Why I’m Posting Daily Content For 30 Days

Why I’m Posting Daily Content For 30 Days

Why I’m Posting Daily Content For 30 Days

Starting today I’m going to challenge myself to post one piece of content on at least 5 platforms every day for 30 days. Now let me tell you about the why, the what, and the how…

I’ve struggled lately to post content consistently for a couple of reasons:
  • First, I wanted to avoid appearing like I was trying to build something outside of my job with Podia that might eventually take me away.
  • Second, I wasn’t really sure what to share.
It occurred to me that my ability to build a brand, grow an audience, and eventually sell products is an asset to my position with Podia. I talk about these topics in Podia videos and the more personal experience I can speak from the more valuable the content will be.
As far as not knowing what to share, I know the answer is to just choose a topic and pivot as needed, but if you’re like me, you know the power of the resistance that comes from feeling trapped by a choice. My answer to this was to treat these 30 days like an experiment. I can just focus on one theme for 30 days, evaluate things, and then pivot if I wanted to. But I was still having trouble so I ultimately decided it was more important for me to focus on building a consistent habit and that’s what this challenge is all about.
Now to the what…

What am I going to share?

My content for the next 30 days may include balancing your personal life with pursuing your passion, fitness, video content production, film-making, and maybe song-writing. I’m not making myself represent each of these equally, just sharing as it comes.
I am going to take before and after snapshot of each of my social media accounts, but I also understand that if I were more focused on a single topic and had fewer variables, the data would be easier to interpret. That’s okay because, again, this is more about building the habit.

How am I going to share daily content across five platforms?

  1. After topic selection, step one is outlining.
  2. From an outline, I’ll write a Twitter thread like the one you’re reading.
  3. I’ll use the thread as a script that I will record as a video.
  4. I’ll export the video as a whole to share on YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn, and IGTV (Instagram TV).
  5. I’ll also export the video in pieces to share as Instagram and Facebook stories.
This same content can be formatted as a blog, saved as audio for a podcast, and the video shared directly on my website. I’ve got all the equipment I need to flip a switch and start recording, so I don’t really have any excuse not to do this challenge.

“The chances are really good that I’ll actually be better off in some way doing this challenge…”

This doesn’t keep me from worrying about how things will play out, but without actually taking action, all I have is my concerns and no real data to validate them. The chances are really good that I’ll actually be better off in some way doing this challenge, despite my worries.
If nothing happens except that I’m more likely to keep posting for the next 30 days, I consider that a win. If you’re along for the ride, I appreciate you being here and would be grateful for any encouragement, thoughts, or questions you have.
30 Day Content Challenge, let’s go.

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A Simple Formula to Turn Failure into Fuel for Success

A Simple Formula to Turn Failure into Fuel for Success

A Simple Formula to Turn Failure into Fuel for Success

Meditate. Attempt. Document. Fail. Understand. Evaluate. Learn

Even though I accepted the idea that failure is essential to success a long time ago, I’ve had a lot more practice living as though failure was a curse rather than a gift. For years I have built old habits and ways of relating to failure that still haunt me to this day, but a recent experience in the gym gave me an idea that might possibly change the game.

I work out regularly at Iron Tribe Fitness, a gym that hosts workout classes similar to CrossFit. Some of the workout days focus mostly on endurance and cardio, some mostly on strength and mobility, some a mix of both. The strength days tend to give us opportunities to achieve new lift records and make heavier attempts than we normally do. On a recent strength-focused workout, we had 14 minutes to find a 1 rep max for squat cleans, a move where you lift the barbell from the floor up to your shoulders (the front rack position) while simultaneously performing a full squat, knees bend below the hip crease, then back into a standing position.

The squat clean, like other complex lifting movements, requires advanced technique, strength and power in various muscle groups, balance and coordination, proper breathing, mental clarity, and calm focus. It’s really difficult to keep all of this in mind during the actual workout. Small variations in any of the above categories can lead to failure, or even worse, success with injury. In fact, I’ll take this opportunity to say that failure is among the best of the outcomes, while success when not achieved correctly can have severe consequences. Let me explain:

I took a video of my lifting technique and showed my coach between attempts. We observed that I was able to muscle the weight up using my arms during a part of the lift where I should have been driving with my hips. This isn’t necessarily going to cause injury, but can keep me from achieving higher weights on the lift. The muscles in my legs are a different story. Instead of maintaining correct form through the squat portion of the lift, I changed my form slightly, pushing my knees in and forward a little bit, in order to stand up with the weight. As I stand here writing this a few hours after the attempts, I can feel the soreness in my knees. That’s not a great sign and will likely cost me in recovery time. It would have been better to maintain correct form and fail than to succeed and cause injury.

