In this video, I’m talking about observing your fears – The Fear Radar! How being mindful and conscious of what fears are around you is the first step towards setting yourself free. Realising how much you are limited can give you the proper motivation to start changing some things for real. Facing fears and start moving you towards a life of freedom.
So, I dare you to do this during the week, as I will be doing! Also, I’m since I’ve been through this process before, I’m also going to face some actual fears of mine. I have the ambition to do start sharing these small daily facing fear moments on my Instagram story. Add me there If you want the most current action on what’s going down in my world! Alenils is my name.
Good luck, and do commit to me in the comments if you’re up for the challenge:) /Alex
FEARS. Yeah, they do control your life whether you’d like to admit it or not. Of course, you’d like to change that, because I know, that just like me you seek a life of freedom. A life that isn’t consciously or subconsciously run by those anxiety-filled emotions crawling around within. Fear of what other people will think of you, fear of what you will think of yourself, or even fear of death. It’s a risk/reward game we often chose to bet safely on. The thing is, we are miscalculating that whole ratio. It’s subjectively unbalanced. And that’s why I’m every week challenging myself – and YOU – to face some kind of fear over a 5-day period. Big or small, singular or plural – you decide!
The rules are simple. You shall choose to face a fear that means taking some action that aligns with your values and believes, but also brings you closer to your goals. Closer to becoming the kind of person you’d like to be. A free mind. For instance, if you want to get over social anxiety, you need to be talking to some people. If you want to be able to handle rejection, you need to practice getting rejected! If you want to be able to jump of a cliff, you need to be able to coop with some heights! You see, as long as you design the challenge the right way and follow through on that goal, YOU CAN’T LOSE IN THIS GAME! This is a super important mindset you NEED to embrace if you’re not to hurt yourself along the journey.
What do you mean Alex? Well, to avoid creating emotional scares that only will make things worse, you need to baby step it and set a low minimum bar. For instance, if you want to overcome the fear of talking to strangers, your challenge could be to say hi to a random person. Then just doing that and only that, would be a win! If that person rejects you it doesn’t matter, because you got to practice in there and exposed yourself to rejection. An INVALUABLE skill to have, handling rejections that are!
The actual outcome of the interaction is not important at this stage. It’s all dependent on your skill level, and what’s the next action on your fear scale. Which means that next time – if you’re ready for it – you can raise the bar. We want to be constantly levelling up. Or well, you can, of course, fail If you don’t take the minimum action you sat out to do. Then the game will TEMPORARY be over. But we all have bad days, so don’t beat yourself up about it. Remember to have fun with it, see it as a game, and of course – there’s always next time!
So, just take a minute or two and think about ONE fear that is limiting you in life, and how different life would be without it. Play this vision out. And then ask yourself what the lowest hanging fruit would be; what kind of facing fear action could you take to expose yourself to this. Lastly, just consider how acting on that thought would add a ton of excitement and purpose to your life for the coming days. Not to mention the feeling within if you’d actually execute on this thing. There’s no harm in fantasizing, right?
Let’s take my week challenge as an example; I’ve been of my interview game for a while, something I want to have close by heart if I’m to produce great content. Also, I want to truly understand how people think and work – hence I’ll be asking people If they’d like to do a short interview with me on the topic of freedom.
So that’s what my week is going to look like – setting off on a mission to set myself and the world free. There’s no turning back now. I’ve made it my personal goal in life to do this. This is my calling, and I will dedicate my life to make this vision come true. A vision of a free-spirited world. Woho, have I lost it or what?!
Feel inspired, but past experiences tell you this feeling will pass? Social commitment is a GREAT WAY TO FOLLOW TROUGH, that’s why I’ve been able to keep these weekly challenges up (this is my 108th in a row). So, commit to me down there in the comments, just write #FF1 if this is your first Facing Fear challenge, and I personally will be asking you if you followed through or not at the end of the week. I’m creating a movement, so spread, share or tag someone that you’d like to challenge on a facing fear challenge this week!
In this WEEK’S CHALLENGE, I’ll outline a strategy for how you and I can become a more productive and effective person. Now I’m just packaging it – It’s all based on the author and entrepreneur Tim Ferriss’s best productivity tips. And we are going to learn this skill through the framework outlined in the book THE FIRST 20 HOURS by Josh Kaufman. Skill you say? because YES – it is a skill! Being productive can be learnt, but until we’ve invested some effective practice. 20 hours that is.
