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hello and welcome back to the show i'm patrick i'm here as always with ben how are you sir i'm doing great patrick good we're gonna talk about vision anti -vision what those things are why they're important to have and then by the end of the conversation hopefully give some tips as as to how to begin to put those things into action in our everyday lives.
Cool. Cool. Yeah, man.
Let's start with vision.
It is something that you and I have talked about a bit before, but I want to do sort of an update.
When you say vision, when we say vision, as we get into this conversation, what do we mean by that word?
And maybe more importantly, what do we mean in terms of how we incorporate a vision into our lives?
I think what we want to do in terms of vision of our own lives, and whether it's a vision of our own lives or a vision for a business or vision for your family...
What we want to be able to do is lead ourselves.
So in the terms of vision of our lives, we want to be able to lead our own lives.
And in Stephen Covey's words, we want to begin with the end in mind.
so to continue to steal from other people jim collins has really i um this is something i think about all the time now which is the number one responsibility for a leader is to create a clear and compelling vision that is shared and acted upon by all So if we want to lead ourselves, we need to create a clear and compelling, two really important words there, clear, like not fuzzy, not like, I'd like to be financially free and healthy.
No, like not that at all.
Like clear, like what exactly?
And compelling, something that you are excited to buy into.
to. So clear and compelling vision that is shared, in this case, with yourself that you know and acted upon, that you can then hold yourself accountable.
So we've done this in a number of, we have a number of different components to this.
The way that I make up a vision is very much borrowed from Gino Wickman's Entrepreneur's Organizational System.
I think it's probably Probably the strongest aspect, along with Quarterly Rocks.
But even like OKRs, I think are kind of – I think that Geno Wickman's shared vision is the best that I've seen.
And it really comes down to – We've been stealing that for years.
Completely. Yeah. It comes down to these – so people go like, well, people have a vision statement.
Other people have a mission statement.
Other people have goals.
Other people have – and it's like, well, people have – it really comes down to these few integral pieces, which is, what are your values?
So vision, like, vision is like, what do you value?
Meaning, what do you think is important to yourself?
Like, what is important to you?
What is your purpose?
You can call it your passion if you want to.
And that is your why.
And this is your North Star.
And it doesn't change.
Like, this should be the thing that That is kind of like built into your DNA from – basically the majority – your entirety of your adult life, you probably have the same feeling of purpose.
I use the word mission but it's – maybe it's different.
The next one – yes, correct.
This is the big kind of conflicting thing that people I think don't clarify, again, clear, is then you have a mission.
So if you have this North star, which is your purpose, your purpose statement, if you want to, that is, it can be kind of, it should be, it's kind of vague, right?
To live a fulfilled life might be a purpose statement.
That is what I feel like I am on earth to do.
Or like to be a strong representation of the almighty, whatever it might be, right?
You know, to have impact on others, purpose statement.
But your mission might change every five, 10 years or so.
As you mature and different things come into your life, certainly my mission when I was 20 is very different than it is when I'm almost 50.
When I have children and other things, my mission is different.
So if you think of your purpose as this North Star, the mission might be these different mountain ranges that you navigate on the path towards that purpose.
So, now you have this values, you have your purpose, you have your mission, and that final fourth component piece is what is that big, hairy, audacious goal?
Again, going back to Jim Collins' words.
What is that, in my term, measurable thing that you're saying, hey, in five years, six years, this is what I'm after.
And to me, if that one becomes a little more extrinsic, I'm okay with that one a little bit.
Meaning like I want to have a million -dollar net worth, right?
I want to – and it's got to be big.
If you know how to achieve it now, it's too small.
Together, those four components, values, they look to be – those are kind of like tough to pinpoint.
But for me, just to kind of put some clarity to it, I have the five H's.
Humble, hungry, happy, honest, and healthy.
So I have the five H's.
For me, my purpose is to live a well -lived life full of purpose, poise, passion, and balance.
From there, I have a mission statement, which is to put my family first. And then my big, hairy, audacious goal is to have a cape house.
So a place that we can call all our own on the Cape and to be able to spend a month out west skiing every winter.
My kids are in school.
I have no idea how to do that.
But that's the idea behind a big heritage school.
You shouldn't know.
You shouldn't have the strategies and the tactics and the plan to figure that thing out.
So kind of wrapping it all together, if we want to lead ourselves, we need to have a clear and compelling vision that you understand and you're acting on.
Take that. Okay. Okay.
So there's some things to dig into there, but real quick, because I think people like examples.
I'm going to give a quick scan because I do similar and I'm going to ask a question about difference here.
So my values, I just call them key pillars because I think as we said before, values are one of those words that people throw around.
I actually like that a lot.
It's like, yeah, you get the eye roll with values, right?
But what are your key pillars?
Yeah, my key pillars.
So I want to ask you about how they show up in your life, but again, I'll just give mine.
Mine are, and again, I stole this from you, I don't know if this is alliteration, but it's the three Cs, control, creativity, and congruency.
And so control is just about focusing on the few things in my life that I can actually control.
Creativity is just not following the default path.
And congruency is working to close the gap between my thoughts, my words, and my actions.
So those are my three key pillars.
And then I don't have of a purpose, but I feel like my mission is a combination.
I have no purpose, but I feel like it's, I have a, I have a mission statement, but I do feel like it kind of checks a few of the boxes that you were talking about with purpose.
And it's my mission is to be a role model who shows what it looks like to live a life focused on what matters and who helps others create a life of focus and meaning for themselves.
So I feel like there's a little bit in there.
There's maybe some wiggle room in terms of the, the purpose and the mission, but I like that.
