What’s the thing that challenges you? Your Rubicon – your insurmountable barrier. The ‘thing’ you’re focusing on when the voice in your head says “If I could just change ..X… I’d be happy”. Everyone has one X, at least one, maybe more.
You’ve probably had challenges in the past. Do you know when a challenge seems easy? When you’ve over-come it of course. Once you’ve solved a problem it almost seems as if the answer was staring you in the face all the time. But when you’re deep in it, the lights are too bright and the noise is too loud and you can’t see the solution.
Do you know why you can’t seem to get a handle on things right now? It’s because you are doing lots of small things for short amounts of time. Splashing about, making lots of waves, but going nowhere.
Whatever you’ve been sold isn’t the answer.
You don’t need anything to stay hydrated except water. You don’t need anything to exercise except your body. You don’t need anytime to lose weight, you need less, You don’t need more to calm your mind, you need less. The product is not the answer, sure the product can help sometimes, but if the product is your solution then it’s actually your crutch, merely propping you up, prolonging your unwanted state.
I promised a silver bullet – the 1 thing that will set you free. So what is it?
Everyone wants to know that, but let me start by saying that it’s probably not something that you heard supposedly works for somebody else. What do I mean by that? The worst action you can take is jumping into a solution that supposedly works for someone else. The way to find your answer is to pick one thing that you know works for you and stick to it. That’s the basis of the silver bullet.
That sounds really boring, I know – but you’ll have plenty of time for excitement after you get rid of the monkey on your back. The quicker you shake her off the more time you’ll have of excitement, You have to walk before you run right? Nature is an excellent teacher. So let’s get boring and let’s get it done fast. Anything else is just replacing the hard truth with distraction.
The One Thing
By now you’ve tried lots of things. Some things work for a while and then stop working. It’s the same pattern for everything. Why is that? Too answers things so little time – so what to do?
It’s time for some focus. Of all the things you’ve tried, which one is the most sustainable for you?
Sustainable. What’s sustainable? Sustainable means that you can keep doing it – forever if you had to. If you had to do one small thing forever in exchange for removing the blockage holding you back from your dreams, would you do it? Sure – within reason. That’s what I mean by sustainable. Something you’re willing to keep doing that isn’t a burden on you. Not something that you know you’ll quit after a few days, not something that requires will power… will power is a starter, an ignition, it’s not sustainable. Which one of the things you’ve tried could you maintain for the foreseeable future? Say for the next 2 years if you had to. What’s the first thing that comes to mind. You might be thinking something like – “When I walk my head is clear, that works for me, but when I get back to my job then I start to muddle up again”.
The walk, in this example, is the ‘thing’ you’re looking for – the needle in the haystack. What works for you? When is you mind clear? What are you doing or have done when you feel moments of freedom?
It doesn’t matter what it is. It does not matter at all if it works for someone else. As long as you’re not actually causing harm to yourself or someone else, then what works for you is your answer, it’s irrelevant whether or not it works for anyone else. You play the house. It’s you. Just you. You’re solving your problem first, not someone else’s.
In the example walking is a great solution because, primarily it works, it doesn’t cost any money, it’s doable anywhere, and you can take it on holidays. The same is true for drinking water, meditation, yoga, martial arts, running… but these are just some things that are common, you may find that one of these are your sustainable thing, but you may have your own unique way. Rest assured that you never need to reveal this to anyone. And you’ll do yourself a favour by not…. even if it’s as common as walking. Pick your thing. You’re one sustainable thing. Sustainable is vital.
Practice over time
Pick your thing, The next part and probably the key part is the practice. Practice requires discipline. Discipline is one of those words that we associate with school. We’ve created an association in our brain and have more than likely labeled it as a bad thing. We don’t want anyone telling us or forcing us to do something. That’s a good position as far as I’m concerned, but that’s not the type of discipline you need now. Self discipline is completely different. Self discipline is a gift to yourself.
Story. The young apprentice asked the master how she could become wealthy. The master replied “As you walk to town each day throw a stone into the river. Never miss a day and you will be wealthy”
It’s very hard to apply self discipline to multiple things, that’s where we fall down. However, it’s not difficult to apply self discipline to onesustainable thing that has massive upside for you.
