Success Habits Revisited

Matthew Henderson (00:08)
Hey, everyone. Matt from the Business Mind Podcast. Today, let’s catch up and do a follow up on the podcast I did very early on, which is called Success Habits. I wanted to kind of rehash it now that it’s 2021 and a lot has changed. I think I need to make some adjustments to it. Now, I don’t think I was wrong in everything I said in it because actually most of the principles I still follow and I’ve had really good success. However, there are a few things I’d like to amend in it. Now, one of the things that kind of drove me crazy was trying to be… Not even be different, trying to fit a different mold almost. Right? Now, I’m not saying I shouldn’t have to change in order to be successful, and I don’t want you to have that opinion either. I think it requires a tremendous amount of change. I mean, over the top, night and day kind of levels of change. …

So when I make these comments, I say them because I was trying… After reading so many books over, I don’t know, the last couple of years, the first year that I really got back into reading and educating myself, I read over 50 books. Since in the years following, in the last two years after that, I probably read, I don’t know, at least that per year as well. So not because I need to read these books. You know what? I’ve probably read less books, but I’ve read them more often, meaning I go back and reread them. But anyway, moving forward, the whole purpose of these success habits were so that I could be a better person, so I could be a better business owner, so I could be more successful. Right?

Well, I was trying to squeeze myself into somebody else’s parameters. And what I mean is more in the sense of everyone trying to tell me what works best for being the most successful entrepreneur. And I don’t disagree, like I said, with most of it, because these are the principles that have gotten me to where I am as well today. But there is a caveat. I feel that you have to make the principles your own. Now, you can’t rewrite the book on some things, but you have to adjust these things to your lifestyle so that they fit you, so that you understand where it will help you and how to use these things as a tool to become more successful. Just because you do them every day, it doesn’t mean you’ll be more successful. They’re a tool to help you become more successful. So it’s a growth tool.

So when I say that, what were the things that I needed to change about my success habits? I was getting up very early every day and trying to fit the mold of the overachieving people that you see in the world. You read about Elon Musk or Bill Gates, or I don’t know, it doesn’t matter who it is, even famous actors, Mark Wahlberg. They get up at these crazy hours of the day, and I mean to the point that I think I read one time Mark Wahlberg gets up at like 2:30 in the morning or something. But what he did was he provided… He fit a system into his lifestyle that worked best for him. And that’s what I wasn’t understanding from when I first read all of the things that I read, was it wasn’t necessarily about these were the only ways to have success and these were the habits I needed to follow. It was more, how can I apply these to my life and then use them to help me further where I’m at?

Now, that being said, I do not get up as early as I used to. And I initially beat myself up so bad about it. I even had an episode where I said I got called out about not getting up as early and being in the gym first thing in the morning, and I’m not telling you to get up late. But the thing is, is I have an issue sleeping and so therefore I tend to be up late. Even if I get up at 6:00 in the morning or 5:00 in the morning, I will still be up late. It’s just what happens. I’m not trying to be that way, that’s just how it is. So if I were to get up at 2:30 in the morning, well, to be quite frank, I went to bed at 2:30 two nights ago. So what do I do, just not go to sleep that day?

So what was happening was it was causing an anxiety in me almost that I needed to fit this mold, because if I don’t fit a certain mold of getting up at whatever, 4:00 or 5:00 in the morning, then I can’t be successful. Now I am noticing I don’t have as much time to work on things if I want to have a family life. Because, well, the reason for getting up super early is a lot of times your family isn’t up early and they’re beating other people up out of bed in order to get work done. Well, that’s great. Except for me, in my situation, like I said, I’m a night person and my wife is a morning person, so I can get a lot of work done at night when she goes to sleep and that’s okay.

So could I be getting up earlier and still getting more done in the morning? Yes. And will I probably at some point keep seeking it back earlier and earlier? I’m sure I will. For right now though, I found it was causing me stress about trying to get more sleep, which then caused me to not sleep. So for me, I adjusted it. Adjust it, make the things work for you. Exercising daily, that I do believe needs to happen. I stopped exercising daily and I have not seen a good result. Go figure. So I would say as far as that goes as a habit, please stick with it. I think it is an answer to things. Meditation, I have now gotten back on to doing it daily and I’m finding it to be helping tremendously. I’m not doing super long periods of time all the time. I’m just doing even 10 minutes spurts. And I’m 10 minutes a day, just kind of turn off and have a few moments of personal time. It’s kind of nice.

Other things that I definitely focus on, eating well has been something that’s been extremely helpful. Cutting back on any alcohol and stuff like that, it’s going to help. There’s no doubt. I know that there’s days where I enjoy having a beer or a drink or something, but everything in moderation, right? So those kinds of habits that you can form, a lot of people start having a drink a day, then it turns into two drinks a day, and then it turns into three drinks a day. And that’s the same thing with, hey, I’ll take today off the gym. Then next thing you know, it’s been three weeks since you’ve been to the gym.

So the habits are not necessarily just the habits themselves, which they are very… Getting done cardio every day for 30 minutes, apparently very good for memory and brain speed. So if it helps your brain function better, then clearly it’s going to be something that helps you in being a successful person because you’re thinking at the top of your game. Now, if you want to be at the top of your game, you have to do things that are outside of your comfort zone and push past where you think you can go. And quite recently, that’s been all I’ve been doing and I’ve actually moved on to a high performance planner and I’m really scheduling out my time to see how much I can maximize my day. And then from there, I’ll see how I have to adjust everything in my success habits.

Now that’s what I suggest everybody does, because that’s how you are going to be most successful using this system. Now it’s not that these things are the only things that help you, but if you listen to the first episode about success habits, you’ll understand that getting up earlier, having exercise, eating well, maybe making sure you get all of your vegetables, vitamins, nutrients, everything in a day, I do it with shake. Protein, you have to have all these things so that your brain functions correctly, so that your neurons are firing. But likewise, you need to just take care of yourself in general. So I’m not saying these are the only habits that I have, but you have to think about, what can I do in my life that’s currently not bringing me success and maybe I need to dial it back? Maybe I need to moderate it better.

So something to think about, something to help you to go a little further in your life, your business, and in your success habits yourself. So that’s my thought for today, is just take those few moments, write out what you’re doing throughout your day, see where you’re losing your time. If it’s that you’re scrolling through social media, Facebook and stuff like that, maybe you need to curtail that. If you’re sitting in front of the TV for four hours or five hours a night, six hours a night, or the second you get home, that’s what you do, you plop down on the couch and that’s it, you can’t do anymore. Well, I’ll bet you can do a lot more. You’re just afraid to, or you don’t want to change your habits. Right? Okay. All right.

Take it in, think about it, just decide, where do I want to be and what’s it going to take for me to get there? And I’ll bet you, you need to change some of your habits. All right, everyone. I’m Matt from the Business Mind Podcast. I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you did, please take a screenshot, share it around social media, tell people about it. If you want to reach out to me and tell me about an episode you’d like me to make, I will surely do that. Also, if you need any assistance with your business, please also reach out. I’m always available. Matt, M-A-T-T @nestadigital, N-E-S-T-A digital.com. And I will get back to you as soon as possible. All right everyone, have a great weekend. Have a great day. We’ll see you again soon.

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