And the big hairy goal.
I and I took this from you I have what I just call a 10 -year I think a 10 -year target yeah which is similar but it's not and it's not as quite as buttoned up as like those two you know measurable things for you so talk to me first about the value of the big hairy audacious goal being something as clear and simple and and yes no as cape house in a month in the west versus what I have which is like two or three paragraphs of like this is what I want my life to look like Like in 10 years?
Yeah. I don't think that's wrong.
Okay. As long as it is, to me, I want, so we play with this a lot, particularly on the business side.
And I play with it personally as well.
When all three are not, or I say then all four are not truly like check the box, pass, fail, did it, done it, you know, like, because right now, if I go like, hey, Patrick, for your mission, are you doing that right now?
I know what your answer is going to be.
It's like, yeah, kind of like, I think that, you know, it's going to be that.
Yeah. Where it's like, Patrick, do you have a cape house?
It's like, no idea.
I think that that creates the level of clarity around it.
Certain businesses have done this.
Some do it, again, as a more esoteric, a little more loose, a little more freedom.
But I like the really specific.
when I changed this for our team, I saw like the eyes get wider and the head started to nod.
And I was like, ooh, I'm onto something there.
So just to give that concretely, our big heritage goal as the gym for a long time, over a decade, was to be considered the best CrossFit gym in the world.
I remember that. And there's no way we know if we get that.
That was weird. I put a little accent in there.
There's no way to know if we've actually achieved that.
So it becomes this sort of like, again, directional thing.
Like we're going in that direction, but that's what the other ones are all about, right?
Yes, you can operationalize them, but they're all kind of doing that.
And we changed from let's try to be the best gym in the world to change it to let's have six coaches earning six figures.
Everyone went, oh yeah, I can see what I can see what we need to do differently from where we are now to that to get that I don't know how we're going to do it but I know we're not there right now when I said the best cross the gym in the world people are like some of them are going like oh well are we that's like are we like is it it wasn't as the big heritage goal is supposed to be the ones that you go like Like, F yeah, let's go do that thing.
Like, the why is, like, what you wake up and you're like, that's – you wake up every morning and you're like, I have alignment with my life.
Like, it's an intrinsic thing.
Like, actions are aligned with values.
It's the kind of thing that ties it all together.
Mission is, okay, to get to our purpose, what's the thing we're going to be focusing on in the next 10 years?
Yeah, and you mentioned this a little bit right at the top, which is just the value of specificity.
and i'd love to know why you think the specificity does it why the why the six coaches earning six figures lit people's eyes up when be the best gym in the world maybe was like yeah let's let's do that but didn't didn't get people to sit up in their seats right i'd love to know what why the former does it when the latter doesn't and why it's important for us when we think about our lives to have something specific and big and hairy and audacious, and even if we don't know how we're going to get it.
What we're trying to do is that clear and compelling vision that shared and acted upon by all, the way you get them to act upon it is they get excited about it.
So they can go, oh, I can envision how that benefits me.
So as a team, you want something that will actually, if we're named the best gym in the world, they get that pride of like, hey, I work at the best gym in the world.
But again, that's the ambiguity of like are we there?
What do we have to do to get there?
When I go, hey, guys, that, when that's double most people's salaries, people stand up and go, oh, yeah, let's go do that.
I have to do extra work to make that happen.
Like sign me up. I'm on board. So that's the thing is like it's the first like I will be willing to do the extra work because that dopamine thing of like I am getting closer to my goals.
And you have to kind of say, it's literally like, I want to get in better shape.
Okay. I want to run a sub three hour marathon. Okay.
Like, I want to be under 10 % body fat.
Okay. I want like that.
It's a very specific part of it.
So I think that it's, some people might go, no, those are really transactional.
Those are extrinsic.
Those aren't the things that are going to create real happiness and fulfillment.
I don't know. I think I would really love to be spending a month because it's – here's the other part is I do think that they all should be tied to, especially these personal ones, and we'll get this.
Maybe we'll – but vision, a stronger vision has to do with how are you going to be spending your days rather than what are you going to have?
have so when i say cape house and a month out west skiing that is not because i want my friends to look at me and go oh my gosh look at that he has a vacation home it's not because i see it as investment that will increase my my my net worth it's because i i can see having that home what my days are going to look like i can envision with the family what like what us waking up in the the morning at our own place.
And that's going to be, that's amazing.
It's like some of the best times of my life are spent in that spot.
Similar is if we are spending that time, I'm with my kids, like I'm with my wife, I have a calm, I can, it's like a big part of this is like, there's a calmness with those two things.
So it's what do those two things represent?
It's not that I want those to To boost my ego and go like the status and the wealth games.
It is, if I have those two things, those are representative of how I'm of my everyday, what that's going to look like of not just my everyday, but if I'm going to be skiing out west for four or five weeks every winter, that represents my physical capacity.
That represents my financial freedom.
That represents the things that I'm thinking about at that time.
So they're not just like, to me, it's very different than I want a Ferrari.
That would not be the thing.
That's very different to me than I want to own half a million dollars in Bitcoin.
It's not have the things to have the things.
It's what those things represent.
Yep. I like that. you know it's both obvious but perhaps worth pointing out is this the word vision it needs to be something that we can see in our minds in our imaginations and i like what you just did and i think it's a it's a helpful maybe trigger or spark for the conversation or thinking you know folks out there thinking which is like what do i what and who do i want to see what or who do i want to who do i want to be with what do i want to feel right like these actual like like tangible things that you want in your life that you want to be able to do in your life for the people you want to
be around, start with those things and then work backwards from a, what does that actually look like?
