WEBVTT - JAMES CLEAR: “ATOMIC HABITS” Author (#1 Best Seller) 0:00:09.080 --> 0:00:11.479 It was a few years ago, and suddenly a bunch 0:00:11.480 --> 0:00:15.400 of people I knew, entrepreneurs, creative types, coaches, and players 0:00:15.680 --> 0:00:20.840 were all quoting from the same book, Atomic Habits, about 0:00:20.880 --> 0:00:26.239 tiny changes producing remarkable results. Ideas like that really connect 0:00:26.239 --> 0:00:30.880 with me because consistent, continuous improvement and growth. That's a 0:00:31.000 --> 0:00:34.800 huge daily focus for me. So my guest today is 0:00:34.840 --> 0:00:38.440 the author of Atomic Habits, number one New York Times bestseller, 0:00:38.560 --> 0:00:42.640 close to ten million copies sold in fifty languages. James 0:00:42.720 --> 0:00:46.840 Clear is a brilliant guy, great communicator, and an ex 0:00:46.920 --> 0:00:51.080 college athlete. This conversation with James was a year in 0:00:51.120 --> 0:00:54.920 the making, but worth the way. James has the best 0:00:54.920 --> 0:00:58.920 advice I've ever heard. Specific ways to gradually build good 0:00:58.920 --> 0:01:02.320 habits that can age beliefs about ourselves who we are 0:01:02.600 --> 0:01:05.880 or want to become, and how to recognize and reverse 0:01:06.120 --> 0:01:10.920 bad habits, specific ways to reshape behaviors. We also talk 0:01:10.959 --> 0:01:14.400 about altering social media habits, something a lot of us 0:01:14.440 --> 0:01:18.160 wrestle with. How curating your social feeds helps direct your 0:01:18.200 --> 0:01:22.440 future thoughts in positive ways. And James is an expert 0:01:22.480 --> 0:01:26.400 on productivity hacks, on doing more in less time and 0:01:26.440 --> 0:01:30.520 not feeling overwhelmed. There's so many ideas and tools in 0:01:30.560 --> 0:01:35.080 his book and on James clear dot com. So, with 0:01:35.120 --> 0:01:38.480 the year wrapping up and a new one approaching, all 0:01:38.560 --> 0:01:41.760 the evaluation and pledges to improve yourself that go with that, 0:01:42.400 --> 0:01:45.080 there's no better way to wrap up season five of 0:01:45.160 --> 0:01:48.919 Fouler Who You Got than a fun, far ranging, fast 0:01:49.000 --> 0:01:53.880 moving conversation with James Clear. Well, James, I'm so grateful 0:01:53.880 --> 0:01:56.240 for your time. The next five minutes that can to 0:01:56.280 --> 0:01:59.600 be very useful and important for people, But more importantly, 0:01:59.600 --> 0:02:01.440 they're also going to get people to go to your 0:02:01.720 --> 0:02:04.720 weekly email newsletter and your Instagram feed and of course 0:02:04.800 --> 0:02:07.680 read or reread atomic habits. There's so much to cover 0:02:08.000 --> 0:02:10.360 that we'll try to hit the highlights. But but let's 0:02:10.400 --> 0:02:14.640 start with the new year that's approaching means that people 0:02:14.639 --> 0:02:18.360 are going to be focusing on self improvement. But new 0:02:18.440 --> 0:02:22.280 year's resolutions, I speak to myself too notoriously ineffective. They 0:02:22.320 --> 0:02:25.720 don't last long. So give us some some concrete tools 0:02:25.800 --> 0:02:28.840 and tips for how to make new habits stick in 0:02:28.840 --> 0:02:32.919 the new year. Sure, so, um well, first pleasure to 0:02:32.960 --> 0:02:35.079 talk to you, Thanks the opportunity. I uh so, I 0:02:35.200 --> 0:02:37.160 kind of have two things that come to mind immediately 0:02:37.320 --> 0:02:40.320 So the first is that a lot of the time 0:02:40.520 --> 0:02:43.280 when we start with making behavior change or trying to 0:02:43.320 --> 0:02:45.679 make some kind of improvement, we think about and I 0:02:45.680 --> 0:02:47.520 think it's a fairly natural way to do it. We 0:02:47.560 --> 0:02:49.800 think about the results we want to achieve. So I 0:02:49.840 --> 0:02:51.800 want to lose forty pounds, or I want to make 0:02:51.840 --> 0:02:54.680 more money or be more productive or whatever finishing a 0:02:54.680 --> 0:02:57.480 half marathon, and then we come up with a plan 0:02:57.720 --> 0:02:59.440 