Kind: captions
Language: en
[Music]
hey everybody welcome to another episode
of impact theory today we're going to be
talking all about training your brain
for success if you want to mentally
fortify yourself so that you can
accomplish whatever it is that you have
set your mind to despite the setbacks
that will happen from internal poor
messaging or external difficulties we're
going to be talking about all that today
all right without further ado first
question
does a negative mindset have more
effects on mental health and the brain
and does it get easier to control your
emotions if you try long enough so first
of all yes a negative mindset is going
to have an overall impact on your mental
health so anxiety is the easiest one to
talk about because i've experienced it
but i think depression is also going to
be
hugely affected by what you allow
yourself to repeat so one core mechanism
of the brain is to understand that while
we are a very active species it's meant
to go out and explore and master our
environment there's a secondary
evolutionary force pushing on us which
is that we also want to conserve
calories to make sure that we survive
a famine so we have this dual competing
thing of wanting to go out and do cool
[ __ ] hence the big dreams and wanting to
sit on the couch and eat a bag of potato
chips uh hence why we procrastinate why
we feel lazy
and
the way that the brain
as a physiological organ has dealt with
this
dual impulse challenge over evolutionary
time frames is that it's a process
called myelination and what that does is
it's wrapping fatty tissue around
neurons that fire together at the same
time frequently so this is why they say
neurons that fire together wire together
they are literally getting optimized for
the efficient transmission of these
signals across those synaptic gaps and
the reason that they do this is that it
becomes easier from a caloric
perspective to do those things so now
you've made whatever you repeat whether
it's something empowering or
disempowering whether it's something
that makes you anxious or feel like you
can do anything it's going to make
thinking those thoughts and feeling
those feelings easier from a caloric
perspective it also begins to move it
into what's called the default mode
network so the default mode network is
responsible for
anything that we'll call automatic
thinking if you've done something a
bazillion times you don't think about
brushing your teeth you just brush your
teeth you don't think about driving to
work oftentimes
certainly before the pandemic you just
drive to work and there were times where
you would show up at work and be like
whoa i almost don't remember the journey
getting here and the reason is that what
ends up happening is your cognition
can be put onto basically something else
you're thinking through daydreaming
whatever and the thing that you do in a
repetitive way is just happening
automatically super efficiently and uh
it's a thing that happens to the brain
where you can scan somebody and go up
they're in the default mode network
right now and if worry anxiety panic
fear stress if that's what you're doing
all the time then that's what's going to
be moved over made calorically easier to
do
moved into the default mode network so
that by default that's where you go and
this is where most people spend the
majority of their lives is living in
that default mode network of these
emotions that they've created these very
well-worn paths to looping around over
and over to feeling those feelings over
and over and so you can understand since
the body responds to your
the mental states that you're constantly
in that each of those mental states is
characterized by hormonal and
neurochemical states and the body will
have different long-term consequences
based on
what you're feeling so for instance if
you are constantly stressed or
constantly anxious your cortisol levels
are extraordinarily high cortisol levels
begin to damage the um
the elasticity of your blood vessels
it's one of the vectors of attack on
your body and so you don't want to stay
in these chronically elevated levels
because it deteriorates the
integrity of the lining of your blood
vessels and this is the kind of thing
that leads to stroke or coronary heart
disease so being incredibly thoughtful
not to loop on those things which
doesn't mean that there aren't bad
things going on in your life but it does
mean that when you allow yourself to
lube loop that there is this hormonal
and chemical cascade as a response to
that that your body will have negative
consequences to or positive consequences
if you're in a loving calm state a lot
and that's the thing that becomes the
default mode network that becomes the
easiest thing for you to think and
you're in this really calm and creative
state a lot of times
then you're going to prolong your life
so i i hesitate only to say that because
of course there are other extenuating
circumstances like if your diet is
terrible
but you're in that calm and creative
state a lot i think you're still going
to run into issues and quite honestly if
your diet is messed up then the odds of
you being able to stay in that common
creative state are very very low because
of the
communication that happens between your
brain and your guts
getting into dysbiosis is a whole other
thing but anyway you want to be very
careful the things that you allow
yourself to think now how do you train
yourself to get out of that
get out of a negative default mode
network and into a positive default mode
network so one is something called
pattern interrupting this comes from
cognitive behavioral therapy
it's
extraordinarily useful and i highly
encourage you guys to get very deft to
this and this is simply not allowing
yourself to think certain thoughts and
every time you catch yourself doing it
to pattern interrupt and you remind
yourself you don't do that so for
instance one of the reasons that i don't
get overwhelmed is because i don't allow
