MasterSelf Year One Read online

  Especially for those of you like me who don’t have anyone in charge of them- if you don’t give yourself deadlines, you won’t have the pressure to get things done. If you want people to work with you, you need to be responsible and reliable enough to get these things done on time. Your teammates should be able to count on your help in a timely and orderly fashion. On top of that, if you’re trying to start a business, you have to be your own boss and self-regulate, because no one is going to remind you. Programs like Asana have neat features for deadlines, with automated reminders to keep you in check.

  The fifth and final step to getting organized is to raise the stakes.

  In my case, I have a team of people who are counting on me to be reliable and consistent. I’ll admit, this is something of a first for me, and it’s hard to get used to. However, I’m a big believer in leading by example, and if I can’t get articles done in a reasonable amount of time, how can I expect my team to? What kind of leader would I be if I couldn’t do myself what I asked of others? Hypocrisy is among the worst of all attributes, and it’s so important to hold yourself to a standard of consistency,both for those who are counting on you, and for yourself.

  Many of you may not have a team, however- so you will have to find other ways to hold yourself accountable. One option is to set up an anti-charity. The idea is to create some sort of penalty for your failure to do something. Some people use a social feedback system, like creating a challenge on social media to hold yourself accountable. While it’s true that shame is a powerful motivator, we’re often less likely to do something if we talk about it. The best, (albeit somewhat hard) solution is to build up your internal resolve by taking responsibility and holding yourself accountable for your life.

  At the end of the day, whether or not others are counting on you, if you are going to achieve mastery over your Self, you’re going to need to be organized to do it.

  Defeating the Three Demons of Failure

  Have you ever tried to make a change in your life? Maybe you had a New Year’s Resolution, or maybe you’ve just wanted to do something different. I certainly have, more times than I can count. However, when I’ve tried to make big changes, more often than not, I’m motivated for a week and suddenly I run out of willpower or I’m not interested any more. Maybe you can relate? It took me a long time to figure out why- it’s because of the Three Demons of Failure. If you’re going to change, you better know the secrets to defeating them.

  The first of the Three Demons that will fight you if you try making a change is Inertia. If you’re familiar with Newton’s First Law of Motion, you’ll know that an object in motion will tend to stay in motion unless acted on by an opposing force. More importantly for those of us trying to change, an object at rest tends to stay at rest. This is the law of Inertia. This is the Demon that stops you from getting off the couch- and if you can’t get off the couch, you can’t get started. He’s the gatekeeper that guards the passageway towards a better version of yourself- and if you can’t defeat him, you’ll never get started.

  If you haven’t guessed it already, his weakness is the Spell of Motivation- which stuns the demon and lets you run past him. The Spell of Motivation is great- it gets you moving, and it’s not too hard to learn- there are plenty of motivational speakers, speeches, books, songs, and so on. However, the Spell only works long enough to get you moving past the gate. Once you’ve crossed the threshold, you better be ready for the other two Demons, or you’ll get spit right back out to the start. This is where most people fail- he is the easiest Demon to defeat, but if you’re not prepared for the rest of the journey, you’ll just have to fight him again and again.

  The second Demon is far more sinister- he pulls at your heels and tries to slow you down. He’ll whisper things in your ear like, “I’ll do it tomorrow,” or “I’ll just cheat today.” His greatest trick isn’t in stopping you, it’s in convincing you to stop yourself- and once you’re stopped, you’re right back at the gates with Inertia. This Demon’s name is Friction- he’s the stress between what you were doing and what you are doing now. As we learned earlier, the Spell of Motivation is great for the sprint past the gate, but it wears off too fast to work on Friction.

  What you will need to defeat this Demon are the Shield of Willpower and the Sword of Commitment. The Shield of Willpower will protect you from his temptations- but how do we get this Shield? Willpower is an interesting thing- it works almost like a muscle. Anyone can go to the gym and work out really hard the first day (that’s Motivation,) but if your muscles aren’t trained for it, you’ll be too sore and tired the second day to go back. What’s worse is if you used to go to the gym and come back thinking you can do what you used to do and realize that you can’t, you’ll run out of motivation even faster.

  How do we train our willpower, then? Start small- find something you know for sure that you can do, and do that for 10 days straight. For example, you could make your bed or clean your room. That may seem silly, but that’s the reason so many people fail to find the Shield of Willpower- they confuse it with Motivation. I could be as excited and pumped as possible, but I couldn’t bench 300 right now if I wanted to- and if I tried and failed right off the bat, I’d run out of Motivation immediately. Willpower is the understanding that if you want to bench the 300, you’re going to have to start with the 50.

  The Shield of Willpower is no good without the Sword of Commitment, and vice-versa. Sometimes you have to block Friction, but other times the best defense is a good offense. This is where the Sword of Commitment comes in. Let’s say one day you don’t have enough willpower to do your full workout- if you don’t have Commitment, you won’t do anything and you’re one step closer to being back at the start. However, if you’re committed, you’ll just do a light workout instead. This is a way to preserve your momentum, even when you don’t have the energy to operate at 100%.

