Articles - Page 7 of 36

Upgrade YOU 3.1. Head down. Drive hard. Hit wall.

That’s how I think of most success.

Actually, that’s what I’ve seen many people experience chasing success.

Arrrrggghhh.

Grind, grind, grind.

Crank. Crank. Crank.

Getting it done. Done. Done. Done.

Boom. Crash.

btw, that boom, crash even happens when people achieve because…

If you don’t know where you’re headed

Well, will you feel good when you arrive?

Your ladder of success can be leaning against the wrong wall.

So you climb, climb, climb, only to reach a level where you’re wondering, is this what it was meant to be?

The worse problem is you never reach this point.

You grind, grind, grind until you can’t grind anymore.

And you still fail to reach your destination.

Or worse.

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Upgrade YOU 3.1. This one action drove him to the top!

One of my oldest buddies has driven to the top this way.

Actually, he’s more than a buddy.

He was one of the bankers who I was lucky to work with in my early days.

In many ways he taught me the business.

Especially what it takes to get it done and keep driving forward.

Not into self-help

This may not surprise you because it might be the same for you.

But, few of my clients, friends, and even people reading these letters are into personal development.

Like me before 2000, I’d never read any of that stuff.

Catapulting myself from working class nowhere to Goldman Sachs was “simple” to me.

It never required reading books on mindset, goals, time management, etc.

Simply, I decided to do everything I could to drive my best results.

And day and night I put my head down and cranked away.

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Upgrade YOU 3.1. Focus is easy compared to this

This is where the rubber hits the road, my friend.

So far in Upgrade YOU we’ve gone deepish into your goals and mind.

In some ways that’s valuable in its own right.

But in our context of driving your grandest goals, you might as well be dancing the jig.

To drive what you truly want, you must be taking action.

What action is our focus

You’ll see quickly in this video that I’m dismissing some of the harder topics on taking action.

Efficiency, effectiveness, time management, all that really matters.

And we’ll be hitting it in Upgrade YOU 3.3 where we talk about engineering flow.

That can be real hard.

But also easy relative to knowing what actions to take.

And being excellent taking them.

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Upgrade YOU 2.3. Enjoy your pull-ups

I know I’m fc’g this up.

A top marketer of personal development told me directly.

“You’ve gotta make it seem easy,” he said.

“But even that’s not enough. Effortless. That’s more like it.”

The point being…

Few people like to workout

Many people avoid it.

Others, with a more important goal, “force” themselves to show up and get it done.

“So if you run around comparing training your mind to working out,” he said, “You turn many people off.”

“Good,” I said.

Those people are wrong for me and I’m wrong for them.

They should stick with podcasts and self-help hacks.

I work for and seek out serious people who do the work.

Because people who are serious about driving transformational results do what it takes.

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Upgrade YOU 2.3. “Just eat Doritos all day” says nobody

Imagine you’re looking to get in great shape.

Seeking to do everything you can, you hire a top personal trainer who designs a comprehensive program for you.

Perhaps it has you working out 4-6 days week.

Maybe you’re doing cardio 2-3 days.

Other days strength training.

Looking at the program you say, “That’s awesome.”

But knowing full well exercise is just one side to getting in great shape you ask, “Should we also focus on how I’m eating?”

“No, it doesn’t matter,” they say, “If you like you can eat Doritos all day.”

Says no trainer!!

Not only would a trainer never say this.

But no matter how good your exercise plan, you know you’d fail this way.

It simply doesn’t matter.

If you’re working out an hour and eating junk 15 hours a day, your shape reflects it.

And of course you know where I’m headed here—

Your mind is the same.

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Upgrade YOU 2.3. The problem with getting out of your comfort zone is…

It’s uncomfortable.

See my point?

There’s no “un” in comfortable!

Which is why it’s much easier to stay here.

Get good with “un”

“When bullets are flying you’ve gotta be comfortable,” a SEAL said to me.

See, that’s the thing, what might be terrifying to us, must be comfortable to them.

I asked my buddy how you get comfortable with that.

He said, “You spend a lot of time training in chaotic conditions so uncomfortable is your comfort zone.”

