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    #180 Progressive Insight

    Performance gap: the frustrating gap between how you know something should be done in an ideal world and how you currently do it. 

    One implication of the performance gap: you don’t have to master this skill today.

    Another implication, maybe even more important: your idea of how something “should be done” is probably wrong anyway.

    Because as you practice and gain mastery, you’ll also gain progressive insight: a more nuanced intellectual understanding of the skill you’re practicing.

    What I thought was a “good” yoga session six months ago, I now see as a session full of misalignment and cramped muscles.

    What I thought of as a solid piece of writing six months ago, I now see as an argument full of holes and points of improvement.

    Sometimes, progressive insight is just about more nuances.

    Sometimes, progressive insight shows that your initial intellectual understanding completely missed the mark.

    There’s only one way to find out: practice: Sculpt away, day by day

  • #443 Be consistent with the how, not the what

    If you’re curious about one topic, you can stay curious, even if your interests change over time.

    If you’re kind to one person, you can stay kind when talking to other people.

    If you showed leadership in your last job, you can show leadership in your new job.

    You can be consistent in how you do things, without having to be consistent in what you do.

  • #362 Your perspective is defective

    Change happens when you let go of defective perspectives about who you were, are, and could be.

    What you used to do, are doing, and could do.

    What’s possible for you, and what’s not.

    Whatever your current perspective, it’s defective. Or at least incomplete.

    Life is beautifully unpredictable. You are beautifully unpredictable.

    I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

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    #15 Being intentional about the questions you ask yourself

    What you focus on right now, in the present moment, strongly affects your state. Focus on problems, you start worrying. Focus on a pleasant prospect, you start dreaming.

    To manage state by directing focus, you must be intentional about the type of questions you ask to evaluate your experiences in life because whatever questions you ask yourself (and you DO ask yourself evaluating questions all the time, consciously or subconsciously), your brain is constantly coming up with answers for these questions.

    The answers can be accurate or not; that doesn’t matter to your brain. It’ll justify and find answers, reasons, and connections for anything you ask… and through those answers, give meaning to anything that happens to you (and interpret it as painful or pleasurable).

    How to be intentional about the questions you ask yourself:

    1. Eliminate limiting, “endless loop questions” that contain self-defeating presuppositions (like “Why does this always happen to me? Why am I always late? Why do I always give up? Why do I always hurt the people around me?). They’re dangerous because they force your mind to come up with answers: fake or real reasons that justify and perpetuate unhealthy behavior.
    2. Ask yourself empowering questions that challenge your mind to come up with empowering solutions, justifications, reasons:
      1. Empowering presuppositions: Why do I always arrive in time? Why do I always stick to the goals I set for myself? Why am I always kind to myself and others around me?
      2. Questions like “How can I be as helpful as possible? How can I make sure this is going to be a fulfilling, amazing day?”
      3. Questions like “What would the version of me I want to be do or say in this situation?”
  • #360 The key to creating everything you ever wanted

    If you wouldn’t see overwhelming results in your first 30 days of writing, working out, dieting, or learning an instrument, would you still show up?

    Are you okay with small, almost invisible gains because the process of learning, creating, practicing is fulfilling enough in itself?

    And if not, could you be okay with that, if you knew it was the key to learning or creating anything you ever wanted?

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