What is, what is an exciting vision of a life that does those things?
And I think that that's the beginning of, if folks don't have a vision for themselves, the beginning of creating or constructing a vision for themselves.
I would love to know So before I move on to anti -vision, a two -part question.
One is, do you get the sense that most people have a vision for their lives?
And then two, if not, what holds people back from having this big, hairy, audacious goal, the mission, the purpose, the values, et cetera?
What is the barrier that stands in the way of having these things, having this vision that will allow us to move in the direction that we hope to move?
So to answer the first one, do I think most people do?
The answer is sadly no, I don't.
And the kind of understanding of that or the reason I feel like that is most businesses don't have this.
Most businesses don't have the clear and compelling vision that is acted and shared upon by all.
And the reason that they don't is not for a lack of understanding the impact it might have, but twofold.
First is the inability to pop out of the busyness and the urgency of the day to look at the more important, right?
And we've talked about this a lot from Covey, urgent versus important.
important and they're just they have to pay the bills they have to cover for their employees they have to make the next widgets they have to do manage the next partner relationships and they don't create the time to be able to and here's the second part work this through this as a framework and if you don't have the framework this is a messy process because if I was to ask somebody that hadn't been exposed to this key pillars vision statement mission and big heritage's goal and gone what is the vision for your life that you don't know where to start and because you don't know where to start you
don't like if i ask you like do you want to get into shape every single person is raising their hand saying yes and i say okay what are you going to do to get in better shape and the hands start to go down.
It's the same thing with this.
Like, do you want a more aligned, inspired and fulfilled life?
Every hand goes up.
I say, what does that framework look like?
What does it look like to have an aligned, inspired and fulfilled life?
And the hands start to go back down.
So when you allow somebody the space to be able to explore this with the framework, it's more like plug and play.
It's more Mad Libs.
It's more fill in the blank as opposed to this esoteric thought experiment of please come up with a vision for what your life wants to look like and people don't know where to start.
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Let us introduce the idea of anti -vision because it would allow us to continue this conversation with a slightly different different angle.
This idea of an anti -vision, I first came across it not even that long ago in a book called The Art of Focus by Dan Coe.
So I'm just going to read a little bit from that book just as a way to enter into this conversation or this part of the conversation.
Dan Coe writes this, it's easier to know what you don't want from experience than it is to know what you want from imagination.
But realize that imagination holds a lot of power.
You need experience to fuel imagination.
And when the two are combined, you create a frame that is impossible to distract your focus.
Create an anti -vision for your future.
Write out every single thing you don't want, why you don't want it, and how you are going to avoid it.
What does an unfulfilling day look like to you?
What kind of person would you avoid as a significant other?
How do you not want to look, feel, and act?
How much money is too little to sustain your lifestyle?
Why is it too little?
What won't you be able to do with that money?
What environment would you hate living in?
Why? So again, just as an entry point to this idea of the anti -vision here, I love what he broke down there, or he kind of breaks down there, which is like these four categories that we can begin to construct our anti -vision around, which is our daily life, our work life, our relationships, and our financial life.
So let's just maybe start there.
Yeah, so just to start and double down on that, I think it's really cool to say what he laid out there is when you combine this experience with imagination.
I love those words of, I'm gonna probably butcher it, but it's impossible to distract yourself from that vision.
Me, like if you are able to, it's very much what we do with the business and what I try to do when I, I track this on a daily basis.
Like, am I doing the things that are aligned with getting me closer to my vision?
You are on a path. There is no standing still.
If you are standing still, you are walking, you are taking a step backwards because the world's continually moving forward. So standing still is backwards.
If you're not actively taking steps forward closer to your vision, you're not in alignment.
And that's a really yucky feeling.
So I want to just like, that is so cool.
It's like from my experience I've had in the past, which have massively shaped my vision going forward. I don't want that job I had before.
I don't want to wash dishes.
I've done that. I don't want to work in a restaurant.
I've done that. I don't want to work in a cubicle.
I've done that. I don't want lack of purpose or meaning with my work.
I've done that. I don't want to be surrounded with these types of people.
I've been there. It feels crappy.
I don't. So it is so much easier to say what you don't want than maybe what you do want from imagination.
But it is the combination of the two that are the real power.
But yes, you broke those down into four categories, daily life, work life, environment, and relationships.
Relationships? Is that right?
Yep. Okay. Daily life, work life, relationships, financial life.
I don't know if you just said that but in a different order.
Yeah, I don't either.
We'll say we got it.
Yeah. So let's start with daily life.
Okay. So what do I not want?
And again, from experience, I know this.
I don't want to wake up.
I'm going to say the word because I think it's going to paint a better picture for this.
I don't want to wake up hungover.
Now, hungover doesn't necessarily mean I've drank too much. Hungover could be from a lot of things, right?
Hungover could be from lack of sleep.
Hungover could be just from like staying up too late or whatever it is, or too much stress or eating really crappy or lack of excitement in my life.
Basically, like I don't want to wake up and go, I want to stay under the covers.
Like that's the first thing is like, I really don't want that.
I, when I start my day, I, I don't want to be reactive.
radioactive meaning i don't want to start my day responding to the urgency around me that i have no control over from emails and text messages to interruptions to shout out to cal newport who was just on the show but no deep work right all this is like a shallow busyness with no actual meaning or productivity yeah i don't want to have my day filled with um a kind of solitude or lots of people around, but no real connection, like surface level conversations, right?
Just full of small talk.
So I want the space to be by myself, to think deeply, but I also want to be able to connect deeply with others, with shared passions, shared values.
