can have a framework as to where we're steering this.

Let's do it.

All right. So the four Feelings, as we jokingly nicknamed it, it kind of works like this. Lori first, because she ran me through the exercise after she did it, she said, okay, I want you to write down all the ways that you want to feel in 2024. And she didn't tell me a number or anything. So I wrote down, like, nine of them. Right. I wanted to feel extra fit. I wanted to feel high energy. I wanted to feel happy. I wanted to feel compassionate. I wanted to feel abundant. Right. There was eight or nine things that came out. Then step two was, you said, okay, you got to narrow them down to the most important four. And that's kind of where the four feelings come from. It's okay to have the other ones, but you're actually going to realize when you look at your list, some of them are redundant or in the same field. So, for example, feeling like you have boundaries and feeling like you have space, that's redundant. That's the same thing.

Explain why that's the same thing, though.

Well, because it takes boundaries to have space, right? So no matter how many you come up with, you have to choose the four most important feelings for you to really zone in on over the next year. And again, you're going to freak out. You're like, but number five is important, and number six, important. Trust us. Feeling five, feeling six, feeling seven, feeling eight. They're going to come as a natural byproduct when you master the first four feelings that you want to feel throughout 2024.

I'll give one more example. So you guys know what I'm talking about. So I had written down nine to start as well, and I had written down for one, like, intentional, focused, healthy. And I realized that intentional actually covered focused and healthy for me. And here was why. Certain words are going to cover certain things for you that wouldn't cover it for me. But when I wrote down intentional, I wrote down that I would be more intentional about our eating every night. So we're going to use our air fryer for five nights a week so that we're not constantly ordering out. And that fixed what I wanted to fix with health.

Yes.

So the main thing for me, it's not necessarily my workouts, even though we do want to get even more clear on planning like yoga into our workouts, which I also had down here under intentional. I realized that if I'm just intentional with what I want to be doing, that will make me feel focused and healthy. So intentional is the feeling that I always want to be feeling.

Absolutely. Great example. So before we get too in depth in that I want to finish giving the framework. So step one was write down all the feelings that you want to feel for the year. Step two, make sure you identify the most important four. You can only choose up to four. Then step three is cool. You take each one of those four feelings, pull it out separately, like let's say one of them was excitement. Then you write down all of the very specific actions you would have to do this year or changes you would have to make this year, or habits you would have to adopt this year in order to achieve excitement or whatever your feeling is. And each one of them might have 3, 4, 5, 6 actions that you have to do under each of the four feelings. Okay, so step three is you write down the actions or the new habits or the changes you've got to make to achieve that feeling this year. Then step four becomes this. You're going to have, you know, four times five or six actions on each one. There's like 25 to 30 different things you got to do. You know you're not going to implement them all. So once again, you have to go choose the 4 to 5 actions or changes or habits that will be the most crucial ones. That will also help to kind of cross pollinate the four feelings that you really want to achieve. So step one, write down all the feelings you want. Step two, identify the four most important ones. Step three, write down the actions below each one of those four most important feelings. And then step four, you got to summarize all of those into four to five actions that you promise to adopt. And guess what the end result then is that you are going to be able to feel these feelings you want to feel because you zeroed in on what's most important. So now let's unpack this in more depth.

I want to share. The reason that I thought of this and came up with it as well was because if you want to be feeling those feelings and you take those actions, you have to remember on the days that you're about to say, I don't wanna go to the gym or oh, it doesn't really matter, I'll just order doordash again. No because you want to feel a certain way. And those simple tasks are so attached to your mood, who you think you are, how you see your day, what your identity is. And I think having the feelings, like, constantly remembering that it's not just about the workout, about the fit bod. Because sometimes you're like, ah, who cares? Whatever. I've lived with this forever. It's like, no, I want to feel connected. I want to feel like an organized person. I want to feel expanded. So for me, feelings are really strong. They really do control me more than most things because I am constantly. I'm more inspired. I'm curious what you are. I'm more inspired to run from pain than I am.

Same for me.

Pleasure.

Same for me.