myself to be overwhelmed that doesn't
mean that i can carry an infinite load
what it means is every time i can feel
that escalation i can feel like oh my
god this is overwhelming i say to myself
ah
you don't do overwhelm
and saying that thought
interrupts that pattern and breaks me
out of it brings my conscious control
back in right victor frankel between
stimulus and response there is a gap we
want to mind that gap we want to get in
there insert something like this
statement i don't do overwhelm which
then puts me back into conscious control
and i decide what i want to insert in
terms of the emotion that i want to feel
which of course is more calm more
relaxed able to handle more things
now i also remind myself that doing less
is always an option so if there's just
too many things happening at once
99 times out of 100 even if i'm really
in something busy and there's a lot
happening if i feel overwhelmed coming
on boom pattern interrupt i don't do
overwhelm and then i'm gonna sit down
i'm gonna deep breathe from my belly
and i'm gonna slow things down
and i'm going to let that stuff go
and that's exactly how i'm actually able
to end up doing more because i don't let
that become a runaway process
eye pattern interrupt it i breathe from
my diaphragm
i slow down it doesn't take long to
reset
to get yourself focused and then
typically what i'll do at that point is
shift back into an aggressive
mental and emotional posture which then
helps me push through anything that
might potentially feel overwhelming
and that is the training so you're doing
that pattern interrupt you're doing the
physiological things that you need to do
to shift your state and then you're
inserting yourself back into that gap
and you do that over and over and over
and over never wasting time being angry
with yourself that you start to feel
overwhelmed but instead
being proud of yourself that you do the
pattern interrupt
that you slow things down
and when you reinforce that behavior
that's what begins to wire together and
now over time it becomes this very easy
loop that happens automatically you
don't even think about it when you start
to feel that sense of overwhelm you
don't get lost in the overwhelm boom you
stop
slow down breathe
insert the aggression in this case i'm
just giving you an example from how i
deal with it but whatever you're going
to do to deal with it
i do something exactly similar to that
for anxiety i start to feel the anxiety
build up i'm not going to allow that to
become this runaway process i'm going to
slow down it happens again that i'm
going to breathe from my diaphragm
i'm going to relax i'm going to close my
eyes i'm going to start some sort of
visualization of things going well
instead of going wrong you only get
anxious
when you imagine things going wrong so
now i'm going to force myself to imagine
them going well
i'm going to breathe from my diaphragm
doing the physiological work of making
sure i'm shifting state and just do that
over and over and over
i hope you guys enjoyed the episode
brought to you by our sponsor blinkist
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trial all right enjoy the episode let me
ask you a question do you know the
difference between someone who crushes
big goals in their life year in and year
out and someone who can't seem to get
ahead
[Music]
what is up my friends tom bill you here
in my opinion there are seven strategies
that you must use in order to achieve
any goal the more of them that you can
take action on the greater the chance
that you'll achieve your goal i say that
the difference between someone who is an
overachiever and someone who fails to
hit their goals is that the overachiever
does everything they can possibly do to
be successful i said a second ago that
there are seven strategies you must use
to hit any goal i'll be teaching them
later this month on a live workshop
called how to make any goal stick great
news is it's a process it can be taught
and you can deploy it in your own life
and you can register for this workshop
by going to this link i'll tell you
though right now quickly what they are
first extreme clarity and focus the
average person fails to achieve their
goals not because they didn't put an
effort but because they don't actually
know what it is that they're trying to
accomplish they're not focused on
exactly what they want
second massive excitement and motivation
there are two things that motivate us
pleasure and pain most people don't
properly leverage pain and negative
emotions which means that they're only
half as motivated as they could be or at
least only using half of the tools of
somebody else that finds their way to
success
third is desire
fourth is massive pressure and this goes
back to that idea of negative emotions
if you use it the right way fear of
failure can actually be a very useful
thing
fifth coming up with the right strategy
sixth avoiding the trap of overthinking
rather than taking fast aggressive
action and finally evaluating your
progress building grit and adjusting
your course that loop is critical in
fact that last part is what i call the
physics of progress if you fail to do
that you will never make progress all
right these are the seven steps that i'm
going to walk through in much greater
detail on my live workshop how to make
any goal stick so go to the link on your
screen or click the button below to
register alright my friend i will see
you soon take care and be legendary
[Music]
next hi tom
i know that you're going to like this do
you know what the best way would be to
accelerate the electrical neural
connections in my brain so i can learn
faster change habits and improve
exponentially in my life working with
the neuroplasticity that you know so
well thank you okay so this is a game of
repetition and understanding that for
the reasons that i just outlaid in the
previous question
it just comes down to what you repeat
whatever you repeat then you're going to
get better at that thing better meaning