Many things in life are like this. When we take shortcuts, lie, cheat, or steal our way to success, we often do so in a way that causes injury. Most of us don’t set out to achieve success in this way, but because of how failure may have been framed in our culture or upbringing as something painful and costly, we sometimes make little “adjustments,” even subconsciously, to avoid it. I pondered this during my workout this morning and reminded myself that we stand to gain much when we not only understand but learn to live by the truth of failure, that it is not something to be avoided but to be embraced, not a curse but a tool of success.

I do realize it’s not as simple as accepting failure as essential to success. Failure, like any tool, must be used purposefully and in the right way if it’s going to benefit us. I find it helpful to systematize the things I want to work for me, so I’ve come up with a formula to help turn my failures into fuel for my success: Meditate, Attempt, Document, Fail, Understand, Evaluate, and Learn. Or, represented as an acronym, MAD FUEL. I will admit I had to do a little bit of wrestling to get this formula to fit into a more memorable form. Memorability is a pretty important factor for me when it comes to being consistent implementing a new system, but take is as you like and adjust for whatever works for you.

What follows is a break down of each step in the formula:

Meditate

I was torn between this word and “mindfulness,” but I wanted an action word and it carried enough of the same meaning that I decided to go with it. When you meditate, you are focused. You are fully present to what is happening in the moment. This is vital when it comes to using failure as a tool for your success because when you’re not paying attention to what is going on, you can easily miss vital clues that could help you know what and how to adjust. The ability to meditate or be mindful only comes through intentional practice. You must take time before your attempt to get into a mindful state so you can absorb as much data as possible. You’d be surprised how things like the temperature of the room, your emotional state, sensations you are feeling in your body, and other seemingly inconsequential bits of data can actually be important factors in your future success.

Meditation can also put you in the optimal physical and mental state to perform your best. Feeling physically relaxed (not lazy but loose), and mentally calm (not floating but focused) allows energy to flow freely when and to where it is needed.

Attempt

In order to achieve failure, something must actually be attempted. An attempt can be large or small, a single thing or a collection of things over several days, but it must be clearly defined and completed as defined. In the case of my one rep max, the attempt was a single lift. Sometimes an attempt could be doing a number of exercise moves within a given amount of time. Of course it could be a goal that has nothing to do with exercise, like writing a certain number of words, or completing a particular daily habit, or reaching a financial goal. The more clearly you define success and the more completely you carry out your attempt (think “you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take”), the easier it will be to identify the factors that contribute to your failure.

Document

Documentation is a supplement to mindfulness. Your mind is impressive, but can only track a finite number of data points before you start missing things. By default, your mind is actually wired to ignore information that is not vital, so even when purposefully paying attention, there are details you will miss. Documenting your attempt fills in the gaps. For my one rep max attempt, I filmed my attempt. Ideally, I would have multiple angles and could see more of how my body was moving. There are dozens of even more detailed forms of documentation available for that type of attempt that could give me data like heart rate, blood glucose levels, recovery time between attempts, etc. I’m not a competitive lifter, so it’s not quite that important to me. The level of documentation should match the level of importance of the goal. Remember, the more data you collect, the easier it will be to understand how and what you need to adjust in order to succeed.

Fail

It may seem obvious, but it’s worth including “fail” in the formula, if only to train ourselves to think about it properly. I can’t overstate that failure is not something to be feared and avoided, but something to be embraced and used as a tool in your success. Also, if you end up succeeding on this step instead of failing, it’s still worth working through the formula in order to improve and catch the places where you might have “compromised your form” in a way that could lead to injury.

Understand

Once you’ve attempted and failed, and you actually have some data, it’s time to look at the data so you can understand what needs to be adjusted. Sometimes it’s clear because we know what a data point on an attempt should be vs. what it is. For example, when I run indoors on a treadmill I can reliably predict what my heart rate will be based on my speed and cadence, assuming I am well rested, not experiencing pain, not anxious or stressed, and properly hydrated. When I run outdoors, given the previously mentioned conditions, my heart rate will vary based on speed and cadence, but also elevation gain, humidity, air quality, and temperature, just to name a few. If I’ve collected data for all of those factors, I can find the ones that are not in line with where they should be so I know where to make adjustments.

Sometimes there are factors you’re not aware of that are contributing to your failure. “You don’t know what you don’t know” is a frustrating place to be. Fortunately, collecting data helps you rule out what you do know, so when you research or speak to a mentor, it’s easier to know where the blanks are and more efficiently find the data you need.

Evaluate

If “understanding” is about the “what,” “evaluating” is about the “how.” Now that you know what you did wrong, you have to determine how much adjustment you need to make in order to make it right. The word evaluate has the root word “value,” which is fitting because you are actually trying to determine the value of the difference between a data point in your failure and the data point that would lead to your success.

