Tag: Motivation

Cool, Daily Life, Motivation

A State Of Flow

Have you ever had that feeling when you’re working on something, maybe writing or a woodworking project in the garage, and time just disappears? You blink and two hours went by? That’s the flow state. It’s the state where we’re maximally primed for learning, acquiring new skills, knowledge, and productivity. We all want to be in the flow state.

I recently read a book called “Gnar Country: Growing Old, Staying Rad” by Steven Kotler. I knew nothing about him or the book. The description talked about the authors desire to improve as a 50+ year old skier. I am both a skier and 50+, so I was sold. What I didn’t expect was that the book was more about general self-improvement, motivation, and using the flow state to gain physical skills than it was about skiing. Skiing just happened to be the activity he was trying to get better at.

I was instantly intrigued by this idea of the flow state. I didn’t realize it at the moment, but I’ve had it a few times this season skiing – and it was identical to what the author described. About to drop down a line that’s slightly steeper and more technical than my skill level. That little feeling of nervousness/fear in the pit of your stomach. Launching down the run and having 100% concentration on every move. Finishing and having that little moment of elation as you realize, holy shit I did it! Suddenly you’re super excited to do it again or find another hard run. Flow state.

That nervousness, concentration, and final little hit of dopamine is what primes the pump for learning. Looking back, I realized that there were only three other activities where I’ve legitimately been in the flow state. The first was way back when I was a software engineer. Every once in a while, while trying to solve a hard problem I’d find time would simply disappear. Three hours of coding could easily go by before I’d look up and realize what time it was. The second has been trying to teach myself video editing. Hours can go by as I master one transition or effect after another. The final scenario has been as a nurse. Dealing with an intense trauma situation, focus gets incredibly concentrated, and time disappears.

Learning video editing is a great example. I’ll see someone’s video and wonder; hmm how did they do that? Do some research, trial and error, and you have something that sort of looks like what you saw. More tweaking. More polishing. Suddenly, whoa I did it! The key is that little bump of dopamine. You want more. You try another effect. And all of a sudden, it’s hours later.

As a sidebar, I recently read that social media is one of the main reasons our younger generation has such a profound lack of curiosity. Broadly speaking they’re not interested in exploring, going outside, or risk taking. The reason is that the endless scrolling on TikTok or Instagram keeps giving them little bumps of dopamine. They don’t need to find another outlet for that min-rush. Having an entire generation numbed by constant scrolling on a screen is a disturbing trend long-term I suspect.

Anyway, I was intrigued by this idea enough that I researched the author’s other books. Turns out he’s also written a book called “The Art of the Impossible: A Peak Performance Primer“. This one delves into the neurophysiology of how and why the flow state happens, and how to cue yourself to get into the flow state. I’m about halfway done and find it fascinating.

The author has a level of discipline and motivation that I don’t think I could achieve… but if I could adopt even just 25% of what he does, my productivity would massively improve. Now, I’m not looking to build the next great start-up company or launch a non-profit to feed the hungry. But I am looking to have more focus and purpose with what I do with my time. The ideas the author has around routine and finding that flow state seem ideal to help me direct my energy.

And going back to that first book, while I may not (will not) ever be hucking off cliffs on skis – I would like to make that next big transition in my skiing ability. Just like the author did in Gnar Country, starting the day after this ski season ends (which is next week) on a program to be ready to enter the flow state next season is a worthy goal.

The problem is it involves squats. Lots of squats.

I hate squats.

Health, Motivation

All-Cause Mortality Rates

“Milk is for babies. When you grow up you have to drink beer.”

― Arnold Schwarzenegger

Have I mentioned that I hate the gym? I’ve never liked it. It’s always been something that I half-heartedly do because I know I should. Some years I’m better at it than others, but it’s never been a real habit. I’ve been more diligent the last six months because I started seeing changes in my balance and coordination. But lately I’ve been slacking off due to my reoccurring stomach issues. It’s hard to be motivated to go lift heavy stuff when your stomach is all queasy. But yesterday I watched something that (hopefully) changed my mindset forever.