I want to move. So as a vision, I should say this the other way.
I don't want to be sedentary, right?
I don't want physical stillness.
because I've had that as well.
I want to feel alive.
It's just like, I want to feel alive.
And if I am still or sedentary, I feel my body rotting.
It's one of those things that I've internalized and it's when it values, right?
This is what values, key pillars, as you said, Health is for me.
What I have told myself is if you're not moving, if you're not training, if you're not active, if you're not doing that thing, you're rotting away.
What does that do? It builds my identity, which it builds my behaviors, which takes actions.
Then it becomes that self -fulfilling loop.
You want to actually tell yourself these stories of how you build the important things in your lives.
That's how they become, you operationalize the key pillars.
With that, I don't want to be lazy, meaning nothing really excites me.
I'm not interested in things.
I'm more passive. There's no levels of curiosity.
And instead, I kind of sit on the sidelines and judge.
Right? That to me is like a terrible existence.
I want to be in the arena doing, building, creating.
People point fingers, that's fine.
I'm okay with that.
but I don't want to be lazy.
I don't do well with lazy and maybe it's because I have some laziness built into me.
So when I succumb to it, I'm like, don't you do that.
I feel like one of the biggest things I'm fighting against is the drift, which is I'm just on the river going down at the speed of the river, not controlling where I'm going.
And this is one of of the big reasons is this we talked about this but this fear i have of like if i take a couple days off from the gym i'm like i'm gonna end up like the end of dodgeball you know like ben stiller like i just i and that's the story i tell it so i've stay active like i want i don't want to drift at all i like that because you just combine the two things there which is just being on a lazy river you've talked about lazy talk about river which where you're just you're just imagining yourself on a lazy river, but it's also really important to point out, at least I'm assuming a little
bit, but we've talked about this before, like you've had in the past times when you weren't active and you remember what that was like.
You remember what it was like to be on the lazy river and not on the active path.
And so that's where this anti -vision is really strong because it's not what we said at the time.
It's not the imagination.
I don't know, Matt, like I'm not imagining a life in which I'm not active.
I remembering a life where I wasn't active and how that felt and the results of those things.
And so I'm bringing those memories up.
And instead of beating myself up for them, instead of being shamed by them, and probably therefore pushing them away and not thinking about them, I'm using them as firepower to push me forward and not drag me backwards.
That's exactly right.
This is a big thing is, you know, we've talked about this where I have a happy list on my phone.
Like what are things that bring me joy and happiness?
What are of things that if I do repeatedly, I feel will create fulfillment in my life.
This is that opposite list, right?
And the only way you create this list, either of those lists is through experience.
You go through that hard weeks of training and or launching the product and burning the midnight oil.
In the moment, it feels really hard and challenging, but you go, wow, that was awesome.
So then you realize that that's the thing that makes you feel awesome.
These things like Like when I don't talk to my family or I feel like if you and everyone's had this experience like you're a little bit more disconnected.
You travel and you miss the phone calls and you spent the day not talking to your family.
You go to bed that night with this level of anxiety, of this disconnection, of this yuckiness.
So of this wondering, right?
Like I take out the wondering in the bad way, not wondering of curiosity, wonder of like fear and judgment.
Right. So from these experience that were sub optimal experiences, you now have this avoid list. Like this is what I don't want this thing to look like.
This is the anti vision.
decision so made a round out like what the day looks like is uh you know maybe the other things is uh there's just this like like emotional immaturity right which is like again this reactive thing but not reactive to the urgency of the outside stimulus but like this idea that like i'm not centered I hate the idea of living a life where something from the outside can knock my inside off -center.
And I want to feel confident.
I want to feel in control.
I want to feel like I have agency over my life.
I want to feel like I'm living in alignment.
and here's maybe the biggest one of the bigger ones is I want that I don't want that feeling because I've had this as well as which is I've done something wrong and man I hope I don't get found out right that is such a terrible feeling you know and it could be like as a kid right you You snuck out of the house and like, hope I don't get caught.
Like, terrible feeling.
You just did something that isn't aligned with your values.
And it's a small, you know, like, oh, like just carrying.
I want to feel light.
I don't want to feel heavy.
I don't want to carry around burdens or guilts or inconsistencies.
I don't want my mind to have to try to play those games.
dreams. I want peace of mind.
So free of regrets, free of disappointment, free of what ifs.
So that's a big one for me is just that, again, as you said, I like, what is the feeling I have?
I don't, I really want, I don't want anxiety.
I want to feel light.
I want calm, all of that.
How do you, how do you, when you think about these things for an anti -vision, vision, how conscious are you of the vision that you've also laid out for yourself?
Or are we or are they separate just in the sense of what you're trying to identify or what we're trying to identify are those moments of feeling like I am not like this isn't it, whether it's today or whether it's this month or whether it's my job or whether it's this relationship, how much should we try to connect or tie or align the vision and the anti -vision?
I think they're one in the same.
So it just said, which way are you pushing something away or pulling something towards you?
Yep. Is it, are you focusing on the haves or the have -nots?
Are you - The do's or the do -nots.
correct so in my i i want i want the feeling i have when i am close with my parents i want that feeling so what do i not want i don't want to feel distance separate i don't know which one i like but it's that you ask an athlete like which do you like more do you like winning more or do you you hate losing more and it is not the right answer, but it, it doesn't matter.
It's both the same things as you want a certain outcome.
So in order for me to avoid the bad feelings I have of when I feel disconnected from my parents, now I put in the action step points, which is why I actually track these things.
So I have, you know, love as one of my things that I want to be paying paying attention to.
And I make sure that I call my parents at least a couple of times a week.
