The Power Of Stacking Simple Decisions

If I'm thinking of skipping my workout or if I'm thinking of skipping something I have to do on my to do list and I know it's going to cause me anxiety later, I say, how do you want to feel tonight? Do you want to feel anxious when you're trying to enjoy your downtime and now you feel guilty? Or how do you want to feel tomorrow? Do you want to ruin tomorrow because you're not willing to just do this small task right now that could take 20, 30 minutes and you could just sit here in this short term pain to give yourself a lot of relief tomorrow. And we're back with another episode of He Said, she Said.

Speaking of back, we get the puppies back. Oh my God. How happy are you right now?

Puppies are back. I'm so happy. And I'm also already exhausted because I.

Thought the work was done for the five weeks they were open.

No, we knew this. We know that we have to reinforce it. That would literally be like saying, hey, I sent you away, Chris to go get super fit. And I didn't know that we would have to continue working out for you to stay looking so good for me.

Okay, that's, that's a good analogy, number one. Number two, I could actually see you doing that. Number three, I might actually sign up for that. But I listen for those of you that are like, what are they talking about? We have two dogs. One is seven month old Sheepadoodle, the other one's a three year old sheepadoodle and they're both big. And as soon as we got the second one, we're like, oh, we need them trained like they are running our show.

Must be trained.

They're running our show. So we sent them away to the best five day doggy boot camp ever. What's it called? It's called Triumph.

Triumph dog training.

Triumph dog training. That's a Triumph dog training here in Scottsdale. They're freaking amazing. They do it different than everybody else who just takes your dog for two weeks. I can't recommend them more. We have these ninja level assassin dogs back, but this means now we have to reinforce everything. So we had a four hour training today. Four hours where they taught us everything, made us demonstrate everything, make sure the dogs were listening to us. I mean, it was really thorough and really cool. And now appropriate to what we're going to talk about today, we have the mundane job of reinforcing every dang little command. And it's already could have been a.

Lot tonight because we want the end goal. We Want two dogs that are very well behaved that we can take anywhere. We can still take them places. Otherwise, let me tell you, if I did this right now, it would not be happening. And we want to be able to take them places. We want to be able to take them out to eat. We want to be able to recall them when they're in the, in the park or if they get away from us. So it's really for their safety, it's for their enjoyment. And that's what you have to think about whenever you're setting goals around anything is I have to keep on remembering what the result is that I want and it's actually better for them. Just like everything is going to be better for you that we're about to talk about, but it's better for them because now if we do this, they're going to be able to go everywhere with us.

And so it's a good analogy for your business, right? You've got an end goal. I know you have a life that you're picturing. I know you have a financial situation you're picturing. I know you've got things you want to do, but without, number one, the training. So that's when you go away and get a mentor or you go to an event, or you just listen to books and podcasts like this. So, number one, you got to go do the training like the dogs did. Number two, it's that monotonous, mundane reinforcement of what you learned and what you know you're supposed to do that's going to be most important.

