One of the most powerful things we can do in work and life is embrace simplicity. The irony of simplicity is that it’s easy to appreciate but hard to create. It takes effort and skill to make something simple, as Leonardo Da Vinci famously said, “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”

The simpler something is, the better it works. A clear request is more likely to be followed. A simple system is less prone to errors. A simple life avoids the stress of overcomplication.

Yet, human nature often pushes us toward complexity. The ego craves it, making us feel smarter when we understand things others don’t. But the best thinkers and writers focus on clarity, crafting their messages to avoid confusion and maximize impact.

I’ve fallen into the complexity trap myself. Early in my podcasting / content creating journey, I tried to sound smart to cover up my insecurities. Over time, I’ve learned that simple messages are far more effective. Now, my goal is to take the complex world of self-improvement and distill it into themes and ideas that are easy to understand and apply.

This doesn’t just apply to how we communicate but also to how we solve our own problems. Overthinking creates more problems, and overcomplicating leads to wasted effort or disappointment.

As Tony Robbins says, "The quality of our lives is determined by the quality of the questions we ask ourselves." A powerful question to create simplicity is: What about this isn’t necessary? What can be simpler?

That’s what I tried to do with this episode. Hope you noticed!

I don’t have a depth of knowledge in nutrition, which is why I don’t often talk about it. However I think even I’m qualified to give this piece of advice: As a society, we need to be eating less sugar.

In the 1800s refined sugar became commercialized and was introduced as a staple in our diet. But even so, on average people are eating 60x more sugar today than they were 100-200 years ago. This overindulgence on sugar is responsible for the obesity crisis where 40.3% of US adults are classified as obese, it increases risk of cancer because it literally fuels overactive cells, it creates chronic inflammation which offsets our immune system, and it increases the risk of heart disease and diabetes. And on top of that, it’s addictive.

It is shocking to witness how much sugar an average person has on a daily basis. For someone looking to decrease their sugar intake, here are some recommendations:

1) Stop drinking your sugar. This is a staple to the Heroic philosophy. Sodas, energy drinks, sweetened coffee and teas, sports drinks, and even juices are loaded with sugar. If you consume any of those frequently, the fastest way to decrease the amount of sugar in your diet is to stop drinking it.

2) Be intentional about your snacks. Often when we’re feeling snacky, it’s more compulsive rather than actually seeking nutrition. This means that our bodies are craving something sweet and rewarding. Many snacks are packed with sugar because sugar doesn’t spoil, so it’s easy to keep in a cupboard for a long time. But instead, you can find healthier alternatives that are vegetable, protein, or nut-based that will satiate your appetite. I even find that flavored water does the trick for me.

3) Read labels. A good rule of thumb is to look over what’s actually in your food. If something has unnatural sugars, or is ultra-processed with ingredients that you can’t pronounce, it’s probably best to limit those. This takes the most work but it’s an incredible way to optimize your diet toward more whole foods.

Again, I am not a registered dietician and everyone’s body and nutritional needs are different. However, in general, it serves us to limit our refined sugars and fuel our bodies from better, more natural sources. As a takeaway, think about the one thing you can do to start limiting your sugar.

Last week I had a conversation with one of the community members in my coaching program and it ended on a much different note than he expected.

He’s building a new invoicing system for his business and he wanted to streamline it - make sure the process from start to end was as efficient and dialed in as possible. Seeing the quality he already had, I asked him “What’s the constraint? What’s keeping you from getting the result you want?.” And after a brief dialogue we realized the limiting factor wasn’t the system itself, it was the consistency with which he was using it.

This is such a common problem. There are thousands of products in the marketplace that can help you with anything and everything, and people figure that a new tool or resource is going to get them a new result. That’s often not the case. The problem isn’t that we don’t have the right tools, but rather that we don’t know how to use the tools we have.

There are so many habit tracking apps out there designed to support you in being healthier and more focused. And people bounce around from one to the next hoping that it’ll be the one that changes their life. But they all fall into the same unfortunate fate of being lost and forgotten.