for doing that, so you've got results, and then you 0:02:59.440 --> 0:03:03.320 have a plan, a strategy, and we kind of implicitly assume, 0:03:03.840 --> 0:03:06.239 you know, if I'm able to achieve this thing, or 0:03:06.280 --> 0:03:08.320 if I can follow through on this, then I'll be 0:03:08.360 --> 0:03:09.959 the kind of person that I want to be, or 0:03:09.960 --> 0:03:11.639 I'll you know, I'll be more of the person I 0:03:11.720 --> 0:03:14.720 hope I could be. And my encouragement is often to 0:03:14.720 --> 0:03:17.880 flip that on its head and to start and say, 0:03:18.080 --> 0:03:20.320 let's start by asking ourselves who is the type of 0:03:20.360 --> 0:03:22.200 person that I wish to become or what is the 0:03:22.240 --> 0:03:25.280 type of identity that I hope to reinforce? And you 0:03:25.320 --> 0:03:28.800 start there and then you build habits that reinforce that 0:03:28.880 --> 0:03:33.200 desired identity. So, no, doing one push up does not 0:03:33.280 --> 0:03:36.120 transform your body, but it does cast a vote for 0:03:36.280 --> 0:03:38.760 on the type of person who doesn't miss workouts and 0:03:39.120 --> 0:03:42.760 no writing one sentences not finished the novel, but it 0:03:42.800 --> 0:03:45.200 does cast a vote for I'm a writer. And I 0:03:45.200 --> 0:03:47.640 think this is the real reason that habits matter. Like 0:03:47.680 --> 0:03:51.520 the truer, deeper reason is that every action you take 0:03:51.600 --> 0:03:53.360 is like a vote for the type of person you 0:03:53.360 --> 0:03:58.000 wish to become. And so small habits seem fairly insignificant 0:03:58.000 --> 0:04:00.960 on any given day or any particular instant, but they 0:04:00.960 --> 0:04:03.320 actually reinforce being that kind of person, and they give 0:04:03.360 --> 0:04:05.560 you evidence that this is part of your story. They 0:04:05.560 --> 0:04:08.200 give you something to take pride in, and once you 0:04:08.240 --> 0:04:11.960 take pride in that aspect of your identity, it becomes 0:04:11.960 --> 0:04:13.520 easier to fall through on it. You know, like, if 0:04:13.520 --> 0:04:15.800 you're the kind of person who takes pride in the 0:04:15.840 --> 0:04:17.880 size of your biceps, you like never skip ourm day 0:04:17.880 --> 0:04:20.359 at the gym, you know, if you take pride in 0:04:20.760 --> 0:04:23.080 how your hair looks, you have like this really complicated 0:04:23.080 --> 0:04:25.760 hair routine that you follow every day. And so what 0:04:25.839 --> 0:04:27.839 you're really hoping to do is to try to encourage 0:04:27.880 --> 0:04:32.120 that process a little bit, and maybe this year, rather 0:04:32.240 --> 0:04:35.480 than worrying so much about the results, we can focus 0:04:35.520 --> 0:04:37.200 a little bit more on the identity that we want 0:04:37.240 --> 0:04:40.159 to reinforce in the habits that can help us get there. Yeah, 0:04:40.240 --> 0:04:42.480 what the world needs as much as anything right now 0:04:43.040 --> 0:04:48.080 is kindness, compassion, empathy. So if I want to shape 0:04:48.080 --> 0:04:50.520 my identity to improve the habit of I want to 0:04:50.920 --> 0:04:54.680 be a person that listens better, is more tuned in, 0:04:54.839 --> 0:04:58.960 is more kind, is more compassionate. Doing the things that 0:04:59.000 --> 0:05:01.359 people have those quality do is what you write about 0:05:01.400 --> 0:05:04.640 being very important. It's sort of what would a kind, 0:05:04.720 --> 0:05:08.880 compassionate person do, Let's do more of that. I actually 0:05:08.920 --> 0:05:11.560 think questions like that are useful to carry around in 0:05:11.560 --> 0:05:15.320 a lot of ways. I find questions more powerful than advice. 