And that's really simple.
I've also gone through periods where I don't track that and it goes off the rails, right?
And I don't even realize I haven't done it because the urgency and all the other things and the busyness take over and you get like eight, nine, 10 days and you're like, oh my God, I almost don't even want to call them right now because Because you start telling like are they upset that I haven't called them?
And now you're like, well, I'm not going to call them today because I just don't want to deal with that if there is sort of any like passive aggressiveness towards this.
And there probably isn't, but I just want to – so you put off another – it's like, holy cow.
So how do you avoid that feeling where you're storytelling, where there's anxiety, where there's that unhealthy wonder?
and the way to do it is to steer towards these other things good relationships what does good relationship mean it means that you're the frequency for me for my parents it's frequency of you kind of like go okay what is it for each one of these things for heather it is it's a combination of a bunch of things right but one of the big ones i've realized with heather is she is is time and touch like she gets tons out of a hug right for my dad it is about just frequency like it's like if there's long as long as there's a conversation it doesn't get weird and even more so my mom probably so it's like
you understand from their perspective what's going to keep this thing going down the right path yeah yeah the little quote we started this with this idea of It's easier to know what you don't want from experience than it is to know what you do want from imagination.
And thinking about the question I asked a little bit ago about why people don't have one of these and what to do to begin to design a vision for yourselves with even the framework that we gave. I actually think that sitting down and writing sort of what you just did for us, but in each one of these categories, daily life, work life, relationships, and financial life is literally come up with, and this is kind of what I did when I first came across this idea of anti -vision, is like, I just want three to five things that explain what I don't want.
Again, based on everything that I know, based on my experience, based on the context, based on where my life is now.
and that's really, I think, a really good place because once you have that on paper, you can simply say, not simply, but you can say, what is the opposite of this?
What is the life that, what life exists if these things aren't happening, if I'm not doing these things?
And at least it can begin to give you a first draft of what that vision might look like.
And I think that could be a really helpful for folks who maybe haven't sat down to create a vision for their lives.
I think 10, 15, 20 things that you do not want, that you do not want your life to look like, and then just flip your perspective and say, okay, well, if that was a different person, what would their life look like if they lived according to that vision?
There's a, there's kind of two different approaches to this.
One is like top down and the the other one is like bottom up and the vision exercise is like top down like okay what's your purpose like what what do you feel like your would give you a fulfilled life and what is your mission that's very top down what are your key pillars the other one which you're saying is bottom up which you can go what do i not want and not even what do i not want the answer is that is my vision What do I not want?
And then you go, what are the actions I'm going to take every day to make sure that that doesn't happen?
That's the bottom up.
And then you start to go, okay, because it goes identity, beliefs, actions, right?
So identity, beliefs, actions.
If you don't know what your identity is, you don't understand how to get this process started.
You don't know what the beliefs are that you have. My key pillars, my values.
Start with the other parts.
Start with the actions.
And just start with what you don't want.
Like, I don't want to be addicted to cigarettes.
Okay. What do you need to do to make sure you're not addicted to cigarettes?
Don't ever buy cigarettes.
Maybe don't hang out with people that smoke.
That makes it a whole lot easier.
And now you, I'm just putting that because it's It's such a black and white, easy one.
But the other ones are, okay, I don't want to be ashamed of my body.
I don't want to be living paycheck to paycheck.
I don't want to be in a toxic, abusive relationship.
What are the things we need to do to make sure that that doesn't happen?
And all of a sudden your actions start spinning up towards your belief system.
You go, this is what I believe.
This is who I am. This is what I value.
you. And then you kind of work on the vision in a more direct and concrete begin with the end in mind from there.
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I want to begin to move into the conversation about kind of integrating these ideas or putting these ideas into action, maybe a little bit more practically.
I want to start with a little excerpt from, we send out every weekday in the morning, we send out something called the Daily Chase, which is to our Chase Club members at chasingexcellence .email.
There's just these short little essays, just kind of get our day started.
And this is from Daily Chase number 23, which is, Think of it like sailing.
Knowing your destination is crucial, but being aware of the hazards you want to avoid is equally important.
When you have both ends of the spectrum clearly defined, what you're moving toward and what what you're moving away from, you create a complete picture of your life's direction.
This clarity becomes particularly valuable when you're faced with decisions like a traveler with both a map and a list of places to avoid.
You can more easily recognize when you're veering towards something you've specifically identified as undesirable.
So I read that just to move us into like what does it actually look like to use the vision and use the anti -vision as a filter through which we make decisions, as a means by which we say this way or that way or yes or no. How do we because I think it's really easy.
And I've fallen into this trap myself, which is like, oh, I have my vision.
It's all set up and I've got this anti -vision.
But my daily decisions don't ultimately change very much, or at least not to the degree that I'd like them to.
And so how do we begin to bring the vision, the anti -vision down from the clouds and into the dirt?
Yeah, so this is a matter of operationalizing.
So you take these statements, you take these beliefs, you take these principles, and you bring them down into the daily actions so that you're doing more of it than you are not, right?
Right. And you're and said another way that the ones that are pull you away, you're doing less of than you are.
So for so for myself, so I have what I what I I'm trying to steer towards.
We've talked about this before, but I have 20 things that I track on a daily basis to make sure that I'm steering in the right direction.
And every month something might get tweaked of those 20 or something might drop off and a new one might come on.
But directionally, they're all the same.
One category has to do with my health.
So it's, again, obviously a huge Stephen Covey fan.
I think that if there's one self -help book to read and basically every other self -help book that's ever been invented is a derivative of seven habits.