It’s like an assembly line where you’re trying to make one step of the process 10% better, but the real problem is getting people to show up to do each task.  Who cares if that one step is 10% better if there's no one there to do it!

For this Community Member, the constraint wasn’t the quality of his invoicing set up, it was his consistency of using the system, following the process, and delegating the work to his team. So that’s what we improved upon - helping him build new systems of time management and awareness that prompted him to use what he’s built more easily and reliably.

No matter what tool you choose to use, the limiting factor is your ability to use it. Any tool can work when you work it, but that’s where most people fall short.

If you’re looking to get into better habits and routines, let me share with you my system for being more disciplined in the things you know you should be doing or could be doing better. And not just the tool, but the process behind the tool that helps you to use it consistently (and really accelerate your progress in ways you never have).

Today I’m starting a new personal development program called Heroic Elite. It’s designed to help you become capable of achieving an incredibly inspiring goal in 101 days. I’m just starting it, but the program is grounded in daily disciplines that raise your standard and create the energetic and focused environment you need to be successful. 

On a daily basis, we’re tasked to fill out our daily performance in a journal they created called 'Carpe Diem'. As you probably know,  'Carpe Diem' means “Seize the day” in Latin. And while that’s the observable timeline we’re choosing to track in this program, the work goes one step further:

Carpe Punctum: Seize the moment.

A day with good outcomes is only made possible by a long sequence of positive moments. This means it’s upon us to show up moment to moment as the most focused, present, and aligned version of ourselves. Heroic calls this living with “arete”, which they translate to “expressing your best-self virtues moment to moment to moment.”

In modern language, I call this living with intentionality, which is the combination of having the awareness to know what the right choice is at any given moment, and the discipline to faithfully follow through on it despite the circumstances. 

Our days are fought and won in these moment by moment battles. Good vs Evil. Daimon vs Demon. As Mark Divine puts it - the Courage Wolf vs the Fear Wolf. The more consistently we make the right choices, the more moments we win and the more of the day we have seized.

So to live a ‘Carpe Punctum' life - with ‘arete’ and intentionality - you need to cultivate more awareness and discipline. Awareness to know what most serves you, what your options are, what’s most likely to come from the choices you make… And Discipline to overcome the feelings of laziness, doubt, resistance, and obstacles that get in the way of you and doing what most serves you.

And at the very least, if you lose that battle in any given moment, recommit to fighting in the next and understanding what it was about that moment that defeated you. Because then the next time your poised to fight it, it won’t have as much power over you.

The Heroic Elite 101 day program will be a great tool to accomplish exactly that. If you’re looking for something advanced that’ll hold you to a higher standard than you’ve ever achieved, then check it out!

Or if you’re looking for something more intermediate, that helps you establish the foundation you need to make the most of every moment and, every day, I run a 21 Day Super Habits Challenge that’s just for you!

Recently I heard a definition of guilt that I love. I’m pretty sure it comes from Alex Hormozi and it goes  “guilt is an emotion you feel when you act outside of your values.”

Think about the last time you felt guilty. Maybe you sold something on someone and it felt icky to you, you said you were going to an event and flaked, you disrespected a relationship, had a nasty thought, or took more than was your share.

No matter the scenario, the commonality is that you took an action that fell outside of your moral compass.

It’s helpful to be aware of times when you feel guilty. By examining the times when you feel guilty you get clearer on what your values are. Especially because personal values can be difficult to pinpoint, taking the time to reflect on your values when they’ve been violated can polish your clarity for what they are.  

In this way, guilt can be used as a feedback mechanism to remind you of what feels out of integrity with your best self.

But instead of just talking about it, let me show you how to operationalize it. The obvious example is if someone is unfaithful with their partner. They feel guilty because their actions violated their core values of loyalty and honesty. But, there are people who don’t value those things and therefore don’t feel guilty about unfaithful actions.