  With the Shield and Sword combined, you can beat back the Demon of Friction long enough to get up to speed- but there’s one problem. What’s the plan now?

  This is exactly when the final Demon, Habit, makes his move. Just when you thought you had a good streak going, Habit steps in and reminds you that you normally go out with your friends on the weekend- and just like that, you skip the gym. Once he hits you, he leaves you open for Friction to come in for a sneak attack. In almost no time, you’re back right where you started, dealing with Inertia. The worst part is that it’s even harder to start over once you’ve failed, and if you fail too many times, you’ll become hopeless.

  There is a secret for defeating the Demon of Habit, however- you need to create the most powerful of all the artifacts, the Scroll of Scheduling. As my father often told me as a child, “Failure to plan is just planning to fail,” and this is absolutely the truth. To create the Scroll, you need to make a plan and schedule your time out appropriately. What I do is schedule a 10 day challenge for myself, and before the end of the 10 days, I come up with the next one. It’s much easier to complete a series of four short 10-day challenges than it is to do something for 40 days in a row.

  The key is to work up to your new skill over time and maintain it for long enough to become a habit. Depending on who you ask, this is somewhere between three weeks and two months (which is why I like 40 days, and it just sounds cooler.)

  With the Spell of Motivation you’ve gotten past the Demon of Inertia. With the Sword of Commitment and the Shield of Willpower, you’ve beaten back the Demon of Friction. After all that, you used the Scroll of Scheduling to help you outsmart the Demon of Habit. You’ve done it! You’ve accomplished something and made a meaningful change in your life! There is one last danger, however- Complacency. Complacency is the worst of all- the Demon that we become once we think we’ve made it or accomplished what we set out to do.

  Never let yourself become Complacent. You have to continue to challenge yourself, start the journey over again and see what else you can accomplish. Now that you have the tools to do it intelligently, self-improv
ement will become easier and easier because you’ve built up momentum.

  Now, go forth and defeat your Demons and conquer Failure!

  The 10 Day Challenge

  (How To Build Your Willpower the Easy Way)

  I’ve spent lots of time in my life trying to make new habits- and I’ll tell you from experience, I’ve failed more often than not. Willpower runs out. It’s easy to start something, in fact, I’ve probably started more times than I can count. However, for a long time, starting was all I managed to do. Maybe you know the feeling?

  After years of trying and failing, I finally managed to get something done- a little more than a year and a half ago, I did a 40 day water fast. Crazy as that may sound, it was a big moment for me, because I realized that I could do whatever I put my mind to.

  Or not. After that fast, I tried a number of times to do another one and failed, over and over again. Why? I couldn’t figure it out.

  I wanted to do another fast, but wanting wasn’t enough. I had the right mindset, and I occasionally could muster up the willpower to do it, but that didn’t cut it. On top of all that, it was something I already did once, so what changed that made me unable to repeat it? I spent a lot of time trying to remember what I did before the fast that made it different from all my other attempts to start- and then I remembered. (Get ready for story-time.)

  That summer, I had just left college, and when I was in school, let’s just say I drank my fair share. After I got out, though, I thought to myself, “I don’t know the last time I was sober for any length of time.” With that, I decided I was going to take a break from drinking. At the same time, I was working at a kiosk in the mall, and I had a lot of time on my hands during the day. For whatever reason, I ended up looking into fasting and discovered a great website on the subject (look up Dr. Jason Fung). It explained the history, the benefits, and the research behind it.

  I was interested.

  I figured, though, that it wouldn’t be something I could just jump into. However, being incredibly broke, I knew I wasn’t going to have much money for anything beyond my bills, specifically food. Realizing this, I figured it would be as good a time as ever to do a fast.

  I’ve never been one to pack a lunch, and I couldn’t afford to eat in the mall each day, so I figured I would start out by doing an intermittent fast from the time I left the house at 10 AM until I returned at 9 PM. By this point, I figured if I was going to do a long fast, I’d like to do a 40 day one for poetic reasons. As a result, I figured I’d start with four 10-day challenges, and each 10 days I would ramp the difficulty up.

  After the first 10 days of IF, I chose to increase the difficulty to fasting every other day. By the end of the second 10 days, though, I was too eager to start the long fast, so I jumped right in, and that was all it took.

  When I realized that the 10 day interval challenges were the key, I knew I had figured it out. 10 days is short enough to see if you’re interested in really committing to something, and it’s also exactly long enough to get you excited about increasing the challenge. Thinking about starting a new workout? Just commit to doing it for only 10 days, and the pressure is off.

  Considering a diet? Try it out for 10 days- anyone can manage that length of time. If you get to the end of the 10 days and you don’t like it, just stop there.

