Matthew Hussey says when you're depressed or anxious, skip big goals and chase tiny victories instead. Eat a healthy snack, take a walk, read one page, or just breathe for 20 minutes. Even doing nothing better than before counts as a win.
Being at the top of your game, peak performance, maximizing your potential, being the best you could be, living your best life, nothing could feel more off your radar. When you're in a place of depression, deep anxiety, deep hurt, when you are feeling shit. I'm interested in that person today, not, how do I get you to live an extraordinary life? How do we transform you? How do we start celebrating the tiny victories? Because I believe that when you're in that state and when everything in your life, I know the feeling, everything, everything in your life feels tinged with pain or hurt or darkness. Nothing, literally, there is nothing you want to do. You know, when you're in that state, you eating breakfast feels like a big deal. Going and taking a shower, simply getting out of bed feels like a huge thing. Forget the rest of the day, because when you're in the place that I'm talking about right now, the rest of the day feels like a marathon. You can't even process getting through the rest of the day. So let's not focus on that. Let's focus on the next 20 minutes after you watch this video. So what could you do in the next 20 minutes? Feed your body something healthy. Do something physical, even if it's something small. Read a page of a book that you feel might nourish you. You don't even have to guarantee that it will. Don't obsess over what book it is. Just this book might help. I'm gonna read one page instead of, you know, looking at social media or whatever else might not help you. It could be watching a video, A video you've proactively chosen because you believe it might inspire you, or it might spark an idea, or it might have you think about something differently. Or maybe you feel like everything I'm talking about right now, even the smallest things, are too much. Then great. Do fucking nothing. Take the next few minutes to sit there and do nothing, but do nothing slightly better than you normally do. Decide for a couple of minutes I'm going to put that problem to one side while I get really mindful about my breath. And if I feel it coming back, I'm just going to note it and then get back to my breath. Just training your mind and your focus on your breath for a couple of minutes is a tiny victory. It's a form of training your focus. And by the way, this isn't just about doing things in the next 20 minutes that could create tiny victories. I also want you to think about what tiny victories have already happened today. I want you to find a five minutes from today where you felt neutral, because those things are reference points. Those things become these. These little, you know, hooks of potential on which you hang this sense that things can be better, this idea that it can be better if five minutes today was okay, was neutral. Let's make more of those minutes. Let's worry about creating another five minutes like that. And what we'll begin to do is create some. Just some small momentum. Doesn't mean you won't backslide, doesn't mean you won't feel pain again, doesn't mean you might not feel it again tonight. But let's create more of those minutes today. Give yourself a break from the big shit and all the things that you wish you could be doing if you could only feel better or whatever. Let's start with the most humble, modest, nothing. Things that made to everyone else seem like it's ridiculous to celebrate that. But we will, because we're celebrating the tiny victories. What's a tiny victory that you didn't celebrate today that you should? Something that, if you are embarrassed at how small it is, write it in the comments. I want to read it. And if you can't think of anything, take the next 20 minutes or even the next five, and do something to create that tiny victory and leave me a comment letting me know what that thing is. I'll see you guys next week. Sam.