0:05:15.480 --> 0:05:18.080 You know, advice is kind of brittle because it's very 0:05:18.080 --> 0:05:21.080 context dependent. It's even somebody who's been there and done 0:05:21.120 --> 0:05:24.520 exactly what you want to do, their situation was different 0:05:24.600 --> 0:05:27.160 or the timing was different, and so you know, it's 0:05:27.160 --> 0:05:29.080 easy for that advice to fall flat or to not 0:05:29.160 --> 0:05:31.120 work quite as well as you had hoped. But if 0:05:31.120 --> 0:05:33.359 you have the right question, then you can walk around 0:05:33.360 --> 0:05:35.440 and you can ask yourself, like you said, you know, 0:05:35.440 --> 0:05:37.880 what does a kind person does a compassionate person do? Well? 0:05:37.960 --> 0:05:41.920 The answer will arise naturally as you go through the situation, 0:05:42.160 --> 0:05:45.080 or what would a healthy person do? That's an interesting 0:05:45.200 --> 0:05:46.920 question to kind of carry around with you if you're 0:05:46.920 --> 0:05:48.640 trying to build a better fitness habit and so on, 0:05:49.520 --> 0:05:52.640 um on that same theme of questions, I think, and 0:05:52.680 --> 0:05:54.400 this is kind of where you're getting at or the 0:05:54.480 --> 0:05:57.960 direction you're moving in. Any way, we start by asking ourselves, 0:05:58.120 --> 0:05:59.599 who's the type of person I want to be? What 0:05:59.680 --> 0:06:01.960 is the kind of identity I want to reinforce? And 0:06:01.960 --> 0:06:04.640 then the natural next question is like, Okay, I kind 0:06:04.640 --> 0:06:06.000 of have a better idea of that, or I know 0:06:06.040 --> 0:06:07.720 what I'd like to achieve, but how do I actually 0:06:07.760 --> 0:06:10.440 do that? And this is one of my kind of 0:06:10.600 --> 0:06:12.800 like gripes or complaints about a lot of self help 0:06:12.839 --> 0:06:15.120 books or a lot of how two books, is that 0:06:15.600 --> 0:06:17.560 they say they're how to, but they're actually what to. 0:06:18.160 --> 0:06:20.680 They tell you what to think, like don't doubt yourself, 0:06:20.680 --> 0:06:22.960 believe in your greatness, you know, fall through, show up, 0:06:23.000 --> 0:06:25.159 work out four times a week, but they don't actually 0:06:25.200 --> 0:06:28.719 to tell you how to do those things. And um, 0:06:28.760 --> 0:06:30.880 I wanted a time of habits to be both a 0:06:30.880 --> 0:06:33.040 how to and a what to book. And I think 0:06:33.680 --> 0:06:36.480 if we're asking that question, how do I actually do this? 0:06:36.680 --> 0:06:40.200 How do I actually fall through? They're roughly like four 0:06:40.360 --> 0:06:43.000 things that you want working for you if you're trying 0:06:43.040 --> 0:06:44.800 to build a good habit or break a bad one. 0:06:45.360 --> 0:06:47.760 So you want the habit to be obvious, like you 0:06:47.800 --> 0:06:50.719 want the cues that sparked to be obvious, available, visible, 0:06:50.839 --> 0:06:53.600 easy to see. You want the habit to be attractive. 0:06:53.839 --> 0:06:57.000 Some more attractive or appealing appealing a habit is the 0:06:57.040 --> 0:07:00.120 more motivating or enticing it is, more you feel compel 0:07:00.240 --> 0:07:03.120 to do it. You wanted to be easy, The easier, 0:07:03.279 --> 0:07:07.560 more convenient, frictionless, simple habit is, the more likely it 0:07:07.640 --> 0:07:10.239 is to be performed. And then the fourth and final 0:07:10.240 --> 0:07:12.480 thing is you wanted to be satisfying, more satisfying or 0:07:12.560 --> 0:07:15.640 enjoyable habit is. The more pleasurable or rewarding it is, 0:07:16.080 --> 0:07:17.840 the more likely are to fall through on it. And 0:07:18.000 --> 0:07:20.240 I call those the four laws of behavior. Change, make 0:07:20.280 --> 0:07:22.320 it obvious, make it attractive, make it easy, to make 0:07:22.320 --> 0:07:25.600 it satisfying. And if you're sitting there and you're thinking, man, 0:07:25.680 --> 0:07:28.200 you know, I how this habit? I've just been procrastinating 0:07:28.240 --> 0:07:31.160 on it, or I got this thing I keep trying 0:07:31.160 --> 0:07:32.360 to do it, but I, you know, only do it 0:07:32.360 --> 0:07:34.440 every now and then I'm not falling through very consistently. 0:07:35.200 --> 0:07:38.000 You can just go through those four steps and ask yourself, 0:07:38.040 --> 0:07:40.080 you know, how can I make the behavior more obvious? 