An ER doctor told me much the same.

Where’s your “uncomfort” zone?

That’s one thing I’ve learned on the mind.

Many of these topics we’ve hit so far in Upgrade YOU are uncomfortable.

It’s comfortable to have small goals.

Perhaps even more comfortable to have none.

You get to stay the same person you’ve been.

Thinking, feeling, acting as you always have.

It’s rarely comfortable to change.

Or dream massive.

What if you don’t make it?

How comfortable are you risking losing playing to win?

To stay comfortable, keep it the same.

But if you’re looking to upgrade here, condition your uncomfort zone.

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Upgrade YOU 2.2 giving thanks as a performance tool

I wrote a longer, boringer article on performance tools.

Then I went for a run which made it much simpler.

You know these things that get you into a better state of mind.

Do more of them!

That’s all I’m talking about in this video on performance tools.

Get clear on what you’re changing in your mind as we did in 2.1.

And keep honing the tools that get the job done.

Running is one physical tool I use to simplify my thinking.

And here it led me to reflect on something too.

It’s the week of Thanksgiving.

In a weirdo year.

And we all still have so much to be thankful for.

One thing I did again was the thank-filled exercise from this lighter side video.

And here’s the video again on performance tools.

Next we move on to Mind 2.3.

Upgrade YOU 2.2. The ultimate performance tool

“Success is never about the idea,” a VC recently said to me.

“It’s not even about the CEO or team.”

Taking a dramatic pause, she finished by saying, “It’s about how they’re showing up every day.”

Who are you showing up?

This is the longer, boringer article I wrote about the other day!

I was being flippant and self-deprecating but I realized it’s far too important for that.

This may be THE topic of upgrading.

It matters so much because it doesn’t just relate to how you’re thinking and feeling, but who you are being.

So before we move onto Mind 2.3, let’s hit this video for lining up your performance tools one final time.

Ultimate Performance Tool

A client reminded me this week that this is our ultimate Performance Tool.

Especially in his context where he’s gotta show up his absolute best.

In this video we’ve been talking about performance tools as devices for getting yourself thinking and feeling how you want.

And this is the extreme case.

Not just changing your thoughts, feelings, actions.

But getting yourself showing up as the person you choose.

When you step into a meeting, who are you being?

Jumping on a call, which “version” of you picks up the phone?

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Upgrade YOU 2.2. Sing this 5X a day

All I do is win, win, win no matter what…

You may know this opening lyric to the song, All I Do Is Win.

That’s prime mental conditioning right there!

Not saying that’s all you need to build a winning mindset.

But it is one simple example of a Performance Tool.

And not one I go into in this Performance Tools video.

Performance tools drive performance…

See, this is the reason I refer to these as Performance Tools.

Because you can call them ideas.

Or philosophies.

Or principles, practices.

Yet I refer to them as Performance Tools so you have clear intent.

You are using these tools to get your mind in gear.

For thinking and feeling your best.

And unleashing your top performance.

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Upgrade YOU 2.2. Using Performance Tools for changing your mind

If you’re driving a nail, you want a hammer.

For rotating a screw, get a screwdriver.

To build up your pec muscles, you might jump on a bench press.

Increasing your flexibility, harness a tool called stretching.

All these are simple examples of tools you can use to drive goals.

Performance Tools are the same

This all seems so obvious to me now, but years ago it wasn’t.

Topics of the mind were far more complicated.

From reading thousands of books on personal development and hundreds on the mind I had tons of ideas.

Positive thinking.

Affirmations.

Visualizations.

Psychology, neuroscience, dozens of schools of thinking.

Lots and lots and lots of smart-sounding quotes about how you get yourself thinking and feeling your best.

On top of that I added tens of thousands of hours training with whom I perceive to be the best teachers on these topics learning the best tools of the mind.

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Upgrade YOU 2.1. Just one more what?

I’m writing you on this one final time because you know it’s such an important step.

All three Modules of Upgrade YOU—Goals. Mind. Actions—are ridiculously powerful in driving what you want.

Yet this “what?” step is particularly crucial.

That’s because here you’re aligning the way you think and feel with going after your goals.

