Ed Mylett (3:08)

Say yes.

Ted Mylett (3:09)

Because the day he slapped you on that ass, a race started. Listen to me. A race began. And it's a race that started that first day when you were born to the last day of your life. And that race is to finally reach the ultimate version of you. You're chasing down the person you were born to be, that you were destined to be. And since that day started, the world, the people around you are trying to get you to conform to average. They're trying to get you off that track, to finally meet your twin someday. The best possible version of you. Every single day has to be a pursuit to get better, to improve, to grow, to stretch. Because you are ultimately chasing the destiny version of you. Do you hear me on that?

Ed Mylett (3:54)

Say yes.

Ted Mylett (3:55)

So every decision you make in business, every call you have, whether you go to the gym or not, you need to put it through this paradigm, through this barometer. Does this decision make, does this relationship I'm in, does this choice I'm making right now put me closer to becoming that man or woman or further away? Listen, you gotta get a little bit more intense about your life, about your business. You gotta stop being so dad gum casual. You gotta get in the game if you're gonna play the game. Let's play to win it. Let's play to max it out. Let's play to 10x it. Right or wrong? Right. I want you shaking, I want you feeling it. I want your intensity level to Go up. Not in this room, but when you leave this room, you're focused on more energy, more intensity, more focus. Because these people you see speaking here, they're not smarter than you. We're not better than you. I don't like when we get over here, I'm rich. You know what? Who cares if I'm rich? I care whether you're rich. I want you to live richly. And I can tell you I. I don't like it sometimes when we come to events like this because you always see the after. If this was a weight loss ad, we're all ripped up here. The power of the weight loss ad is you see the fat lady, then she's the skinny lady, right? You don't see the before. You're only seeing afters here. The before with me is an introverted, shy guy, insecure guy, low self esteem, afraid of public speaking. That's the before me. A broke me. And I'm not getting into the details of that, but I want that to give you hope. Because it's decisions we make to chase that best version of us every second, every day, that every day alters the direction of the course of our lives. We've all made decisions that we regret. That decision took me off course. That decision put me further away of being the best life I could have. The best version of me. When you were a little girl or a little boy, there was somebody who knew you were special. It was your grandma, your uncle, a coach, a teacher. There's been one person in your life, hasn't there? They're the one who knew you were special. There's always one. If you're blessed in life, you may have two or three of those people. Just picture their face for a second. Who was that person that when you were a little girl or a little boy, they just looked at you a little different. They just knew you were special. They knew you were great. They knew you could do something great with your life. See, I think the key to being great in business is being that person.

Ed Mylett (6:13)

In other people's lives.

Ted Mylett (6:14)

I don't believe in faking it till you make it. And you can listen to all my podcasts and know how broke I went. But I'm gonna prove to you how crazy entrepreneurs are. Because you know what entrepreneurism is, right? It's the greatest self discovery process in the history of mankind, isn't it? You learn more about yourself, what you don't know, your resiliency, how tough you are, what your weaknesses are. By being an entrepreneur. It's probably the Greatest self discovery program in the history of the world. It's also this. It's the greatest self improvement program with the highest compensation package possibly attached to it, too. That's what entrepreneur is. A self improvement program with massive compensation package attached to it. And that's why too many of you are too focused on growing your company and not focus enough on growing you. Because your company will never, ever exceed your identity or your vision for it. You got to grow you. Because what will happen when it starts to grow? You'll start making unconscious mistakes to shrink it. Making bad calls, getting weak, getting lazy, making mistakes. You're all nodding because you've all done it. Because at some point, your business got ahead of you. Far too many of you in your life are obsessed with what cab driver number two and bouncer number one, Think about what you're doing instead of the lead characters. You're obsessed with what other people think about you. The thing that's gonna kill your dream is your addiction to other people's approval. And cab driver number two, he ain't gonna approve of what you're doing at the end of your damn life. He's not gonna show up in any of the important chapters yet. You give him all this power all the time. Stop giving people power who aren't in your book. Do your life for the leading characters. You, your spouse, your children, your parents, your legacy. They're the lead characters in the story of you, of your life. And the more you focus on them, and I know that many of them are the very ones giving you a hard time. They're the very ones telling you you can't make it. You should quit. You should give in. Let me tell you, somebody who experienced that, who's now written a pretty damn good book, they are thrilled with the book, and they knew you were gonna write it all the time someday. But you get focused on the lead character. Here's the good news. A leading character can decide to live a new script at any point she wants. She walked in here, one character, and she says, you know what? I am the lead character. This is some stupid script my parents gave me or a script my boss gave me or a script someone else gave me or my husband gave me. You know what? Screw that. I. I'm the new leading character. This woman's more beautiful, more confident, more influential, more resilient, more evangelical. This woman's just a little stronger. And you leave here in the break, you just feel different. You decide, I'm a new character. I'm a new leading character in the book of my life. Because the more you decide to take control of the narrative of the script of your life and you live your dream, the more likely, at the end of your life, you're gonna meet that dude. You're gonna meet that woman. See, at the end of my life. Cause I am a person of faith. The Lord's gonna go, hey, hopefully he goes, well done, good and faithful servant. This other little hallucination, he's gonna go, hey, by the way, this guy over here, this was the man you could have been. This is the person you were born to be. All those choices you made, if you made them all, you got the right place. This is who you could have become. This would have been your dreams. This is where you would have gone, what you would have seen, who you would have helped, what you would have changed. This would have been your book. Meet him. My dream in my life is that when I meet that person, we're not total strangers. You don't want to get to the end of your life, and that character is a total stranger to you. I don't care if you have faith or not. You know damn well there's gonna be a funeral for you someday. And at that funeral, there's gonna be a sense and a spirit of what you could have become. The woman, the man you could have become. And every day, those decisions you're making to max out your life are chasing that person. See, you know what I want at the end of my life when I meet him? Watch how I pull this together.

Ed Mylett (9:50)

I want to be identical twins.

Ted Mylett (9:55)

I want to be identical twins. I want you to be identical twins. Ted and Ed are going to meet each other someday, and I'm going to say, hey, man, good to see you. Been riding with you for quite a while. Been chasing you, man. He's going to go, I've been watching you. You're exactly like me, man. We're identical twins. You maxed out your damn life. Congratulations. Max out, everybody. God bless you.

Ed Mylett (10:16)

Very short intermission here, folks. I'm glad you're enjoying the show so far. Don't forget to follow the show on Apple and Spotify. Links are in the show notes. You'll never miss an episode that way. I'm excited to be with you today because you get to spend the time with me. No guests this week. You know, more and more people have been requesting that I go back to doing a little bit more of my original content where I'm sharing messages from me with you. And so, you know, every once in a while, we're not going to have a guest on, and I'm going to share some thoughts and strategies and ideas with you that I know can serve you. And so what I'm going to talk about today is separation season. Some of you heard me talk about this before, but I'm going to do it in a way that you've never heard about it. And right now is a time of year where you can really separate yourself. You can separate yourself from other people, your competition, but you can also separate yourself from where you are, from the standards you've set. You can separate yourself from your current position to a new position in your relationships, your money, your body, your business, depending on the area that matters most to you. And so we're going to talk about that. You know, it's difficult when you're competing if you're an entrepreneur or you're an athlete. If somebody's ahead of you, it's difficult to catch them when they're at full speed. It just is. It's difficult. They're in front of you, they're running full speed, and you're chasing them down. It's difficult to catch at those times. But where you do catch people is during what I call separation seasons. And these are the seasons where some people begin to flinch. They get weak, they take time off, they relax, they get casual about their routine. Maybe they're not as sure about their standards as they once were. And when they do that, they flinch. Bam. You blow their doors off. Because you keep pushing and separate yourself during that time. You can separate from all kinds of different things. And again, I want to remind you, this isn't just about competing against other people. It's separating yourself from where you currently are, which is what all of you want to do. It's called growing. Growing is separating yourself from your current condition to the next level, Whether that's mentally, emotionally, financially, as I've said, but from an entrepreneur standpoint, from a business standpoint, from a family standpoint. Nutrition diet we're entering the ultimate separation season, which is this window of time in the holidays. It kind of started around Thanksgiving, but it really begins to accelerate about the second, third week of December when everybody starts taking time off, they start cooling it. They don't show up to work like they did. If they're an entrepreneur, they're not really hustling. They start making all these excuses in their mind, well, clients don't want to meet with me during the holidays, so I'm going to take a bunch of time off. Or everybody eats bad. This Time of year. So that's what I'm going to eat bad or everyone spends money during the holidays that they don't have. I'm going to do the same thing. And that's when they get weak, they flinch. And if you can get even more disciplined, more focused, you can begin to lap people that are in front of you. You know, here I am nearly 50 years old and I could tell you I've worked hard all my career, all my life in different areas. But I really get excited during separation season because I'm like, this is when they're at half speed, I'm at full speed, I can lap them. If I'm in front of people, I can lap them two or three or four times. And it's also where I've separated myself from the former me. You know, we're coming down to the end of the year. There's just so many days left when you're hearing this at the end of the year. And it's a chance right now to lean in at the finish line in so many areas. But what do most people do if it was full speed sprint all year, this is when they start to jog and slow down and, you know, I should eat that extra piece of cake. I should do this. And they get off their game. And so today's going to be about separating those of you that are listening to this to take advantage of this, to get excited, to go. This is when I get them, this is when I get after it, right? Because in life, I've said many times in life, we really will never exceed what we believe we're worth. We just never will. And so if you can begin to do things you think other people aren't willing to do, or maybe do things the former you weren't willing to do, you begin to believe that the new you deserves things other people won't get. And the new you deserves to get things the former you didn't get either. And so this is why this season is so critical. And I've stacked up maybe 30 straight separations. There's other ones. There's summertime, right? There's times like that. And we're going to talk about some of that right now. And so. But right now is the big one. You all know what I'm talking about, right? Everyone gets kind of casual. Everyone slows down. And one day turns into three days, turns into four days. You know, Christmas is a holiday. It's not a hola months. New Year's Eve is a holiday. Not a hollow month or A hollow week. But people keep taking these hollow weeks and hollow months this time of year. And it's when you get them, it's when you get the former you, it's when this new version of you emerges. And so take advantage of this season. It's the greatest of all seasons. And I can tell you it's one of the reasons why, if I do have some good things going on in my life is I separated during this time. I separated from the old me and I separated from my competition. So let's talk a little bit about what some of those things are. Number one right now, you know, in business, people are gonna start slowing down. Here's the truth. Planning doesn't take that long. You can do planning in a pretty quick window of time, right? You need to get after it. You need to execute. There's 12 months in a year. There's 365 days in most years, right? But don't, don't go start planning 21 days before the year on a plan you could have done on New Year's Day anyway. You know what I'm talking about? Let's not make any excuses to do that for you achievers. You want to separate this time of year, but there's a subtle thing that most people don't realize about themselves. If you're not a real competitive achiever type, maybe you're more of a belonger. I want you to hear me very closely because there's a lot of people that fit both descriptions. You like being on the team. You like being a part of a squad. You like being part of a family environment. You're kind of that person who loves to be a part of something but maybe not lead something. You have a really hard time doing the work this time of year because unconsciously, subconsciously. Listen to me. You don't want to separate. You don't want to pull away from the pack. You love these people that you're around. Abercrombie knows how denim should fit and feel. And this year is about curating a denim collection that carries your closet head straight to Abercrombie's baggy and ultra baggy fits. These are the pairs that turn any tier shirt into a full outfit. All of their jeans come in classic fit with select jeans available in athletic fit designed for guys who want more room in the thigh shop. Abercrombie Denim in the app, online and in stores. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Checking off the boxes on your to do list is a great feeling. And when it comes to Checking off coverage. A State Farm agent can help you choose an option that's right for you. Whether you prefer talking in person on the phone or using the award winning app, it's nice knowing you have help finding coverage that best fits your needs. Like a good neighbor style. State Farm is there. And so unconsciously and subconsciously you start slowing down as to not pull away. Even though you know these things could pull you away from the pack because you don't want to leave people. You like the people that you're around. You're kind of that person. So if you're that person, you go to evaluate that. Is there some element of you, subconsciously or unconsciously, who purposely doesn't do the things you know you should be doing to separate? Because you don't want to separate from where you currently are and you don't separate from the group of people that you're around. And this is something that most people don't process. And so let's talk about some basic places you could separate. Number one, let's talk about your fitness. This is the time of year where people start missing gym days, don't they?