And he says, basically, we all have these four core parts of our lives, which is to live, love, lead, and learn.
He says leave a legacy, but I call that leadership because it's not about building statues.
It's not about that.
But his idea is share, share your wisdom, so that the people – you're impacting others.
So that's leadership.
Leadership would come in the form of mentoring, helping, or charity, or whatever you want to call it.
Parenting. Parenting, for sure.
So live, love, lead, and learn.
And what I've done is of those, I create four or five of different things to track on a daily basis of those things.
So if for me, I figured out what are the things that anti -vision that are missing out of my life for enough period of time, I start to feel weird about them.
And that is things like if we don't have family dinner every night, but we don't have family dinner for like five nights in a row.
that starts to feel weird. I want to make sure that's not the case.
So I'm tracking when was the last time we had a family dinner and hopefully there's more checkboxes than not.
It doesn't have to be perfect.
It's the same thing that I'll do for different things in terms of my health.
And this is probably the one that rotates the most. Honestly, because I go on different little kicks.
So it'll be, how often am I running?
In the summer, a lot of times I'll have running in there or am I doing 10 minutes of mobility every day so what I found is like if I don't do mobility for ten minutes long enough I start to feel weird so it's like yeah we have a saying in the business in the business which is don't don't don't let it be weird mm -hmm right if you have something to say to somebody and you don't say it to them you kind of hold it yourself or you even worse like say it to somebody else that's gonna be weird right if coaches are talking to their classes and there's side conversations going on, the coach doesn't realize
that's weird. Like if you went into any classroom at any grade and the teacher was presenting and some of the students were having their own side conversations, that's weird. So like, don't let it get weird. So what are the things that are going to keep you on the path?
Don't let it get weird. Like stay on the path.
So this is how you operationalize it.
you go here are the things that are important to me what are the things I'm going to do on a daily or certainly a weekly basis.
I don't call my parents every day but I try to make sure that they both get called every week.
I need at least two check marks on there and that are going to move me closer to my goals and sometimes those change a little bit like right now I'm very much focused on deepening my male friendships.
You know I think this happens as you get closer to 50.
I'm starting to feel it certainly in my 40s.
But now that I'm almost 50 now, this is a very obvious void in my life.
So I'm tracking that now.
I'm like, what am I doing to make sure that I'm getting closer to that goal of vision?
I want deeper, more meaningful male relationships in my life.
How am I going to do that?
It's turning vision into action.
You operationalize it, you track it, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant, if you are making the incremental moves, the aggregation of marginal gains, the accumulation of very small things, accumulate, they compound into very, very big things.
So this is how we do it, is we just make sure that we are living in alignment with our vision.
so a clear and compelling vision that is shared and acted upon by all I'm not sure we're actually putting this into practice I do something similar with the tracking obviously inspired by stuff we've talked about before I do it slightly different I've got 18 things to track and I do them across 6 different categories the 6 categories are the 5 factors slightly broader though I do move instead of training so that I can have more than just one checkbox So for me, it's the three things in the, in the move category are trained, but it's also get 9 ,000 steps.
And then the third one is to cross over symmetry.
So obviously just like you, like, it's not, it's not every day, but those have been in mine as well.
Yeah. And so, so I do, I do move, think, connect, rest instead of sleep, because again, sleep is pretty narrow.
Sleep is like the number one of the check marks, but then I do other things like read fiction or watch comedy.
And then I've got another one.
And then the sixth one though, is actually vision.
And so I've got three check marks for vision, one of them being review the plan.
So in other words, I give myself credit for actually reading through the vision, reading through the anti -vision, reading through one thing that I want to get to, which is what I think Cal Newport called the narrative test when we talked to him recently, which is to write out what an ideal day looks like.
And so anyways, my point is, though, similar to you is, I've got these things that I can look at and say, am I moving in the right direction?
Are my days focused on the things that matter?
Or am I distracted by whatever I might be distracted by?
And when you do that over a long enough period, you can say, oh, wow, I'm really trending up or I'm trending down or I'm really missing this thing.
Why am I missing this thing?
Why aren't I doing crossover symmetry three to five times a week?
Like I say, I should like I like I want to.
do. That's like, Okay, I haven't figured out when in the day I should be doing it.
So like, I can go backwards a little bit and say, Alright, well, when am I going to do cross?
So you can sort of like, figure out on a on a very logistical sense of when am I going to do the things that I say are the important things.
And then in a similar way, what I found is, when you fill your plate up with fruits and vegetables and lean protein, you just simply have less room to eat a cookie or the bread or whatever it might be.
And I think the same thing happens when you intentionally fill your day with the actions and the activities that move you towards your vision and away from your anti -vision is you simply have less time for the things that don't matter.
You have less time for Netflix because you know, tomorrow morning, I'm going to have to either say, yes, I got enough sleep or I didn't get enough sleep, right?
You can give yourself yourself a bit of a check on the laziness or the bad behaviors or the distractions or whatever it might be that on a daily basis slowly slowly slowly pull us away but those slow slow slow pulls away after a month or after three months you'll look back and you'll think like i haven't talked to my mom in three months i haven't gotten to the gym in three months and you're like six tuesdays ago you didn't realize it but when you have these things in place you can look back and say, that's when it started to fall apart.
And then you can also say, this is how I'm going to fix it.
I love that, man. Yeah.
I think the fact that you give yourself credit, if you will, or at least it's a check in, like, am I doing this thing?
And that is a, that I do that as well.
And I think it's a, I think it's an important part of this is that you're giving yourself credit for, as you said, doing the important things.