I stumbled on several podcasts by Dr Peter Attia and Layne Norton. They discuss many topics, but one of them was all-cause mortality and hazard ratios – the likelihood of you dying of something. A study was done of 122,000 people with an average age of 53. The study did a Vo2 max test on the subjects and ranked them into five categories – Low, Below Average, Above Average, High, Elite. The study then correlated mortality rates to the Vo2 rankings. The results shocked me.

Just improving from the Low category to Below Average was a 50% reduction in mortality over a decade. Improve to one more category, Above Average, resulted in a nearly 70% reduction in mortality! Being in the lowest category of Vo2 max carries a higher risk of mortality than coronary artery disease, high blood pressure, and diabetes. Wow.

I’m sure I always kinda knew that having a great cardiovascular system would be a good thing as you got older. But then they followed up with a very similar look at the correlation of lean muscle mass and mortality. Past age 70, the hazard ratio of having very little lean muscle mass is greater than smoking! It turns out falls are the greatest cause of accidental death in the last decades of life. As a nurse, I can attest to this. A fall resulting in a broken hip is a near certain death sentence within 6 months to a year amongst the elderly.

So, in a nutshell being weak, fat, and having low Vo2 max is a near guarantee of an early death.

Seeing this was enough for me. I dragged my queasy-ass stomach to the gym and picked up a bunch of heavy shit for an hour. And I’m going to do it again today. And I’m going to start maximizing my Zone 2 training. One of the things that was said in the podcast is that past age 60-65 you’re realistically not going to gain muscle. The best you can hope for is to maintain what you have. So in the decade before that your goal should be to pack on as much lean muscle mass as possible.

I’ve missed out on much of that window to build muscle and strength due to general sloth and love of nachos. But it’s not too late. Every single percentage gain in lean muscle mass I can make in the next few years is an additional hedge against that hazard ratio. It finally sunk in.

Every single day of doing nothing, sitting, not moving, watching TV, gaining weight – is subtracting a day from the other end.

Think about that. Is skipping being active today because you don’t feel like it, worth dying one day earlier? I calculated out, based upon living to age 85, how many weeks I have left. About 1,600. That’s not very much when you think about it that way. It’s time to maximize those weeks to ensure I have as many as possible.

Let’s roll.

Cool, Daily Life, Motivation

Extreme Sports, Attempted

I’m not sure what I was thinking. I suspect my improved leg strength gave me a false sense of skill. Regardless of how it started, I found myself panting heavily, staring down at a series of steep drop-offs and surrounded by cliffs. How did I get myself in this predicament? Too late to back out, nothing to do but take a deep breath and 3..2..1… go.

Let’s rewind to the beginning. I am an average skier. A rockstar on the intermediate groomers, more tentative on the steeper stuff, a disaster in the crud and moguls. My problem is that I really, really like the idea of skiing in the trees. Off-piste as the Europeans would say. I just can’t figure out how to get good at it. I watch others flow through the trees and smoothly navigate big bumps and obstacles. Me on the other hand on the same terrain – a series of awkward hop turns, sliding, skidding, often ending up in a snow covered, contorted upside-down position.

This year I vowed to master the off-piste. To be one of those guys flowing through the trees. I started out with vastly improved strength, due to the time I’ve spent in the gym. That new-found strength has given me the confidence to ski hard, all day. I’ve been fortunate to be able to ski every 2-3 days, which has certainly improved my form. I started making small forays into the trees and seeking out ungroomed snow. As my skill improved, I started eying a valley known as an “experts only” area. One of the groomed runs borders the area and I kept flirting with the edge and eying the trees and chutes in the valley.

