If Your Life Sucks, Here's How To Reprogram Your Mind

The Darkest Period Of My Life

00:00I think often about one of the darkest periods of my life the funny thing is at the time I didn't know it was one of the darkest periods it was just a normal phase of my life it was my standard and my good days then are my terrible days now so many people have no idea how much better they could feel they don't realize that their normal state is bottom of the barrel I would start my days at 10 a.m.

00:23I would drive straight to the McDonald's grab two sausage and Egg McMuffins and a large iced coffee with cream sugar all of it I would instantly feel like garbage and I would just lay back down and binge watch episodes of the office and I did that until I got hungry again and then I would either go somewhere to eat and just eat way too much food again or I'd cook at home and just again eat way too much food again like frozen burritos and all of the stuff where it just doesn't require any effort to make and this was in college I was taking online classes at the time and I just didn't know how

00:57to manage myself I saw the freedom of online classes as an excuse to adopt self-destructive habits I barely did any of my schoolwork and I would log on last minute to just complete the assignments and I still passed with A and B's so that says a lot about the education system at night I would spend 5 to 7 hours playing League of Legends and this was with or without friends and at this point I was just numbing my mind to escape the whatever I was hiding from and this is all to illustrate one point the difference between video games in real life is fake risk and real risk

01:33real pain real fear real sacrifice the things that allow pleasure love and results to exist in a video game you can fail without repercussion you can die and you respawn in life you can't just hide behind your screen and hope that there won't be any kind of failure that is necessary to grow in a video game we trick our minds into thinking that we're making progress we increase our level we acquire skills we acquire traits we unlock certain things like dungeon and new quests and it triggers the reward system in our brain and we start to enjoy the comfort and security of

02:10diving into the fake unknown in a video game to give us that false reward and it's just all backwards I was doing this same thing in my life I was hiding from the necessary failure and pushing into the unknown that will bring true progress and reward into my life I had to get my reward from something external I had to get my reward from video games and food rather than pursuing my goals and making progress the sleeping in fast food and Netflix binges kept me in a drip fed dopamine sedation so that I didn't feel the need to pursue anything greater everything was fine because I let it be fine my

02:47life sucked because I let it suck before we begin I am once again asking you to pre-order my new book The Art of focus it's more than just a book it comes in a keepsake box the price actually will increase inrease in 2 days and there's only 2,000 total copies available uh 25% are gone and by the time this YouTube video goes out there's only 2 days and I upload weekly so this is the final update you're actually going to see on YouTube before the price actually increases so go and click the first link in the description to actually check out what's inside you don't have to buy

03:20obviously if you just go and click on the link to see what's inside but if you want to be one of the first 2,000 to actually read the book then you get instant access to the digital version that you can read on Kindle or readwise reader and of course the annual event the future of work event with total of five to six speakers that we already have that's going to happen in Q3 of 2024 and all Keepsake holders the people that purchase the Box get a private invitation to that let's get back into

Tiny Choices

03:46it your life sucks because of the thousands of tiny choices you made over the past year you didn't make the choices that led to a purposeful career you didn't make the choices that led to fulfilling relationships you didn't make the choices that led to a healthy and aesthetic body but Dan what about my genetics and where I was born and the job that doesn't give me the time to blah blah blah blah blah yeah those things obviously play a role but you just made another choice to close your mind off to the potential choice that you could make to slowly get yourself

04:14out of that situation so that you can free up more time or move environments or whatever to make better choices choices come after choices you don't just make the choice to quit your job without making the prior choices that allow you to do that the ability to choose can be taken away or even given away it can only be forgotten that is a quote from Greg Macau from his book essentialism it's not difficult to look around and see that you're not a special case there are thousands of individuals if not hundreds of thousands or millions that were in a relatively similar

04:46situation as you that made the choices that allowed them to get out of that situation what I'm saying is is that there is a way out of whatever it is if your business isn't growing that's your fault you haven't zoomed out or developed the mental capacity or skill to be able to even register what the problem is in your business so that you can solve that problem and let it continue growing same goes with your relationships or just your life situation in general you have to push into the unknown in order to discover the skill mindset or whatever that allows you to then from a higher level