Or a personal example: It was my nephew’s birthday and I chose not to come into town to celebrate it. When I FaceTimed to say Happy Birthday, afterwards I felt guilty that I wasn't there in person. It brought to light one of my values, family, and my actions (or inaction) violated that.

But even though I felt 'guilty', I still feel like I made the right choice. Staying at home allowed me to focus on leading a fundraiser and live out other values of “impact” and “doing what I said I was going to do”. 

It’s a complex topic. Guilt doesn’t necessarily mean you did something wrong, it just means that you did something outside of your values. It’s helpful to know what that action was, and what that value is, so you can construct a life that is even more aligned with who you want to be in the world.

One of the great drives of improvement and innovation is feedback. In experiments we need to review what happened in order to make progress on our next attempt. In business we need feedback to understand what’s resonating with our clients, employees, and in the market to get a better sense for how to position ourselves.

Unsurprisingly, the same is true in our self-growth. We need to get feedback to help us figure out what’s working and what’s not in pursuit of our goals so that we can make positive adjustments and change course in beneficial ways. Yet, the majority of people in self-improvement don’t have good feedback systems in place. I believe this happens for two reasons: 

The first is that it hurts to look at the areas where we’re falling short. It’s easier to avoid what’s right in front of us. We pretend not to know because it’s more comfortable to act like our shortcomings don't exist than to face up to reality. Many of us have a tendency to be overly self-critical, and this is a defense mechanism against that.

The second is we just don’t know how. In the areas that we are open-minded to looking at, and dedicated to improving, what does getting feedback look like? And how do we take those insights and integrate them into meaningful improvement? We want to be better, more efficient, and more effective… And the process of optimizing our lives is a cycle of receiving feedback and changing approach on repeat. Finding a way to implement that is the challenge.

There’s a Socrates quote that goes “A life unexamined is not worth living.” While that takes an extreme position, the essence of it is that an ultimate purpose in life is continuous improvement. The world is evolving and we must evolve with it. Our seasons of life will change and we need to reimagine who we need to be to maximize ourselves within it.

It’s through a discipline of self-examination that we can better see the relationship between cause and effect, adjust our inputs, and create new outputs. In fact it’s invigorating and life-giving! But many people are missing the very basics of it.

As Tom Bilyeu puts it, you must be willing to stare “nakedly at your inadequacies” if you want to see what it really takes to maximize your potential in the world. In doing so you get the critical feedback you need to advance your life, your mission, and yourself.

If you want to make the most out of life and you’re feeling inspired to not just talk about it, but actually implement it... Click here to see how I do it!

Merriam Webster’s word of 2024 is “polarization”. It chooses the word of the year based on what people were actively searching to learn more about and using in conversation. Unfortunately, it’s representative of what we went through in the United States this year with a heated and divisive election.

Ironically, the one thing that people can agree on is how polarized the world is. There’s an undercurrent of people wanting to build bridges and better understand each other, but it lacks application. Media is pulling us further into our viewpoints and belief systems. Stances are being taken to their extremes rather than settling somewhere in the middle. And people are starting to distrust and lose faith in those who are different from them.

The opposite of polarization is “unity”. Imagine if that was the word of the year… That 2024 had a narrative of collaboration, putting our differences aside, and joining forces for a greater good. It’s undeniable what a better world this would be!

We can play our part in making unity a major part of 2025, and this is how:

First we need to listen to each other. Rather than trying to get our point in, we need to understand each other's perspective. The only way you do that is by allowing someone to share it, and genuinely listening to understand and not to respond. If you want to change someone's perspective you must be willing to change your own.

Second is accepting them for who they are. It’s okay for two people to disagree. Diversity is healthy and it breeds innovation. It’s because we see the world differently that we can begin to solve the world’s problems. In fact we need these differences to be as effective as possible.

And last is the idea of oneness. At the end of the day we all want the same things - to live a joyful, impactful, meaningful life shared with others. The way we get to that varies, but the foundation is the same. So knowing that we’re all on the same team anyway, and being abundant enough to know that my success doesn’t take from your success, we can collaborate in ways that bring more goodness to all.