0:07:40.240 --> 0:07:42.240 How can I make this more attractive? How can I 0:07:42.280 --> 0:07:44.640 make it easier? How can I make it more satisfying? 0:07:45.280 --> 0:07:47.640 And the answers to those questions again a good question 0:07:47.640 --> 0:07:49.880 to carry around with you will reveal the answer as 0:07:49.880 --> 0:07:52.920 you're kind of going through life. So, um, I think 0:07:53.840 --> 0:07:56.840 start with identity, and then how do we actually do that? 0:07:56.920 --> 0:07:59.000 We kind of have these four different stages or four 0:07:59.040 --> 0:08:02.680 phases that we can implement and apply. I cringe. Whant 0:08:02.680 --> 0:08:06.040 to hear someone say with my luck filling the blank 0:08:06.120 --> 0:08:09.920 and they catastrophize and sort of expect the worst to happen. 0:08:09.960 --> 0:08:13.680 And that kind of a mindset can lead to bad habits. 0:08:13.680 --> 0:08:15.920 And what you write about in Atomic Habits It's so 0:08:16.000 --> 0:08:20.360 important is that positive habits are great, but avoiding negative 0:08:20.400 --> 0:08:22.320 habits might be even more important, in the way that 0:08:22.360 --> 0:08:25.560 avoiding terrible decisions might be even more important than making 0:08:25.600 --> 0:08:27.720 a bunch of good ones because they're so life altering, 0:08:28.080 --> 0:08:31.360 and that bad habits can can increase by one percent 0:08:31.400 --> 0:08:33.480 and send you way off course in a hurry. So 0:08:33.920 --> 0:08:36.880 what's the best way to check that, be aware of 0:08:36.880 --> 0:08:40.240 it and prevent it. Yeah, that's a good question. You know, 0:08:40.920 --> 0:08:43.480 some of the things you mentioned there are really difficult, 0:08:43.520 --> 0:08:46.440 because there I would kind of have two buckets. There's 0:08:46.480 --> 0:08:49.160 like habits of thought and habits of action. Habits of 0:08:49.240 --> 0:08:51.440 action you know, doing to push up or meditating for 0:08:51.480 --> 0:08:54.680 one minute or whatever the stuff like that. Um, you 0:08:54.720 --> 0:08:57.120 can plan for it a little bit more. Habits of thought, Man, 0:08:57.160 --> 0:08:59.719 they're so rapid. They arise so quickly. You're having to 0:08:59.760 --> 0:09:02.199 come station with somebody and they make an off and 0:09:02.320 --> 0:09:06.040 comment and suddenly you're you know, judgmental or self loathing 0:09:06.120 --> 0:09:08.640 or you know, just like these feelings arise like pretty quickly. 0:09:09.400 --> 0:09:12.720 And I don't have a great way to like stop 0:09:12.720 --> 0:09:15.920 a thought from happening. But I do think that there 0:09:15.960 --> 0:09:19.520 are ways that you can optimize your environment to try 0:09:19.520 --> 0:09:22.240 to prime things to be in a better position, to 0:09:22.280 --> 0:09:24.440 try to like stack the deck, so to speak, in 0:09:24.480 --> 0:09:28.320 your favor. And one thing you can do is just 0:09:28.400 --> 0:09:30.480 walk into the rooms where you spend most of your 0:09:30.480 --> 0:09:33.760 time each day, your office, you're living room, in your kitchen, 0:09:34.280 --> 0:09:37.680 and look around and ask yourself, what behaviors are obvious here, 0:09:37.880 --> 0:09:40.840 what behaviors are easy here? What is this space design 0:09:40.920 --> 0:09:44.120 to encourage? And you'll start to notice a few things 0:09:44.120 --> 0:09:46.320 that you could tweak and design and improve, you know, 0:09:46.360 --> 0:09:49.800 like when I um one bad habit, for example, that 0:09:49.840 --> 0:09:51.400 a lot of people feel like they have is checking 0:09:51.400 --> 0:09:53.720 their phone too much, or maybe browsing Instagram or Twitter 0:09:53.760 --> 0:09:56.360 all the time or whatever. And I fall into that 0:09:56.440 --> 0:09:58.839 just like everybody else. And so when I wanted to 0:09:58.880 --> 0:10:00.959 start reading a little bit more where I did two things. 