A few days ago, we had a big powder dump. I got to the resort early and did a few warm-up laps on the groomed runs. Finally, I skied down the run bordering the off-piste area and stopped at the edge. I spent quite a bit of time looking down and going over in my head what could go wrong if I dropped in. Eventually I told myself that I’d never know If I didn’t try.

Down I went. And it was awesome! While I don’t know if I was actually flowing through the trees, I handled it without any problems. I spent the rest of the day dropping in and playing in this new playground. I had a blast. The next day I skied with friends who stick to the groomers. I spent that whole day diving in and out of trees bordering the runs, seeking out all the crud and powder remnants I could find. My confidence was through the roof!

Yesterday we had another overnight snow. I hit the slopes and warmed up with a few runs. I was going to drop in where I spent the other day, then thought to myself why not drop in from the very top? With my newfound confidence, I rode the lift up and traversed around to the entrance of the expert area. There were ominous signs posted indicating this was an area for experts only and ski patrol was limited. I paused for a moment, but my excitement over my new skills won out. I went through the gates.

Things went bad from the beginning. The “trail” was a very narrow, slick, twisting route full of bumps and awkward off-camber turns. My speed was increasing, but I had no way to slow down as the trail was too narrow to turn or even snowplow. I was now flying along, borderline out of control, and definitely did not want to slide off the edge. Up ahead I spotted a wider spot in the trail and did a hard slide to bleed off speed. Unfortunately, immediately around the corner the trail turned steeply uphill and I no longer had the momentum to make it up. I came to an awkward stop on the edge. Fuck.

Now I was stuck. No way to get my skis off and hike anywhere. My only choice was down. I was looking down a narrow chute with trees at the bottom and unknown terrain below that. It took a while to get my breathing under control. I will say, committing to that first jump turn was one of the harder things I’ve done. I made my way down the chute. Jump turn. Slide, slide, jump. Over and over.

Finally, I reached the trees. This was a little easier, but there were steep cliffs everywhere and I couldn’t always tell if the edges I was skiing up to were vertical or navigable. I kept traversing across the slope, dropping down in places my skill allowed me to make turns. Eventually I made it to the wide open part of the bowl and terrain I could handle. I was drenched with sweat and my thighs were quivering.

I turned around and looked back up at what I had come down. I realized I’d come down a double black diamond called Chinook Chute. Probably one of the hardest areas in the resort. Wow. I couldn’t believe I’d done that. I started feeling pretty proud of myself. It was ugly and more sliding and slipping than actual skiing. It certainly won’t make any Warren Miller ski film highlights, but I did it and managed to not crash.

If you told me at the beginning of this season I’d be going down that, I wouldn’t have believed you. Trust me, I’m in no hurry to go back up there. It really is above my skill level. But… I’m not that far off.

The lesson is that you are capable of way more than you think you are. All it takes is the willpower to try. Yes, you may crash and burn. But if you don’t try, you’ll never know.

My problem is balancing my age, true skill, and good decision making with my new-found ego. I need to remind myself that I’m no longer twenty. At this stage of my life, do I really need to be flirting with cliffs and double black diamond runs? Probably not.

But man, it felt good to accomplish that. Hmm… maybe I could become that guy effortlessly floating through the trees?

Motivation

It’s All About The Effort

I’m sitting here with my legs quivering and on fire. My damaged back is going to bark at me the rest of the day. Why? I went mountain biking early this morning. Now wait, you might say if you’ve been a long-time reader… this guy writes all the time about going for a ride. What’s the deal? The difference is that I rode with my new next-door neighbor. He’s much younger and in good shape. I thought I’d be fine since I do ride from time to time. I was wrong.

It turns out you are a horrible judge of your own level of effort. Since I have the freedom to ride during the week, more often than not I’m riding solo. The other folks I ride with are of equal strength and conditioning. So when I’m cranking along, I think I’m putting out max effort. I’m breathing hard and it feels like I’m pushing it. But if you don’t have any way to actually measure or compare your effort, you never really know.