You need to commit to practice over time. What can you commit to? Make it sustainable for you. Using the walk example “One walk around the block at least 4 days per week” What’s your level? Do not go all in with all guns blazing, you’ll run out of energy and be back to where you started. This is not a willpower exercise, nor should you kid yourself a drop of salt in the ocean makes no difference. If you’ve read this far well done and good luck to you…. but the rest is for grown ups. (That’s you – want to know more? keep reading…)
Minimal effective dose
The amount of time you spend at your onesustainable thing should also be sustainable. You can increase the volume later but never start with something you can’t sustain. One lap of the block once a month is not going to do much. How much is enough? For you the amount to start with is the minimum amount that you feel has a noticeable effect on you. Remember it’s very important not to focus on what works for someone else.
Recap. One thing, that you might even enjoy, done regularly, in minimal doses, continuously – practice over time.
It’s time to trust yourself. You need to be the adult in the room with this. Now. This cannot be the latest thing you try. This cannot be something to tell other people about. This cannot be a green shoot or another ray of hope. This must be the thing that finally breaks through the wall that has imprisoned you. So how much time on this one thing? It won’t take forever if you commit to forever. But it will never happen if you don’t go all in. Prepare yourself to do this one forever. If that scares you then compare it to the life you’ve let roll by imprisoned – a butterfly who has never spread their wings. Your journey on planet earth will certainly end and you can either stay where you are, continue doing what you’re doing or you can throw a stone in the river daily and live.
CAPE FEAR
Overcoming fear – Have you ever felt like the proverbial deer in the headlights? Not just a deer in the headlights, a depressed, confused apathetic deer who might be thinking that that oncoming car might be the best solution.
You need to get your story straight. You’re going to have times when this feels like it’s “just not working”. You’ll be familiar with that feeling so you don’t need to practice, you just need to notice the feeling when you’re experiencing it. It’s during that time that you usually switch to something else, some other magic bullet. This is the time to have your story straight. Your story has to go something like: “This is what I’m doing, this works, the feelings I have now, the symptoms I’m seeing are temporary, I’ll let them pass.” You need to make this your default story. your default story is the home you go to when things get tough. It’s worth noting (seeing you got this far) that things will always be tough. But tough will become more tolerable, then easy – you’ll see.
Giving up
How long should you try something before giving up? Good question! You might be wasting time doing the wrong thing! You already have lots of experience of things that don’t work, so use that – you’ll know what the wrong thing is if it happens. Are you doing the wrong thing for you? If so stop now and return to line 1. However if you think you might be on to something that’s improving your life, but it’s not working as fast or as consistent as you wanted then remove time as a factor. Time is an unnecessary measurement when the solution is right. For comparison, the time you’ve wasting flapping from solution to solution is exponentially greater than the time it will take to free yourself.
Try Forever, forever removes the burden of time. Never give up, never ever, ever ever give up. Then give up. what? Give up?
You might pick the wrong thing! It happens when you try. So how do you know when to give up if it’s the wrong thing?
Well here’s the primary benefit of doing one thing – It’s not difficult to measure results with one thing. So give your one thing everything.
Commit to a schedule, stick to it a minimum of 80%. Adjust the frequency as needed – this is a factor in sustainability. Rigidity will almost certainly lead you to failure. Allow enough time. How much is enough? Not a week or two anyway – commit to 10 days minimum to get momentum going, then 30 days then 2 months then a quarter then a year. Something like that.
Over that’s time you will see results. If you don’t see results then you have either picked something that never worked for you or your expectation are out of alignment with reality.
Expectation
The problem with silver bullets is that people expect them to work right away. They never give a solution enough of a chance and continue life in a try – fail cycle.
What does prefect look like for you? You might have set the bar so high that you can’t possibly be happy. If any mere indication of a problem is utter failure to you then you’re always going to feel that way. If what you’re doing frees you from your shackles 80% of the time then that’s a roaring success. What about the other 20% of the time? Well the other 20% of the time you sit with it and let it pass. You go back to your new story your new home – what you’ve committed to doing and why recall why you’re doing it. Sit with it. Focusing on this will stop your mind becoming a runaway train. If you do this there’s no reason that over time you can see a reduction in this 20%. Experiencing the feelings you are trying to release is normal. You can’t expect your body to just forget the patterns it has built up over years. It may never forget those. But this time It will have an alternative – the alternative story that you create.
Silver bullet formula.
One thing
Sustainable
Done regularly
Commit to it for as long as it takes
On the dark days – Focus on the story of why you’re doing it
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