05:21of mind come back to that situation and solve the problem the quote from Einstein you cannot solve a problem from the same mind that created it so increasing your mental capacity comes first increasing your mental capacity comes from pushing into the unknown cultivating new skills understanding new knowledge and getting out of the known the comfortable routine and cycle that you have dug yourself into the quality of your life one year from now will depend on the tiny choices that compound into that life you don't have to make perfect choices it's actually better if

05:52you make mistakes the greatest risk is no risk at all because how else would you fail without failure Improvement is is literally impossible without Improvement you don't have an aim for your life without an aim for your life everything becomes meaningless becoming a better person is how you live with

Big Standards

06:09purpose that was about tiny choices and now we need to understand big standards broke people are okay with being broke until something catastrophic happens and it is much more likely for a catastrophic event to happen to them their car blows up because it's old and unmaintained someone breaks into their house or their car because they live in a bad neighborhood their parents get sick and they can't help because they have a low income and of course they you have the motivation to make money at this point when something catastrophic happens but most people think it's too

06:39late when the catastrophic event actually happens so they don't do anything about it and then they just wait for the next catastrophic event they didn't prepare they didn't have the foresight or vision for that catastrophic event they couldn't break out of the narrow mind that they have adopted because of the narrow routine that they are stuck in so they get trapped in an infinite cycle of I should have started sooner and eventually things equalize right so they the the event happens like someone breaks into their car and then the stress slowly comes down and then it becomes normal

07:13and then they're comfortable again and it's like I don't have to do anything I feel just fine my survival isn't at stake and they just wait for another one to happen they don't do anything to prevent it they don't do anything to reverse entropy successful people use these events to change who they are and who they are determines their standards and values and their standards and values determine the tiny choices that they make if you're okay with having $5 in your bank account you won't see that as a problem if you're okay with having $100,000 in your bank account you will

07:43see anything less than that as a problem that needs to be fixed problems frame your perception I have an entire chapter on this in my book when your mind is open and has the intelligent limitations or the standards that allow you to create smart problems that require creativity then you begin to notice more let's say money-making opportunities in these situations where if you have $5 in your bank account you don't see that as a problem right so you're not going to notice any opportunities that help fix that because it's not on your mind it's not framing your perception and when you

08:20are not okay with anything less than $100,000 then even if you have $50,000 your survival is at stake you're going to see that as a problem it's going to break bring a you stress to your life which is a good kind of stress and then things the universe starts to conspire in your favor but this is just like The Logical outcome of having a problem on your mind that you want to solve creatively you start absorbing information without even really being aware of it your Google searches change to things like how to make an extra $1,000 a month you start having conversations about money with your

08:53friends all of these tiny choices begin to compound into results you rewire your thinking patterns based Bas on your intentional search for specific information relating to the problem you are facing the information you consume highly influences your identity and thus your standards so if you are in let's say a social media space or you're reading books or you're immers your conditioning programming training your mind like I talk about in the video about mental bodybuilding you're slowly allowing these standards to form over time if you're surrounded by a group of

09:24Internet Hustlers no matter what you think of them that keep saying oh you need to make this much a month to be successful there's goods and bads about that but if you adopt that as a standard the likelihood of you actually reaching that point is a thousand times higher than someone who does not have that standard in their mind they're just not receiving and storing and memorizing and being able to use the information that crosses their mind they just get stuck in this cycle of scrolling all day long if you surround yourself with people physical or digital

09:53that make it seem like it's okay to be 100 lb overweight have zero money work a job you hate stay stay with a partner you despise get drunk every night and the rest how do you think your life will end up if your standards require you to eat from Whole Foods you are going to look at McDonald's in disgust if you don't then those aren't hard standards in your head and this is also how standards intertwine with identity a bodybuilder is naturally going to gravitate towards certain types of food and see other Foods as disgusting and the only way a bodybuilder becomes a

10:25bodybuilder is through the education pushing into the known seeing progress in progress in the practice of bodybuilding and adopting the actions that are necessary to become one and the standards to become one or else they don't get results and this is in more than just bodybuilding if you're not interested in bodybuilding okay whatever if you're interested in making money or changing your life then you're interested in adopting the identity of the person that is going to reach that ideal future if your standards require you to work like a CEO you will see low-level gruntwork as a problem that