To keep up on this ride, I was pretty much red-lined the entire way. There was no conversation… I was too busy trying to suck in air. Same thing on the downhill. I thought I was a reasonably fast rider, but I couldn’t keep up with him going down. Here’s the interesting part. While I was working 10x as hard as he was, I generally kept up. So, I have the ability. Why haven’t I been riding at that level all along?

I think that’s what separates truly elite athletes from the rest of us. They have the ability to push themselves to their true limit day in and day out. Most of the rest of us quit way before that. It’s hard, it hurts, and we don’t really know what our actual limit is. I’ve noticed the same thing in my attempts at lifting weights. During our recent vacation, the resort gym didn’t have the same weight kettlebell as I’ve been using. So, I grabbed that bigger kettlebell and managed to do the same workout. At home, I would have been convinced that it was too heavy and hard. Why?

Clearly, I’ve been sandbagging myself and didn’t really know it. The new goal is now to make sure every workout leaves me in a quivering puddle on the floor. I will push weights to actual failure. I will ride at redline as much as possible.

Because what could go wrong? It’s not like I’m an old dude with a bad shoulder and damaged back. It’s not like I’m setting myself up for overuse injuries or anything, right?

Sitting here with my quads on fire, maybe I’ll just get an E-bike instead. Motor assist sounds pretty good right now.

Health, Motivation

It Just Hurts

When I first started out as an RN, I’ll admit I got a bit judgmental sometimes towards certain patients. It was the folks who were fairly obese, in their late 60’s or early 70’s, and lacked the strength to get off the toilet or out of a chair. As two and sometimes three of us struggled to get them standing so they could shuffle back to bed, I’d say to myself “how could anyone let themselves get to that point?” They’d reject the physical therapists who came to work with them, saying they were too tired or hurt too much to do anything today. I’d do my best to encourage them, often admonishing them that if they didn’t start moving things were only going to get worse.

I just couldn’t fathom wanting to spend your remaining years in that condition. Why didn’t they take better care of themselves? One of the more common problems we’d see with this patient population was toenails. Nasty curled and twisted daggers that hadn’t been cut in god knows how long. Often they couldn’t wear socks anymore because you couldn’t pull them on without snagging on the nails. They’d just resort to wearing sandals or slippers all the time. Why? Because they’d become so deconditioned, they couldn’t bend over enough to clip their own toenails. It just seemed so crazy to me. And when they wouldn’t work with therapy and rejected most advice to do something, anything, to help themselves… I’ll admit I developed a certain lack of sympathy.

Fast forward to today. I hurt. Everywhere. I can barely lift my arms over my head. I look like an 80-year-old walking down the stairs. The moaning and groaning when I attempt to get down on the ground is ridiculous. Why am I in this state? Well… my back injury scared me enough that I’m going full speed, hard core, with my workouts. Every day has been at least an hour in the gym. Stretching, mobility work, kettle bells, club bells, lunges, squats, medicine balls… every exercise I can find on YouTube. Plus another hour and a half of hiking hills with the dog.

The end result is that I’m sore. Everywhere. There isn’t a body part that doesn’t hurt right now. Yes, I realize that I’m probably overtraining a bit. But I’m scared. The back strain was a brief window into a potential future if I don’t fix things. And I don’t like the future I saw.

Reality, as they say, came up and bitch slapped me in the face. I was forced to admit to myself the true, current state of all things physical. I’ve never been very physically strong, so I tended to avoid gym work. I was pretty good with endurance stuff, so that’s what I did. I mountain biked, skied, and ran. And I told myself I was in decent shape. Yes, cardiovascular-wise I was. But year after year my muscles were atrophying. Now, years of ignoring strength conditioning have caught up to me. I strained my back badly while sweeping leaves. Yes, really.