0:10:01.280 --> 0:10:03.640 The first thing I did was I downloaded Audible for 0:10:03.679 --> 0:10:05.760 audio books, and I moved it to the home screen 0:10:05.760 --> 0:10:07.240 on my phone. I put it kind of in the 0:10:07.240 --> 0:10:08.640 home bar, and I took all the other apps and 0:10:08.679 --> 0:10:11.719 moved into the second screen. Now that's a really minor thing. 0:10:12.040 --> 0:10:15.000 It's not going to radically transform your behavior, but it's 0:10:15.000 --> 0:10:17.199 a subtle reminder each time I opened up my phone, Hey, 0:10:17.240 --> 0:10:19.079 the one thing I want to be doing is spending 0:10:19.120 --> 0:10:21.960 more time reading. And I sprinkled books around like the 0:10:21.960 --> 0:10:23.800 physical environment, you know. I had a bunch of my 0:10:23.840 --> 0:10:25.600 desk and some by the bed, and some of the 0:10:26.240 --> 0:10:28.720 living room and so on. But then the second thing 0:10:28.800 --> 0:10:30.960 that I did was I started to leave my phone 0:10:31.040 --> 0:10:34.640 in another room until lunch each day. And that doesn't 0:10:34.679 --> 0:10:37.080 work for everybody's job. And I can't do it all 0:10:37.120 --> 0:10:39.040 the time, you know, I can't do I probably do 0:10:39.080 --> 0:10:42.720 it maybe eight percent of days, but man, whenever I 0:10:42.720 --> 0:10:45.040 do it, I almost always have a better morning. And 0:10:45.080 --> 0:10:47.839 the thing that's funny is that if it's next to me, 0:10:48.160 --> 0:10:50.920 I'll check my phone every three minutes, just like everybody else. 0:10:51.400 --> 0:10:53.240 But if I have a home office, and so if 0:10:53.280 --> 0:10:55.840 I leave it in another room, it's only like thirty 0:10:55.880 --> 0:10:59.360 seconds away, but I never go get it, And I'm like, 0:10:59.640 --> 0:11:01.400 did I want it or not? You know, Like, in 0:11:01.480 --> 0:11:03.880 one sense, I wanted it bad enough to check it 0:11:03.920 --> 0:11:06.320 every three seconds when it was next to me, But 0:11:06.480 --> 0:11:09.000 in another sense, I never wanted it so bad that 0:11:09.040 --> 0:11:11.280 I would walk thirty seconds down the hallway and go 0:11:11.320 --> 0:11:13.600 get it. And there are a lot of behaviors in 0:11:13.600 --> 0:11:16.280 life that are like that. They'll kind of curtail themselves 0:11:16.360 --> 0:11:19.240 to the desired degree if you just increase a little 0:11:19.280 --> 0:11:22.080 bit of friction between you and the action, increase the 0:11:22.120 --> 0:11:25.440 number of the number of steps. And so I think 0:11:25.480 --> 0:11:27.520 that's one thing that you can do when you're thinking 0:11:27.520 --> 0:11:29.360 about some of your bad habits are just maybe some 0:11:29.440 --> 0:11:31.000 of the time that you're spending in a way that 0:11:31.280 --> 0:11:34.240 you'd prefer to spend it in a different way. How 0:11:34.240 --> 0:11:35.880 do you increase a little bit of friction, how do 0:11:35.920 --> 0:11:38.480 you introduce a little bit of distance between you and 0:11:38.520 --> 0:11:41.880 the behavior. That's a great point. Um, Yeah, I try 0:11:41.920 --> 0:11:44.600 to furiously protect I don't know the succeed the first 0:11:44.640 --> 0:11:46.520 minutes of the day. I can't go till lunch without 0:11:46.600 --> 0:11:48.400 checking the phone. But when I get up in the morning, 0:11:48.400 --> 0:11:52.839 whether it's breathing, drinking water, stretching, and certainly not bombarding 0:11:52.880 --> 0:11:55.840 my senses with with devices and input, I don't turn 0:11:55.840 --> 0:11:59.600 on the TV things like that. And now many people 0:11:59.600 --> 0:12:02.400 listening or going to find that's the most radical confrontational 0:12:02.400 --> 0:12:05.000 suggestion you could possibly. I can't do it out my phone, 0:12:05.200 --> 0:12:08.439 but you you've actually practiced that. You you will uninstalled 0:12:08.440 --> 0:12:10.800 the Instagram app. I've heard you say, just to avoid 0:12:11.600 --> 0:12:15.640 scrolling and falling prey to the evil algorithms that dictator 0:12:15.840 --> 0:12:19.880 patterns of right now. Actually, I uninstalled Instagram about six 0:12:19.920 --> 0:12:21.920 months ago and I haven't put it back on, and 0:12:23.040 --> 0:12:26.360 