Ted Mylett (17:33)

Don't they?

Ed Mylett (17:34)

But you right now are going to make a conscious decision. I don't miss my routine. In fact, I double up on my routine. I'm not going to miss workouts, I'm not going to miss my gym sessions. I'm not going to make any excuses about parties or, you know, stay home orders. Now if you've got Covid or something like that, obviously you're going to be working out at your home or push ups or some nature like that. But you're not going to use Covid as an excuse not to train or work out. If you can go to a gym, if you live where you can still go to a gym, you're not going to use holidays or parties as a reason not to do that. You're going to let other people miss those workouts. Other people. The former you would have missed this workout. The former of you would have made a Covid excuse. The separating you doesn't do that anymore. And that's going to produce a better version of you. So that's one place you could separate nutrition this time of year. You're going to have all kinds of temptation around you, aren't you? About eating food you probably normally wouldn't eat. But what do we do? We go, well, it's Christmas. But what if you could not, I'm not saying don't eat the dessert, but could you separate? What if you decided, I'm just going to do it a little bit different than everybody else. Because I want to convince me I'm doing things other people aren't willing to do. I'm going to convince me I'm different from the former me and from the people potentially that I want to pass up. There's two types of people listening to this. One of these. Like, I'd really like to change me and get better than the former me. And then there's the other ones. You're like, I want to do that and I want to smoke. Some people in life and business, too, I'm competitive. Both are okay. But when it comes to eating, let's just say when those desserts present themselves, you know what I'm talking about, right? What if you just ate half the dessert? Maybe you're not so crazy you don't eat any desserts. You want to enjoy your life. The holidays are eat half the piece of pie. It's the same flavor after the first three bites. That's what I found out. It's the same cake on the fifth bite. It was on the third bite, so I'll eat three. It's the same taste, right? If it's going to be an unhealthy meal, it's going to be, you know, turkey and stuffing and all that stuff around me. If you do that, or in some cold enchiladas or whatever it is, you're doing tamales around Christmas time. You know, the different foods that we eat in our cultures, Italian folks with our lasagnas around the holidays, whatever your traditions are. Could you. It's not that you don't want to eat it because you want to enjoy your life. What if you just ate half of it, right? What if you were in proportion control? That's a way to separate yourself. So it's little things like that. It's when you're at the gym, it's the separation season of doing that one more rep that I talk about, the one more exercise. In fact, I have to share with you. I was at the gym today and my gym has moved outdoors here in California. At least fortunate that the one I go to in Orange county, at least they move their equipment outdoors. Many gyms have just shut down. And at the end of my workout, I was doing abs. I'd done. Today was a shoulder leg day or shoulder ab day for me, and I'd done my shoulder workout and exactly what I had prescribed. I did one more rep and one more and all of my different sets because I believe in that mantra of one more, doing one more separates me. Remember that? One more, right? And so, but when I was doing my abs, I had picked three exercises I was going to do and I'm like, wait a minute, it's separation season. Everybody's just doing their normal ab workout. I'm going to do one more exercise on my abs for a fourth ab exercise, set separation. Does that improve my abs? Maybe, but it improves the way I look at myself. And when I left that gym today, I did, I did stuff the old me wouldn't do and I did stuff most people working out there aren't willing to do. I deserve, at 49 years old to have the body of my dreams. So I'm convincing myself through what I'm separating that I deserve those things. I'm not in competition with other 49 year olds, but I'm in competition with the 48 year old me. I want to be more fit, I want to feel stronger, I want to feel more powerful, more flexible, right? More energized than I did. And so these little separator steps, you stack them up, especially in the season when everyone else isn't doing it and it magnifies. So it's important not only to do separation season because I'm challenging you to do that, it's important to give yourself credit and be intentional about it when you do it to go, I did it, I did it. And you're stacking that in the bank of changing you. They're deposits you're making. But if you're not aware of deposit, imagine you went to a bank, you made a thousand dollar deposit in the bank, but you didn't get the deposit slip to prove that it was in there. You didn't do anything to validate the deposit. Right? That could be concerning. Well, a lot of people do these separation things, but they don't get the deposit slip. They don't go, I did it. The deposit slip of life is acknowledging and giving yourself credit for doing the things that serve you that the old you wouldn't do or other people wouldn't do. So it's not enough just to do it. You have to be intentional about giving yourself the deposit slip, the credit that's required. That's what begins to change our identity. That's what begins to change our subconscious and unconscious mind and eventually even our conscious thoughts. How about having some separation moments this year with your family? How do you separate your family? How about some separation moments? What could you do this holiday season? That's a moment that you've never had before. Think about, how can I separate my family from every other holiday we've had? How can we separate from the average, ordinary families? What could we do this year? You know, many of you have been dming, say this is the first year ever I'm going to go down and I'm going to feed the homeless this year and I want to take my children there. What an amazing way to separate this holiday from all the other ones. If you've never done that before, maybe your separation is you're going to go back to church. You haven't been to church in a long time. Maybe you can't physically go, so you're going to do it online. Maybe it's this holiday season you're going to decide, hey guys, this is corny, but we're going to take a walk or this may sound silly, but I know how we don't always eat together every night, but for the next week, we're going to have dinner together every night at the dinner table. These things may seem very simple, but I ask yourself right now, what could I do to have some sort of separation season during this holiday season for my family that makes it better and different in a very difficult time that may cost no money that I could do if I were innovative and creative, that would make this the separation of all holiday seasons for my family. I want you to begin to think about how you could separate that separation moments. I think if you begin to process this stuff of I'm going to separate in every area I can, I think you're going to find something very special happening. Friday afternoons, the productivity level on all the studies for entrepreneurs and employees and even in school with students and teachers. Friday afternoons beginning at 1 o' clock till 5 o' clock is the most unproductive window of the week. Why? Because everybody's taking their plan to go cool it for the weekend. What if you decided, I'm going to start pressing the pedal down Fridays between 1 and 5. That's a separation window of time. Where before, maybe you weren't after it, now you are. You've changed your identity. If you just do the same things, right? Or you just think different thoughts but behave exactly the same way, the chances of you separating yourself from where you currently are at the time you're listening to this podcast or this YouTube video and watching it, and a year from now, when we come back, if it's just thoughts, see, you have to have a congruency between the way you move your body, your actions and your thoughts that validates them that congruency changes you. But if you just think something and act the same way and don't separate from the former, you separate from the former thought, then eventually the body overtakes the mind. Your body is your unconscious mind. It's your subconscious mind. The thought is conscious. The body's your subconscious mind. So if you can begin to move your body in congruency with your thoughts, maybe a new company, maybe a new family, maybe a new relationship, maybe a new body, maybe new finances. But the actions have to be in congruency with the thoughts, the body moving as you think, that's how we separate. And so I want you to begin to think about, well, Friday afternoons, I could separate. Another thing that happens. Most entrepreneurs slow down on weekends. Saturdays are huge separation seasons for entrepreneurs. Most entrepreneurs cool it on Saturday. I'm not suggesting you have to work Saturdays. But if I were trying to find. Because life's a game of inches in the big time. It's not yards that separate the great ones. It's not yards that take people who are functioning at a high level and they go a little bit higher. It's inches. It's a game of inches. In fact, these inches are so small, it's almost too scary to talk about because it's that small of a thing when you start stacking up one more, but you separate. So what's another place, Ed, where I might separate? Saturdays, Saturdays, Friday afternoons, right? These are places where you can separate. They slow down, they flinch, you blow their doors off. You know what I'm talking about. And as you're doing it, I'm doing stuff no one's willing to do. I'm going to get things no one's going to get. Or maybe the thought is, I'm doing stuff I've never done before, so I'm going to be a whole new me and get a life I've never had before. This is how you change how you view you. By the way, there's a whole bunch of other ones, too. There's the summertime, there's evenings. A lot of people just assume once I'm home, well, what if you could carve out a half hour in the evening and disappear and do some emails that the average person doesn't do or disappear in the evening. You've had your family time, but you kind of carve it out. Or you do a second workout, like in 75 hard in the evening, because no one does second workouts. But now you do. So there's these things where you can separate. It's abstaining from a particular behavior for a window of time that separates you. It's like, you know what? I'm not going to eat this way or I'm not going to drink this thing or smoke this thing I smoke. I'm going to put that down and separate from the former me. I'm changing my behaviors. If you're an athlete and you're that person who always stays the Latest right, stay 15 minutes more, stay another 15 minutes, separate from the former you, all of these inches add up. Here's another way you can separate yourself. This me seems small. You're at a social function. You sort of see the person who's left alone that nobody knows. It's very uncomfortable for me to walk up to a stranger. But what I've built the habit of is separating from the former me. Is approaching somebody in a social circle. I can tell is the one who doesn't know everybody there and going over and welcoming them and introducing myself and getting to know them and asking them what their story is. Maybe the way you separate yourself is here's a huge one that you could do starting now. You ready? Stand up for somebody when they're not there and another person is gossiping about them. You want to separate and feel great about yourself. You know exactly what I'm talking about. We all get into these conversations where there's a little gossip about another person. What if you started to separate from the former? You separate from the average Nordic person and stand up for that person when they're not present to defend themselves and say, hey, I don't know if any of that's true, but that's not something I want to be hearing about. Or you know what? I know so and so. And I don't believe that's true. I don't think they would do or say that. And I don't like that we're talking about this. It makes it uncomfortable. We're both better than this. And so what if you started to do these little things, could start to tell you, you know what? I'm different. I'm behaving differently. I'm a little bit better than I used to be. I'm separating from the former me. I'm separating from what average and ordinary people do. Average and ordinary people do all the things reverse of what I just said. They cool it on Friday afternoons. They eat the full piece of cake. They slow down on their workouts. They don't get creative around the holidays. They gossip about other people, don't they? They don't Create new thoughts. They don't do the extra rep at the gym. They don't stay disciplined to their diets. Right. They don't put in a little extra effort in the evening. They don't do anything on Saturdays. So all of these things are opportunities. I think what you're going to find. If you really begin to think about separating from the former you and becoming to better you, almost nobody goes up to that person who's alone at the party. You know what you're going to find out? This thing we call winning or bliss or self worth, self confidence, identity isn't as difficult as we think it is. It's little inches. And when we're aware and we're intentional and we get creative and innovative about places, we can separate ourselves. I mean, it may sound really silly and stupid because I'm an introverted person, but one of the ways I separate myself, this may sound really silly, guys. I smile and say hello to strangers often because almost nobody does it. I would have never done it before. And just to give them the gift, you're going to think I'm crazy. I walk by people sometimes. If I can't make eye contact, I literally say a prayer. Peace be with them. You think, why would you do that? Well, one, I want to pray for them. And two, it's a way for me to feel better about me. I'm doing something. Thousands of people walk by that person. Didn't see them, didn't say hello, didn't smile. And even if I didn't do that, almost nobody'd say a quick prayer for a stranger. Right? Separation season. Next level. Make a few extra phone calls and text messages this year that almost no one's going to make. Instead of texting that friend that you talk to all the time. You know, that's the normal behavior. Separate. Call them, Let them hear your voice. Maybe that person you have not texted or talked to in a long time, Send them that text. Send it to multiple people. Let them know you care about them. You know how you all get that text everyone sends, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, that everybody gets? Separate yourself and make them voice notes this year where you personally say it to somebody takes a little bit more time, might be an extra couple hours. Do it. You want another way to separate yourself? Do it before New Year's Eve and do it before Christmas Eve. I'm gonna give you a tip. Everyone gets all their messages on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. How about you leave your voice notes or your text message two or three days early? Hey, I wanted to be the first or. I wanted to get in there early before everybody's hearing about you. I wanted you to know I was thinking about you. When New Year's happens, how about doing it December 29th? Just say, hey, New Year's is coming. We're all going to get flooded with messages. I've already made my plans. I know you have. And reach out early. That's a separator. It makes you different, it makes you unique, and it makes you begin to separate from the former you and you separate from your competition. If you want to move apart from where you are currently, it's what you're going to do now, right now and into next year that's going to make the difference. Not what you say and not just what you think. Now, I've done millions of hours with you guys on what you think can impact how you act. I understand all that. But at the end of the day, there's too many people just thinking they can think their way into changing their life. You can't think your way into doing it. You must physically do it. You must physically separate. And I'm going to give you the mother of all great news about separation season. You ready? Millions of people are hearing this show right now or watching it. And less than 1% will do any of the things I've said. Springsteen Deliver Me from Nowhere is now streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney.