Well, one of the important things things is tracking this so I give my one of my check boxes like am I tracking it'd be crazy to say no like that's not that's that's gonna be there it's gonna be it's like no like if this didn't happen it would feel weird after a while so you want to keep that going so I congruence and then the second part is just that idea that we've heard a bunch is you know show me your calendar and I'll show you your values.
I'll tell you what's important to you.
I think that's partly true because your calendar isn't always what ends up happening.
Totally. The actual thing, it's kind of that idea that time isn't the most valuable thing.
It's attention. It's not you being at the dinner table with the family because you'd be at the dinner table with the family doing email under the phone underneath the table like, and not really giving them attention.
That could almost be worse than you not being there at all.
Right. So it's not time, it's attention.
Well, it's not your calendar, it's the actions.
It's what you're actually doing because you could have workouts in the calendar every morning, but are you actually going to do that?
Right. And it's not even so much the calendar.
You get no credit for putting it in the calendar.
Right. And there's a lot of things that don't get put into a calendar, right?
Like I don't have call mom on the calendar.
I don't have hug Heather on the calendar.
Both of those things are on my checklist. Like literally I have a checkbox every day.
Did I hug Heather yesterday?
Because I know how valuable one of her love language is physical touch. And she feels that.
She feels love when I do that.
There's nothing more that I want in my life.
My first principle is family first. Dot, dot, dot.
If they need me, I come running.
That's what I see. Like, what does that mean when you say family first?
Well, it just means that like, if push comes to shove, you ask like, how do you actually make decisions?
You make decisions in peacetime so that when the battle comes, when it's wartime, decisions have already been made.
So Heather didn't grow up this way.
I did. And she's seen the value of this.
I grew up that, like, if something was happening in your family, we've had plenty of family issues and problems and my parents are separated and divorced so we're not the Brady Bunch and far, far from it.
But one of the really important things that I inherited as a value was if your family needs you, you drop everything and you come running to them and you sit next to them until the storm has passed.
so there was a time when heather and i were first first together that um her her dad went into the hospital he fell and this and they were like it's not a big deal don't come down and so anyway that's what they're telling heather heather called me at work she's like hey my dad fell he's in the hospital i was like i'll be there in three minutes and she's like beware i was like i'll be home in three minutes.
We're going to drive down to Connecticut and go see him.
She's like, you, I've seen your calendar.
You have like six meetings after you.
I was like, it doesn't matter, right?
Like it is that thing.
So you're, I'm setting it up ahead of time.
Cause otherwise I go, yeah, you're right.
He said he's okay. And the doctors don't think it's a big deal.
Cool. Because I did have these three meetings.
It would be kind of a big deal to kind of reschedule those.
One of them's really important to potential partner and you justify it.
But then now what what we're doing is we're not living in congruence with our values.
You said beforehand this was the way we were going to conduct ourselves.
Now, because you're truly up against it, there's no decisions.
You go do those things.
So you're saying this is what my life is going to look like across a week, a month, and a year.
These are the values to me.
These are the things I'm going to do.
So I am going to go to the gym six days a week.
Now it's just a matter of like, Like that's the deal.
Like we're doing that thing.
You said it. Don't – this is one of the – don't negotiate with your mind.
Like your mind is a terrible thing to negotiate.
It's going to have all of these biases and this default programming and this thing that's going to edge towards immediate pleasure versus long -term fulfillment always.
And when it's pushed up against it, it's the reason that you go, next summer I want to look great.
because when it's far enough away you can all your mind is always going to go yup and guess what we're going to do we're going to get shape and we're going to eat right we're going to start running and lifting we're going to get we're going to have a six pack and we get down to the beach everyone's like oh my god you're in such good that feels so good and then guess what happens when it's you know four months before that when you need to be doing those things and someone's like, you want a cookie?
You're like, yeah. Yep.
That's the misalignment.
Your story or your explanation of what that value looks like reminds me of my dad.
Anytime I was growing up, you know, in college and I'd call my dad, he'd always, and he was at work, he would always pick up the phone.
And it was only five to 10 minutes into the conversation that I'd realize he was in the middle of a meeting, but he always picked up the phone.
And he was obviously to the day he still does.
I want to wrap up this conversation with something that actually is new for me in terms of my vision, my anti -vision, this practice, this daily practice for me.
And it comes from the conversation we had with Cal Newport.
You mentioned this a little bit.
He had this idea of like, at the end of our conversation with him, I think we started talking about like, how do you actually put some of this deep life, these deep life principles into practice?
And his advice was to actually create a narrative of what your ideal day looks like.
Yeah, I love that. And I think, you know, there's something that I probably played with before, but for whatever reason, it never stuck.
And so I sat down after that conversation and actually sort of started thinking through this and actually came up with, I reframed it a little bit because I've always had trouble with this idea of the ideal life because the ideal life is like, well, I wake up in a hammock in Fiji, right?
Like, okay, that's great, but that's not particularly helpful in building toward this vision, I guess, unless you want to move to Fiji, in which case, go for it.
But for me, so what I what I what I reframed it as is, what does an excellent day look like?
And then so so with that in mind, it's like writing a narrative of your of your excellent day focused on the environment, activities and people that contribute to your subjective well -being.
And so I think this is if nothing else, at the end of this conversation, I think this is a really good exercise because I think you can start to peel back into anti vision because like, well, what is an op?
What is the opposite of that excellent day look like?
And where in my life?
Am I not meeting that standard?
And then okay, if this is an excellent day, then what does that mean for the bigger picture?
What does it mean for the life I'm trying to lead?
What is it? What hints does it give me towards my purpose or my mission or my values?