Now I’ve set a goal for myself to start some kind of business before the first of October this year. That means that ALL my week challenges strongly must align with taking me there in an effective way. This increased pressure on delivering valuable output, has made super conscious of my inability to get things done. Distracted, unfocused and constantly multitasking – eating, googling random stuff that pops up, YouTube rants. My mobile addiction has seriously started to frighten me. I’ve got the attention span like any other person these days – horrible that is! And I’m sure you’re not far behind.
This is currently what’s hindering me from advancing – and if I want to live that amazing life I dream of, I MUST learn the skill of how to be productive. And you know what, I think the FEAR of letting these dopamine stimulating things go, is a big part of it. I need to face my fears and commit.
SO, if you feel the slightest resemble – join me and commit as well! I can guarantee you’ll be frustrated as shit and wished you’d never signed up for it. BUT, in the end of the week you’ll also be looking back at all the things you’ve accomplished and, above all, have a new solid system that brings your productivity game to a new level!
First off, we need to understand what it is that we are trying to do and get the concepts clear:
“Productivity = Output / Input
Productivity is generally regarded as a measure of outputs divided by inputs. All of the activities that you get done in a day may be considered your output and the time you put into them are your inputs.
Efficiency = Doing things right
Efficiency is a measure of how well you do those things. If you are able to get more outputs from the same inputs, you are said to have increased efficiency.
Effectiveness = Doing the right things
Effectiveness is a measure of doing the “right thing s.” Highly effective individuals and companies act in ways that move their highest priorities forward on a regular basis.” ( source )
Basically, we need a system or a method for identifying the most important things to work on – and then make sure that execute on those things with a high level of efficiency. Increasing the overall output in relation to the time we put into it.
Now in the book `THE FIRST 20 HOURS Josh Kaufman has structured a 4 step process to learn any skill effectively with high efficiency:
Deconstruct a skill into the smallest possible sub-skills
Learn just enough to practice intelligently and self-correct during practice
Remove physical, mental, and emotional barriers that get in the way of practice
Practice the most important sub-skills (with feedback), for at least twenty hours
So let’s walk through them and apply Tim Ferris productivity tips.
Deconstruct a skill into the smallest possible sub-skills “Deconstructing the skill before you begin also allows you to identify the parts of the skill that aren’t important for beginning practitioners. By eliminating the noncritical sub-skills or techniques early in the process, you’ll be able to invest more of your time and energy mastering the critical sub-skills first.” – Josh Kaufman
There are literally is THOUSANDS of tips and tricks for how to be more productive. But after listening to and watching hundreds of thes, you start to see recurrent themes. And since my huge admiration to Tim Ferriss, I’ve put together his best tips here. Most of them coming from the book the 4-hour work week and his podcast and YouTube channel.
“Parkinson’s Law dictates that a task will swell in (perceived) importance and complexity in relation to the time allotted for its completion. It is the magic of the imminent deadline. If I give you 24 hours to complete a project, the time pressure forces you to focus on execution, and you have no choice but to do only the bare essentials.
If I give you a week to complete the same task, it’s six days of making a mountain out of a molehill. If I give you two months, God forbid, it becomes a mental monster. The end product of the shorter deadline is almost inevitably of equal or higher quality due to greater focus.
This presents a very curious phenomenon. There are two synergistic approaches for increasing productivity that are inversions of one another:
1.) Limit tasks to the important to shorten work time. (80/20)
2.) Shorten work time to limit tasks to the important. (Parkinson’s Law).
The best solution is to use both together: Identify the few critical tasks that contribute most to income and schedule them with very short and clear deadlines.”
-Tim Ferrriss, The 4-hour work week
“The Pareto principle (also known as the 80/20 rule, the law of the vital few, or the principle of factor sparsity) states that, for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes.” – Wikipedia
Which one of these, if accomplished would make everything else easier or irrelevant?
Which of these, if checked off, would leave me satisfied with my day?
Which of these, if done, creates more time for me next week.
Shorten work time:
Define the outcome and only give yourself a certain time to accomplish it. Work in 25-50 min sessions, (the Pomodoro principle) and use a timer set for 25-50 minutes before taking a short ~5 min break. I’m using the App: strict workflow / Task Timer to keep count and see the accumulated time of my focused work sessions. It works offline too.