James Clear (32:07)

Trying to find something real in all.

Ed Mylett (32:08)

The noise you always do. The artist, you know the story. You don't see Golden Globes nominee Jeremy Allen White as Bruce Springsteen. Critics are saying it's a career defining performance. Let's burn this place down. Johnny Springsteen. Deliver Me from Nowhere now streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney. Rated PG 13.

James Clear (32:30)

This is pro linebacker TJ Watt and I'm back with YPB by Abercrombie for another activewear drop.

Ed Mylett (32:36)

My second co design collection has new shorts and tanks that keep up with.

James Clear (32:40)

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Ed Mylett (32:43)

Game changer off the field too.

James Clear (32:45)

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Ed Mylett (32:51)

Online and in stores because your personal best is greater than anything. Is that incredible? Less than 1%. So by virtue of doing anything I've said today, any of the things, not all of them, and some of you will do all of them, but any of them. Any one of them, you have separated yourself from about 99% of the people. But more importantly, if you do just one of them, You've separated yourself from the former you into a growing, better you. So I love separation season. When they get weak, when they flinch, when they relax, when they kick back, when they take a hollow month or a hollow week, we take our holiday. And even on our holiday, we find our little goofy, crazy ways to separate ourselves. And you know what you could do really big time this holiday season? Separate yourself by having more fun. See, none of the things I said can steal from fun. Don't have to take from your fun. What if you decided this is gonna be the most blissful, most fun holiday of all time? And you know what? It doesn't matter what the conditions are. I've had some health issues too. I've had some family issues too. I've had my best friend and father pass away too. So I understand all that, okay? I relate to a lot of the pain many of you are going through. I connect with that. I'm being vulnerable with you. And guess what? This is going to be the most blissful separating season of my dadgum life. Because I'm going to honor these difficult times by coming out of this a better man, an improved man. And I don't do that by hoping it or thinking it, even though those things help.

Ted Mylett (34:30)

I want to hope, I want to.

Ed Mylett (34:31)

Think, but I got to do. And there's simple little things. These inches are the separators. The sad thing in life is people think they have to make these massive dramatic changes in order to create the catalyst for long term change. Most massive change are simple fine tuning type carburetor adjustments that we make that end up overhauling the engine of our life. Long term, if we're willing to get creative and innovative. So I want all of your thoughts, your vision, your paradigm, the Matrix, you start to see the world through, starting right this moment. How can I separate? How can I separate separation from competition, separation from the former me? How can I separate my body, separate my mind, separate my family, separate my moments, separate my nutrition, separate my business, separate my money? Everyone's spending extra money. I ain't doing that this year. I'm separating everyone overeats. I ain't doing that this year. Everybody cools their workouts. I ain't doing that this year. Right. All of these things begin to be catalysts for change and you stack up all these inches. And this time next year, there's a different woman standing there, there's a different man standing there. It won't be perfect. There'll be things you need to do then to separate from that person. But I want you to remember this. Lastly, we're not separating from where we are because there's something wrong with us. That's not the reason. You're exactly the way you're supposed to be because that's exactly who you are right now. All you can do is start from where you are one day at a time, one more at a time, and, and separate. And guess what? In a year, you'll be exactly the woman or man you're supposed to be at that time. And we'll be talking about separating from there as well. That's the journey of life. We're either growing or we're dying.

Rich Devinney (36:13)

Right?

Ed Mylett (36:13)

And I want you to grow, and we grow by separating. So today was brief to the point. Tactics, strategies.

Ted Mylett (36:20)

Share this with people.

Ed Mylett (36:21)

Get the message out to your teams, if you're in business, that it's time to separate as a team, as a company. Get it to your children, your family, the athletes. You know, it's time to separate. Very short intermission here, folks. I'm glad you're enjoying the show so far. Don't forget to follow the show on Apple and Spotify. Links are in the show notes. Now on to our next guest. Hey, welcome back to Max out, everybody. Today is a show that I call it a thick show, meaning you're going to write a lot of notes. It's very granular, very tactical. You're going to learn a bunch. The reason you're going to learn a bunch is I have a very uniquely qualified man to visit with you. Rich Devinney was a Navy seal, but he was also, and I can't say what group he was a part of, but let's just call it a very elite group of seals without using the name. And Rich was in charge of selection process and also human performance. So you talk about an elite, elite group like that and then, you know, understanding the attributes required to perform at that level and then the teachings. And so he's also got a book out right now, ironically called the Attributes that cover these very, very things that we're going to get in depth with it today. So, Rich, welcome to the show. Thanks for being here.

Rich Devinney (37:29)

Thank you, Ed. It's an honor to be here. So thanks for having me.

Ed Mylett (37:33)

So I got to tell you, it's an honor for me and I'm going to learn today, too, with you. And I told you off camera, I can endorse your work because many of the things I've taught you've just been able to apply them in scenarios that I can't even imagine. In your life. So first things first. I talk a lot about peak performance. You make a distinction in the book between optimal performance and peak performance. So any of you listening to this that are leaders of groups or just want to perform at a high level consistently, I think this distinction is really powerful. So give us the difference.

Rich Devinney (38:03)

Yeah, absolutely. And it really came to me as I left the military and people were asking me a lot about peak performance. And what I realized was I wasn't comfortable with the term in defining what Navy SEALs or spec operators do. And the reason is because peak, at least to me, peak is an apex. And it's an apex from which you can only come down. And it usually has to be planned for and prepared for and scheduled. So for example, the professional athlete or the. The NFL player, you know, uses the entire week to prepare and plan to peak for three hours on Sunday. Right. And so it really didn't apply to what we were doing every day because when I thought about, for example, myself in some combat situations or, or even SEAL training when you're freezing in the surf zone, there was nothing peak about my performance. Right? We were just kind of moving through. And so I really started thinking about it in terms of optimal performance. Optimal performance is really what's the very best I can do in the moment, Whatever that best looks like, right? So sometimes that best looks like peak and it looks like flow states and everything's clicking, right? Other times that's like, hey, I am head down and I'm just taking step by step, and that's all I got, right? And it's dirty and it's gritty and it's muddy and it. And it sucks. And that's really, in my opinion, what. It's not only spec ops. I try to take all the stuff I learned in spec ops and apply it to life, but that's really what life is. I mean, life, it's unrealistic and probably unhealthy to try to peak at all times during life. It's just not going to happen. Right? So optimal performance allows us to be comfortable with this modulation and be comfortable with the fact that sometimes if you're just head down, just taking step by step, just grinding it out, that's okay. You're actually performing the best you can. Right? And. And I would, I would say the COVID you know, 2020 for all of us. I would. I would imagine that most of us in 2020 didn't say that we were at. We were. We were performing at our peak for most of 2020. Right. We were just. We were doing the best we could. And that's. It's really just a more realistic, more practical way to think about performance.

