Feel like you’ve reached a ceiling?
Rather than trying to push upwards, try digging downwards.
For the height of your ceiling is directly dependent on the depth of your foundation.
I help busy people do inner work.
The full collection of explorations.
Feel like you’ve reached a ceiling?
Rather than trying to push upwards, try digging downwards.
For the height of your ceiling is directly dependent on the depth of your foundation.
Sometimes, experiencing the emotions that come from messing up lights a fire that accelerates improvement faster than contentment ever could.
—They accomplish nothing.
They merely stand in the way.
Life is a piece of art that we slowly create over time.
We don’t get to choose the paint, but we get to choose what to paint.
Choosing not to paint, to complain about your paint, to curse your paint, to hate your paint, to compare and mope about your paint vs. other people’s paint—to expend energy doing anything that involves not painting your masterpiece—is a waste. Period.
Complain less about what colors you’ve been granted and focus more on how you’ll create a masterpiece with those very colors instead.
There aren’t any colors or color combinations that can’t be turned into masterpieces.
Never forget it.
Time management trick: define whether each task of your day should have a “hard stop” or “soft stop.”
The problem with getting these confused is that it mostly hurts your top priorities.
Top priority tasks should be treated as “soft stops,” but are often treated as “hard stops.” Things like sleep, family time, exercise, writing, reading, connecting with friends, etc.—you should be able to spend whatever amount of time feels right. But, either you force yourself to cut it short or you don’t have enough time to allot.
Which leads to the second confusion: treating tasks that should be “hard stops” as “soft stops.” Things like TV, video games, social media time, etc—you can easily end up spending entire days doing these types of things if you don’t take control. And when you don’t, that excessive time gets taken from—that’s right—your top priorities.
And it turns into a vicious cycle.
Not enough time to do what’s most important because you spent too much time doing what’s not. And because you have less time, you’re constantly playing catch up.
So, what’s the solution? Give what’s less important tighter “hard stops” and then you’ll finally get to enjoy “soft stops” while doing what’s more.
Sometimes the most productive thing we can do is nothing at all.
Hustle culture tells us otherwise.
Hustle culture says:
But, what hustle culture fails to tell us is:
Turn down the volume on hustle culture. Turn up the volume on the whispers of your body.
If there’s anything you should prioritize in the new year that will best help you reach your goals, it should be more blocks of nothing.
Space where you can deliberately recharge, check in with your body, and adjust your pace.
Not more ways you can work at a suboptimal levels for the sake of getting diminishing returns only to end up rebounding back to where you originally started.
No. This year, don’t add more hustle to your resolutions—add un-hustle.
Trust the whispers of the body.
Question the yells of the mind.
Your body might whisper “sore legs” to which your mind might amplify to “TAKING THE WEEK OFF FROM EXERCISE!” Question the mind:“Is that really what sore legs means?” Listen to the body: “Sore legs—noted. Light stretching and upper body it is then.”
Before a public speech your mind might yell, “DANGER! RED ALERT! RUN!” while your body might be whispering, “you’re ready for this… you know this topic… stay calm.”
Or, after a hard breakup, your mind might be saying “GOOD RIDDANCE! WE DIDN’T NEED THEM! THEIR LOSS!” while your body might whisper, “that hurt.”
You see, the mind is in the business of seeking pleasure and avoiding pain which usually means staying inside of the comfort zone and fabricating situations to make them more—comfortable. But, that’s not what the body needs.
What the body needs is for the mind to respond properly to its signals; for the pain to be confronted, felt, and expressed; for the emotions and trauma to be seen and heard.
It needs for the mind to be a compassionate ear—an ally. Not a lazy megaphone that operates as an independent.