10:57needs to be outsourced or automated or taken over by a software this explains the majority of like Ai and automation coming into take away those jobs it's because the people with those jobs don't have the standards that allow them to bridge their understanding and action to a higher identity now you obviously can't solve all of the problems in your life immediately you can't escape your situation right now you need a plan you need an aim and by sticking to this plan I can promise that the journey will be more enjoyable than the outcome of that thing as nche would say happiness is the

11:33feeling that power increases that resistance is being overcome so now tiny choices and big standards we've covered those and how they connect with each other now a good way to adopt higher standards is to adopt the standards of the person you want to become or the ideal version of yourself most people

The Standards Of Who You Want To Become

11:51take the bare minimum approach to life quick money quick sex quick pleasure no commitment no depth no failure the easier you try to make your life the harder it's going to be the way out of mindless living is to adopt the standards of who you want to become how much money do you want to make what kind of work will bring you fulfillment what is your ideal relationship for friends or a partner how do you want to look and feel you must go beyond the bare minimum of survival commit to having a reason behind your actions if you don't know why you're doing something why are you

12:23doing it and if you do know why why are you ignoring it are you advancing Humanity by handing out 40 quadruple pumped caramel macchiato at Starbucks or are you making Humanity sick and overweight why haven't you begun pursuing a more purposeful career or starting a business do you know why you are putting that food in your mouth are you aware of it do you understand how each nutrient interacts and creates a healthy state in your body why haven't you begun educating yourself on nutrition and training if you live in your body it should be your full-time job to learn about it do you know why

12:58you're going going through the motions with a partner that was easy to get with do you see yourself with them for 40 more years why haven't you improved your social skills and your personal development to the point of being able to attract a better partner because in this case most people just become what's I don't even what's the word incel they become an incel because as what we talked about earlier they don't see the tiny choices that they can make to reach an ideal outcome and then as I said earlier they close their mind off and that's the choice they decide to make

13:25it's cliche but you only have one shot at the Thing Called Life the only person that can stop you from living a meaningless existence is yourself let's

The Power Of The Internet

13:34break down what creates better choices learning is the fundamental human drive at Birth you are an information sponge your parents friends Society teachers and bosses all project their world viiew on you where did they get their worldview from the same people unless they question it they got it from their parents friends Society teachers and bosses this is all that you know when you reach the age of let's say 12 to 18 and if we could put a number on it you know less than 1% of the information available in the world I would even say it's less than 0.1% and that is the same .1% that every

14:09single other person knows because it was passed down by every single other person that's what the Matrix is it's a web of expectations and those web of expectations create your identity which is the same as everyone else and they get locked in into the same routines the same Cycles they get locked into the known and they become slaves to it your ident limits what information you notice because you've only learned so much you won't notice certain things if you haven't learned the information that Bridges what it is with what you know you won't understand intermediate

14:39information if you haven't learned beginner information you can't advance from level one to three you are missing out on 99% of life for this reason it's because oh I don't want to do that thing when it's the exact thing that will lead to you doing what you want if I was exposed to the environment and information that made me a a goth I would notice certain likes and dislikes in music People clothing work opportunities outlooks on the future and I would have a a a certain cycle of emotional states that I go through if I drown myself in information that would

15:14lead to the identity that I want over time I would spot opportunities related to that identity this brings up the power of the internet you can tend a digital Garden or be thrust into a digital swamp we've never had access to so much information and I find it hard to believe that it isn't creating identities for the worse and very rapidly when you log on to social media the default action is to follow entertainment and meme accounts rather than value creators almost all of them subject your mind to unwanted tenants that party like it's a frat house when the parents come down they're

15:48devastated by what they see your awareness is the parents coming down to see the swamp that you've created in your mind become aware of this now one unfollow anyone who does not serve the conditioning of better standards in your life even if it doesn't seem like it and no matter how much you justify it the people you follow suddenly influence your actions slowly then all at once you become someone you may hate two take your time to follow valuable accounts valuable accounts challenge your worldview make you think outside the box and educate you on the skills necessary

16:21to reach a higher quality of life this is not an overnight process again you may not find the information useful at first it takes time time to bridge specific ideas that lead to understanding you will probably find it boring until it's one of the most interesting things in the world follow One account let the algorithm do its work follow accounts that reply to the first accounts post with time you will create an environment that is conducive to your growth the only difference between you and the person more successful than you is the consistent intention behind the information they

