Monday Motivation: Don’t Fall Into the Trap, Do the Hard Things

Hey, what’s up, guys? Brandon here, Monday Motivation. This is something that we just did a podcast on earlier, DO HARD THINGS. I’ve just been thinking a lot about just doing hard things. I don’t mean work or hustle or anything like that. I mean pushing to the limits, pushing to the boundaries, pushing yourself, having a hard conversation, having the hard talk with your spouse, with a client, with a boss, whatever it is, have the hard conversation. Have a hard talk, do the hard thing. Those things that we fear in life and that we’re putting off, we all do it to some degree or somebody with less than others. Some do it more than others. I did it in hockey, a lot, growing up and I didn’t have the hard conversations as much as I should’ve and I didn’t ask the right questions. I didn’t ask nearly enough questions and it affected me. It’s something that I’m really focusing on businesses, have the hard conversations.

Do the things that are uncomfortable.

It’s like working out, when you’re working out and you’re doing a bicep curl, you’re tearing the bicep muscle and then it gets to rebuild and replenish itself. Then rest, build, grow stronger and get bigger. That’s what you’re doing. You’re making yourself more capable and giving yourself more capacity to do things. Harder things, bigger things, and better things, when can do the hard things.

So many people, whether it’s in sales and they don’t want to make the cold call, they don’t want to send up the cold email, they don’t want to follow up, a new relationship. You don’t want to ask the hard questions, you don’t want to ask about how many kids does someone want. You don’t want to talk about politics. You don’t want to talk about religion. You don’t want to talk about the past, you don’t want to talk about the future, the present or whatever it is. We tend to steer away from that, it’s just human nature for whatever reason. When we’re doing that, we’re limiting ourselves. So do the hard things.

Again, it’s not work, it’s not hustle.

Those things are totally separate. Doing the hard things are those things that we don’t like doing. Really focus on doing the hard things that most people don’t want to do. It’s what the 1% do and the 99% don’t do. That’s why we have that disparity and that growing gap between people. Those that do those hard things consistently over and over again, day after day, are the ones that are building those muscles. They’re building those, that mental capacity, just like you’re building yourself in the gym. You’re eating clean, you got the momentum going and most people will quit in that first month or two because they just stopped. They don’t give themselves that ability to catch momentum and get into month two or three.

You know, as a lot of studies say “66 days to start a habit.” Some say 21, but I would stick with 66 just to be safe. When you’re working out for two months straight and you haven’t seen anything yet, and then you know in that second month, all of a sudden you see that first ab pop or you see your waist is getting smaller or whatever may be. Then all of a sudden you go crazy. Your mind is like, “oh my gosh, I’m in,” “I’m not missing a day.” Then the habit is there, the momentum has been created and you’re not missing anything. But this is where, again, most people will never get themselves that ability because they might have that hard conversation once with one person and then there are 19 others that they need to have and they don’t do it.

Instead of getting through all those things and then expanding that capacity and becoming comfortable with that, it’s like fear. FEAR stands for False Evidence Appearing Real and it’s so true. If for some reason we think that that thing in front of us is scary. It’s like a shot when you’re a kid, thinking about it is scarier than the actual event.

Consistency is a key.

So do the hard things. Make the hard call, do the hard thing. Have the hard conversation. Have the hard talk. Ask those hard questions. That way you can grow, you can tear that muscle. It can grow, it can get bigger and continually keep doing that every single day or every week and grow those muscles. Then, sooner or later, after two months, six months, a year, five years of doing that consistently, day in and day out, your capacities can be huge.

You know when you’re running, the same thing, right? Like you’re training for a marathon. You train a little bit every day. You do those hard things, you get up, you get out of bed and you’re running. You’re doing six miles and you’re doing seven miles and you’re doing 10 and you keep going. You’re building and building. It gives you that more capacity, right? You can’t just get out of bed one day and run 26 miles, 26.2 two miles, right? You have to build that capacity. You have to do hard things.

So many of us, and I am so guilty of this: think that “oh, I’m so smart and all, I’m worth X amount of money and I can do this and that.” It’s just not the case. You have to become capable of that first. You have to have the capacity to do that. You don’t just get things handed to you, right? You have to earn it and earning it is a euphemism for doing those hard things every single day, doing those hard things all the time, every single day, day in and day out. Then eventually you get there. It might be 30 days for some people, it might be three years, might be 30 years and eventually, you’re taking the correct action day in and day out and gets you to where you want to be, whether it’s relationship goals or financial goals.

That’s why you really have to be building that muscle and doing it every single day, day in and day out because that momentum is the only thing that’s gonna carry you through and carry you to the end and to your goals after being consistent long enough. So do the hard things. It’s as simple as that. It’s really, it’s not easy, but it’s simple. As Jim Rohn says, “what’s easy to do is easy not to do.”

Don’t fall into that trap. Do the hard things.

We’ll see you guys soon.