Ed Mylett (40:01)

I think that's real world stuff. You know, as I reflect on it, I think about the, you know, the most successful people I know or the people that perform at a high level. Really, the key is they do it more consistently than other people. They do it under pressure, which we're going to talk about in a little while as well. Whether you're an athlete or a dad, you know, it's under pressure. How do you perform? How do you respond to certain conditions? So you were in charge of the selection process and you make a distinction in the book. And by the way, when you're listening to this everybody, these are attributes you wish to embody if you're going to be happier and a higher performer. It's also attributes you want to find in people you want to surround yourself with as friends, as associations, colleagues, business partners, et cetera. You make a distinction, though. That's awesome. Between skills and attributes. Because this is something I think most people discount themselves. Well, I don't have these incredible natural talents or skills, so I'm discounted from performing at a high level. He makes the case. Guys in the book. Seals are regular guys, and I have to say I've got to know a few and I don't know that I disagree with that necessary. I think there are extraordinary things about a few of them, but I tend to agree with you as an outside observer. So what's the difference between skills and attributes?

Rich Devinney (41:16)

Yeah, it's a distinction that I had to make when I was running the assessment selection because we were our particular program. We were bringing in very experienced Seals and we were putting them through our process and we were still getting about a 50% attrition rate, which is natural and okay. But the problem was we weren't able to effectively articulate why. And we weren't able to say why to ourselves to be comfortable with that. We weren't able to tell ourselves senior leadership why. But most importantly, we weren't able to tell the candidates why they weren't making it. And these are guys who are coming in. They really. They were kind of all stars and rock stars. And to be able to be able to tell them something like, well, you couldn't shoot very well or you couldn't do this very well, it just didn't seem to fit right. So I had to really break it down. And in a very general, basic sense, skills are not innate. They're not inherent to our nature, right? None of us are born with the ability to ride a bike or throw a ball or shoot a gun. In the military sense, we can be taught them. We can sometimes sit down in a class and learn them. They direct our behavior in known situations. So here's how and when to ride a bike, throw a ball, shoot a gun. And because they're visible and because they're set up that way and kind of steps that you can learn and teach, they're very easy to assess, measure and test. And this is why most teams, especially business teams, who are kind of putting together dream teams, make the mistake of focusing only on skills. The best salesperson, best graphic designer, best marketing, whatever it is. What the problem with skills is is that it doesn't. Skills don't tell us how we're going to operate when things go south and sideways and the environment turns completely uncertain, Right? Because you can't necessarily apply a known skill to an unknown environment. This is where attributes come in. Attributes are innate, right? All of us are born with levels of adaptability, of situational awareness, of discipline, of resilience, right? They don't direct behavior, they inform our behavior. So they tell us how we're going to show up to a situation. So my level of adaptability and resilience, for example, informed the way I showed up when I was learning how to ride a bike and I was falling off a dozen times. Okay. Because they're hidden though, because of their background, they're very difficult to assess, measure and test. And they most visible and visceral environments that you can see, these things are in environments of challenge, uncertainty and stress. Which is why the laboratory I had, which was SEAL training. And whether it's basic, whether it's BUDS or the SEAL training I was running, it's all about throwing guys into challenge, uncertainty and stress. It was just showing these qualities. And I, I always joke, you know, the, when I take it back to buds, you know, which is basic underwater demolition, SEAL train, that the, the basic course for a guy to become a Navy seal. You spend hundreds of hours running with boats on your heads. You spend hundreds of hours PTing with 300 pound telephone poles and freezing in the surf zone. And you know, over a 20 year career, I've been on hundreds of combat missions and I've done thousands of training evolutions and never on any one of them did I carry a boat on my head or a telephone pole on my shoulder. Right? So what they were doing to us in buds wasn't training us to be a Navy seal.

Ed Mylett (44:23)

Right.

Rich Devinney (44:23)

It wasn't teaching us the skills to be a Navy seal. What it was doing was just teasing out these attributes. It was seeing if we could do the job right. And so this is where we have to start thinking about making distinctions when we're putting together teams. And even in our own performance, our performance, especially in challenge, uncertainty of stress, is driven by these attributes. And that's really important to know.

Ed Mylett (44:40)

Well, I think also when I hear that I think of so many things, I think of even with our own children, you know, we're always evaluating their skill set. But if they're really going to be flourishing their life, why not help them identify what they're doing? Giftedness or attributes are from what you call it. Then I'm thinking of all the people I've recruited in the different businesses I've had. And I think, you know, you get these people with these perfect skills, perfect background, you're like, they're going to just crush this. And they're such a great speaker, they're going to be great in sales, except you don't know how they're going to respond under pressure. That's right, Failure. And it's these attributes. And I have seen people with frankly, far lower skill levels with exemplary attributes long term have this optimal performance. I always use Tom Brady because people think I'm a whack job. But like, I think of Brady, not tremendous skill set, but some of these attributes that you write in the book, I was actually thinking of him from an athlete standpoint. Yeah, give us a little bit of a gift. There's 25 of them in the book, guys. When you were selecting, and I'm sure all 25 were important, were there two or three that really were requisite or stood out that were, you know, you really look for in people? Because I don't want to give away the entire book, but what are a few of them that you could share with us that are attributes that are just. They're almost mandatory for optimal performance?

Rich Devinney (45:59)

Well, so first, so I answer that question because I know people are curious. But the first thing I want to caveat is that the list of attributes to be a Navy SEAL is going to be different than the list of attributes required to be an athlete or a salesperson or a teacher or whatever. Right. So that list changes. So it's incumbent on you as a team leader or a leader if you want to understand what attributes you need for your team to figure out what that list looks like. And this is how we also position ourselves properly in the Environment. Some people have a better makeup for being a nurse than they have for being a Navy seal.

Ed Mylett (46:34)

Right.

Rich Devinney (46:35)

And that's because of the attributes they come to the table with. If we were to talk about buds, SEAL training, I would say the most important attributes are the grit attributes. So you're talking about courage, perseverance, adaptability, and resilience. And then probably the drive attributes, which there are five. There's self efficacy, there's discipline, there's open mindedness, there's cunning, there's narcissism, which we can get into that later if we want.

Ed Mylett (46:57)

Narcissism is an attribute.

Rich Devinney (46:59)

Narcissism is an attribute. Yes. Okay.

Ed Mylett (47:01)

No, you're not doing that later. I got to know this. That's fascinating to me. Hunting and narcissism just give me a little flavor. Then you go right back into that.

Rich Devinney (47:08)

Absolutely. Yeah. And it's the most about one anyway, which is good. It was probably one of the most fun to write. Well, let's start with narcissism. Narcissism is obviously a pejorative word. And narcissistic personality disorder is a bad thing. Right. The DSM 5, which is a psychology bible, will state nine criteria which will define if I think if you have five or more, then you have narcissistic personality disorder. However, when you read those nine, what happens is when I read, I was like, wait a second. Okay, I don't have that, but sometimes I kind of have a little of that. Right. And it really kind of made me think about why I became a Navy SEAL in the first place. And, and think about when my friends would talk about why they became Navy seals. Certainly we were patriots. Certainly we loved our country, but we really, we just kind of wanted to be badasses and we wanted to see if we could do something very few people could do. There's nothing wrong with that. And that's a little bit of narcissism talking. This is biological. Right. When we are, when we're paid attention to by our parents as infants, we are getting hits of dopamine, which is a very powerful feel good chemical, serotonin, which is kind of a bonding trust, I'm protecting you chemical. And then oxytocin, which is another bonding chemical, so that that combination is powerful. When we're getting paid attention to, this translates to adulthood. All of us to some extent, want to at some point feel special, feel loved. You want to be paid attention to. Okay. That's a natural thing. And if you have an audacious goal to be a rock Star, a Navy seal, an entrepreneur, very successful, to stand out, to be special. There's nothing wrong with that. That's a little bit of narcissism speaking. And it can drive you. And that's why I put it in there.

Ed Mylett (48:47)

I love it. So I got to be honest with you, I'm thinking of all these friends of mine that are what I called peak performers, but to your point, optimal performers, because they don't just peak, they do it consistently. And there is a little bit of equality of that and even a little bit of self thinking, Meaning I want to get this attention. I want to do something significant. I want to prove something to myself that's special. And so I really want to acknowledge that I agree with you on that. And I kind of jumped in there. I think you were on a little bit of a roll before I did that. But inside that answer you were giving, you create this mind gym. You also talk about resilience. I'm surprised that wasn't what you went to first, but obviously it's where you went. But resilience was one of them across the board, is it not?

Rich Devinney (49:33)

It is. Although we have to recognize resilience is just the ability to bounce back. Right. You still have to get through it first.

Ed Mylett (49:39)

Yeah, but you make a distinction in the book. I'm not interrupting you, but you make a distinction. It's not just you make a distinction about how you bounce back, when you bounce back. I'd love for you to go into that a little bit because this is huge. When you get rejected in sales, if you get knocked down, that's fine. Oftentimes it's the length of time you're looking. The length of time you lick your wounds.

Rich Devinney (49:59)

That's right.

Ed Mylett (49:59)

Can you talk about that? It's one of my favorite parts of the things you teach because it's so true and it's subtle. Almost nobody would make this distinction other than someone like yourself. So speak to that a little bit.

Rich Devinney (50:09)

Absolutely. So resilience, again. Resilience is the ability to get knocked off baseline. Right. And then get back to baseline, which is extraordinarily important in any factor of human development. Whether it's weightlifting, whether it's. Whether it's physical, whether it's mental, whether it's. Whether it's environmental. Right. Then there's. And then. So just to give another distinction, we were also really interested in what's called Anti Fragility, which is a great book by Nassim Talib. Right. That's the ability to get knocked off baseline when you Come back, you're stronger, right? You've moved, you've shifted your baseline. To be able to do either, all right, you need to have the ability to reflect appropriately and for the right amount of time. And so the example I give in the book, which you probably enjoyed, was a former CEO of mine used to tell us what his grandfather told him, which was the two minute rule. And basically two minute rule was this. Anytime that you have something bad happen, okay, Something negative, bad, it's awful, it's horrible. You have two minutes to wallow, to mourn, to do whatever you need to do. After that two minutes, you stop and you get back on track. You're back in it. Same thing happens when anything good happens, right? Any big success or all that stuff, promotion, whatever. Two minutes to rest on your laurels, pat yourself on the back, feel like you're the big man or woman, get back to normal and then get back to baseline. So it's a mental exercise to help get back on baseline. Now, obviously, certain trauma, it's going to take more than two minutes, but I think the concept still remains to be able to reflect enough about something that happened and ask the right questions. So frame it properly allows us to get back to that baseline and many times grow from it and then move on. And this is the crux of optimal performance and in fact growth, because we can't grow, we can't move on until we. Or we can't take those steps unless we shed that trauma.