16:50consume but what about taking action you're acting every day why because your mind is programmed with the information conducive to those actions your identity is forged by the information you've been fed and that alone determines what you perceive as an opportunity to act surround yourself with the right people and you can achieve anything you want

The Path Of The Value Creator

17:10now let's talk about becoming a value Creator or the path of the value Creator which I've done in two videos the most recent one is the value Creator something something something why do people keep doing things they hate I've always wondered this not like I'm a special Little Flower that never got stuck in that trap but one who feels like he's a escaped and can view the situation from a higher place on the mountain until he inevitably falls back down after crossing the peak praying for the weekend dreading Monday morning hiding who you are to make conversation

17:40with people you don't like working with using the internet as an escape scrolling clicking shutting your mind off for just a bit longer because when it's on you don't like what it's doing this is the life of the consumer the person who is used by the internet rather than the one who uses it there's no escaping this new world you can fight with with it or flow with it and while the internet is a big problem it's also the solution you do not have to use the internet to do this but I don't see a reason not to every time someone emails me and it's like oh I want to do this

18:10but do I have to do it on social media like isn't social media bad for your mind and it's like yes if you let it be if you can't control yourself and the people you follow other than that it's like just the greatest way to make friends in the world like I I it doesn't make sense it's like it's like saying that social media and subjecting your mind to those bad experiences is like going to a bar and acting like you have to stay there because you don't like the people like you're free to go to a bar at any time but on social media you can go to a bar on the other side of the

18:42world the last reason your life sucks is because you don't contribute to humanity you don't contribute to humanity because you don't have something so valuable that you can't help but share it you don't have something valuable to offer because you are ignoring the problems in your life that beg a solution to be created you IGN ignoring the problems in your life because you don't have Clarity on how to achieve the goal that will solve them you don't have Clarity on how to achieve a goal because you have nothing to build nothing to frame and guide your learning A value Creator is

19:09someone who has intention behind their inputs and outputs they treat their life like a science project and it it's funny that like I'm writing this and it's crazy how I've conditioned my mind to think in my book because everything that we're listing here is like chapter by chapter it's kind of a summary of what's inside the book really like your science project building something how to learn it's all in there so they treat their life like a science project and they identify problems in their life they educate themselves with the infinite resources available to them on the

19:38Internet they test the solution on themselves and distribute their experiences with writing if you want to learn writing go watch the digital writer series or the oneperson business series playlist they package up the most helpful and streamlined Solutions in the form of a product or service that is how they make a living by living with purpose becoming a Creator is the cure for overc consumption writing is the vessel for Distributing value I write on all platforms I don't care to compete with designs or images YouTube is the only place that I actually have videos

20:07aside from the animations but I rarely do those anymore and this is just a written script it's all writing I just stand up here and talk and go over the points of my script I gain a deep sense of fulfillment by using the internet as a place to curate good thoughts but to organize and share them with others with the ultimate upside of doing what I enjoy joy to make a living something that's in my control this isn't about becoming famous this isn't about building a mass of following although those things can happen this is about Distributing the value you have to offer

20:38in a place that can reach anyone with the opportunities that will change your life and career you don't need a step-by-step course to join the online party write what you want to write talk to who you want to talk to get your name in front of people by not being a ghost get eyes on your writing so it can spread more with time I just talked about that in the last video how to grow how to actually grow on social media if you really need the extra push just look at the people that you have followed for a long time observe what they write about observe how they write it observe

21:05who they interact with observe what they sell to make a living piece the dots together and begin emulating them if you don't have an answer look it up you won't get all of the answers in an instant be okay with that if you know you are meant for more start acting like it you don't have to write but I've tried it all with writing being the fundamental mode of communication that has survived throughout human existence it's a great starting point to discover what you truly want to do enjoy the rest of your week my friends Link in the description for the art of focus box

21:33other things like tour writer digital economics learn a high income skill productize yourself uh 7 days to genius ideas I haven't said that one in a while that's a free challenge my idea generation system that'll actually be really helpful for WR for writing if you want to go and download that one I'm stumbling over my words it's time to go have a good one peace