Muscle atrophy and weight gain are insidious creatures. They sneak up on you. Every year a little weaker, a little heavier. As it creeps up on you, your motivation to do something about it gets less and less. Sure, you try here and there to diet or start working out again, but it’s hard. The weight doesn’t come off and you end up hungry and frustrated. Your attempts to work out leave you sore and unable to walk. It’s really hard to keep getting after it when you feel like that. Pretty quickly you abandon the diet and give up the workouts. And the atrophy keeps setting in.

And that’s where I had a very real insight into how those patients let themselves go. And I feel bad for not having more empathy for them all those years ago. It would be so easy to do. I hurt, I’m sore, I’m tired. At my age, do I really need to be trying to lift weights? Let’s just stop. A heating pad and some pain pills will make me comfortable. Blink my eyes and I’ll be that old guy struggling to get off the toilet.

No. I’m not going to do that. I refuse to give up. I know that if I just keep pushing, eventually the soreness goes away. Muscles and tendons will become more supple. The aches and pains get better. Mobility and balance improve. I will not let atrophy win.

I’ll just have to wear hats for a while… my arms hurt too much to brush my hair.

Daily Life, Motivation

I Fixed It

Remember that scene in Cast Away when Tom Hanks’ character manages to create fire? The absolute joy and dancing around as he proudly looks at what he created? Well, I did that yesterday. I created fire – both literally and figuratively. I fixed my barbeque.

Backstory. 20+ years ago we bought a multi-thousand-dollar grill. I loved that grill. It’s safe to say that we cooked 90% of our meals on the grill. But over time parts started failing. The outside of the grill still looked brand-new, but the interior not so much. Now to my shame, I should have been keeping up with maintenance on it. I’m really bad at that. Regular tear-downs and deep cleaning, replacing burners, etc… But I didn’t. So one by one the burners started failing and eventually it stopped working altogether.

I really didn’t want to go out and spend gobs of money on an equivalent grill. Besides, as I said previously, it really does look brand-new from the outside. So, I announced to the world that I was going to fix it. And a month went by. And then another. And another. Then winter came and who wants to fix things in the snow? Mrs Troutdog finally got annoyed and went out and bought a small little grill so we could at least continue grilling. But I never really “clicked” with that grill. I constantly burned stuff and it was too small to cook multiple things at a time. Much to Mrs Troutdog’s annoyance, I complained constantly about it.

Every time I walked into the backyard, the big grill sat there mocking me. A constant reminder of a project on my to-do list that never went away. Every night I cooked on the small grill, the unfinished project gnawed away at me.

I don’t know what finally sparked it, but I finally got fed up enough to start the project. It took the better part of a day to get the thing completely torn apart and cleaned. I made an inventory of every new part that had to be ordered. Then came the challenge. The main bracket that held up the burners and gas tubes had completely burned and rusted away. Unfortunately, the grill is old enough that nobody sells that replacement part. Now what?

I managed to find someone who could manufacture that part for me. I sent dimensions and drawings. What I got back was close, but not exactly what I needed. So, I dredged up my ancient high school machine shop knowledge and set to work making the parts I needed. It took about a day of drilling, bending, cutting, and pounding, but I finally had a working part.

It was another day of assembly, multiple trips the hardware store, cursing over missing (or extra) bolts and fasteners, but finally it was back together. I turned the knobs, pushed the ignitor and… voila! FIRE! I MADE FIRE!! It worked. Back to nearly new condition. I grilled a steak that night and it’s hard to describe how pleased I was with myself. I redeemed my manhood. Alpha male.

My point of this long rambling story is not that you need to learn how to fix things. What is important is that you accomplish things. It doesn’t matter if it’s figuring out how to create a complicated Excell macro, or paint a room, or run your first half marathon. The point is figuring out something you haven’t done before, going through the pain of learning, and then finally accomplishing your goal. It’s an amazing positive jolt to your self-confidence. If you can do that thing, what else can you accomplish? Those endorphins to the brain fuel the drive to continue moving forward.