Ed Mylett (52:03)

I think this should give people hope. I think some people think they're weaker than they are sometimes. Like, I get knocked down and guys, this is a guy who led and selected the biggest group of badasses that walk the planet, we say, and they get knocked down. The question mark is, can you get back to baseline? Or an antifragility, can you get even better than baseline? And there is a time factor. So those of you that are knocked down or get knocked down, you need to begin to evaluate how quickly this two minute rule and whatever, however that manifests itself for you, because we all do. But I do feel like, I would say I don't have a lot of attributes, but one of mine has been the pace at which I get back up to baseline or then eventually exceed it. And in mind, Jim, what you created, I guess in the seals are there. It sounds to me like you believe resilience can be developed and built, that it's. Even though it's an attribute, it can be expanded. True or false? And how do we do that?

Rich Devinney (52:59)

Absolutely true. And so the idea is develop a working relationship with our brain, which was really the goal of the mind gym, was to help guys begin to figure out this gray matter between their ears and try to access that and more proactively use that gray matter. Because again, we're just from a basic standpoint, and our nervous system, which it's all connected, which we all know, but the sympathetic response versus the parasympathetic response, this is active doing something versus recovery. Recovery is one of the key elements required. In fact, probably the key element required in any type of resilience or antifragility. You have to take time for recovery. This, we know this intuitively. When you lift weights, you tear the muscle, right? The only way you grow muscle is to rest. Okay? If you lifted the same weight every day, you just keep on tearing. You'd go into entropy. So you have to tear it and then you have to allow it to grow back, which is what recovery is. Accessing our kind of understanding, our neurology a little bit better allows us to more actively and proactively shift into parasympathetic and initiate some recovery more effectively, more often, and in some cases on demand. And that was really the key kind of goal of the mind gym was to teach guys, begin to teach guys how to do that more effectively, more efficiently and more quickly. So I used to call, you know, sometimes, you know, recover in between gunfights because honestly, resilience, we talk about the two minute rule. And you know this, and I think a lot of your audience knows this when you're really. When you're really kind of performing at a high level, whether it's optimally or peak, whatever that looks like, sometimes the situation, the environment doesn't allow for recovery in the moment. Okay? And so this is. You can watch every, any war movie, right, where the guy who's. The guy's next to his buddy, his buddy, his buddy gets shot and he. And you'd spend the next two minutes while the guy's, you know, in the movie is crying over his buddy and mourning all that. That doesn't happen in the real world. You don't have time to mourn. You have to win the gunfight, right? Which means it's incumbent on us. And obviously combat's an extreme case, but it's incumbent on us that if the recovery is not available in the moment, you have to, have to have to make it a priority later. All right? So. So if you're in the moment and something bad happens and you're just like, okay, I got to block that out. And I just got to move forward and make this. I gotta. I gotta finish the mission. I gotta win the fight. Finish the mission. Once that's all done, you need to go back and you define time to recover. This is very hard for top performers to do because we're so. We're so kind of seduced by the performance part of it. We love. We love breaking through, like, getting through, but recovery is huge. Just think of it in the terms of if you don't recovery, if you don't recover effectively, it's like you're benching three times a day, every day, right?

Ed Mylett (55:58)

Yeah. I've seen this take out more people than most people realize. I've seen people have really good careers and whatever it is they do for a window of time, and they don't recover. They don't recover. Then what happens is they're fatigued and they make huge mistakes or they fry. They just fry out. And so this is a huge thing, by the way. I don't know that we've done an interview that in 20 minutes has had this much stuff in it this quickly. I think everyone. This is like crap, like, you know, pulling over the side of the road and writing things. But on recovery, is there anything other than sleep? Because sleep's the go to. Any other things you'd offer, say, hey, this is a recovery technique.

Rich Devinney (56:35)

Well, some of the quicker ones can be breathing. And I know you've had Dr. Andrew Huberman on.

Ed Mylett (56:41)

I was thinking of him when you've been talking.

Rich Devinney (56:43)

It's like he and I have been. Well, and he's in the book. He and I have been friends now for, gosh, four years. And we've been working on a lot of this together. And so a lot of my neuroscience comes from just geeking out with him and hanging out with him and his friends. But, you know, breathing techniques, so we can do. Certain breathing techniques will help us shift into parasympathetic. There's vision techniques which Huberman talks about. Open gaze, for example, real fast way for your audience. Open gaze is just. It's different than focusing. Instead of focusing on something in front of you, just go soft and start noticing your peripheries. Right. That open gaze has been proven to start shifting your nervous system into parasympathetic and start going that way. So those are some micro techniques. A little bit more macro techniques is really start to think about anything that produces relaxation and joy in your life. Think about doing more of. Okay, this doesn't have to be meditation. Some people like meditation. Meditation I find difficult personally. And so I had to find different ways. For me, my meditation is I go running. I go running in the woods here in Virginia. I don't wear headphones, I don't time myself. And I just think and I just let my mind wander. Right. That is recovery for me. Visualizing. Visualizing is a hugely powerful technique because the brain, if you visualize correctly and deeply, the brain doesn't recognize the difference between real experience and visualized experience. So you can create the same neuro transmitters and hormones that you would in the real experience just through visualization. So, for example, I, you know, I have two boys. They're. They're teenagers now, but, you know, when they're. When they're babies, I used to, you know, they used to nap on my chest. Right. Such a wonderful feeling as a parent just to have your. Your kid sleeping on you. And what I would do sometimes is I would just visualize that. And, and as I visualize that deeply, those. All those feelings would come back. All those neurotrans, all those chemicals would be flooding me. That's recovery as well. So. So think about, think about some breathing, think about vision, think about visualization. And then you could do things like, I mean, yoga, meditation, the float. I'm a big fan of float tanks. I don't know if you've ever tried the. Love those things. And so. And then, of course, sleep is the kind of the coup de grace of. Of recovery.

Ed Mylett (59:00)

Yeah, I want to go back through that. So, guys, we've talked about float tanks on the show before, and I've recommended it to friends of mine that even are struggling with some depression and mental health, even minor mental illness. So float tanks are big for me. The things that you've listed rich for me is float tanks. I do open gaze is something that I did as a child rather naturally. So it's something I go back to. And the visualization stuff that he's talking about, guys, can also. You can almost call it like awake dreaming. And it's something that I do. And one of the things is I'll repeat the same ones over and over. And that had given me a previous good feeling. So for me, it's a very random moment in my life that when my daughter was a little girl, we're on a boat, and she asked me, daddy, can I drive the boat? And she sits in my lap. And just the way her. Just my little girl felt, you know, I had my arms around her. It was a little bit windy and cold, and it was like One of my favorite moments of my life. Well, I've played that video thousands and thousands of times, guys. And so that when I get into an anxiety or stress state or fatigue state, I go right to that video and it takes me back to that moment. I do it, guys, with silly things. Like before, I do my labs, my blood draws. With 10 vials of blood, I'll look away. And I go back to the boat with Bella and I. Because it's become reflexive. Those neurotransmitters, those synapses have been so connected now that I can go there anytime I want. These are real things that you can be doing to recover and also to perform at an optimal level. I love that you talk about this, because it's very rare. I'm listening to you. I'm thinking, were you a little bit, pun intended, fish out of a water in the seals, the way you talk and think around the other guys. Not every dude I know is like you.

Rich Devinney (60:37)

I was, admittedly, I was a little bit. Fish out of water. Yes. Yeah.

Ed Mylett (60:41)

You had to be, man. You had to be. That was a great conversation. And if you want to hear the full interview, be sure to follow the Ed Mylett show on Apple and Spotify. Links are in the show notes. Here's an excerpt I did with our next guest. Welcome back to Max out, everybody. I'm so honored and blessed to have this man to my left here today. He just came on my radar very recently, and God is so good because I immediately fell in love with this man and his message through social media, through YouTube, and within about a week of me discovering who he was, unbelievably, his name came across my desk with an opportunity to have a conversation with him today. And I think he's one of the most unique and influential people that I've ever heard from as a man. And it's really an honor to have you here today. He's an author, he's a speaker, he's a coach. But what he does is he really impacts people's lives, particularly men. But you women today that are listening to this or watching this, you get to listen in on a conversation. I think it will help. Help you understand your man, your son, your potential boyfriend, or your husband even better today. So, Jason Wilson, thank you for being here.

Jason Wilson (61:42)

It's a pleasure. Thanks. I appreciate it.

Ed Mylett (61:43)

You're so soft spoken and gentle. You're such a big, strong man. Is this a different you? In other words, even the way that you speak, there's a cadence. You got to be aware of this. There's a cadence. There's a cadence. There's an ease. There's a pace to it. I'm curious if. Or maybe you don't even know if I met you 20 years ago. Was there. Did that exist? Was this always your disposition, so to speak, or has your disposition changed as you've been willing to share with yourself all of the emotions that a man should be experiencing?

Jason Wilson (62:19)

I've changed. I have to ask. I would like to ask Alex. Let's ask her what you think he's changed.

Ed Mylett (62:24)

Even this.

Ted Mylett (62:25)

Kate.

Ed Mylett (62:25)

His daughter's here. She's off camera, guys. But I was curious. Even his disposition. And because I've noticed this with myself, I've listened to audios of me 20 years ago. I still have a deep voice. I'm still aggressive. I still talk quickly. But there was an edge and an aggression to even the way I spoke. That is somewhat different now. And Alexis, you see that always talk to me about his whisper. Yes, he has this whisper. Okay. But that wasn't there, to your point. Has developed as he's developed. I got it. Okay. So those of you that can't hear Alexis, she's saying that he slows down. Even the way that he speaks is much different as he's changed. And I think that's an external manifestation of. Of something that's happened internally within you. It's very noticeable with you. It's one of the things I noticed right away with you was that there's this strong man, visually very strong man, who is, frankly, strong enough to communicate in a very gentle and kind way that's pleasant to be with. It's not off putting to be with. And I just think all of you should know that over time. I think Jason's an example of subtle changes. You may not even know, but your daughter knows, sitting here, change within you.

Jason Wilson (63:39)

It's interesting. I had no idea you said cadence. I'm like you talking about riding a bike.