We all know how much this matters.

Yet it’s not always so easy to do, is it?

Especially coz nobody ever shows you exactly how!

Where are you pointing your magic wand?

See, again, the reason we keep hitting this is because it really matters!

Certainly, this IS happiness.

But especially in our context getting clear on what you’re changing in your mind is key to unlocking your top performance.

So, how clear have you gotten on what you might change?

Come back to the question we asked in this first video—how would you be different?

I mean, really?

Lining up the topics we discussed here, what remedial and generative changes might you make?

How might you invoke the first rule of mind control for optimizing how you think and feel?

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Upgrade YOU 2.1. Bathe in the lighter side

Hells yeah!

That’s what we’re doing in this video.

We’re coming at the topic of changing your mind from the lighter side.

See, coz, what happened is, after watching this first video on what you’re changing in your mind, I stepped back.

And thought to myself, damn that’s a cool guy 🙂

But then I also thought…

That video comes at this more from the darker side, and I wanted to also bring more light.

What are you changing in your mind?

How do you want to be different?

These are the types of questions we asked in the first video.

Yet the emphasis was mostly on those negative things you might change in your mind.

This is natural on topics of thinking and feeling.

How often does someone go to a therapist coz they’re feeling great and want to feel even greater?

Never, right?

Typically we’re focused on topics of the mind because we’re feeling “bad” or “so-so” at best.

But this video is all about feeling amazing, and feeling more and more amazing.

For best dreaming and scheming your goals.

And driving your best actions.

By focusing on cultivating the lighter side of your mind.

What might you change to more bathe in your lighter side?

Upgrade YOU 2.1. The first rule of mind control for doing what you want

The brain screws you…

This remedies the #1 mistake in thinking.

It’s so fundamental.

So basic.

Yet it can be extremely “not easy” to do.

I won’t go into detail why.

We go into enough detail together in this video.

All I’ll say here is, so long as you’re thinking, why not be thinking about what you want?

Don’t want to drive to Kansas

OK.

Great.

So, where do you want to drive?

Waze doesn’t ask you for all the destinations you don’t want to go.

Only the one you do.

See my point?

All day every day many of our brains are thinking about what we don’t want.

Ugh, I hate my job.

Haven’t left the house in months.

It’s just so hard with the kids.

Certainly there’s many things in your life you don’t want.

So what do you want?

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Upgrade YOU 2.1. Limitlessly upgrading your mind

If you had a magic wand to change how you think and feel, what would you upgrade?

And why would you upgrade it?

Are there “negative” thoughts and feelings that make you think and feel worse?

That limit the way you scheme and dream your goals?

Hold you back from taking your best actions?

How would you be different if you could remove these?

What about the positive side?

How would you want to be different?

Would you want to feel more focused, energized, confident?

Have more belief in your goals, in yourself?

Upgrading your mind for 2 reasons

Honestly, I hate using the word “mind.”

It’s imprecise relative to talking about the neuroscience of your brain and nervous system.

Or the psychology of your thinking and feeling faculties.

Yet the notion “mind” conveys something incredibly powerful—

The way you’re directing your thinking and feeling faculties, brain and nervous system.

In this context of Upgrade YOU, this matters for 2 reasons.

The first is top performance.

Quite simply, like a pro athlete, to best drive your goals and actions you must get your thinking and feeling aligned.

You can never be worried, fearful, distracted, and every other “negative” way AND playing your best game.

This matters most in driving your goals, but it may be the second reason that matters even more.

Happiness, or as I prefer to label it, “feeling amazing!”

This to me is the end game of being human.

If you can alter the way you think and feel at will, you’ve won the game.

But there’s also a lot more to this than just play.

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Upgrade YOU 1.3. Condition your goals like Biden and Trump

It’s election day, so let’s use it in our context of conditioning your goals.

Consider for a moment—

How many seconds a day do you think Trump and Biden have been conditioning their goal to be president?

Do you imagine for the last month they’ve been thinking about much else?

What about the last 6 months?

12 months?

Heck, each of them has been talking about being president for 40 years!

To the point where today they have millions of other people focused on their goal.