Yeah. So if I remember, like, oh, this is going to make me feel this way and I'm going to stay out of pain, then that's a huge reminder for me.

Absolutely. Like, obviously there's things I desire or want, but for me, that is not even a quarter of the motivator as avoiding the pain of not having something.

Exactly.

Right. So you got to really dial that in for yourself. So if we're going to break these down and go a little bit deeper. Lori, number one doesn't need a breaking down. Right. You're just writing down your 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12 feelings that you want for the year. That's easy. Step two was you gotta choose your four most important ones. We kind of touched on that one a little bit. But what if someone's like, yeah, but you won't get it. There's five or there's six.

Okay, so that was me.

Yep.

So Chris and I did this separately. I actually did it first to, like, see how it worked and how it felt. And if I really loved it and I was obsessed with it, actually I feel like I want to do it every year, but when I did it, I could not detach from, like, all nine feelings. So what I did is I actually wrote out every single feeling, and I did the whole exercise on all nine.

So you put the actions below nine different feelings when you first did it?

Yes. And what I found is that I kept on realizing that it was redundant. So I'd write another feeling, and I'd write what I was supposed to do to feel that way under it. And it kept being the same thing.

Yep.

So it was like, all right. So when I wrote down intentional and when I had focus and when I had healthy, I kept writing the same tasks underneath it.

Yeah.

And I had the realization that the root for me, of those tasks would just be I would have to plan and get intentional. So planning and intentionality were the same thing. So I just ended with the word intentional because that's how I wanted to feel.

Yeah, you wanted to feel intentional.

Yep.

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I love that. Okay, so that's good clarification on how to navigate step two and get it down to the four most important ones. Whether you're just, you know, hacking the other ones right away and saying, okay, here's my four, or if you actually have to, it's okay if you do it Lori's way and write the actions underneath all eight or nine feelings you have and they realize, okay, this is really redundant. Then step three, though, this one is where it might get a little murky for people because as you're writing those actions underneath each of these feelings you want to feel, I mean, they could have four, five, six things that they need to start doing times four to five feelings. That's 20, 30 things and no one's going to implement that.

Okay, this is great. Don't overreach. If you are not a person who has been known to create new habits, do New Year's resolutions, or do well at, you know, putting new things into your schedule, pick the easiest thing that you can feel success on immediately. So even if that is, you know, you pick a simple workout because you want to get healthier. Maybe you just start with a 20 minute walk three times a week. And. And you also notice that you have on your list, like, I want to start doing Orange Theory three or four times a week. No, do not start there. Like, you want to feel success as fast as possible in your first week and you want to try to hit it in your first week as well. So whatever those easiest things are, I love that.

And I think it's important to remember, if you look back, if you could somehow fast forward to the end of this year and if you looked at your year and said, wow, I didn't hit all four feelings, but boy, did I master these two, can you imagine doing the actions that achieved the mastery of two of these ways that you want to feel for the year. Can you imagine how that would affect everything else and just how great your year would actually be by just mastering, like, two of them?

You know, I want to add one other thing to how you pick that one that you should do right away as well is which one could you schedule literally right now without a lot of in depth work? And also which one can you get some accountability around too? So if I was choosing walking, I would pick that one because it was easy to do without a lot of barrier of entry. But it's also something that I could text a friend and ask them to join me a couple times a week so that I could get that accountability as well.

I love that. Okay, and then so step four was here, you've got your 20, 30 actions, right. And you got to narrow it down to the ones that would, let's say, kill two birds with one stone. Right. You got to narrow it down to the four to five actions that you know that you're going to maintain. You and I are going to do something kind of cool to make sure that we actually do these actions, and you want to kind of share what that is.

So I know that this is powerful and I know that you and I have gotten to a place where we're pretty good. We're probably going to do.

We follow through with these, but when.

We say quite a few, it's still not a lot. It's really like, we'll do two to four of these for sure. But these are so important. And I know that we could literally blow our minds this year if we read it every single morning. Because Chris and I have something called the power nine that we've done for over 10 years and we talk about all the time. You guys, it has literally changed our entire lives. And we have so much proof and evidence of that working right down to something that just recently happened that we'll talk about on a podcast. But we're like, this is all the Power 9. So with that, we, we know the power of going over something every single day and seeing it and bringing it to life, breathing it to life and discussing it.