In my lift attempt, I lack the strength in my legs to make heavy attempts without failure or injury. It would be helpful, in this case, to know what my front squat max is because that would be a limiting factor in my squat clean max. Even though I can successfully complete a 235 lbs squat clean, I may actually only be capable of a 225 front squat. In order to reach 235, I need to build my front squat strength. It’s not always a specific number, but you should be able to see a clear difference between a data point in your attempt and what it should be for you to succeed, and be able to determine how you can close the distance between those two numbers.

Learn

I chose to use the word learn here for a few reasons: I really wanted to be able to spell out MAD FUEL and couldn’t find a better “L” word. Technically “L” should be first, but then it would sound like “L’Mad Foo” which sounds like French for “The Mad Fool.” Ultimately, I feel the word “Learn” brings the formula full circle. Learning isn’t just about acquiring information, but carries the idea of applicable knowledge, which can only be gained and expressed through action and experience.

“Learn” could belong in the beginning because in order to do something, you have to know enough to make an attempt in the first place. The act of lifting a barbell is built on hundreds of small pieces of knowledge: how to walk, how to bend down, how to wrap your hands around something, how to stiffen your muscles, and on and on. More advanced pieces of knowledge are required as well: how to drive a vehicle to a gym, how to follow instructions, how to properly build and secure the weight on your bar.

“Learn” could also belong at the end because you only learn from your failure by understanding and evaluating your failure and making the next attempt. Failure is only useful to you as a cyclical system of learning, understanding and evaluating, and making attempts, repeat, repeat, repeat.
In the end, this formula isn’t just about success, it’s about growth. Where you are purposefully using some version of this formula in your life, you will see growth. Where you are not, you will either see stagnation or decline. This doesn’t mean you absolutely must use this formula for each area of your life at all times. Life goes in seasons. Whatever season you’re in, wherever you’d like to see growth, I hope you’ll take some version of this formula, learn to embrace your failure, and find the success and growth you’re looking for in your life.

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Thoughts On Staying Disciplined On Sabbatical With a Family

Thoughts On Staying Disciplined On Sabbatical With a Family

Thoughts On Staying Disciplined On Sabbatical With a Family

I recently participated in a conversation about staying disciplined with your routine while on vacation or sabbatical, and how practical it is to do so when you have kids. Most people take their vacation as a chance to loosen the reigns on their routines and good habits. Add kids into the mix and this seems inevitable and maybe even necessary.

Below is the original excerpt from Sean McCabe about staying disciplined on while on sabbatical. His full article about it can be found here: https://t.co/cFx3VTOY8d

“I treated my first couple dozen sabbatical weeks like lazy vacations. I’d stay up late, sleep in, and just sort of veg out. Sometimes I would do productive things, but mostly I just let the time slip away from me.

The week would go by in a blink and my sabbatical would be over. 

 

In more recent years, I’ve made a point to stick to routine during sabbaticals. In other words, discipline does not stop

 

Staying disciplined during the sabbatical does not mean I have no freedom. In fact, the exact opposite is true: I have more freedom than ever. 

 

When I wake up early and maintain my early morning routine, exercise, and writing, I feel good about myself. In the first few hours, I’ve already done so much. Then, I have the rest of the day to do whatever I want! Nothing feels more restful. It’s a fulfilling kind of rest, as opposed to the lazy kind of rest I was practicing before.

 

The lazy sabbaticals where I slacked around did not feel like true rest. They left me feeling unproductive, unfulfilled, and guilty. 

 

When I stay disciplined on sabbatical, the week feels longer. I have more time in a day. I have more time to do nothing if that’s what I want to do! But I maintain a structure that creates this freedom. I can then use the freedom to rest, create, think, or do anything I want. 

 

Discipline doesn’t stop when you’re on sabbatical—and that’s a good thing.”

So we had some back and forth about the degree to which this advice could be applicable to people with children (Sean does not have kids). Knowing I have six children of my own, a friend of mine asked me the following question:

Does that depiction of discipline vs. vegging out on a week long vacation ring true to your life?

My answer is, it kinda depends. The degree of difficulty in staying within normal routines can vary depending on whether you’re taking a sabbatical at home or traveling abroad or anything in between. This is true whether you have kids or not. The most notable difference with kids is that they add a much wider variable into the equation.

A bit of math:

x = 100 (normal routine)
y = var(1*(-1,-5)) (type of sabbatical, staying home, traveling nationally, internationally, etc.)
z = var(1*(-1,-50)) (kids)

*The variables are resistance based on the likelihood that they will interfere with your routine

x – y = (99,95)
x – y – z = (98, 45)

You could add other variables like whether or not you are sick, level of stress leading up to the sabbatical, etc. Also, the equation is oversimplified as many of these variables can have dependencies within the others. Basically, the type of sabbatical adds a level of resistance that can put conditions for staying with your routine anywhere from 95%-99% optimal. With kids, the range could be anywhere from 45%-98% optimal.