So, this weekend resolve to learn something new, find a project that’s just a bit outside your comfort zone, or go do something you’ve never done before. When you’re done, I guarantee you’ll thank me.

Health

The Beatings Will Continue…

The beatings will continue until moral improves

Unknown

Ok now I’m really mad. No, not mad – pissed. And frustrated. And depressed. And defeated. And I don’t know what to do.

No, this is not a cry for help or any bullshit drama like that so don’t get your panties all in a bunch. I hurt my back – again. Actually, it’s more than that. I think I’ve hit my physical low point. I’ve clearly got some sort of chronic back issue now. I have some new stomach issues that I’ll spare you the details of. And I’m fat. There’s no point in tip toeing around it – there’s way too much jiggle wiggle when I walk. We’re rapidly approaching sports bra territory (don’t be offended, I’m not misgendering anyone with 13 pronouns in their bio – it’s simply beer and nacho man-boobs) All in all, I just don’t feel good. Haven’t for a while.

I don’t understand how this happened. Well, I do – bad diet, too many calories, inactivity, poor posture, zero mobility training, and lack of strength training. Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, everything is great! The part I don’t understand is why I can’t snap out of it. Why can’t my brain finally say, “ok you’ve had some fun, now it’s time to get back to work”?

This is approximately the 1,023 time I’ve thrown down the gauntlet and declared, now I’m really serious. Like the old saying about smoking – Quitting smoking is easy. I’ve done it hundreds of times. The irony is that every one of my most liked posts on this blog are related to resolutions and health. I’m going Keto! I’m exercising! Look at my new diet! I did a sit-up! The problem is that my follow up on all those resolutions lasts about three days. It often pains me to think about this blog. For reasons I don’t understand, almost all my followers are health and fitness related folks. And I am not healthy or fit. When someone likes a health-related post or HealthyFitMotivations1443 starts following me, it’s a painful reminder that I’m not actually doing what I write about.

I’m angry at myself and concerned. I’m worried about my ability to reverse this trend. If I feel like this now, what am I going to feel like in 10 years? That scares me. I don’t know what to do about it. Well, I do know what I need to do… I just don’t know how to keep doing it.

At the end of the day, what I need is motivation, routine, and habit. How do I get my ass to walk into my garage gym every damn morning and do the work I need to be doing? It needs to become a non-negotiable part of my daily life. I don’t know how to make that happen.

If anyone has any magic secrets to building motivation and discipline, can you help a brother out? Otherwise, I may have to resort to posting shame pictures of me in a speedo all over the house as a reminder to go to the gym and to stop me from opening the fridge (again). And nobody wants that. An image you can’t unsee.

Hmmm, I think I just found my next business venture. A service you sign up for in which I call you twice a day and demand proof you worked out and ate well. Otherwise, I’ll berate you mercilessly and yell at you that you’re worthless and weak. The next day you’ll get three calls and ten nagging text messages. The abuse will continue until discipline improves.

That could work. I’d sign up for it. Meanwhile, I need to walk down to the gym. Wish me luck.

Health, Motivation

I’m A Cheater

It’s not something you really want to admit. But confession is good for the soul, or something like that. So here goes… I’ve been cheating. Now in my defense, I didn’t realize I’d been cheating. Let me explain. If you haven’t been breathlessly following my every post, I’d recently written about a life altering change – I switched from clip-in pedals to flat pedals on the mountain bike.

TL;DR – I love them and don’t know why I didn’t switch earlier. But it has exposed one flaw. You have to constantly keep more pressure, or force, on the pedals otherwise your foot will slide off. So now I’m generally pushing a harder gear than I’m used to. What I’ve discovered is that with the clip-in pedals I was able to “relax” quite a bit when pedaling. While my legs were going around, I was essentially coasting far more than I realized. If I try that now, my feet come off the pedals.