Conditioning their goal for them, and for everyone else in the country!

Think about this for a moment.

Millions of other people have given up on their own goals to focus on the goals of these two people.

In this way, your goals become not just your reality.

But the reality around you.

This happens when you’re deeply living your goals.

Thinking about them all the time.

Working on them.

Dominated by your goals.

Not only are you more likely to make them come true.

Your goals have become you.

That’s what we’re doing here in conditioning your goals.

Not just setting clear goals for yourself, as we covered here in 1.2.

Or why your goals matter for starting and finishing, as we covered here in 1.1.

But conditioning your goals to the point they are automatic in you.

They are you.

Your goals are who you are and what you do.

To be sure, this is extreme, and not for everyone.

But for anyone looking to achieve a massive goal like becoming president, you must condition your goals to become you.

You can watch the video again here.

Upgrade YOU 1.3. Conditioning your conditioning your goals

Meaning, I’m just repeating what I wrote in the last letter to you.

Just conditioning.

Repeating.

The same message.

For you repeating the same process for conditioning your goals.

Of course I’m playing around a bit here.

But I’m also being literal.

As we go into in this short video for conditioning your goals.

This is the most important step.

Knowing the why of your goals deeply matters to starting and finishing, as we covered here.

And of course so too does knowing what your goals are.

But it is this repetition.

Conditioning your goals over and over again.

That makes the hugest difference between thinking you have goals.

And literally living them.

Here’s the video again for conditioning your conditioning your goals 🙂

Upgrade YOU 1.3. What’s more important than why and what goals?

This is.

In using your goals to get what you want…

The most important thing isn’t why your goals matter.

Nor what your goals are.

What matters most is how you’re using your goals.

Not just knowing your why.

Or looking at your goals every now and then.

What matters most is deeply conditioning your goals.

Monthly.

Weekly.

Daily.

Continuously.

Every second using your goals to get your mind in gear.

For driving your best actions.

Here’s the video for Upgrade YOU 1.3. conditioning your goals.

Upgrade YOU 1.2 #1 risk with goals this woman never accepts

Not having goals is the worst case.

You have nothing to aim for.

No clarity on what you’re doing.

Just floating along seeing how it all works out likely works fine like a leisurely cruise down the river.

Worst case, it leads you to a waterfall.

Best case something good happens for you.

Not because you made it happen, just because it happened.

No pro lives this way.

Consider Mikaela Shiffrin

Two-time Olympic gold medalist.

Three-time Overall World Cup champion.

Four-time reigning world champion in slalom.

The youngest slalom champion in Olympic history.

Do you think she has goals?

Damn right she does.

And in breaking the 33-year old record for the winningest slalom skier, she completed one run of the course in 58.78 seconds.

Just 0.13 seconds ahead of her rival.

Meaning, to beat Mikaela, you must be racing against the clock to within a fraction of a second.

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Upgrade YOU 1.2. 6 subtle problems with goals

Goals can be hard to achieve, right?

But if you’re like me, you know sometimes they can be just as hard to set!

As we bang on deeper in this video for Upgrade YOU, setting goals for yourself…

Let’s hit 6 subtle problems you see with goals.

1. Don’t know what you want

I spent 10 years on this topic…

Reading thousands of books looking for an answer, thinking you need to know what you want to get it.

That’s the dirty secret I wrote about here.

And the method we work through in this video.

How you set massive goals, even if you don’t know what you want!

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Upgrade YOU 1.2. The dirty secret to setting MASSIVE goals, even if you don’t know what you want!

What do you want?

I don’t know.

Well, you really better figure it out.

Yep, OK, so, what do you want?

I don’t know.

Well, you really better figure it out.

Yep, OK, so, what do you want?

I don’t know.

Well, you really better figure it out.

Yep, OK, so, what do you want?

Arggghhh

Been there, done that.

For about 10 years, actually.

Round and round in circles.

Making no progress on the question, only grinding your gears.

As you likely know, that’s what started all this for me.

Stepping back from my career at Goldman and asking the question that would come to dominate my life—

What do you want?

Reading thousands of books searching for my answer, I never found it.

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