And so I don't know if you have it if you've got if you've done that exercise before, but I think that's a good place to maybe end this conversation and begin to end this conversation.
And also give a little bit of homework is to like sit down for an hour and come up with like, give me Give me the story of what a great day looks like.
Yeah, I do that practice frequently, actually.
I have it written down at least every year for the last 10 years I've done that.
Usually it's a lot more frequently than that.
And I think this is, I love that you're bringing this up because I think this is the most powerful exercise.
Because we talk about as you're taking this kind of esoteric thing of like, well, I want calmness.
I want peace of mind.
I want health. I want and go, no, what I actually would.
think is a little bit more helpful is the concrete, right?
Six coaches making six figures.
But even actually that is like, okay, if that is the thing, what we want to do is go, what is the actual day going to look like?
And actually break it down into a daily schedule.
Now, you might go, well, wait a minute.
Like my ideal, excellent, is that there is no schedule.
I have this freedom to do all these things.
Okay. But still, you can still break it down.
So what does it look like?
What are the component parts?
Mine is just kind of without going like letters of the letter, but I would like to wake up around 630 without an alarm clock, fully refreshed and excited.
Like that's what step number one, from there, a quote, slow morning where I'm reading, journaling, it's quiet.
There's a little bit of outside with a little bit bit of nature.
There's a little bit of kids, but it's quiet, calm, and very reflective.
From there, it's exercise.
I want to go and I want to exercise.
And what does that exercise look like?
A really big, long mobility piece, like 45 minutes.
I love that. I feel great with that, followed by some strength and some higher intensity stuff.
Then from there, it's a late breakfast with my wife.
Hopefully my kids can be a part of that as well.
Outside with really fresh, great food.
The early afternoon is or mid -morning is about work.
So working on really meaningful things, building, creating, doing things with other passionate high performers in a collaborative affirmative environment where we are making, building, and trying to create a more meaningful, exciting future.
That's the big thing for me.
I just want to make the future better.
So whatever I can do there.
Then from there, the early afternoon is active.
So something like pickleball or go for a bike ride or a swim, skiing, something active.
The evening or earlier or evening is a early dinner and then i love to go and like get out into the yard and like anything was like stay in the backyard with a hose like i'm such like a that or like yeah or like like making like building a rock wall like that type of thing is like i just love love love then from there because also what those represent is space stillness contemplation self -diagnosis like digging in introspection and also the opposite of busyness right so it's also ensuring that you're not putting things on your plate making commitments that you don't want to make yeah uh then from there
it's again a really great healthy dinner um and then more quiet time with others so our dinners are usually kind of lead into that and by quiet i don't mean like whispers.
I assume, like, no distractions, like, fully present.
If Maya is there, our 25 -year -old, it's not quiet, like Hurricane Maya.
But it is with people that, like, are really close, deep, connected to people.
And then, from there, it's an early bedtime.
That's really, it's like, then from there, it's like shutting it down.
And starting the bedtime process process really slowly.
Like, I love, like, it's kind of like the same thing as the early morning, like you're turning a dial into the day, right?
Where you kind of turn the dial, you get up and then mid morning is the peak of activity and mental.
Like, and then it's kind of the winding back down.
Um, so that's my, that's my ideal.
I try to, and what I'm my goal.
And I think that this is the right way to do this, at least it's one of the better ways I've found, is that explorative process and then the every day, week, month, and year, how can I get closer to that is the actual thing.
And then I actually interject that into yearly as well.
So meaning I want to have a quarterly adventure.
So in the summer, I want to be spending majority of my time on the beach, on the Cape with my family, on boats.
And then in the fall, I want to do some sort of hike or some sort of outdoor thing.
Winter, skiing, hopefully out West or big mountain stuff.
Spring, do some sort of like adventure with friends.
So that's very a Jesse Itzler type thing where he's like, he has all these different, like you take your daily vitamins and then you You have these big, meaningful peak moments every quarter.
So it's kind of like an inflection point.
So you get out of the routine and you're lodging onto meaningful memories.
And then he has this kind of like, I forget what he calls it, someone's rule, Calvin's rule or something like that, where every month you're supposed to go and just kind of do something out of the ordinary as well.
I like that. All right.
Anything wrapping up this conversation about vision, anti -vision, and putting those things into practice before we bounce?
It really goes down to what we've kind of laid as our overall framework, the three big pillars, which is awareness, intention, action.
You need the awareness of what are the things that are going to move you closer to your goals, the strategies, the intention about how to go and actually do that, create the frameworks, create the game plan, create the tactics, tactics, create the ways that I'm going to get closer to that.
And then none of it really matters until you take action and actually doing the thing today.
And everyone starts a diet on Monday.
And it's like, nope, it starts today.
Like you just have to start right now.
Thank you very much for tuning into the show.
Make sure you're subscribed wherever you're listening or watching.
So you do not miss another episode for more frameworks and daily practices.
is visit chasing excellence dot email and don't forget to tap the link in the show notes for today's full listener guide where we break down the key ideas and provide actionable steps to put them into practice until next time keep building health finding freedom and living with your heart on fire oikos presents 15 seconds of strength here we go steve's got a trunk full of groceries and no one to help him oh that's tough jim looks like a five trip load at least He grabs the first bag, the second.
Bob, it looks like he's trying to do it on one trip.
He shimmies the door open, steps over the dog.
Oh, and he stumbles.
Oh, right into the kitchen without missing a beat.
Jim, now that's a man who eats his protein -packed Oikos.
With 15 grams of complete protein in each cup, Oikos Triple Zero can help build strength for every day.
Oikos, stronger makes everything better.