more efficient from a brain wiring
standpoint it gets easier to do and so
as you think about trying to learn
faster a lot of this is going to be
practice learning you're going to be
learning as much as you can and one
you're going to lay down those neural
pathways but two and maybe more
importantly is you are going to learn
tips and tricks along the way that will
optimize for exactly you so i'm giving
you all the things that work for me i
think it'll probably work 80 to 85
exactly the same for you but there's
that 15 that's going to be optimized
just for you where you're like you know
what that thing like i'll give you an
example from my own life box breathing
so to meditate people will typically
tell you to breathe in four equal parts
i found that that didn't work for me so
i found by optimizing for the pleasure
cycle of those four parts of the breast
cycle that it worked perfectly so it was
like 85 percent of it was just sitting
down meditating understand how to come
back to the thought understanding how to
breathe from my diaphragm all that that
was by far
all of the heavy lifting but then that
little tweak at the end made a big
difference and so by practicing learning
by repeating learning by doing it over
and over by finding out do you do better
when you're reading a physical book do
you do better when you're listening to
audio do you do better on youtube videos
do you do better on audiobooks do you do
better when you can take physical notes
do you do better notes handwritten or
typed all of these things so it's it's
all the same stuff
but there are going to be little nuances
that are different for you and so
getting in there and doing them over and
over and over that's going to be the key
to learning faster increasing the speed
and then just overall getting better at
that by doing those things over and over
and over so that you get the hard wiring
that you're looking for
next
is it possible to train your brain to
control dopamine addiction especially
with things like youtube games and nfts
that are so all-consuming and addictive
how can you redirect your brain to focus
on your goals all right let's talk about
time management so i am very grateful
that while i have a very obsessive
personality i don't have an addictive
personality and what that means is that
i find it relatively straightforward to
create rules in my life
and i highly encourage anybody to do
this whether you have an addictive or an
obsessive personality or anything else
to create bright lines in your life
rules that you simply don't violate that
way there's no question like imagine if
you say something like
this is actually true from my childhood
my mom would say i don't remember the
exact number but it was something like
13. we could have 13 doritos
so you're eating your 13 doritos but
like dorito number nine was kind of
broken so that doesn't really count as a
full dorito but then the next one maybe
only has a tiny bit of a corner missing
so you take that when you're like well
they were both broken and so you end up
eating you know the equivalent of more
or maybe you lost count and so you don't
want to cheat yourself of course so you
know at number six maybe you start the
count over so there are all these ways
where you end up in taking more than you
mean to versus saying i only eat doritos
on a saturday
that way if it isn't saturday i'm not
eating doritos and then if you find well
what i end up doing is on friday night i
stay awake until 1201 so i can eat
doritos go to bed wake up eat more
doritos if that isn't the outcome that
you want then you say cool
i
don't eat doritos until i've woken up on
a saturday morning after you know at
least seven hours of being in bed
whatever you need to do to make sure
that you're not getting up in the middle
of the night or only sleeping four hours
because you're so excited to go eat
these are sadly all real things from my
past and so
figuring out all of those things and
understanding how you have to refine
your rules so that you can be very clear
about what you do and what you don't do
once you do that now you can start
breaking that dopamine loop that people
can get into so one area that i do find
that i get into it and i have to be
really thoughtful about this is this
weird loop around checking uh
whatsapp checking
twitter checking my text messages if i'm
moving something forward in the business
so i never do it just like in my
personal life but there are times where
i'm trying to move something forward in
my business i need to see what the team
is doing some people on the team
communicate via whatsapp some for text
and then on twitter if i'm trying to
promote something and so i'll get in
this loop of just like going going going
going going and each thing leads to the
next
and you know
getting to sort of inbox zero and
whatsapp triggers me to go get to inbox
zero on my text messages triggers me to
go get to inbox zero on twitter it
triggers me to go back to whatsapp to
text and and i get in this weird crazy
loop and so what i do to end up breaking
that cycle one becoming aware of it is
hugely important and understanding how
that dopamine cycle works and then two
to make sure that i put confines around
it even if i have to set an alarm
normally i don't because my day is so
busy
that i've got to get onto the next thing
but
recognizing okay this is something that
i'm prone to and that i need to have a
hard stop because if i don't have a hard
stop then i know that i'll end up in
this loop and it begins to not feel good
like at first it feels like i'm making
progress i'm pushing things forward and
then
at some point it begins to start to feel
really uncomfortable and like that i
have a compulsion i have to check again
i have to go back and so
recognizing that that's a thing and then
instituting rules so for instance i
don't care about inbox zero i care about
moving a project forward i care very
much about time management i care very
much about having my priorities in order
