Mental Toughness

Today we start our section on mental toughness. The phrase can mean many things to different people, so let’s start by clarifying what it means to me and the topics we’ll cover over the next few days.

In a nutshell, mental toughness means resilience. It’s an uncompromising march toward your goals, with a refusal to give in to temptation or luck. This is best accomplished by creating habits. Once formed, habits provide consistent daily, forward momentum with no extra effort on your part. Another benefit of habits is a concept popularized by Tony Robbins called “stacking.”

Think back to when you learned how to drive. You had to operate the steering wheel, the gas pedal, the brake, and possibly the clutch. When you encountered an intersection, you had to find and use the turn signals (though some of us have yet to master this).

Over time, these independent actions became “stacked” into one task you now call driving. We can also leverage this same technique in other areas of our life to accomplish our objectives and goals.

That’s mental toughness.

It’s building those stacks so they become “what we do” without thinking about it.

“It’s raining and cold; why are you outside running?”

“I always run on Sundays…”

We’ll begin our section on mental toughness with morning and evening rituals. You’ll learn what they are, see some examples, and learn how to create your own. You’ve already started this process by building a daily routine around reading your ten pages, drinking a gallon of water, sticking to your meal plan, and updating the tracking spreadsheet.

From there, we’ll introduce meditation. Many struggle with this or assume it’s not for them since their goals don’t involve becoming a monk on a secluded mountain. We will break that myth and the myth that meditation means blocking all thoughts from entering your mind.

Goal setting will be our next topic. There is a saying “if you have no destination, any direction will do.” You do have goals, but you may not have articulated them or even thought of them as goals. We’ll define real-world, achievable goals and learn to put them into a context that is meaningful to you. Goals don’t have to be becoming a millionaire, achieving world peace, or becoming president (though if you’re interested, we really could use some solid candidates…)

Next, with our goals in mind, we must acknowledge that there will be obstacles along the way. How we deal with those obstacles ultimately determines our success in achieving our goals. We will talk about getting comfortable with being uncomfortable, and I’ve got some really fun challenges to help with that.

Finally, we’ll wrap up the section with a segment on box breathing that helps center and focus you, and for many, it is easier than meditation because it is more structured. We’ll also cover sleeping: how to improve the quality and determine how much is needed.

That’s a lot to cover, and I’m looking forward to it. I hope you are too, but for now, it’s time to focus on our daily tasks. Head to the tracking sheet to mark them as completed once done, and tomorrow we’ll dive into morning and evening rituals.

Morning And Evening Rituals

Rituals.

Who doesn’t love them? The fire, the blood-letting, summoning of demons…

Oh, wait, wrong email list. My bad.

Defined

A daily ritual, simply put, is an activity or set of activities defined by you that you will not deviate from. This is commonly used to define your day or to work on the things that are most important to you. For most of us, our days are driven by distraction: your interrupting boss, a client that seems to have an “emergency” every day (side tip: fire these clients immediately), kids, school, spouses… the list goes on, but I don’t need to tell you that, right?

The point is there is always someone competing for your time. This can leave you feeling like you never have the opportunity to do “me” things or do the things that you know would ultimately improve the quality of your life.

Enter the daily ritual.

The daily ritual is time set aside, however much time you can, that absolutely, positively will not be interrupted. If God himself comes down from Heaven and demands your presence, he’ll need to have a seat, and you’ll be with him shortly.

It’s that important.

The time of day isn’t as important as having a defined time. For me, I use the early morning hours. No one likes to get up early, so my ritual time is almost guaranteed to be uninterrupted. If the evening or late at night works better for you, perfect! You can even change the time later if it’s not working for you; this isn’t an airline: there are no change fees.

Examples

Many admirable people have claimed their daily rituals are the keys to success.

Benjamin Franklin started his day at 5 am, asking himself “what good shall I do this day?”

Pablo Picasso locked himself in his studio to paint every day at 2 pm.

Mozart composed from 11 pm to 1 am every night.

Stephen King starts writing each day at 8 am sharp.

If it worked for them, it could work for us, too, right?

Objectives

There are several objectives with daily rituals:

• Identify the most important task of the day
• Build in time to work on that task
• Add structure to a chaotic life

Obstacles

A lot of people think they don’t have time for rituals. “My day is already busy; how can I add something else?” Many of you have commented on that as you struggle to finish your daily reading and workout. Here’s how:

For 24 hours, write down what you are doing every 15 minutes. It’s a shitload of writing; I get it. It’s worth it.

The next day, look at those tasks and ask yourself did this task improve my life? Ruthlessly eliminate anything that doesn’t. Granted, things like a job take a large chunk of your time, and you can’t do anything about that. But what about that half-hour you spent on Facebook, Instagram, or TikTok? What about Netflix?

