Ultimate Days Masterclass

I struggled writing this for YOU.

That’s because I kept finding myself writing about the world and my year…

What it meant to me.

Why it was so transformational.

How it was one of my best.

Where they’re taking the world, etc.

There’s lots of stuff I’d like to share with you.

But this isn’t about any of that.

This is about one thing and one thing only—>

You, and getting the most from YOUR year.

Not about the world’s year

You’d have to be pretty narrowly focused to be looking back on “your” year without any reference to the year humanity had.

Tragic.

Disastrous.

This was a hard and painful year for billions of people.

Many lost their lives and livelihoods.

Multiples more still have their backs up against it.

Freedom was surrendered by all.

You simply cannot tally the enormous cost of human suffering this year.

Yet you also can’t let that weigh down your year.

True compassion and empathy is so rare and crucial, yet that’s different to using the suffering of others to justify your own.

If you wanted to ruin your days counting human tragedy, before this year it was still everywhere there’s oxygen.

But if you’re focused on how you keep doing your best to serve yourself, family and humanity…

Well, you must focus on those things you control.

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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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Like a rectal exam I avoid doing taxes.

I just sent off the K1 to a business partner.

As usual it’s only a couple of days before the filing deadline.

I hate it’s happening again this way.

Next year I’ll get out ahead of it.

See, here’s the thing, it’s super simple for me to do this.

It takes me little time to organize my stuff and get it to the accountants.

Just I put it off somewhere down the bottom of my list till it needs to be done.

Jams you up

Too many of these letters to you are JIT.

In business just in time manufacturing is extremely valuable, but it also risks jamming the production line.

Over the years I’ve drafted 675 of these letters that were never sent.

That’s all good, it’s part of the creating process; when you’ve gotta flow, you’ve gotta flow.

But I rarely go back to drafts.

I tend to keep it fresh, so I’m constantly creating and sending you new stuff.

The cost of course is time, and more specifically just in time.

Too many of these letters I’ve written you in real time, which I enjoy, but also messes with our process.

It leaves little time to get the team involved, and too often we rush proofing and getting these articles up and out.

To be sure there’s a nice flow from writing to a tight deadline.

But to keep scaling, and to optimize quality, we must be more methodical.

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My hair is sticking straight up.

I’d never go to work this way, but hey this is WFH, so I look a little WTF.

It’s 9:00 am, it’s a late start for me, because I got a late end.

I’ve learned the crucial importance of getting the right sleep, and so I took my 7ish hours.

Woke up and did my a.m. trance in bed.

And now here we are.

Tie on

Suit pants and shirt.

Hair standing tall because I’m pre-shower, and because I’m growing it out for a new Character.

This is September Man here.

Rather than getting up, getting organized, and then starting your day, we’re starting quick and dirty.

I’ve set the timer for an hour.

The brain told me to write this to you, which wasn’t my original plan, but as a creator, when it flows, you’ve gotta let it flow.

But we’re gonna do it fast enough so there’s enough time left for the frog I’d committed to eat.

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With a client we’re focused on solving something very hard in his business.

In his industry, it’s never really been done.

We know that’s because it’s a hard problem to solve, and that’s the point.

If we can solve it in his business, it will work forever.

His business will massively scale.

Him and his executive team will be able to focus on other things to drive the business even further.

We’ve only failed 3 times so far…

I won’t repeat the Edison quote, coz you know it.

10,000 fails isn’t failure if you’re iterating to your solution, is it?

Ultimate failure is never trying.

Settling for a sub-optimal solution.

Giving up too soon.

Failure is the point we keep driving through to get to success.

And it’s not just that each time we get closer and closer.

It’s that you want to love the pursuit.

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This PPP is an acronym you can use to best drive your goals.

And to feel your absolute best every day—

Power of Positive Projecting.

I’m trying to keep these letters to you tighter, so let’s just get to the point.

Why PPP?

Because your brain is constantly projecting your reality.

Literally, it’s looking around you right now, seeing a tiny part of the world (only as far as the eyes can see).

Yet, somehow it has an entire “movie” of what the world is.

Think about this for a moment.

Your head is filled with a projection of what you perceive the world to be based on the content you’re feeding your brain.

e.g. if you saw a week of news that somehow the world had become a magical, happy utopia, how would you be imagining the world different right now?

Your life is exactly the same.

All the time your brain is referencing movies of your past, present, and projecting your future.

So make it PPP.

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“You can only push yourself to the wall,” I said to him.

“What do you mean?”

“Push, push, push, push will only get you so far,” I said.

So what takes you all the way?

I drew him this chart

I draw a lot of charts for myself.

There was a time in my old apartment where every wall was covered with charts.

Laughing about it, but being serious, my friend Liz used to say, “hmm, I hope you don’t bring people over here…”

That apartment I saw as my lab—like a scientist scribbling all over a chalkboard looking for a solution, it was where I did my work solving the mind.

When I moved and took all the charts off the walls I counted some 36 charts, just in my office, and I won’t tell you how many in total.

The point being that I’ve always been able to “see” developing more clearly than saying it.

So I showed him this chart that you see above.

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When I’m doing what I want, then I’ll feel amazing.

I didn’t tell myself that.

If you had asked me all those years ago when I was just so desperately scrambling to escape my life and be living the life I truly wanted…

I would have said I was happy.

Running like mad to figure it out, sedating myself with escapes, thinking that was “happy.”

Knowing, not just believing, but knowing, with certainty…

When you’re doing what you want, then you’ll feel how you want to feel.

The biggest human lie

It’s the lie your brain is constantly telling you.

The lie our consumer economy is selling you.

The lie our society spoon feeds you from cradle to grave.

The lie that nearly everyone will live and die by.

The lie that keeps nearly every human on the planet at some low level of what you might call happy.

The lie that—

Something in your life needs to change is how to feel happy.

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This situation has obviously thrown a spanner into our year.

Boom, crash, there go the goals you had for the year.

Or worse, many people are scrambling just figuring out how to get by.

What it means for our years is still a mess.

Yet, we’ve all seen what it’s done to your days.

Has your daily routine gone to sh*t?

How’s it looking for you?

For most of us it’s gotten harder, hasn’t it?

Getting up at a certain time, into that rhythm you used to have.

Having your setup, those things that would set the cadence of your day.

A clear set of tasks to get done.

And what about your mind?

How’s all this had you thinking and feeling?

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