and going down my list of priorities and
once that thing is no longer a priority
even if i see that a notification comes
in and now there's a message waiting or
five messages waiting or ten messages
waiting i train myself that i'm not even
gonna look at that
i know that there are people waiting for
a response i've already moved it forward
as much as makes sense given my time
allocation given my priorities and
therefore i'm going to be completely
fine with that and so one thing i've
done is
on almost everything it's not on
everything everything but on almost
everything i've turned off all visible
notifications so that if you were to
pick up my phone it looks like i have
nothing waiting for me there's nothing
in my email nothing in my text nothing
but there are but i force it so that i
have to go in to check it so there
aren't these little things dripping on
my mind so being very careful about
doing that and then things that are just
pure fun like games or nfts or something
like that
again it's it's
knowing that i'm going to allow myself
to spend this much time so for instance
having a bedtime that you stick to is
incredibly important i'd be lying if i
said the nfts haven't led me beyond my
bedtime a few times
but i really do try to be religious so
if once or twice out of the week i end
up going say 20 minutes over my bedtime
i'm okay with that we'll call that a
margin of error
but if it started to be a problem then i
would put bright lines and i would say
something like
i cannot stay up past my bedtime more
than twice in a seven day period and you
do something like that
and again bright lines are incredibly
effective at making sure that you don't
end up in a behavior pattern that you
don't want to be in
all right and then go look at andrew
huberman and his work on dopamine and
all the things that he's discussing uh
it's really powerful to understand how
dopamine works and that it isn't
actually rewarding you for getting the
thing it's rewarding desire so dopamine
is the anticipatory
neurochemical that feels good it's
exciting to want something to pursue
something and so once you understand
that dopamine is actually triggering the
desire to pursue it then you're more
likely to be able to break that pattern
because you realize that doing whatever
behavior playing the games looking at
nfts all of that it's never going to
satisfy it you're never going to be like
oh cool now i've had my fill and i can
go stop dopamine is specifically
making you want to do more of something
to pursue it go after it to repeat that
behavior so be very thoughtful about
that
do you ever just want to be a better
version of yourself a more confident
knowledgeable you the fastest way to do
it is to get
learning my whole obsession is what i
call abl always be learning learning
about a new topic or skill revisiting
one you learned about in the past or
getting up to speed on something
everyone is talking about right now can
not only broaden your horizons but also
boost your self-esteem
and your success too
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guys take care and be legendary
what's up everybody tom bill you here
quick question for you how many times
have you sat down in your life to write
out a list of goals and said yourself
for real this time i'm gonna make every
single one of these happen and i will
not quit if you're like most people you
set a lot of goals but you don't achieve
all of them in fact you may not have
achieved any of them the great news is i
don't care if you are the highest
achiever in the world or if 2021 has
beaten you down hard what i know for a
fact is that humans are wired to adapt
and no matter how difficult the previous
year or years have been you can find
your path to fulfillment and achieving
your goals look my friend trust me
learning how to stick to your goals and
achieve them again and again is a skill
and you can't learn it you can master it
and when you do it will serve you for
life great news is it's a process like
anything else 2021 has been hard for a
lot of people so i'm going to be going
live later this month to host a workshop
on exactly how to run that process
called how to make any goal stick now
you can go to this link or click the
button on your screen and get free
access to this live training and when
you register i'll send you a bonus class
from impact theory university to get you
started all right see you soon over at
the live workshop and until then my
friend be legendary take care
next
should you be hard on yourself or soft
on yourself how can you tell if
someone's brain is geared towards
hearing negative affirmations or needs
negative persuasion to get things done
case in point where you tom use a
negative scenario to get you through
your workouts thank you okay so there's
moving towards and there's moving away
and once you understand what your
baseline personality is are you more
likely to move towards something or more
likely to move away from something i'm a
move towards kind of person so the vast
majority of my life is spent moving
towards the things that excite me call
it 80
and then 20 of the time i find that
moving away from something is very
powerful and what the
person asking the question is referring
to
in the gym because i hated it so much
and it was so exhausting and felt like
such a waste of time i had to think
about protecting my wife and that if i
wasn't able to get strong and not be
able to protect my wife that something
bad might happen to her and so that was
a real motivation but if i'm honest as i
get into the nuance of that it was
really the thing that i would imagine
was just [ __ ] ruining the person
trying to get after my wife and so that
it was about me winning in that scenario
being able to dismantle them and
even that was like a move towards it was
moving towards getting stronger but
there's no doubt that there was some
negative impulse there but it's figuring
out from yourself what motivates you
what scenarios as you imagine them walk