Decide what is important to you and eliminate the rest.

You’ll feel better about it.

My Day

Here’s what my day looks like. Some days I deviate, but 90% of the time, this is it. There is no distinction between weekdays and weekends.

4:30 - 4:45 - I wake up, most of the time before my alarm goes off 15 minutes of gratitude & visualization using a Tony Robbins audio track

5:00 - 6:45 - gym/workout/stretching

6:45 - 7:30 - coffee, write in my journal, read my ten pages for the day, meditate, review my tasks for the day

7:30 - 8:30 - creative work. This is when I’m most creative, so I do things I want to do here. No client work allowed. Side projects or personal projects only (like writing 45 daily emails for this challenge)

8:30 - 12:30 - client or income-generating activities

12:30 - 1:00 - 20-minute nap

1:00 - 4:30 - client or income-generating activities

4:30 - 6:00 - dinner + cleanup + 1 episode of a tv show

6:00 - 8:00 - hobbies, leisure, projects: i.e., whatever I want

8:00 - 8:30 - review the day’s progress, set tasks for tomorrow

8:30 - all electronics off, stare into the abyss, self-degradation over my inability to spend 30 minutes without electronics

9:00 - bedtime

Ok, so that’s pretty regimented… but yours doesn’t have to be. Start small and make adjustments as you go.

Ben Franklin’s Day

I’ve been reading Ben Franklin’s Autobiography. In it, I found his daily ritual plan and thought it worth sharing here:
5:00 - Rise, wash, and address

6:00 - Powerful Goodness! (exclamation point his)

7:00 - Contrive the day’s Question: What good business shall I do this day?

Resolution of the day

Prosecute the present, study, and breakfast

8:00 - Work

12:00 - Read, or overlook my accounts and dine

2:00 - Work

6:00 Put things in their order.

Question: What good have I done today?

7:00 - Supper

8:00 - Music or diversion or conversation

9:00 - Examination of the day

10:00 - Sleep

Today’s Tasks

Don’t forget to complete today’s tasks for the challenge.

• Drink 1 gallon of water
• Workout for 45 minutes
• Read ten pages from your book
• Stick to your meal plan

Once completed, head to the tracking site and mark them as completed to track your progress for the challenge. Tomorrow we’ll introduce meditation and bust some mega-myths about why you can’t do it.

Meditating (How-to)

The Sole Purpose of Meditation

Think about this: suppose you are at work, diligently focused on your task, when a co-worker pops in to ask a question. You stop what you are doing to answer the question, but once complete, what do you do?

Do you return to your task or say “f**k it, I’ve been interrupted; I can’t go back to work now!”

Most of us return to our task, but when it comes to meditation, we assume that if a random thought pops into our mind, the whole meditation is ruined.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

If you get nothing else out of this section, understand this: meditation is not about clearing your mind of random thoughts, it’s about recognizing those thoughts and saying, “That’s not what I’m focusing on now.” When first starting to meditate, you may run with a thought for a full 10 minutes before recognizing you’ve been distracted.

That’s ok.

Meditation’s sole purpose is to recognize that you’ve been distracted. Whether that takes 5 seconds, 5 minutes, or 5 hours is irrelevant. Your incessantly chatting monkey mind is the annoying coworker to your meditation. You don’t have the authority to fire this coworker, but you do have the authority not to give it your attention.

No one, absolutely no one sits through an entire meditation session without letting their mind run off with a random thought. Let’s suppose such a person did exist, though, a Tibetan Monk able to keep their mind clear for hours at a time. You both sit down to meditate for 10 minutes, and at the end, you’ve caught yourself multiple times getting distracted while they maintained their focus entirely. It could be argued that you got a better workout because you did more reps. You exercised the part of your brain that identifies random, non-productive thoughts more than they did.

Why Meditate At All

Who cares?

We’ve already established that your meditation will always be filled with identifying and redirecting random thoughts, so why bother?

Let me ask you this:

Have you ever said something stupid you wished you hadn’t as soon as the word left your mouth?

Have you ever been in a disruptive environment where you wished you could have 5 seconds to think?

Have you ever struggled to think through a difficult situation with focus and intent?

I’m betting the answer to at least one of those questions is “yes,” and that’s where meditation helps.

It buys you space. Meditation trains the mind to identify and ignore random thoughts and refocus on the task. After all, random thoughts are just rogue electrical impulses in the brain, much like static electricity on a cold, dry winter morning. They appear they get your attention, then you refocus.

Meditation has health benefits as well. Meditation can help lower blood pressure, reduce anxiety, decrease pain, ease symptoms of depression, and improve sleep. So now the big question: how do I meditate?