Ed Mylett (63:43)

I had no idea. It's the way that you. You're. Well, it's welcoming. It allows someone to sit with you and be present themselves. And I think when. When people become more vulnerable in the way they express themselves, it almost gives you permission in their presence to be that way. So the. And the reason I say this is just dawning on me is that I have a son who's a kind young man. He's a gentle. Pretty strong. Much bigger than me, much stronger. But I'd like to think that maybe a little bit of that is because he was fortunate enough that the former me isn't the one that raised him. That for the most part it was a guy who had done some of this work that raised him. And I just think it gives people permission to be in your presence. I want to share something with you and then ask you about it because I see this all over you. We have more in common than you might think in that. When I played baseball, when I was done playing college, I was unemployed, just living at my parents house. My dad gets sober, he goes to his first AA meeting. My dad gets sober, comes back from the first meeting, says I got you a job. Turns out it was an orphanage. It was a boy's home. A big one though. My boys were all removed from their homes or their parents were incarcerated or dead. But what I discovered by working with these boys, I was their big brother. I could took them to school. I was there when they opened presents on Christmas day, you know, took them trick or treating. I was there when they got in a fight at school or broke up with their girlfriend or whatever it was. People always ask me, what do these boys want from you? And what I found from them was they wanted me to love them. They wanted someone to love them, care about them, believe in them, and maybe just show them how to live a little bit better. And as I got older and I got into business, people said why did you have some success in business?

Rich Devinney (65:18)

Business?

Ed Mylett (65:19)

Because that's what everybody wants. All people want you to love them, they want you to care about them, they want you to believe in them, they want you to show them how to do a little better or help them. And I find that that's your over. If I distilled down your message. The reason I agree with it and love it so much is it appears to me that that's what you do.

Jason Wilson (65:38)

You know, I'm glad you said that because when I first started the cave of a Dunham for boys, it was just martial arts and discipline. Because although I rather I always tell men to reset to the lam, no one wants to be in fight or flight response the whole time. Where you gotta be tough and mean mugging the whole time. Can I go there? Absolutely. But if I could stay majority of the time here, this is where I want to be when I start working with the boys. And I was different. I was a different guy then. I was all about structure, discipline, toughness, fortitude. And I still am. However, I want you to be comprehensive. Boot camp programs were very popular and scared straight programs were popular where you would take kids into school, into Prison, Prisons. Yeah. And to get them scared enough to say, hey, I don't want to act up ever again. I discovered quickly, man, that re traumatizing someone never heals the trauma that you experience. Boot camp's program started failing at alarming rates, and I started shifting. I went from just a discipline program to a place where it's a safe space. And then I discovered that our boys didn't need more discipline. They needed more love. As soon as I gave them that, you know, our first program was in Highland Park, Michigan. If I was late, these boys, I'm talking about tough kids. They would sweep and clean the room, everything, move the desk out, and they would sit there playing purposefully so that I could see them and say, wow, that's great. You guys didn't. They just wanted the affirmation. They wanted to love. That's why they act out. And that's what I give them. I give them what I longed for. I'm literally. I became what I wanted. And that's what. That's what it is. It's no secret. I became a man who's strong but sensitive, who's compassionate but caring. Someone who can encourage you when you need to push through some pain, but also encourage you to express sorrow. We need to apologize to someone or feel the grief so that you can do something to transform someone's life. If you're only. You're stuck in just masculine attributes, you can see something wrong, but you say, no, I'm feeling something different. That ain't gonna. I won't be a man. So they shy away from that.

Rich Devinney (67:51)

So true.

Jason Wilson (67:51)

When we change as men, I say this, and I didn't say. You didn't say this. This world will change.

Ed Mylett (67:58)

You're right.

Jason Wilson (67:59)

When we can change, like, really become comprehensive, misogynistic behavior, I can go down the line, will change, and. And that's inside. Working from the inside out.

Ed Mylett (68:12)

