- So for the majority of my life, I struggled to go to the gym consistently, even though the gym has always been a part of my life to some degree. I grew up playing hockey, and all my brothers played hockey and went to the gym. So going to the gym was always the right thing to do. But I could never stay consistent. Even into university, sometimes I'd go two weeks straight at the gym and then take a month off. I'd try to get into a groove and hype myself up, and I really wanted to look like Thor. And then I lost my hair. The whole point of this story is to let you know that if you relate to this, I've been in that exact same place. But I've managed in recent years to develop a tremendous consistency at the gym. And it takes me a lot less effort to get there than it previously ever has. And I can credit this a lot to a particular mindset I've adopted.

when it comes to doing things that I find difficult or boring, and sort of tricking my brain
into liking these things. I've also been able to apply this strategy to other areas of my life. Most specifically to reading
books and editing videos. Essentially what I did is I
stopped generating motivation by thinking about an end goal, and instead I learned
to enjoy the process. So first of all, what's wrong
with visualizing an end goal? Why not use this image of this beach body or a Greek god physique
as motivation to work out? Well, the main problem
you'll face is the fact that there is a huge disparity
between what it feels like to fantasize about this Greek god physique and what it feels like to actually be at the gym pushing heavy weights. They're are completely
different sensation. Fantasizing about having an
awesome body feels awesome. It puts you in this sort of La La Land where you're just walking around

as this imaginary version of yourself. Actually going to the gym,
it's strenuous, it's sweaty. And it's often really boring, especially if you're doing
cardio on a treadmill. It's the most boring thing I've ever encountered in my life. That's the first problem. The second problem that you face when you try to generate your motivation from this ideal image of yourself is that it will always be a moving target. No matter how much you fantasize about this perfect version of yourself, you will never feel like you have arrived. And even if you were to
hypothetically arrive at this goal, there's something called entropy. Stagnation breeds destruction. If you just sit on your winnings, everything will fall apart. You need to keep moving. You have to love the daily discipline of going to battle every single day and finding pleasure and
fulfillment in the thing, in the present moment for its own sake. If you're able to do this,
then that's the happy place.

The thing itself will generate its own motivation as you do it. And you can become fully immersed in the activity you're doing. So am I saying it's bad to have goals in general? Not at all. Goals are really good for creating direction. Having an ideal is sort of like having a compass. It's leading you in the right direction. You should take a glance at it for reference, but in the day-to-day struggle of actually doing the thing, it's not what you should be focusing on. So now that we know why it's kind of unhelpful to always think about this end goal, now you're probably thinking, how do I learn to enjoy and embrace difficult things and have it be an integrated part of my life? So there are two things that really helped me do that. Number one is more of a mindset shift, and it's more inner work. And number two is more of a practical, strategic thing.

that you do to yourself. So number one is to operate
from an abundance mindset, rather than a scarcity mindset. When you think to yourself,
I need to go get jacked, do you think that's an abundance mindset or a scarcity mindset? - [Child] Ready? Begin. (whimsical music) - That is a scarcity mindset because you need to go get something. And that implies that you
don't already have it. When you say, I need to go to the gym because I need to go get jacked, you're subconsciously saying to yourself, that's because I'm not jacked yet. Which also implies to yourself
that you're not jacked. And as I've mentioned in previous videos, human beings have an innate sense of wanting to stay
intellectually consistent. Whatever you think your identity is, you will operate accordingly. So if you are constantly telling yourself that you are not jacked,
what do not jacked people do? They don't go to the gym.

When you look at it that way, going to the gym will always be something that's outside of yourself. It's something that's unnatural for you. Why would you go to the
gym if you're not jacked? So am I saying you should
do some woo-woo thing and pretend that you're
jacked all of a sudden? Like force yourself to know that you are in fact a giant beast? That's not what I'm saying
because that's not true. Instead, try reminding yourself that the reason why you
want to go to the gym is because you're an active person, and going to the gym is something
that is important to you. Your health is important to you. So since you're an active person, going to the gym is just something you do. That gets rid of a ton of
mental resistance in the way of actually going to the gym. You can use this exact same
method for reading books. If you're constantly telling yourself,