So I was cheating at the effort I was putting in and didn’t know it. I could never figure out why my climbing speed never seemed to improve. Now that I have no choice but to push hard, presto, my speed and power output are much greater than before. Crazy how that works.

We all cheat, we just don’t like to admit it. I’ve never had much upper body strength, my shoulder is kinda jacked up, so I suck at things like push-ups. So what do I do? I ignore doing push-ups because I don’t like them and can’t do very many. Unfortunately, push-ups are exactly what I should be doing. How many of you are avoiding doing the things you know, deep down, you should be doing?

Confronting our flaws and weak points is hard. If it was easy, we’d already be doing them. But the older I get, the more I wish I’d been stronger about conquering my weaknesses when I was younger. But you’re never too old to start. Deep down, you know what your weak points are.

So pick one. Resolve today that you’re going to start working on it. You’ll thank yourself later. So now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to see if I can do a push-up. Don’t laugh. I’m pretty sure this will look like the Bill Murry push-up scene from the movie Stripes. But you’ve gotta start somewhere, right?

Daily Life, Health, Motivation

An Unexpected Lesson From Tragedy

The other day I was surfing through YouTube before I went to bed. It was getting late and I was looking for just one more video to watch before retiring. A thumbnail came up that I’d seen several times the past few days but had ignored because it was almost two hours in length, and I just wasn’t terribly interested in it. It was an analysis of what went wrong at the Uvalde school shooting by a guy named Mike Glover.

If you’re not familiar with him or his YouTube channels, Mike Glover is a former Green Baret with 18 combat deployments. He’s clearly been there, done that. He now provides tactical training to law enforcement. The failure of law enforcement in this scenario was horrific. Here’s a link to that analysis if you’re interested. I ended up watching the entire thing and going to bed way too late.

Out of everything he said, one thing towards the end really struck me. He was commenting on all the sexy “kit” the officers had on. We’ve dumped truckloads of money on police departments so they can outfit themselves as quasi-military units. They’ve got the ballistic helmets, plate carriers, ballistic shields, even wearing military style fatigues and boots. But in this case, none of them did anything with their fancy equipment while kids were being shot and left to die. They stood around, checking phones, getting hand sanitizer, and waiting for someone to tell them what to do. Mike’s comment was:

“Everyone wants to be an operator until it comes time to do operator shit”

That lesson is so true and can be applied to almost everything. Everyone wants to lose weight and look better (myself included), but very few want to put in the time in the weight room and or do serious cardio. You want to be a writer? Are you getting up and cranking out 1000 words every day? You want to be a YouTube star? How many hours a day do you spend learning and perfecting the filming, editing, and storytelling? You want to climb the corporate ladder? What are you doing to improve your skills and value daily?

We all want to be or do something. Only a small percentage of our society actually wants to do the work to achieve those things. I get it. I’m in that same boat. I kinda half-ass things. Sometimes I’m motivated, sometimes I’m not. Shockingly, it’s when I’m motivated that I get/achieve what I want. Crazy how that works.

Buying fancy gear, joining the latest fitness or diet fad, or subscribing to the killer new app is all great… but it doesn’t do diddly-squat if you don’t do the work. Another great example comes from David Goggins, who’s a crazy over the top, type-A overachiever. But he didn’t start out that way. He was a fat, lazy pest exterminator working nights and eating doughnuts. He had an epiphany one night, quit his job, went to a navy recruiter and said, “I want to be a navy seal”. The recruiter laughed and said you’re 100 pounds overweight. He’d have a very short few months to lose it if he wanted to actually attempt to qualify.

Spoiler alert – he did and went on to a successful career as a navy seal. When asked what program he used and what diet he followed to lose all the weight, he said “I stopped eating so fucking much and ran every day until I collapsed”. Simplicity. But the real reason was that he was willing to put in the work.

We all want something. How many of us are actually willing to do what it takes to get it? Very few. It’s a metaphor that struck home for me. Hopefully it’ll light a spark under my butt to get after it. Even at my advanced age, there are still things I want to achieve. But how bad do I really want them?