So let's talk about it, Mastering the mundane. And we want to share some tips and things that we think about when we are stuck in the middle of the mundane, which is daily, that helps get us through and reminds us that this stuff is so important. So I think the most important thing to realize first with the mundane is that you have to have faith that it's going to work. And so whether you feel that way right now or not, whether you just started a fitness routine and you're like, I don't know if this is gonna. Whether you just started a business and you're not seeing any results, because I'm going to tell you, results take a lot of time. But it doesn't mean that results aren't happening. It just means you're not seeing them yet. And what I mean by that is, you know, I was a trainer for tons of years and I was my first client. So when I first started working out, I didn't see results for like, Six months. So I had to borrow the belief of these fitness magazines that were telling me, you, you need to stick with it because you're not gonna see anything at first, and you're gonna layer on these different results. So essentially, what was happening is. Let's just talk about fitness for a second. When you first start working out, you don't really see the muscle that you're building. If you're going to the gym three times a week, because maybe you haven't dialed in your nutrition yet, but you have dialed in your workouts. And in fact, what would happen a lot to me and my clients is that your weight goes up in the beginning. So this is where people stop, is they're not seeing the result. They're actually seeing negative results. Right. Like, let's talk about what. When you start a business, your family might be against you in the beginning. You might not be getting the results you want. You might be losing money because you're investing. So in the beginning, a lot of times, you actually see some negative results. This is where your faith really has to kick in. So back to the fitness idea. You are building muscle, but you're not seeing it yet. So you have to borrow belief, you have to borrow faith. That I promise you that if you're doing something different that is challenging you, that is becoming a habit, if you're doing something that you know, know is better than what you were doing, you are actually, in fact, getting better. So what you have to tell yourself is, even though I don't see results yet, I know that there are changes happening, and I trust this. So what happens in a fitness journey is that you're getting a lot of results within your body. You're getting stronger, you're building muscle, but you're not gonna see that until all of a sudden, the fitness part becomes. Or the lifting part becomes a habit, the gym part becomes a habit. And then once that's a habit, you have to stack another ha, which is now trying to eat a little bit better. And then with that comes the result after you've done that a few months. So I know that there's plenty of things in business, but what I want to say is, today I was at the gym, and, you know, the mundane, you can master it, but I'm telling you, you can always slip out of it too. So I have to reinforce and constantly use my reinforcing thoughts in order for me to continue on with the gym and continue on with eating right. And today I was at the gym, and I'm like, you Know, I feel pretty fit, I feel pretty good. But I want this end result. And I know that at the end of the day, if I'm not consistent, I'm going to lose this habit. And I was working out in the gym and I wanted to quit early. Chris was over there. I knew I could. Trust me. I know that at any given time, I can probably pull Chris out of the gym.

Hey, wait, that's not fair.

Is that true or no?

I'm she the fifth.

So I was like, oh, I could walk over and get him out of here. And I said, lori, every successful person in the world right now, who has what you want, who has the life you want, and who is happy, every person who earns their happiness has spent their hour in the gym today, or they have spent their hour on a walk today. And the second that you stop this, you actually stop the momentum of happiness. So I continued on.

You know, I always ask myself a question that will help me stick with the mundane. So, for example, being at the gym or making good food choices, instead of saying, oh, what do I feel like? Or what do I want to do? Those questions, you know they're going to sabotage you because you know the answer to those. So instead I ask myself, what would a fit person do? Or what would a ripped person do? Or what would a person who has the summer body that I want, what would they do? And when you ask that question, it helps you to be okay with continuing on with those small actions that feel boring, that feel mundane. I was just on a road trip with my mom for a week. You know, I took her from Arizona to her summer place up in Wisconsin. And I love snacking on the road. Who doesn't? But I didn't want to come back sabotaging my summer body goals. So every single time that she'd offer me a snack or every single time we stop at a gas station, I would just ask myself a better question. I'd say, what would a fit person do? Right? And then I'd leave the chips behind, or I'd leave whatever behind and I'd grab sparkling water or something like that. And that little question helped me master those small decisions. While seemingly insignificant when looked at as an individual decision, when you stack them, they make a huge difference. Difference. So you got to ask yourself or find what your question is going to be that you ask yourself when it comes to possibly slipping out of the mundane.