oh, I have to go read
books to get smarter. Oh, I have to go read a book now. Obviously, you're not
gonna have a good time while you're doing it. But if you identify as somebody
who enjoys reading books, it's something that you like doing. It's just a part of who you are. Then you're way more likely to actually follow through with doing it. And if you think this is
just some woo-woo crap, this is how some of
the greatest musicians, athletes, and performers operate. Take John Mayer, for example. I was just watching one of
his Instagram live videos where he was jamming
out to blues backtracks, and he was having the time of his life. And he said on the actual livestream, Nothing's more fun in this lifetime than going out to dinner and coming home and picking up a guitar
and just practicing. Just play. I don't even call it practicing. Because even the word practice implies

that you're only doing it to
achieve some sort of outcome. But if you're playing, you're just enjoying it for what it is. - So when I'm playing for you, I'm like, I'm kind of
doing what I do at home, which is repeat the same
stuff over and over again, 'cause it feels really. - This next tip is a
little bit more practical and a little less theoretical. And that is to utilize habit-bunching. And that is when you pair
an already existing habit that you are used to doing with one that you're trying to work on. So for instance, I'm a sucker
for a great cup of coffee. I have one in the morning and
one in the early afternoon. I really enjoy the taste of coffee, and I look forward to
it every single time. Do I have an addiction? Yes, but I can leverage
this filthy habit of mine into working on another habit. A great one to pair with a
coffee addiction is reading.

And that's exactly how I started reading more books. Every single morning next to my coffee maker, I placed the book that I wanted to read next to it so that when I made my coffee, I knew to pick up the book and I could only drink the coffee if I was reading the book the entire time I was drinking it. Done. And the crazy thing about this is eventually you just start getting used to reading, whether you have coffee or not. The action of opening up a book and reading becomes a lot more natural. But it'll become something very pleasant to you. That's so much better than reading for the end goal of becoming smarter. What is getting smarter even feel like? It doesn't feel like anything. It's not like in The Matrix where they download kung fu onto Neo, all of a sudden you just feel it. Habit-bunching also works really well when you're trying to develop a gym habit.

If you have an album that you are currently in the habit of listening to, and you crave the sound of Post Malone's beautiful, sweet, silky melodies, then you should leverage that. Allow yourself to listen to Post Malone, but only when you're at the gym. This is one of the main ways I started to become consistent at the gym. I had this Migos album that would pump me up so much. Even though I'm looking back on it now, it's not even good music at all. And just like drinking coffee and reading, once you start using habit-bunching to develop a positive association with the habit you're trying to work on, then your entire mindset towards that thing shifts. Pretty soon you will just like going to the gym because of the way it makes you feel. And realize that it's less about the music that's actually making you feel so good, and it's more about the endorphins of pushing heavy weight and getting stronger.

So to summarize, stop generating your motivation
on a day-to-day basis by fantasizing about some sort of end goal that you're never going to arrive at. Instead, use the
appropriate mindset shifts and the habit-bunching tool, and whatever other tools
at your disposal you have to help you love the process and help you love doing these
things for their own sake. Huge shout-out to Skillshare
for sponsoring this video. For those of you who don't know, Skillshare is an online learning platform with thousands of classes
covering dozens of topics, everything from
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Which, obviously, if I'm gonna invest in the stock market, I would wanna know what I'm doing first. Luckily, there's this class that I discovered on Skillshare by a guy named Business Casual. And he has two classes on just an introduction to how the stock market works and how all the different elements come into play, and I feel my mind expanding already. Pretty soon, I'm gonna be like Eddie Morra from Limitless and just start making millions of dollars overnight. Skillshare is offering Better Ideas' viewers two months completely free of a premium membership if you use the link in the description. Which means right now, absolutely free, you can check out Business Casual's class on the stock market and learn as much as I'm learning right now. After your free trial expires, Skillshare is actually still very affordable. If you sign up for the annual membership, your monthly hit is less than $10 a month. So once again, hit the link in the description

to get two months of Skillshare
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I'll actually be uploading next week, based on Atomic Habits by James Clear. But that's all for today. Thank you for watching and we'll catch you in the next video. (relaxed music)

How I tricked my brain to like doing hard things

Created by Joey Schweitzer

Inaction is a Slow Death.

Better Ideas, betterideas