Now, this is a habit we want to build and it can be broken down to Que-routine-reward. For the theory of this check out “The Power of Habit” by Charles Duhigg.
The que: Starting the timer
The Routine: the focused work
The Reward: This is up to you to design it the best for you! It can be enough to just get up and jump around, feeling proud for the progress. Some may want to treat themselves with something good. For me, I have attributed each minute to a certain monetary value. So for 25 minutes of work, it equals 2,5 SEK. And I’m using that money to pay of a debt to myself on money I’ve lost on stocks. Making that loss worth it! You can also use it like earning up money for treating yourself with something you want to buy. Or watch time for a funny series or YouTube videos – be creative. But acknowledge the power of the habit loop!
Learn just enough to practice intelligently and self-correct during practice “Learning helps you plan, edit, and correct yourself as you practice. That’s why learning is valuable. The trouble comes when we confuse learning with skill acquisition. If you want to acquire a new skill, you must practice it in context. Learning enhances practice, but it doesn’t replace it. If performance matters, learning alone is never enough.” – Josh Kaufman “Instead of trying to be perfect, focus on practicing as much as you can as quickly as you can, while maintaining ‘good enough’ form.” – Josh Kaufman
So don’t watch another productivity video – have the faith of only applying this and only this week. Don’t overwhelm yourself with other things. Less is more.
And when it comes to the self-correcting part our timed work session – this is how we define “practice time” in terms of developing this skill. This means we need to be aware of when we’re failing. It’s simple – as soon as we’re not doing what we set out do before starting the work session, we fail. So, to be awake to this, we are simply going to have a piece of paper and an analogue pen and make a mark when we get distracted. Put a pin there, and then continue with your thing. Likewise, if you thought of something you need to do, take a note of it and then get back to your business.
For self-improvement purposes – you can also write the conditions of your work; like time of the day, music, being hungry, tiered, and see how it corelates to your ability to focus. And by that see when you are doing your best work and identify those factors to be able to easier get to this beast mood in coming work sessions – getting to know yourself.
Remove physical, mental, and emotional barriers that get in the way of practice “There are many things that can get in the way of practice, which makes it much more difficult to acquire any skill.” – Josh Kaufman
“Here are three barriers to rapid skill development to consider and eliminate prior to practicing a new skill:
Limited access: If it’s too hard to get started, or it takes too long to get started, you’ll find an excuse not to start. If you want to learn to play the guitar, place your guitar in the middle of the living room with a sheet of music next to it. Doing so will make it easy and effortless to pick up the guitar and start practicing.” *
Use the tools that suits you best, you don’t need a whole lot of aps. A regular watch and a piece of paper might just work the best for you. The principles as super simple – keep it that way if it suits you! For me, I like the gear, makes it more of a game.
Distractions: “Skill development requires your undivided attention while you practice. Practice in areas that you consider boring while you are free from distractions: no television, ringing phones, or incoming e-mails.” *
This is key when it comes to working focused and disciplined. REMOVE ALL DRISTRACTIONS. Don’t have your phone visible. If your work allows it, block internet or certain pagers and any kind of social media (I use AdBlock and Strict Workflow). Food is another huge on for me – can’t eat and focus at the same time. Chose music that makes you focus – I can only do non- vocal. NO PHONE. You know what works for you – or should I say don’t work for you!
“Self-consciousness: The fear of looking incompetent is the largest barrier to skill development. Adjust external expectations and laugh at yourself for the first 20 hours (without losing enthusiasm for learning the skill).” *
You will fail in the beginning. Your multitasking brain is used to being all over the place. But have faith in the process, and think about your why – imagine the impact it would have if you got so much better!
“Practice the most important sub-skills (with feedback), for at least twenty hours “Once you start, you must keep practicing until you hit the twenty-hour mark. If you get stuck, keep pushing: you can’t stop until you reach your target performance level or invest twenty hours. If you’re not willing to invest at least twenty hours up front, choose another skill to acquire. The reason for this is simple: the early parts of the skill acquisition process usually feel harder than they really are. You’re often confused, and you’ll run into unexpected problems and barriers. Instead of giving up when you experience the slightest difficulty, precommitting to twenty hours makes it easier to persist.” – Josh Kaufman
Since I do weekly challenges – This means we’re going to practice this for 20 HOURS in just one week! MAN, that’s a huge commitment. Or is it? I probably work 80-90 hours throughout the weeks, my real job and this YouTube channel put together. So just staying super productive for a fourth of that time really isn’t much to ask for! Quite the opposite really, in theory, we should get more done and free up time to do other things!