So I use a couple more questions, too. I have many, so I think Chris does, too. So if I'm thinking of Skipping my workout or if I'm thinking of skipping something I have to do on my to do list and I know it's going to cause me anxiety later. I say, how do you want to feel tonight? Do you want to feel anxious when you're trying to enjoy your downtime and now you feel guilty? Or how do you want to feel tomorrow? Do you want to ruin tomorrow because you're not willing to just do this small task right now that could take 20, 30 minutes and you could just sit here in this short term pain to give yourself a lot of relief tomorrow. I'm always trying to bring in future, like what would have been future pain. And I'm trying to use that as a motivator. So I'm like, oh, I don't want to feel that pain tonight. And I know that I will. I know it's going to feel this way if I don't do it and I just don't want to. And I let myself experience that pain in the and I go, nope, I don't want to feel that tonight. So I'm going to do it right now. In fact, even with this podcast, I said to Chris, he's like, oh, I'm so tired. We're exhausted tonight and we've had a busy day. And I was like, I need to do this quickie because I cannot feel the anxiety about it again tomorrow. Let's do it. So I fast forwarded to tomorrow, let myself feel how I'm going to feel if I don't do it again and then I'm going to go to that.

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So here's the good news. What we're talking about here. Mastering the small decisions. Mastering the small actions. Mastering the mundane. The good news is anybody can do this. So this means you can be successful. This means you can have the business you want. This means you can have the body you want or the life you want or the relationship you want. Because it's no radical big move that only a few have the talent to make. No, it is a ton of tiny decisions. It is a ton of insignificant moves. It is a ton of slightly better questions that anybody can do and anybody can master. So that means you. Yes, you listening. It means you can have that life that you want. It means you're not missing any special talent. You're not missing any kind of giant muscle or giant willpower. It's these small things, and it means that you can win, too.

So I'm almost done with Atomic habits. I feel like it's taken me a while, guys, but it's so freaking good. And in here, it says, professionals, stick to the schedule. Amateurs, let life get in the way. And I know some of you are saying, I'm too busy, or I have kids, they don't understand, or I'm working all of these jobs. But the thing is, is that we've all had our own set of circumstances where we feel that way, and we could let it get in the way. But what a professional starts to understand. And you can start acting as a professional right now, even though you don't feel like it. That's how you become one. What a professional understands is that life can wait. Unless it is a dire emergency or someone's in the hospital or something is happening that you have to be there, then everything else can wait. And you teach people how to treat you, and you also train people what you will be doing. So if you're answering the phone, if it's your mom and she's calling before the gym, and you're like, I need to get this. Do you? Or did you communicate? Hey, if it is an absolute emergency, text me the word emergency, and I will call you. But if it's not, it's going to wait until after the gym because you have to take care of yourself. So have your plans for when these things come up. Communicate with people. Teach them how you're gonna respond. Teach them when you're available. And this was the hardest lesson for me to learn. When we were in network marketing, I would let people, anyone in our downline, throw me off because I was like, they need me.

Oh, my God.

They said they need me for this call right now. And it would be, like, during a gym time, or it'd be during a family time. And Chris would be like, you're teaching them that you're accessible all of the time, and it's throwing you into massive anxiety. And the difference between who we would see were the very successful people in that company who still loved their life and the people who were not successful was they learned how to do this. They would learn how to set hours. They would learn how to take care of themselves first. They would learn to master the mundane of everyday life and know that everything else could wait. And I want to end with this because this was a habit that was such a game changer for us. It's the Power nine. You guys know it. If you listen to this podcast, it is three gratitudes, three excited abouts and three manifests and it's life changing.

We do it every day. Talk about mastering the mud.

We do not miss it. It has been one of the biggest mood changers for me ever. And I'm telling you, you can start with this habit and other things can layer on because this is gonna be the habit that changes your mindset. And for the day, and maybe one of the gratitudes every single day is I am so grateful that I am learning to master the mundane because the mundane works. It just does. So if you guys want the Power 9, I'm going to send it straight to your inbox so you know exactly how to do it. It's less than a two minute read. You can learn it that fast. Send it to someone you love. Because I'm telling you, everyone who's done it so far has said it is life changing for them. I'm getting messages every single day. Message me the word manifest in the DMs on IG. So just go to my Instagram page orieharder and just message me the word manifest and I'm going to send it to you and it's going to change your life and I'm so grateful for you. You're in my gratitudes tonight and today and until next time, we will see you next week.

Thanks for listening. Love and appreciate you.

Sam.