Yep. So if you don't have somebody to do that with, that's like added accountability. But what Lori and I are going to do is we're literally printing out these four to five actions that are give us the feelings that we want to feel for the year. We're going to literally laminate them, and we're going to read them out loud to each other. Like, I have to read my actions and feelings. She has to read her actions and feelings while we're having our cup of coffee first thing in the morning together. Now that might sound nerdy as hell. Like, come on, two months in, you're really gonna be reading these things. Three months in, you really can be reading. Yeah, like Lori said, every single morning for years we've done our Power 9. Remember what that is? That's three things we're grateful for, three things we're excited about for the day, and three things we want to manifest that day. Well, that's become such a habit. And the redundancy of doing that out loud to each other has locked these things into a freaky level. Like, that's for another episode, but to a freaky level of how things manifest and come true. So, yeah, we really are going to read these lame ass little laminate cards every single freaking morning as we're starting to have our coffee to each other. Why? One, for accountability. Two, to remind ourselves that day of what actions we're going to take and what feelings we want to feel and.

To remember our roots from the 80s.

What's that?

The lamination.

Oh, my God. The laminated cards, laminated library card, laminated driver's license, laminated everything. I love it. So that's our exercise that we did that's probably going to move the needle the most for us this year. I love the results that it gave me because the four to five actions are like, so doable. But most importantly, I love the accountability, the way that we're going to make sure that these things happen.

It's also discipline is freedom. These are simple disciplines. When you actually look at them, that aren't huge things every single day for us that will completely change our lives. I mean, for example, a couple of them are just you and I want to feel like we're ahead on our social media planning. That's not hard when we actually break it down, you guys, it's about two to three hours a month to feel.

Like we're not always playing from behind.

Of less stress, because every single morning we can feel stressed out. Every single evening, you can feel stressed out if you don't have certain things out. So I really want you to look at it as the yes, it is an investment in time. It is starting things that work well, starting systems, starting new plans. It takes time. But I actually just got to spend some time with Jenna Kutcher, who is literally the queen of getting ahead and having systems and the way that she was talking about how much freedom she feels all the time. And the time freedom because she's so systemized. I was like, I am the only one standing in the way of being able to feel exactly how she feels. And I think it was that realization of, are you willing to just be disciplined and take a few hours when it's uncomfortable to follow through, to have freedom all month long in certain areas.

And that applies to all the actions that you come up with. Right. Maybe it's booking out your workout classes once a month. Maybe it's running and doing your meal planning once a week on Sundays. Maybe it is planning your content for your business or your social media or whatever. The point that Lori's making is you have to do the same amount of work whether you're agonizing over it daily once you make these to do lists or whether you do it in chunks and always feel ahead of the game. So your likelihood of following through with these things is going to be much higher if you're getting ahead of the game and doing it in chunks.

Yeah, I just. For me, it was about understanding that I am done. Want to know what I'm done with in 2024? Choosing to sit in resistance because I'm not being disciplined.

I love it. Well, we'd love to hear what your guys 4 feelings are and what actions you're going to do. And when we say that, we don't just like, kind of mean it like DM us. Tell us what your four feelings are. I freaking love when you guys reach out.

I want to see your laminated card.

I want to see. Yes. I dare some of you to do a laminated card and send it to us. We should do like some kind of little prize for that. We'll think of something. All right, guys. Also, we'd be remiss not to tell you that there's like four or five spots left at our very first dinner series networking day and dinner in Scottsdale on February 1st. Literally four to five seats left at the table. It's the best thing we've ever freaking designed. Like, this will be our new flagship program going forward for years, more so than anything else. So if you want to get in on one of those founders spots, they're priced still at Early Bird. Go over to Chrisharder Me Dinnerseries and grab one of those last four or five spots or go to loriharder.com dinner. Same thing. Chrisharder Me Dinner or loriharder.com Dinner.

We're so grateful for you guys and we will talk to you next week.