**Disclaimer: I’m terrible at math and have no idea what I’m doing, but I hope this is making a point.

Optimal Conditions May Vary

The point is that while the optimal conditions for staying on your routine can vary (and can vary greatly with kids), it’s still possible to take necessary measures to stick with your routine, and I would add that I believe doing so can improve the experience for the whole family. 

I’ve found that, when on vacation or taking a sabbatical, I enjoy my time more when I stay disciplined with things that have become vital to my daily routine. The kids do better with structure, especially when we are in a new environment, and we all have a better time.

Personally, I still wake up early, but maybe not as early. This has more to do with me than it does with my kids. I still exercise. I may eat more meals out but I’m still careful about not overeating to the point of discomfort (again, a personal choice that doesn’t depend on kids). We still keep our kids as close to their normal routine as possible (meals, naps, downtime, bedtime, etc.) and that seems to help them stay more even-tempered.

It’s important to note that we don’t do this perfectly and from time to time we make exceptions, but I think the point of Sean’s original post is not to prescribe 100% adherence regardless of your circumstances, but to begin to think of deviating from your routine as the exception instead of the rule. If you believe that sticking to a routine provides a better experience for you and your family (a theory worth testing out), having a mindset of sticking to your routine as the rule will help you be more creative and resourceful when it comes to dealing with the variables, whatever they may be.

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I Couldn’t Keep Up

I Couldn’t Keep Up

Yes, that’s me over there lying on the floor, gasping for air, sweating profusely. Yes, that’s a workout designed for women. Is this a surprise though? Women are really tough. Their bodies can carry babies for nine months and then give birth to them. My body can’t do that. Really, I should feel proud that I was able to keep up at all. That’s what I think to myself 2/3 of the way into the workout, while I stare up from the carpet and watch Rachel handle the workout routine like a fitness professional.

This post is a part of Ben’s fitness journey. Check it out.

I Earned Something Today

I Earned Something Today

This is a “Reset Week.” So far, so good. Here’s what I was able to check off today:

  • Exercise (Did an Insanity workout)
  • Diet (Clean eating all day)
  • Vitamins (Took em)
  • Drinking Plenty of Water (almost 3 liters)
  • Sleep (77%)
  • Breathing Meditation (5 minutes. Fell asleep)
  • Journaling (Did it)

The Brownies Call to Me

I went downstairs this morning after getting ready for my day. Put away the dishes, got some tea going, made a smoothie, and greeted the kids as they came down for breakfast. Sitting out was a pan of home-baked brownies.

These aren’t brownies from a box. Rachel, my wife, makes them from scratch. They are perfectly moist, chocolaty but not too rich, and melt-in-your-mouth delicious. She made these two days ago and normally the whole pan would be gone by now, but I abstained. I asked myself, “What grown man eats brownies at 6:30 in the morning?” and I walked away.

Later I returned from a meeting, ground fresh beans for coffee and waited for the pot to brew. There they were, calling to me. I poured my coffee and strode upstairs to begin my work, brownieless.

I Talk to Myself

After dinner, we cleaned up the kitchen and reset it for the following day. It was a long afternoon, tidying the house, keeping up with my 6 boys, cooking a healthy dinner. It had been a long day. I had eaten well, taken my vitamins, worked out, had plenty of water… I looked at that pan of delicious brownies and said to myself, “You deserve this.”

“Deserve what?” I replied to myself. “A brownie?” I inquired hopefully.

“No. You deserve much more than a brownie.” I replied.

“I don’t get your meaning…” I said, confused.

“You deserve this.” I paused for effect, then I said, “Saying “no” to things you want now so you can get something you want more later builds self-discipline. Self-discipline is a great gift, a gift you’ve given yourself today.”

“Oh. Well, thank you!” I said.

“No,” I said, smiling, “thank you!

Build Your Self-Discipline Muscle

Silliness aside, self-discipline really is a great gift. When we make commitments to ourselves and stick with them, we learn to trust ourselves more. Trusting yourself is a powerful tool in accomplishing your goals. Saying no to something you want can be difficult. Sometimes it may feel impossible, but the more you exercise your self-discipline, the more you’ll be able to push back against things that try to come between you and your goals. A pan of brownies may not weigh much, but it’s a good start for me. Maybe I’ll tackle some homemade cookies next.

Motivation.

Motivation.

I could give you a long list of reasons why I am motivated to be healthy. At the top of the list are the names of the people who are closest to my heart.