Before we start the interview with my next guest, just want to remind you all that you can subscribe to the show on YouTube or follow the show on Apple or Spotify. We have all the links in our show notes. You'll never miss an episode that way. Now, on with the show. Welcome back to the show, everybody. It's such a blessing to be with you this week. I'm going to give you three keys today to, I think, just shifting perspective. Today's podcast is really about your perspective on life and how you see things. It's such a critical thing in life. And isn't it interesting that when we have a tragedy or Something difficult in our life or we hear about it with someone else, how that instantly changes our perspective for a little bit? For a little bit. You ever have that if there's a passing of somebody that you love or in your family, it makes you reevaluate and recalibrate life and what really matters to you, but doesn't it seem like that's fleeting and it's just for a while and then you find yourself six months, a year later, back to thinking and doing exactly what you did before? And so that happens with me as well. And so I saw this quick video this week that this is. These are not my words, but they made an impact on me. And I wanted to share the words in this video with you because they were so compelling for me. And I think it'll be a gift for you as well. And then I would give you some takeaways that I took from these words. So here we go. I asked God, why are you taking me through troubled waters? He replied, because your enemies can't swim. I asked, why do I always feel like I'm failing and struggling? He answered, because your growth and accomplishments come from facing challenges and overcoming difficulties. Every failure is a stepping stone to success. I asked God, again, why do I sometimes feel like life is filled with pain and helplessness? He responded, because in your weakest moments, I am by your side. I use your pain to shape your character and your helplessness to showcase my power. Continuing, I inquired, why do I have to experience disappointment and setbacks? He replied, because in disappointment, you learn to trust. In setbacks, you learn to persevere. I am with you every step of the way, guiding you towards victory. Finally, I asked, why do I always feel confused and lost? He answered, because you overlook my plan for your life. When you focus on me, I will smooth your path and provide you with clear direction. Trust me, everything is within my control. Set a big impact on me, a profound impact, because I think oftentimes we do wonder why certain things happen in our life. And I think perspective is everything. You know, when I talk to people that are a little bit older than me, I'm always blown away by the perspective that they have. I recall when Max was about 6 years old, every weekend on Saturdays, I would take Max down to the car wash and we would get my car washed. And it was back in the days where there really wasn't a lot of Internet at the time. So there was a man there that we would see every Saturday, an older man. He was reading his newspaper, and I think he sat There for hours. Frankly, I always wonder, like this guy's car took a long time to get washed. I think he would just come down there and read his paper and maybe his car was being, it was maybe was being detailed or he just let them work on it while he sat there. And so he would always, we'd always say hello and he was a nice man and. But I could tell that he wasn't happy. I could tell there was something unsettled in his spirit. And I watched him several times, this looks sad to me. And I took notice of it. You ever just feel someone's energy? And I remember several times seeing this man feeling some kind of sympathy for him. And I'll never forget this because he, one Sunday he goes, so how old is Max? And I said, He's 6 years old. And he gave me great advice. He said, well, enjoy the six year old because when he turns seven, that six year old's gone forever. And if you're a parent, you know that's true, that six year old really does go away. And there's a brand new person at seven and he goes, in fact, enjoy the seven year old because once he turns eight, that seven year old's gone forever. They become a whole new person and remake themselves and you know what, and enjoy him when he's 16, because when he turns 17, that 16 year old teenager is a completely different person. They just, they keep changing and growing. And I didn't even mean it in a mean way, but I remember I turned to him and I said, sir, when did that process stop for you? And he put the paper down, he said again, I said, when did you stop remaking yourself every year? And he sat back and he went, I don't know, I guess maybe, maybe my early mid-20s. I said, you should evaluate that. I said, one of the things I'm most obsessed with in my life is that the 33 year old me will be gone forever when I turn 34, replaced with a whole new, better, growing version of me. And I hope someday when I'm 40 that when I turn 41, the 40 year old's gone forever. Just like the 6 year old Eddie Mylett, there was a new version of him and improved. Now obviously you take parts of you into your future, but there's a new and improved version every year. I'm remaking myself. You know, you can look into your body, your lung tissue, your digestive tract, even your bones are remaking themselves on a very regular basis. It's part of nature to be reborn and Remade. But so many people lack the perspective in their life and that lack of perspective causes them to not grow anymore. There's this great quote that I used to throw around all the time that said most men die in their early 20s, we just don't get around to burying them until they're in their 70s. Too many people right now are not remaking themselves and wondering why they're not happy. This requires growth, this requires perspective. And I think that quote that I read you earlier about God, whatever your version of God is in your life, however you look at that, everyone knows how I look at it, but however you look at that, that it changes your perspective and that the things that happen in your life take on a different meaning. See, everything in life is what does something mean to us? If you can change the meaning of something, you can change everything in your life. But once we stop growing and changing, it all starts to feed the same meaning. They ever say, well, you keep telling the same story to yourself. That's a big thing in personal change your story and you should change your story. But in order to change the story, you have to change what you believe things mean. And so that's why the questions that that person was asking, that God was answering changes the meaning of when things happen. So I'm a big believer that you are supposed to be replacing yourself. So if you're 28 years old and you're listening to this today, one of your ambitions ought to be to take all the great things with you into your 29th year, but to grow and improve so that 28 year olds gone forever. And there's a new better version of you at 29, if you're 40 years old listening to this today, that by the time you're growing all year long, that by the time you turn 41, that 40 year old's gone forever. Just like the 6 year old, you was gone forever when you turned 7, just like when you turned 8, the 7 year old was gone forever. Just like when the 16 year old turned 17, the 16 year old was gone forever. If you look back at your life, you've changed and grown quite a bit, haven't you? What pace, at what percentage, how much? Right. And to what perspective do you need to accelerate this? And so I believe very deeply in life that the meaning we take away from experiences changes everything. And how do you change your meaning? So I'm going to give you three keys today to shifting perspective. To shifting perspective. Number one, with that, that quote I gave you in the beginning illustrates number one is Ask a better question, have a better life. The quality of your life is really comprised of the quality of the questions you ask yourself, because the quality of the questions creates the quality of your thoughts. Quality of your thoughts defines the meaning. So if you can begin to ask better questions in life, you can have a better life. But what you're doing right now, the reason you're not growing, if you're not or you're not growing at the rate you could, is because you're not looking to ask a better question. See, the powerful thought of that whole thing I read to you is that it was powerful questions with better answers. So it was a pretty average question with an extraordinary answer from God. And when you begin to ask the right questions, I believe you begin to get the right answers. Your life is really a patterns of regular questions you're asking yourself. All this data that tells us 80 to 90% of our thoughts are the same every day and that most of them are negative. Why? Because 80 to 90% of the questions you ask yourself are just autopilot. Why do they. Why am I this way? Why aren't I happier? Why am I more successful? What are they thinking about me? What are they going to think? What are people going to say? You add the same questions all the time you're asking yourself and so your perspective doesn't change. That's why I love talking to people that are at later stages in life because you just see a piece about them and a wisdom about them that's come with time because they've had more perspective, change in their life. That's why I think listening to podcasts, and hopefully mine at the top of the list, reading books and talking to people that are successful or happy can give you perspective. You want to do something that's unbelievably productive in your life? Go spend an afternoon at a retirement home or a nursing home and talk to those folks about their perspective on life. You really want to have a lot of change in your life, get with a great coach and ask them quality questions. Get with people that have the information and the person with the most information wins. And by the way, for me, the source with the most information, that's why I read this to you, is God. And so when I pray, I ask questions and I find the higher caliber, higher quality, better newer question, I elicit a better answer. So number one is ask a better question. Have a better life. Number two, shift your perspective and you shift your life. I have this great story that I was once told and I, you know, it's not my story, but Mother Teresa, I'll give you two of them. You know, for most of us, if we saw. If we were with something, someone who passed away, or we saw a car accident, let's say, and we rushed to the scene of that accident and we had someone in our arms that passed away, you and I would probably. Our perspective would be, my gosh, I just witnessed a tragedy in my life. And that's okay. That's reasonable conclusion that you had witnessed this tragedy. I think it was Tony Robbins that told me this story. And he said, actually, Mother Teresa said that the greatest honor of her life was to be present with a person when their soul leaves their body and goes to heaven. So can you imagine the exact same event? You and I would sit there and say, this is tragic. This is horrible. Mother Teresa would say, this was the greatest honor of her life to be there to watch this soul leave its body and go to heaven. Same exact event. Different perspective, different meaning, different emotion, different quality of life. You following me? Perspective creates meaning. Meaning creates emotion. And the quality of our life is the quality of our emotions. We have a completely different life. Mother Teresa, in an event like that is such an unbelievable. It's an extreme example, but it's illustrative of everything, is perspective and meaning. It's not the events of our life that define us. It's the meaning we take from these events. Let me say that to you again. It's not the events of our life that define us. It's the meaning we take away from those events. If you want to change your life, you can go back and begin to look at what meanings you've taken. Ask yourself, what would I need to believe about that event so that it would serve me? Not what do I believe? What would I need to believe so that it would serve me? I could have. You know, there's all this data about children that grow up in alcoholic households. It's fascinating. Usually they're one way or the other, either become extremely successful achievers or they repeat the patterns of their parent. Why is it that two children can go up in the exact same house with the exact same parents and have two totally different lives? Most of you are nodding, probably, when I say this. You thinking of even your own family or somebody you know. Same two parents, same environment, same house, same upbringing, same information, two totally different lives. Why is that? Perspective and meaning? One person took away a different meaning from the exact same events, and the other one took away meanings that didn't serve them, made them shrink, made Them negative, made them bitter, made them lose their confidence, and the other person didn't. What I learned from watching those events happen in my life is I learned what I didn't want to do. I learned when my dad got sober that people can change their life. I took those meanings away. So everything in your life is the meaning you take away from the event. And by the way, the meaning you attach to your work. There's this great story I'll tell you. Secondly, I believe it was jfk, and he was visiting Cape Canaveral. And he's walking through Cape Canaveral. This is back in the days where they're, you know, they're going to launch and go into space and attempt to go to the moon, as I understand the story at the time. And he walks by this man who's got a mop and a bucket. And he stops and asks this man and says, what is it that you're doing here? What would been reasonable for that man to say, oh, sir, I'm cleaning the floor, I'm making this place spotless, etc. Etc. Do you know what this man replied to him? The man with the mop and the bucket? President Kennedy says to him, so what are you doing here? And this man says, I'm helping put a man on the moon, Sir, I'm helping put a man on the moon. Had a completely different perspective about his work. He took a different meaning away from his work than what the average and ordinary person would do. It's not even what we do. It's the meaning we take from it. And then the third thing that I would recommend to you is to learn to reconnect with your center, to get centered in your life. I'm talking about this a lot more. And so to do things that give you perspective is to reconnect with center. We lose perspective when there's chaos around us. We lose perspective when we're just repeating the same thoughts and the same questions and the same emotions over and over again. So in order to change that, one, you got to ask a better question. Two, you've got to shift your perspective and your meaning. And third is reconnect to your center. So what are the things you could be doing to reconnect to your center? For me, my center is my faith. And so I focus on my prayer life. In fact, I'm reading a prayer right now. I probably will just pull it up on my phone. I wasn't going to do this, but I'm reading a prayer currently that I think I should share with you guys. So here we go, Father, here I am before your throne with a heavy heart and an anxious mind. Come Lord, and fill me with your holy presence. Let me rest and be at peace. Let me feel your protection. Let me feel as if I'm under the shadow of your wings, safe, hidden and secure in you. Only you can give it and take it all. I pray, Father, please take my fear away and give me your peace that surpasses all understanding. You know that my life is in your hands. My trust and my hope is on you alone, Father. Thank you. In the name of Jesus, Amen. Just a prayer I've been reading myself. I give myself different prayers from time to time that just change my perspective. So for me, by the way, whatever your faith is, I also meditate. I love vibrational frequency. I love to center myself. And so whatever your practices are, get back to those practices. Care for your body a little bit more. For me, I've learned that my center almost always has to do with my faith in my body, that when I'm connected to my body, this what we would consider to be a temple, when I care for it a little bit better. So these things may seem very simple to you, but reconnect, if you're meditating, really refocus on it. If you've got prayer life, really refocus on it. For me, it's strange, but the more I do little things where I'm connected to my body. Cold, plunging, sauna. Here's a random one for you. Lately, I just love to stretch. Just stretching and some yoga has really helped me reconnect to my center, something I've never done before. I'm a bigger guy. I always thought, I'll get around to stretching, I'll get around to yoga. Well, this year, last 12 months, I've made it a pretty big priority. It helps me reconnect. It's just I'm present with my body. I also love to do earthing and grounding where I walk around with my bare feet on the earth. I try to get in the grass or on the beach if I can and just reconnect to that for some reason that helps me connect with my center. And then lastly, just one of my formulas is I love to be around water. And so when I had an apartment and couldn't live near the ocean, I always had like a fountain in my house where I could hear running water. Something some of you may relate to this just somehow being around running water centers me, calms me, whether it's a lake or an ocean. Even a pool, a fountain, something that is water centered for me, helps me reconnect to my center. And those just part of my formulas. I think it's to know oneself, right? And so I love to work out and lift heavy and all that stuff. But boy, I really tell you something, I found out stretching and yoga, my prayer life, my meditation, my earthing and grounding, these are not things that five or eight years ago you probably would have heard me talk a lot about, but they've helped me change my perspective. And so what today was all about was sharing with you a perspective shift on life and getting you to consider is one of the things I need to do. Of all the things that's talked about in personal development, self help, self improvement, entrepreneurship, what about my perspective? How is my perspective impacting my thoughts? How are those thoughts impacting my behavior, the decisions I make, the emotions I have? And if I can shift my perspective, I can tell you that I think you can shift your life. And so go back in the beginning of this video or audio and listen to that exchange that this person has with God that you could have with your God. And then ask yourself a better question. Shift your perspective and shift your life and reconnect with your center. And I think you're going to find a formula and a recipe that may have change come find you as opposed to you having to always go chase change. You can actually become somebody where change helps find you, where you magnetize and gravitate to yourself because of this incredible perspective you've had. And the last thing I want for you is to be a man or woman who in their 20s or 30s, really dies, but doesn't get buried until they're in their 70s, 80s, 90s or beyond. That's not what you want to be. You want to be that person who every year, that new birth date, that new time is replacing the former. You taking the best of the best from the previous person, fixing the things that aren't so good and growing and improving into that new year. Just like the 6 year old did, just like the 7 year old did, just like the 16 year old did. So should the 40 year old, so should the 25 year old, so should the 65 year old. And I believe those are the key things to creating change in your life. That was a great conversation. Be sure to follow the Ed Mylett show on Apple and Spotify. Links are in the show notes. You'll never miss an episode that way. Welcome back to the show, everybody. Excited to talk to this gentleman today because his Work's fascinated me for a long time. The reason work has fascinated me for so long. I went through this string for a while where so many what I'd call high performing, successful friends of mine would say, have you read Atomic Habits? Have you read Atomic Habits? I'm talking about athletes, business people, entertainers. And I'm like, what the heck is Atomic Habits? And I finally find out there's this guy, James Clear. Turns out he's written this book, like 5 million people have bought it. And I'm like, well, why have 5 million people read this book on habits? Because, you know, you're supposed to have them. And then I read it and I. I'm like, ah, it's not one of these, like, have a habit book. It's like how your brain works, how to create habits, how to eliminate bad ones, and physically why in your brain you can do these things and why it's so necessary. So I've wanted James on for a long time. We finally put it together. I'm so grateful to share him with all of you today. So, James Clear, welcome to the show, brother.

James Clear (88:15)

Hey, thanks for having me on. Great to talk to you, Jeff.

Rich Devinney (88:18)

Yeah.

Ed Mylett (88:18)

And I don't want to just talk habits today. I want to talk about some of your productivity hacks as well.

James Clear (88:23)

Sure.

Ed Mylett (88:23)

Your work rose is, I think I'd call it groundbreaking because I don't think anybody's really approached Habits the way that you have. But let's back up a little bit just for a second, because I think it's important for people to understand this concept. You teach that everyone's always talking about taking massive action. You take massive action towards what you want, you're like, yeah, you should do that. But your concept of getting 1% better is much more believable for most people. And so just address that for a second. Why? Why 1% better every day? And how does a habit do that?