Everyone wants to be an operator until it comes time to do operator shit.

Daily Life, Motivation

What’s Your Habit, Dude?

So, the other day I stumbled upon a YouTube channel. It’s a middle-aged guy who lost a hundred pounds and now competes in all kinds of running, cycling, and general fitness events. He’s articulate, funny, and doles out some pretty good, motivational advice. I’m not sure why, but I gravitate to those types of channels. Probably because in my head, any day now I’m going to go run an ultramarathon. Never mind that I’m struggling with 3 miles at the moment. The training is really going to kick in soon.

Anyway, in one of his videos he mentioned creating habits. He referenced a book that he says completely changed the way he thinks about this sort of thing. It’s called Atomic Habits by James Clear. Well, if it’s good enough for this guy it’s good enough for me. I jumped on to Amazon’s book site, found the book, and… it said I’d already downloaded it. I checked my Kindle and sure enough, there it was. I’d even read it. And I had absolutely zero memory of it. Clearly it didn’t make much of an impression on me.

But maybe I was taking too much cold medication that week? I decided to give it another go. Sure enough, something jumped out at me several chapters in. Something that further proved, once again, that Mrs. Troutdog is the smarter one in our marriage. She didn’t like my post from the other day, saying she hates when I talk negatively about myself. I agree that I tend to be very self-effacing when I write. Sometimes it’s for brilliant comedic effect. Sometimes it’s authentic voice. The truth is that I’m not much of a self-promoter. Besides, it’s hard to fail if you set the bar ridiculously low to begin with. Right?

So, what does this have to do with habits? One of the things that the author said about creating a habit is the importance of creating a positive affirmation. It’s a subtle thing, but one that makes a difference in how you view the habit you’re trying to start. Rather than saying, “I’m going to go for a run because I’d like to be considered a runner one day”, you need to tell yourself that you ARE a runner. It doesn’t matter that you can barely go three blocks… you ARE a runner and therefore you need to train. That subtle shift in mindset makes a huge difference in motivation to continue a habit.

I realized that this is exactly what I’ve been doing to myself, for years, and why it probably drives Mrs. Troutdog crazy. While a pure beginner may not know the difference, someone who’s participated in a sport or activity for a while can recognize the difference between an amateur and someone who’s actually good. For many of my activities I can tell when someone really knows what they’re doing. In my head, those are the people who can call themselves a cyclist, skier, runner, writer, etc… I’ve never viewed myself as one of those people. For anything. In my head I always see myself as a beginner. Not worthy of a higher rank.

I need to go for a run this morning because I’m a runner. That’s what I do. And runners need to train. Boom! Mind blown. It’s weird how such a small change in thinking, can influence your motivation to do something.

The other nugget that was in the book is about quantity vs. quality. I’ve always struggled with habits because when starting out, it’s hard. Your form is bad. You don’t have the coordination. Endurance and strength limits what you can do. You watch videos that tout “do this one exercise for 20 reps to make major changes!”. I can’t even to 10 reps, let alone 20. Guess I won’t be doing that one.

As the old saying goes, perfect is the enemy of good. Habits are formed by repetition, regardless of the quality of what you do. The author suggests that if you want to run every morning, start by getting up every day, lacing up your running shoes, and walk around the block. That’s it. Do just that for three weeks. Every single day. It makes no difference that all you did was go around the block. You’re creating a mental cue. Rewiring your brain to change what your morning routine is. It takes hundreds of repetitions to create a lasting habit. It doesn’t matter what your running form is, if you get better, how far you went, or how fast you go. What matters is a hundred times you reinforced that cue – get up, put your shoes on, and step out the door. It’s a habit.

I am a runner. I am a mountain biker. I am a skier. I am a motorcyclist. I am a fisherman. I am a photographer. I am a writer. Now please excuse me, I need to go train.