Reality Laughs

Mini celebration dinner with wife and daughter. Can’t miss moments like that.

Strap up and run. Full stomach. Not good. Plodding.

10k done.

No matter what.

The lesson from the Pentathlon and using the Lights tool.

The answer is simple: yes or no.

Did I stay on task? Yes or no. There is no “Guilty with an explanation.”

Did I run the full distance? Yes or no.

The only person who knows the truth is me. The only person who asks and answers the question is me. The only person who knows I’m a liar if I lie — is me. The only person who knows I am a weasel if I give a weasely excuse — is me. The only person who will grow stronger when I tell myself the truth — is me.

Rigorous self-honesty.

Ask myself yes or no questions.

Give myself yes or no answers.

That’s how to do it.

Work is overwhelming, disappointing, a relentless torrent of uninspiring opportunities to show my inadequacy.

No. Be stronger. Keep hammering, one small task at a time.

My body is sore. Knees hurt and quads are tender from running.

No. Be stronger. Keep hammering, one daily run at a time.

These are the voices of weakness. Reject them. Ignore them. Crush them.

There is time to retool your business. You’re doing that right now. Plant the seeds and let them grow.

There is time for your body to adapt. Keep running at this level for a few more months. You’ll see.

Discipline. Determination. Patience. And a simple answer to weakness: NO.

Nearing the end of the Pentathlon, I see the impact of incremental, focused action.

• Set a daily performance objective. Aim low. Make it easy to accomplish.
• Just a few.
• Do it daily for two weeks. Remember: a week is 7 days. Does your life exist only Monday to Friday? No.
• See traction.
• See the mindset spillover.

The Pentathlon asks you to set targets in sleep patterns (lights out time and waking time), fitness, daily planning, concentrated work on your most important project, and nutrition. Only in fitness did I set a semitough target.

“Decision made, action taken”. That is the positive loop that I have experienced in the last two weeks.

The way the targets are defined is binary: either I was in bed with lights out at 10:30 pm or I wasn’t. 10:31 pm is a fail.

This is a useful way to approach actions. It’s clear, unambiguous. What’s interesting is that I am using binary judgments to move forward on analog objectives: getting better, and there is no binary scoring of whether I’m better or not.

Via negativa showed up in my nutrition goals: don’t eat any of the free snacks in the kitchen at work. This probably removed 600 – 800 calories a day from my food intake.

Daily planning is interesting. I’m at the stage where I cheerfully admit that I’m a failure at it, yet I make a plan daily and maybe accomplish half of what I list on paper. Right now all I am trying to accomplish is the act of daily planning. The accomplishment of tasks comes later.

The Pentathlon runs a couple more days. I plan to do it again, alone, for another two week cycle.

Lessons:

1. Modest goals.
2. Just a few.
3. Goals focused on removing rather than adding. Simplifying, not complicating.
4. Binary metrics. I did or I did not hit the target.
5. Honesty. Don’t lie to yourself about hitting the target when you didn’t.
6. Again and again. Sameness, repetition. There is power in boredom.

That’s all I want from myself.

The victory lap? It happens inside my head. Outside? No one gives a fuck, and why should they?

Better? It’s achieved one disciplined action after another.

Feels good.

From Discipline Equals Freedom, the “Good” chapter:

Accept reality, but focus on the solution. Take that issue, take that setback, take that problem, and turn it into something good.

Life doesn’t stop. There is no finish line, so no end state for any event. Each action is the end of something and the beginning of something else.

That’s why it’s important to not look on a seeming setback as awful and bewail the fact. It’s just an event. Investing an opinion in the event is a waste of time at best, or damaging at worst. Opinions about the past? Past events are out of your control, so don’t pay them any mind.

Except, pay attention to them as they are right now. The present is good. Always good. And the present facts are what you have to work with.

Your opinions and thoughts are the only thing you can control, so why not be default positive? Default optimistic? Default constructive?

Using that attitude means you don’t wallow in regret or bitterness about past events. Negative opinions about things out of your control are crowded out.

Using that attitude means you focus on improvement and achieving your goals right now, using what you have on hand, not what you wish you had.

Using that attitude is contagious to those around you. Not everyone defaults forward. But most people default to follow and mimic. And a few observe and embrace.

Whatever happens, default to “This is good. Let’s get into action.” Not just the right opinion. No. Attitude and immediate action.

Back to work.

Do something hard.

The most important thing to learn is that we have so much to learn.

Jocko Willink, Discipline Equals Freedom

There are so many people in the world that know so many things that I do not know. There are so many things to learn. As a practical matter I am at noob level and will be for the rest of my life. It’s like facing a meal of 300 billion hamburgers. As a practical matter no matter how many I eat the number might as well be infinite.

So have a bit of humility. You might know a little thing here or there, a skill or insight. It means nothing. You are showing up for the first day of school every day of your life. share what you know and go learn something new.

At least I know that!

Meditations.

We find ourselves in a river. Which of the things around us should we value when none of them can offer a firm foothold?

Meditations 6:15.

I don’t have an answer today. I’m trudging.