James Clear (88:56)

Sure. So first of all, I think there's no reason that you can't be really ambitious. Right. Like, I consider myself to be a very ambitious person. I think it's just that you're oscillating or switching between these two modes. You know, like when you're in planning mode, when you're in strategy mode, sure you can be very ambitious and be very aggressive and, you know, stretching yourself and reaching. But when it comes time to take action and execute, have to scale it down to something that you can achieve that day, you know, like the. In. In one sense, the biggest unit of time you could ever do something is About a single day. Cause then you gotta go to sleep, you know, and then you have to wake up again and do it the next day. So unless you're playing, you know, at some point there's a limit. You can only stay up for 48 hours or 72 hours, like, you know, and then you break. So that's the largest possible unit that you could ever do a single thing in. And I think more realistically, most of the time, the truth is, you know, you got about an hour or maybe you got two hours to work on this, and then you gotta go move on to something else. So we don't have big chunks of chunks of available to us. We need to scale things down into pieces that we can actually work on and execute. So the way that I think about it is when making plans, think big. When making progress, think small. And getting 1% better each day is a way to encourage that. The story that I like to tell, and this is something that I kind of kick atomic habits off with, the story of the British cycling team. And you know, for many years, British cycling was very mediocre. They had never won a Tour de France, which is the premier race in cycling. They had won a single gold medal over like a hundred year span. And they brought this new performance coach in named Dave Brailsford. And he had this concept that he called the aggregation of marginal gains. The aggregation of marginal gains and the way that he described it was the 1% improvement in nearly everything that we do related to cycling. So they started looking at a bunch of things you would expect a cycling team to focus on. Like they put slightly lighter tires on the bike, or they designed like an ergonomic seat for the riders. They had the writers wear a little feedback sensor, little chip to see how each individual responded to training. Then they would adjust the practice schedule. But then they started doing like these little 1% changes, these small improvements that nobody else was really thinking about. Like they hired a surgeon to come in and teach the riders how to wash their hands to reduce the risk of catching a cold or getting the flu. They have this big trailer, like a semi trailer that carries a lot of bikes in it to major events. And they painted the inside of that truck trailer white so that they could spot little bits of dirt and dust that might get in the gears and degrade the performance of the bikes. They have two different types of fabrics. They've got like indoor racing suits and outdoor racing suits. And they tested those fabrics in a wind tunnel and they found out that the indoor fabric was lighter. And more aerodynamic. So they asked all of their riders to wear that fabric. They even had all their different riders test, you know, like, a bunch of, like, maybe a dozen different types of pillows. And then they see which one led to the best night's sleep for each person. And then once they figured that out, they brought that on the road with them to hotels for the Tour de France and so on. And, you know, Brailsford said something like, if we can actually do this right, if we actually make all these 1% improvements related to cycling, then I think we can win a Tour de France within five years. He ended up being wrong. Uh, they won the Tour de France in three years, and then they repeated again the fourth year with a different rider. And then after one year break, they won three more in a row. So after having never won for, like, 110 years, you know, they win five of the next six. And I like to use that story as an introduction to this idea of getting a little bit better, making these 1% improvements, for a couple of reasons. The first is it shows you that excellence a lot of the time, maybe we can even say most of the time, is not actually about radical change. It's about a commitment to accruing small improvements day in and day out. Secondly, and I think this is also crucial, it encourages you to focus on trajectory rather than position. There's a lot of discussion about position in life. How much money is in the bank account? What is the number on the scale? What is the current stock price? What are the quarterly earnings? There's all this measurement around our current position. But what getting 1% better each day encourages is to focus on your trajectory instead. Am I getting better? Is the arrow pointed up and to the right, or have we flatlined? Am I getting 1% better or 1% worse? Because if you're on a good trajectory, all you need is time, right? If you have good habits, time becomes your ally. You just need to let time work for you. But if you have bad habits, time becomes your enemy. And every day that clicks by, you kind of dig the hole a little bit deeper. And so it's very much at the core. It's about encouraging you to focus on trajectory rather than position.

Ed Mylett (93:26)

How did you get to 37.78 times better? Where'd that ratio number come from?

James Clear (93:31)

Yeah, yeah, it's just math, right? So if you get 1% better each day for a year, so 1.01 to the 365th power, then it gets 37 times better by the end of the year. If you get 1% worse, 0.99 to the 365th power, then you drive yourself almost all the way down to zero. Now, you know, look, real life is not exactly like a mathematical equation, right? Your habits are not exactly like this, this formula. But I do think that it highlights an important concept which is the difference between making a choice that's 1% better or 1% worse on any given day is relatively insignificant. It's very easy to dismiss. And this is, I think, one of the things that makes it underappreciated or underestimated. You know, like what is the difference between eating a burger and fries for lunch today or eating a salad or you know, going to the gym for 30 minutes or not? Well, on any given day, not a whole lot. You know, your body looks the same in the mirror at the end of the night, scale hasn't really changed. It's only two or five or ten years later that you turn around, you're like, oh, you know, those daily choices really do add up. And I think you see this pattern again and again throughout life. Like take knowledge for example. The person who always reads for an extra 10 minutes each day. Well, look, reading for 10 minutes a day does not make you a genius, right? It's very easy to dismiss, but the person who always does that over five or 10 or 20 years, yeah, really meaningful difference in wisdom and insight. Productivity is the same way, you know, like the person who gets one extra task done each day, doing one extra thing does not make you an all star. But again, over a 10 or 20 or 30 year career, that can be a really meaningful difference in output. So this pattern shows up again and again. What starts out small, relatively easy to dismiss, compounds, or turns into something much more significant over time.

Ed Mylett (95:18)

The biggest word, bro, I don't think most people take into account. You and I are both college baseball players, good ones, but neither one of us were, you know, surefire first round draft pick, major league players. And I think most people don't take into account in their life the compound effect. I don't think they understand it in money. I don't think they understand it in their bodies, both positive and negative. And I don't think they understand their identity or in just in habits. The compound effect in life of allowing small things to stack up over time has a multiplier effect. And one of the things that I feel like in your work, and by the way, your work is I'm all, we're a few minutes in here and I'm like, this is so Good. And the reason is one, I believe most people believe they can get 1% better every day. I don't think most people believe that they can completely transform everything in one big leap. I think there's a multiplier, though. Do you agree that between doing the right things 1% or just better habitually every single day, not only are you actually making deposits of doing things correctly or better, but there's a part of your identity that starts to change over time about how you view yourself, that I am that guy who doesn't eat the hamburger and fries when he can choose to eat the other one. And you stack those choices and behaviors up over time and you start sort of believing maybe you deserve something that you didn't deserve Prior. Isn't there a factor of that? Don't you think as well?

James Clear (96:33)

This is a huge part of kind of my philosophy and book, this idea of what I call identity based habits. But essentially the concept is, and this, I think this is the real reason that habits matter. The surface level, reason the habits matter is they help you be more productive, they help you make more money, they help you lose weight and get fit. And look, habits can do all those things, and that's great. But I think the deeper reason that they matter is that every action you take is like a vote for the type of person you wish to become. And so when you perform these small habits, when you take these little actions, you're casting votes for a certain aspect of your story or a certain element of your identity. In a sense, every time you perform a habit, that's how you, like, embody that aspect of your identity. So, you know, when you make your bed in the morning, you embody the identity of someone who is clean and organized, or if you write one sentence, you embody the identity of someone who is a writer. And this is why it can be valuable, you know, even to like do one pushup. It's like, no, that does not transform your body, but it does cast a vote for, I'm the type of person who doesn't miss workouts. And eventually, as you build up evidence of that story, as you start to cast more votes for that identity, you have like actual proof to believe this, right? This is, I think this is a little bit different than you'll often hear something like fake it till you make it. And I don't necessarily have anything wrong with fake it till you make it. It's asking you to believe something positive about yourself, but it's asking you to believe something positive without having evidence for it. And we have a word for beliefs that don't have evidence. We call that delusion.

Rich Devinney (98:07)

Right.

James Clear (98:07)

Like at some point your brain doesn't like this mismatch between what you say you are and what you're actually doing. And so my argument is to let the behavior lead the way. To start by meditating for one minute or doing one pushup or writing one sentence and letting that be undeniable proof that in that moment you were a meditator or an athlete or a writer or whatever it is. And ultimately, I think this is the real value that habits provide, which is they reinforce your desired identity.

Ed Mylett (98:35)

Boy, it's just so good, brother. So good. I don't know why I'm just meeting you now. Because our overall belief system about change is so very, very similar. And we are going to talk a bit about how to actually begin to establish habits. But before we do that, I want to talk about the concept of establishing one, because you said something about the one pushup reading or listening to something you're talking about about the guy who would go to the gym for just five minutes and work out. And you said something about this casting the vote for who you want to be or who you're going to be. That was powerful. Right? But you're saying before a habit can be, and I don't want to quote you incorrectly, but I want you to elaborate on it because this is profound to me. I mean, it's obvious. But if you, if you don't step back and get away from it and look at it, you really don't realize the truth of it. Before a habit can be improved, it has to actually be established. And I think what happens is, you tell me what you think. Beginning of the year, I'm going to lose £50. I'm going to do this, I'm going to eat, then it's. I'm going to starve myself to 500 calories. So it's not a 1% improvement or I want to get up earlier. I'm going to get up two hours earlier starting tomorrow instead of get up 15 minutes earlier. Right, get up a minute earlier. So talk about that. From just the concept for everyone to just, they can take control of their life right now by just the establishment of a habit. Right? Or right?

James Clear (99:59)

Yeah, definitely. Right. So one of the concepts I talk about in the book is this. One of the strategies is this idea of what I call the two minute rule, where I encourage people to build a habit that takes two minutes or less to do. So you take whatever you're trying to do read 30 books a year becomes read one page or do yoga four days a week becomes take out my yoga mat. And sometimes when I mention that idea, people resist a little bit because they're like, okay, buddy, I know the real goal isn't just to take my yoga mat out. I know I'm actually trying to do the workout. So if this is some kind of mental trick, then why would I fall for it? Basically, Well, I tell the story of this guy Mitch that you mentioned, this guy who I talk about him in Atomic Habits. He went to the gym. He's lost over a hundred pounds, kept it off for more than a decade. And when he first started going to the gym, he wouldn't stay for longer than five minutes. He had this little rule. He had to leave after five minutes. So he'd get in the car, drive to the gym, get out, do half an exercise, get back in the car, drive home. And it sounds ridiculous, right? It sounds silly. You're like, obviously he's not going to get the guy the results that he wants. But if you take a step back, you realize that he was mastering the art of showing up, right? He was becoming the type of person that went to the gym four days a week, even if it was only for five minutes. And this gets us to that deeper truth about habits that you just mentioned, this idea that a habit must be established before it can be improved. It has to become the standard in your life before you can optimize it and scale it up into something more. And I don't know why we do this. We get very all or nothing about our habits. We're so focused on finding the perfect business, business idea or the best workout program or the ideal diet plan that we spend all our time theorizing and researching and looking for a better way. And instead, if we could just master the art of showing up, even if in the beginning it was less than what you had hoped to do, you're establishing a foothold. You're building some small progress that you can advance off of. And it reminds me of Ed Lattimore has that great quote where he says the heaviest weight at the gym is the front door. And, man, there are a lot of things in life that are like that, you know, like the. The hardest part is getting started. The hardest part is establishing the routine, even if it's a lower level baseline than what you ultimately hope to achieve. But the reality is, if you can't become the type of person who masters the art of showing up, even if it's just for five minutes. Then it doesn't matter how good the plan is, it doesn't matter how great your theory is. And so I think the two minute rule pushes back on that perfectionist tendency a little bit and just encourages you to master the art of showing up.

Ed Mylett (102:52)

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Ted Mylett (102:59)

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James Clear (103:01)

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Jason Wilson (103:02)

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James Clear (103:04)

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Ed Mylett (103:07)

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James Clear (103:19)

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Ed Mylett (103:29)

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James Clear (103:30)

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Rich Devinney (103:33)

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Ed Mylett (103:35)

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