it's been really good. I uh, I used the desktop 0:12:26.360 --> 0:12:29.000 app so I can log on like when I'm on 0:12:29.200 --> 0:12:31.680 you know, my computer or something, but I'm not sitting 0:12:31.679 --> 0:12:33.840 at my desk all the time, whereas my phone is 0:12:33.880 --> 0:12:36.120 with me constantly, and so I don't know it. Just 0:12:36.360 --> 0:12:38.920 for some reason, that little shift, it feels like, Okay, 0:12:38.920 --> 0:12:41.440 now I'm using the service the amount that I would 0:12:41.520 --> 0:12:44.040 like to use it, rather than just checking it all 0:12:44.080 --> 0:12:47.920 the time. You're an athlete. We'll get to your college 0:12:47.960 --> 0:12:51.120 baseball career and how that puts you on this path. 0:12:51.920 --> 0:12:56.120 Athletes connect with atomic habits and coaches maybe coaches first 0:12:56.120 --> 0:12:59.160 and then athletes. But when the book came out around 0:13:00.080 --> 0:13:03.240 ninety and I kept running into teams and coaches who 0:13:03.280 --> 0:13:06.000 were referring to your book and encouraging their players to 0:13:06.040 --> 0:13:07.920 read it. I mean week after week on the college 0:13:07.960 --> 0:13:09.840 football circuit every end of this and the players would 0:13:09.840 --> 0:13:11.280 talk about it because I had read it, and we 0:13:11.320 --> 0:13:13.320 would have part of our little production meeting would be 0:13:13.320 --> 0:13:15.120 about your book and what they were getting out of it. 0:13:15.400 --> 0:13:17.839 So that has to be very gratifying to you that 0:13:18.080 --> 0:13:21.439 in a world of sports where or habits are are 0:13:21.559 --> 0:13:25.000 so much and it's a result oriented thing, but really 0:13:25.000 --> 0:13:27.080 the smart people focus on the process and not the 0:13:27.120 --> 0:13:31.319 results that you're connected with so many coaches and athletes. Yeah, 0:13:31.320 --> 0:13:33.040 thanks for sharing that. It's fun. You know, I don't 0:13:33.040 --> 0:13:34.800 get to hear all the stories a lot of the time, 0:13:34.840 --> 0:13:36.679 they like don't make their way back to me or whatever. 0:13:36.800 --> 0:13:40.520 And uh, it's cool. It's really kind of wild and surprising, 0:13:40.559 --> 0:13:45.320 and it really nice to be able to create something 0:13:45.400 --> 0:13:48.120 people find useful. Um, you know, like that's that's kind 0:13:48.120 --> 0:13:52.280 of my ultimate objective is is this contributing is my 0:13:52.480 --> 0:13:56.040 little contribution to the you know, pile of knowledge for humanity? 0:13:56.120 --> 0:13:58.079 Is that doing something? You know? Is it like carving 0:13:58.120 --> 0:14:00.680 out a little niche in the universe and making a 0:14:00.720 --> 0:14:03.720 positive difference. And it's fun to see the book doing that. 0:14:03.840 --> 0:14:07.040 And as a former athlete, um that it feels cool 0:14:07.080 --> 0:14:10.080 to be able to contribute to that particular sphere. What 0:14:10.200 --> 0:14:12.760 kinds of work have you done with athletes or teams? 0:14:12.760 --> 0:14:15.200 And what's what's the most powerful thing you've heard back 0:14:15.520 --> 0:14:18.319 from from someone about how it's it's helped them in 0:14:18.559 --> 0:14:23.640 a really tough, challenging competitive world. Well, I spoke with 0:14:23.680 --> 0:14:25.680 the now the Cleveland Guardians. They were the Indians back 0:14:25.680 --> 0:14:27.960 when I went talked to them, and they've had one 0:14:27.960 --> 0:14:29.520 of the best records in the American League for the 0:14:29.560 --> 0:14:31.640 last couple of years now, and I don't think we 0:14:31.680 --> 0:14:36.200 can attribute very much of that to my book universe, 0:14:36.240 --> 0:14:39.480 so I know, right, yeah, but it's fun. You know, 0:14:39.520 --> 0:14:41.520 it's fun to contribute to a winning program and to 0:14:41.600 --> 0:14:43.880 see kind of where they've been in the path they're on. 0:14:44.040 --> 0:14:48.040 And yeah, I've you know, most of the most of 0:14:48.080 --> 0:14:50.800 the teams have received copies of the book at this point. 