Call me naive, but that’s the world I want to see. So that’s the world I’m going to play a part in creating. And I hope you’ll join me.

I was visiting my wife’s family in the mountains and the water is really cold this time of year! I have a personal policy to start every shower I take with cold water as my version of a cold exposure practice. I was standing there in a towel bugging my wife, procrastinating, and complaining about how I have to take a cold shower.

And then I realized… I don’t need to do it. No one is making me step into the cold water, it’s entirely my choice. If I didn’t want to do it, then I wouldn’t do it. And I realized it was so silly to complain about something that I’m choosing to do.

You can even extend this argument about if it’s worth complaining about anything. Let’s say you have a rude co-worker, a crack in your windshield, or you’re stuck in traffic and running late for a concert. They’re not ideal situations for sure, but nonetheless you’re choosing them over the alternatives.

A rude co-worker? No one is making you work with him. You can choose to stay and deal with it, or get a new job.

A crack in the windshield? You’re choosing to keep it there, and not invest the time and money to get it fixed. Your windshield doesn’t need to be cracked.

Stuck in traffic? You don’t have to go to the concert. You burn your ticket, leave your friend hanging, turn the car around and head home.

You’re choosing to endure the inconvenient thing because you want it more than the consequences of choosing the alternative. And when you see it from that perspective, you realize you have way less reason to complain. In fact it gives you reasons to be grateful.

The more Stoic-influenced perspective is acquiescence. To accept how things are. If you can’t do anything about what’s happening, then why let it occupy your mind? Your energy is better invested other places. And if there is something you can do about it, then be empowered to make changes.

The next time you catch yourself complaining, run through what the other options are. Allow yourself to go to the extremes. Recognize what’s in your control. And you’ll realize that there’s a lot more good in the current situation than you gave it credit for, or that there’s little value to complaining about it at all.

It’s really interesting, people have good intentions but have a really hard time following through on them.

Intentions to prioritize their health by getting consistent and routine with their exercise and eating choices, but struggle with it on a day to day basis. To be bolder and more focused as passionate contributors to their bigger mission, but then on most days show up with a fraction of the enthusiasm. To get stronger in the face of adversity and challenge, but give up sooner than they’d like to admit.

What’s getting in the way? What’s missing? There are two reasons why people are chronically falling short of their fullest potential: Fear and laziness.

We fear what other people might think if we try our best and we don’t succeed. We’re hesitant to take risks or bet on ourselves for fear that it doesn’t pan out. Instead of testing the edges of what’s possible, people are stuck contained in their comfort zone, keeping them from taking action on the things that make them feel most alive.

And people are lazy. We eat the more convenient food option, skip the most energy-demanding task, wait for others to figure it out for us, and talk ourselves out of following through on our commitments by convincing ourselves that we deserve a break.

Interestingly, fear and laziness come from the same root - our brain’s evolutionary hardwiring to keep us safe. Safety is the brain’s primary purpose. Fear is a mechanism for keeping us out of harm’s way, and laziness is a mechanism for preserving energy so that we’re prepared to flee from a threat should we need to.

In other words, pursuing our potential exists in opposition to what our brain is designed to do.

Fear and laziness are an unconscious, underlying script. They are always at play shaping our choices and actions in the subtlest ways. And it’s those who are best at limiting their influence that are most positioned to be successful. Those who are better at overcoming fear and laziness do what’s required to achieve their goals.

So my recommendation to you is to use fear and laziness as a trigger to ask yourself a very important question - “What do I want?” Listen to the answer your best self gives in response, and have the courage and discipline to take action on it.

The 21 Day New Year Challenge starts today and it’s not too late to join. If you’ve been struggling with consistency but you want to become more disciplined and intentional, and play a bigger game in 2025, this is a perfect fit. Don’t let your fear hold you back, fortune favors the bold, and you know what you need (even if it's just doing something different). Sign up at www.newyearforgood.com and we’ll get started!