through them push you to do more and
then recognizing that nature has only
given us two things pleasure and pain
and so the more you can optimize them
both the better now part of the
optimization cycle of pleasure is
understanding that when you think about
the beautiful things the pleasurable
things that you want to bring into this
world that you could soak there you
could spend all of your time there and
it would feel wonderful
the negative stuff i think is actually
higher in amplitude in its ability to
incentivize behavior
but is corrosive and so
their video game references coming to
mind there is a gun in destiny 2 and the
longer you use it the more it overheats
and it will actually end up damaging you
as you use the gun and so you have to be
careful not to use it too much because
it starts taking away your own life so
that's negative energy all day so as you
are using that negative energy it works
at first and gives you this real boost
then if you stay there too long it
begins to become a problem both
physiologically and just from a is it
fun living my life perspective so you
want to be really thoughtful i find that
an 80 20 balance is roughly right find
the right balance for you i would be
startled if it was ever more than 20
percent um but in my darkest times where
i am just exhausted and cannot bear the
thought of going on any longer
to get that like
re-invigoration i need to only think
about the people that are waiting for me
to fail
and that gives me the juice that i need
but i try not to spend a lot of time
thinking about that so
be thoughtful in your own life but both
are powerful and i would learn how to
wield both tools
all right
love your content
how do you stay up and positive when you
keep getting kicked down things get
worse and before you know it
you're buried neck deep and completely
lost as to what to do how do you get
back to center and beyond can you break
down step by step how to train your
brain to move past how you see yourself
yes i can
so here is how to think about
yourself
number one
recognize
that you are hopelessly average
that way you don't have to think of
yourself as special because that
negative voice in your head is going to
constantly tell you that you're not
special
so now just admit you're average and
given the distribution curve the odds of
you being average are extraordinarily
high so your average you meet what i
call minimum requirements so if you're
asking this question you are smart
enough to do all of the amazing things
you want to do in your life you may not
be the best in the world at them but
you'll be able to do extraordinary
things that are going to dazzle yourself
and other people
so step one recognize that you are
average
step two recognize that you're an
average human and the average human has
become the apex predator of all apex
predators because of one simple
principle it is not the strongest of the
species that survive nor the most
intelligent but rather the most adaptive
to change
as the average human you are the most
adaptive creature the world has ever
seen
so now even being an average
adapter you're going to be able to do
things that are incredible it's what i
call the only belief that matters the
only belief that matters is that if you
put time and energy into getting better
at something you will get better
the second part of this idea is that
skills have utility so you're putting
time and energy into gaining skills and
those skills let you do something in the
world that other people can't do
when you can do something in the world
that other people can't do that the
world values
you will always be able to make a living
if you get good at something that the
world values that other people can't do
and you love it now all of a sudden
you're optimizing for a life that fills
you with joy and if you're optimizing
for something that the world values that
other people can't do that you love and
it serves other people as well you now
have the magic formula for fulfillment
and the harder you work to gain that set
of skills that serve yourself and others
you will begin getting feedback from the
world because they value it and you're
out there doing something that lifts
them up so you're lifting them up in a
way that they recognize and value and
inevitably they're going to thank you
for doing that thing and that makes you
feel good which makes you want to go get
better at that thing and so now you go
gain more skills in this thing that was
hard that the world values that you're
getting better at than other people and
doing things other people can't do and
elevating people in ways that other
people can't elevate them they're
thanking you for that and now you're in
a virtuous cycle and so that was the
breakthrough for me was recognizing i
did not need to believe that i was
different or special because i was
having a very hard time doing that life
was showing me that that just wasn't
true that there were so many people that
were better than me and so
dealing with that was emotionally very
difficult in the beginning so that big
first step was recognizing oh i'm just
hopelessly average but that's okay i'm
the hopelessly average adaptation
machine and now it's a question of what
are my goals what do i love doing what
do i love doing even when i'm failing
even when it's really difficult and as
long as i'm doing something that i find
exciting
okay it has to be fun it's got to be
exciting and it elevates other people
now the harder i work at that thing the
better it is for everybody involved and
it becomes this really magical thing
so
that is my advice to you my friend do
that and all will be well all right guys
that's a whole bunch of things that i
recommend to all of you and i hope that
you guys will embark upon this journey
of training your mind for success
because trust me it actually does work
and speaking of things at work if you
haven't already be sure to subscribe and
until next time my friends be legendary
take care peace