  The secret as to why this works comes back to something I’ve touched on in the last article- willpower works like a muscle. Far too often, we try to jump right in to something without taking the time to build up to it, and because our will-muscle isn’t trained, we do fine at first and then we’re exhausted afterwards. I used to run quite a bit, but if I went out today and tried to do sprints, I’d be demolished tomorrow- and it’s the same thing with your willpower.

  One of the other benefits to this system is momentum. Once you get started, you’ll start picking up speed because you’re training your will the right way. As you continue to make progress and ramp up your challenges, you’ll gain momentum that will carry over into other areas of your life. Remember, willpower is the muscle that moves all other muscles.

  According to a study published in European Journal of Social Psychology, the average number of days it takes to start a new habit is 66, or just over two months. We can break that down into seven (for good measure) sets of ten days. Hopefully you’ve already determined what it is that you want to do- now let’s break it down into 10 day intervals.

  The first 10 day challenge should be something you ABSOLUTELY know you can do every day for 10 days. The reasoning behind this is because after the first 10 days, you’ll have built up some easy willpower, and you’ll have started telling you mind, “Hey, we have something to do and we’re going to do it every day.” This is the crucial part. Ultimately, you’re not building whatever habit you’re aiming to build- you’re actually building the habit of continuous self-improvement.

  If you didn’t make it through your first 10 days, that’s okay- it just means you picked something too hard. Some easier ideas might be making your bed (or keeping your room clean,) doing the dishes (my personal favorite morning routine for some strange reason,) or getting up 15 minutes earlier than you usually do. Remember, the key to the 10 day challenge is building your willpower. Don’t expect yourself to have much at the beginning- because you won’t. On top of that, don’t beat yourself up about it.

  If you fail to complete any of the 10 days, take the next 10 days off and start over, either from the beginning or from the last 10 days you managed to complete. Up to you. Once you get started, though, it actually gets easier- because you’re training your will the right way.

  If you made it through the first 10 days, good work! You’re well on your way. For the second 10 days, pick something that will be just a little bit challenging or inconvenient. If your ultimate goal is to start going to the gym, maybe try doing some bodyweight exercises like pushups and sit ups in the morning. Again, the emphasis here is on building- you can’t put on more than your foundation is ready to hold. Focus on the foundation- your willpower and repetition. If the most you can do is one pushup a day, then just do that, because it’s the repetition of the habit that matters. Eventually, you’ll be able to do two a day, and after that four, and eight, and so on.

  This is the most important part of the 10 day challenge, building. One of the mistakes we make is desiring instant results. This often causes us to self-sabotage and try something that’s too hard, then when we fail, we end up feeling worse than we started. It’s a vicious cycle- and if you only know how to do it that way, then you’ll never get out. However, if you really want to change something and haven’t been able to, instead of thinking “I can’t,” think “I haven’t figured out how to do it the right way yet.” This distinction is important: what you tell yourself matters.

  For the third 10 days and onward, you want to continue to focus on incremental improvements. At this point, you have (at least) 20 days of willpower and habit built up, and that’s almost a month. That’s a lot- and probably a lot more than you might have been able to do before. Take some pride in your achievement, but don’t let it go to your head. Continue to build, and choose something just a little bit harder for the next 10 days.

  One thing I like to do is to pick the next challenge 10 days in advance. Then, when you reach the end of the current one, you can see where you’re at versus where you thought you’d be. If you’re currently doing 5 pushups a day for your current challenge and you planned on doing 10 for the next one, but you think you can do 12, then try that. On the other hand, if you planned on 10, but you think you can only do 7, then don’t be afraid to reduce the number- you’re trying to build, not hit a target. Better to have 10 days that aren’t super hard than 10 days that are impossible. Trust your gut.

  I hope this idea helps you to start a 10 day challenge of your own- and hopefully you can get all the way to 7 in a row! Who knows, once you get there, you might not want to stop…

  Let us know what your 10 day challenge is, w
e’re rooting for you!

  Nietzsche’s Demon and the Face of Eternity

  “What, if some day or night a demon were to steal after you into your loneliest loneliness and say to you: ‘This life as you now live it and have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more’ … Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus? Or have you once experienced a tremendous moment when you would have answered him: ‘You are a god and never have I heard anything more divine.’”

  -Friedrich Nietzsche

  Let’s take Nietzsche seriously here for a moment- truly imagine that the life you are living will be lived again and again, endlessly and identically, for eternity. How would you react?

  If you’re miserable, well, bad news for you. The misery you now know will be known to you again and again. Not a great prognosis, I’d imagine. Wait a minute, though, you aren’t dead yet. That leaves the possibility that your life may improve, right? I thought so.

  Imagine, if you will, that out of the countless infinite possible universes, all of the forces of being and chance came together to birth a self-replicating string of nucleic acids that managed to form a single celled organism. Eventually, that organism was able to absorb other organisms and mutate to create organelles and other intracellular processes.

  These processes led it to survive what many others did not, and eventually developed the ability to reproduce sexually. The explosion of genetic diversity this caused greatly increased the speed in which this life grew and changed, becoming fish and plants and animals, spreading all across the Earth.