So that’s it – that’s the objectives of the week: implement these two principles for a total of 20 hours.
Start with asking yourself the three questions in the morning or in the evening to define what’s the most important tasks you need to do during the day. Or when you’re sitting down with a project of yours. Then brake those tasks down to tight deadlines and work in 25-50 minute sessions before taking a short break. Implementing the habit loop – the que, the routine, the habit. And don’t forget to remove all distractions!
So that’s it! I’m going all in on this one, loves when there’s a measurable outcome. 20 ours here I come! And I’m going to get so much done. Commit to me down there in the comments, social responsibility is one the major things that makes us follow through. That’s the reason for me doing these challenges for over two years. I’m committing to you guys EVERY week. It’s power in that.
Thank you for watching, thank you for pursuing a life of freedom – the world needs to be a happier place, and free people for sure makes that happen!
So I kind of stopped drinking like 1+ year ago, due to health reasons and that I hate being hangover. I get nothing done and instead I just eat, eat and then eat some more. Between tackling some anxiety filled thoughts that have no particular logic for existing.
But so turning thirty I ended up throwing a party and felt like having some. Mostly to prove myself wrong – maybe I’ve overexaggerated how bad I get from drinking.
So I ended up having 1-2 glasses of wine, a cider and a tiny whiskey. In terms of feeling drunk – it really didn’t do much for me. I had a blast and was in a great mood, but I easily could have gone there without the alcohol.
However, that was 2 days ago, and I still feel like shit. A headache, groggy, no sense of willpower or discipline, and find myself just feeling sluggish and dead inside. I NEVER feel bad otherwise. I barely know what a headache is. Now I for sure had my wildlife growing up, but today I see no way of justifying drinking.
For me, growing my self-esteem has made me enjoy myself and social gatherings much more than alcohol ever did. Although I can miss how it made me more relaxed when dancing, that’s also the only thing. Good thing I got a salsa course as a gift so I totally can destroy the need for having a drink!
What’s your take on this – is it just my body that is super sensitive?
“I refused to do anything, that wasn’t in the best interest of the goal I have set for myself” – Will Smith.
So many things to accomplish, so many things to experience and so many people to meet. But there’s a whole lot of efforts and fears to overcome to do all that. A whole lot. But I’m determined. You have no idea.
SO WHAT DO YOU WANT?
A new 6-month goal starts NOW. I want to see If I can make a living out of this, or something relating – I want the freedom to live a life on my conditions. Everything I do has to aline with this goal in (an effective way). I’m going to break it down into different themes to give it the proper attention. First out – business and sales – SELLING OF MY STUFF. For multiple reasons:
– it’s one of the skills needed to run a business of my own
– sales skills are great ( & key!) for practising social skills and charisma
– less stuff frees us from shit stealing our attention
The objectives: – Sell off everything I don’t need. Making sure to always have an add out there. – CAN I MAKE A 10 000:- IN APRIL? ( ~1200 USD)
Secondary: Reading Tim Ferriss’s “The Four-Hour Chef” so we can make sure to do this journey in an effective way! This week reading, next week implementation.
UPDATE: realised the book was HUGE and 80% if the content was about learning how to cook. Instead found a great summary of learning fast methods, so I’ll be breaking down and understanding this video! Shortcuts DO Exist! 4 Hour Chef/First 20 Hours/Little Book Of Talent Animated Book Review/Summary https://youtu.be/IX1wYFiumAs
P.S my new mission statement: To apply all the best self-improvement tricks and & techniques in a structured and effective way to make all those things happen. Living Life, A life of freedom. A life on my terms. I want to prove to you that it can be done, and I’m inviting you along for the journey. If you dare. Because it’s going to be hard and scary as ****. But that’s what living is all about – if you ask me ;). And I can close to guarantee you that it will be the best decision you ever made. Yepp, pinky promise. Videos in the description: One Thing Arnold Schwarzenegger Told Me That I’ll Never Forget | Will Smith Vlogs How to Improve Sales Skills https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6MGJ…