0:14:51.440 --> 0:14:54.480 A lot of those sports performance or mental performance coaches 0:14:54.520 --> 0:14:56.720 that work with some of the professional teams, they love 0:14:56.760 --> 0:14:59.360 the book, and I talked to them like fairly frequently. Um, 0:14:59.440 --> 0:15:01.000 you're right, it it's kind of it's funny. It's like 0:15:01.040 --> 0:15:03.200 the coaches like it, and then the players like kind 0:15:03.200 --> 0:15:05.440 of asked to read it, or like parents like it 0:15:05.480 --> 0:15:07.000 and their kids are kind of asked to read it. 0:15:07.360 --> 0:15:09.440 Whether they enjoy it or not, I don't know, but 0:15:10.160 --> 0:15:12.560 it's uh, I don't know, it's fun. You mentioned something 0:15:12.560 --> 0:15:16.360 a minute ago about how it's a very results oriented business, 0:15:16.360 --> 0:15:19.320 and sports is perhaps more that than almost anything else 0:15:19.360 --> 0:15:21.160 because it's so easy to measure did you win or 0:15:21.200 --> 0:15:26.480 did you lose? And I am a very results oriented 0:15:26.520 --> 0:15:28.760 person and pretty much everything that's in the book is 0:15:28.760 --> 0:15:32.600 written as a reminder to me to stop for focusing 0:15:32.680 --> 0:15:34.680 so much or worrying so much about the results. Think 0:15:34.720 --> 0:15:36.720 of a little bit more about the system, Stop worrying 0:15:36.760 --> 0:15:38.440 so much about the goals, think a little bit more 0:15:38.480 --> 0:15:42.080 about the type of person you're trying to become. And um, 0:15:42.120 --> 0:15:44.200 it helps to kind of pull myself back to center. 0:15:44.640 --> 0:15:47.280 And I do think it's true that if you genuinely 0:15:47.320 --> 0:15:49.920 care about the goal, if you really care about the results, 0:15:50.120 --> 0:15:52.520 you'll focus on the system. You know, this is one 0:15:52.560 --> 0:15:54.720 of the core ideas of the book, is that you 0:15:54.800 --> 0:15:56.960 don't rise to the level of your goals, you fall 0:15:57.000 --> 0:16:00.880 to the level of your systems. And so often in life, man, 0:16:00.920 --> 0:16:03.240 it's so easy to focus on the outcome. It's so 0:16:03.280 --> 0:16:07.320 easy to focus on the result. And results do matter, 0:16:08.040 --> 0:16:10.120 but they aren't the thing that you'd be getting most 0:16:10.160 --> 0:16:12.760 of your focus. I mean, that's like Bill Walsh's famous line, 0:16:12.800 --> 0:16:14.800 you know he wants multiple Super Bowls. In his line 0:16:14.880 --> 0:16:18.280 is always the score takes care of itself. And that's true. 0:16:18.320 --> 0:16:20.440 If you're committed to the system, if you're focused on 0:16:20.520 --> 0:16:24.320 building a better process day in and day out, you 0:16:24.440 --> 0:16:26.560 end up with much better outputs. It's one of these 0:16:26.600 --> 0:16:32.160 like interesting or almost ironic things about life. Our outcomes 0:16:32.160 --> 0:16:35.040 in life are offering a lagging measure of the habits 0:16:35.040 --> 0:16:37.560 that precede them. So your knowledge is like a lagging 0:16:37.600 --> 0:16:41.040 measure of your reading and learning habits, or your bank 0:16:41.080 --> 0:16:44.240 account is a lagging measure of your financial habits, or 0:16:44.480 --> 0:16:46.560 even like stupid stuff like you know the amount of 0:16:46.560 --> 0:16:49.600 clutter in your garage the lagging measure of your cleaning habits. 0:16:50.160 --> 0:16:54.320 And we also badly want our results to change, but 0:16:54.400 --> 0:16:56.720 the results are not actually the thing that needs to change. 0:16:56.920 --> 0:17:00.640 It's like fix the inputs and the outputs will fix themselves. Um. 0:17:00.680 --> 0:17:04.640 And if you if you think about like your goals 0:17:04.720 --> 0:17:07.040 are what you're optimizing for. That's like the target, the 0:17:07.040 --> 0:17:09.919 thing you're shooting for. And then your system is the 0:17:09.960 --> 0:17:13.440 collection of daily habits that you follow. If there's ever 0:17:13.520 --> 0:17:16.600 a gap between your goal and your system, if there's 0:17:16.640 --> 0:17:20.640 ever a gap between your desired outcome and your daily habits, 0:17:21.160 --> 0:17:24.960 your daily habits will always win. Like almost by definition, 0:17:25.600 --> 0:17:29.520 your current habits are perfectly designed to deliver your current results. 0:17:30.080 --> 0:17:33.800 So whatever system you're running, whatever collection of habits you're following, 0:17:34.200 --> 0:17:37.760 they're kind of carrying you almost inevitably to the outcomes 0:17:37.800 --> 0:17:41.119 that you have. And it's not that habits are the 0:17:41.200 --> 0:17:44.119 only thing that influence outcomes in life. You know, you 0:17:44.200 --> 0:17:46.359 got luck and randomness. Sometimes the bul just takes a 0:17:46.400 --> 0:17:51.560 bad bounce, but they are the element of the situation 0:17:51.600 --> 0:17:55.520 that's under your control, and by definition, luck and randomness 0:17:55.560 --> 0:17:58.120 are not in your control. And the only reasonable rational 0:17:58.119 --> 0:18:00.119 approach in life is to focus on the element to 0:18:00.200 --> 0:18:04.240 the situation that you can control. So for all of 0:18:04.280 --> 0:18:07.399 those reasons, I think the collection of habits that you 0:18:07.440 --> 0:18:10.280 have is the system you're running, and that's the thing 0:18:10.320 --> 0:18:12.480 that deserves most of your attention day in and day out. 0:18:13.440 --> 0:18:14.920 I want to repeat that because it's one of the 0:18:14.960 --> 0:18:16.800 core principles, and for a lot of people who read 0:18:16.800 --> 0:18:19.320 Atomic Habits, it is kind of an aha moment. You 0:18:19.359 --> 0:18:21.560 do not rise to the level of your goals. You 0:18:21.640 --> 0:18:24.560 fall to the level of your systems. And I'm surprised 0:18:24.560 --> 0:18:26.520 to hear that you're you're that goal oriented and that 0:18:26.600 --> 0:18:28.560 that not that system orient and that the book helps 0:18:28.600 --> 0:18:32.840 remind yourself that I kind of preach against goals, James. 0:18:32.920 --> 0:18:37.320 I think I just don't value concrete goals as much 0:18:37.320 --> 0:18:40.560 as I do the path the process. I think that 0:18:40.560 --> 0:18:43.320 that if you think about paths and that destinations or 0:18:43.760 --> 0:18:47.320 not even paths, but just directions instead of destinations, because 0:18:47.320 --> 0:18:49.480 the path is sometimes hard to define or even find. 0:18:49.520 --> 0:18:51.960 But if you had any direction, to me, that's always 0:18:51.960 --> 0:18:55.280 been more powerful than than the end result. And uh 0:18:55.400 --> 0:18:58.000 I get that. You come from from that sports world 0:18:58.040 --> 0:19:00.959 where it's all about the score. You are what the 0:19:01.000 --> 0:19:04.600 score is. You know, you're not defined by anything else 0:19:04.640 --> 0:19:07.280 than that. But how cool that you've you've come to 0:19:07.320 --> 0:19:10.320 this and it's a reminder for yourself what's important. Pretty 0:19:10.400 --> 0:19:14.520 much everything I write is a reminder to me. Um I, 0:19:13.600 --> 0:19:17.120 uh I like the term. I like how you phrase 0:19:17.320 --> 0:19:21.000 their path or direction. I think a lot about trajectory. Now, 0:19:21.160 --> 0:19:23.000 that's like kind of the thing that I try to 0:19:23.040 --> 0:19:25.919 come back to. It's not we have all these measurements, 0:19:25.960 --> 0:19:29.840 all these analytics, all these numbers for determining our current position. 0:19:30.119 --> 0:19:32.440 You know, there's so much discussion about position in life. 0:19:32.520 --> 0:19:35.719 What's the number on the scale, what's the current record 0:19:35.720 --> 0:19:38.320 of the team, what's the stock price or of the 0:19:38.400 --> 0:19:41.200 quarterly earnings. We have like all these ways of analyzing 0:19:41.200 --> 0:19:44.680 and measuring our current position. And then if the number 0:19:44.720 --> 0:19:46.879 doesn't come out right. If it's not what you're hoping for, 0:19:47.160 --> 0:19:49.280