How To Meditate

First, you’ll need a large robe, preferably dark red or burgundy, a mountaintop retreat, and a signature chant phrase from a spiritual leader at the quest’s end. Shaving your head is optional but highly recommended.

I’m kidding, but that’s how I viewed meditation before beginning the practice. There are multiple types of meditation and multiple ways to meditate. I’ll explain the common ones here, or if you’re impatient, skip to the bottom for the TL;DR (Too Long, Didn’t Read).

Focused Meditation

Focused Meditation involves using any one of the five senses. It most commonly involves focusing on the breath: feeling your belly expand on the incoming breath, feeling it collapse on the outgoing breath. After a few breaths, you’ll realize that you are no longer thinking about your breath and that your mind has run off in some random direction. That’s ok: drop the thought and return to the breath.

Movement Meditation

Movement Meditation uses gentle forms of movement to focus your mind. Yoga is a popular example, but it can also be done with walking, qigong, or musical instruments. I’ve been using this one recently with my guitar. I’ll pick a piece of music and play it from memory or sight reading. Sure enough, as soon as my mind wanders to something else, I start missing notes. This has been helpful because the incorrect notes provide immediate feedback that I’m not focused.

Mantra Meditation

This is what I perceived as meditation before learning differently. It’s the “Ooooooohhhhmmmm” meditation. It’s commonly used in Hindu and Buddhist traditions. It uses a repetitive sound (“ohm”) to clear the mind.

Spiritual Meditation

Prayer, anyone? A deep prayer is a form of meditation. Think about it: during prayer, you are deep in thought and highly focused on connecting with your spiritual being of choice. When random thoughts appear, you shove them aside and resume your prayer. I’ll be damned; that sounds like meditation to me!

Transcendental Meditation

Just don’t. You may be shocked that I have pretty strong opinions on some things.

Transcendental Meditation is the Pyramid Scheme of Meditation. It does have positive benefits, and it works… but. Search for it on Google, and you’ll end up in a quagmire of “Transcendental Meditation introduction” centers that offer to help you with the process. For a fee, they will “help” you get started and “learn more about you” to identify the “perfect” mantra for your meditation. Here’s the ugly truth they don’t want you to know: they have a spreadsheet of mantras and randomly give you one from the list once your credit card charges successfully.

TL;DR

“Cool story, bro. Just answer the question. Use [Headspace] or [Calm]. They both have free versions and are available on iPhone, Android or from your computer. I’ve used both successfully for years and have nothing negative about either. Both have a “getting started” track to help further clarify the points I’ve made here, namely, “Yes, you’re gonna get distracted, and yes- that’s ok.”

Today’s Tasks

Look at that! We get to add another task to our daily task list! Starting today, we’re adding meditation to the list. It doesn’t have to be a marathon 4-day fast + meditation from a remote mountain top —just 10 minutes. And if you spend 9 minutes, 45 seconds of those 10 minutes wondering if you’ve ever bought milk from the same cow twice, that’s perfectly ok.

• Drink 1 gallon of water
• Workout for 45 minutes
• Read ten pages from your book
• Stick to your meal plan
• Meditate for 10 minutes

Once completed, head to the tracking site and mark them as completed to track your progress for the challenge. Tomorrow we will talk about goals, but avoid the self-help guru bullshit that usually accompanies it.

Goals

We will talk about goal setting today, but I will avoid the happy, wishy, manifesting, fairy tale bullshit that most goal-setting gurus preach. If you’re looking for that, plenty of resources are available for you elsewhere. For me, most of my goals resonate with the photo above: keeping one step ahead of Will to keep Will from fucking up Will’s life.

Our focus here is on goal achievement, not goal setting. It’s a subtle but key difference. It doesn’t matter what your goals are, and I know you have them; you may not think of them as such. Losing weight, doing a strict pull-up, getting a new job, buying a home, and getting a new relationship all count as goals. So what are the key components that distinguish goal setting from goal achievement?

Clarity, specificity, balance, and time.

I asked the Genie for $1000 per day for the rest of my life. He handed me $3000 and wished me luck.

Clarity

It’s important to be clear on what the “goal” of this goal is. If your goal is to make more money, why is that important to you? What problems in your life will be solved by having more money? What additional problems will you have as a result of having more money? It’s important to think these through to ensure you’re chasing the right goal. Oftentimes, we spend a tremendous amount of effort chasing a goal that could have been more easily obtained by clarifying the end result in the beginning.

For example, if your goal is for more money, why?

Because having money means freedom.

What is freedom?

The ability to do what I want, when I want.

What do you want to do that you currently can’t?

…

Continue this process until you are very clear on what your actual goal is. It may take days or weeks to work through this process. That’s ok; you’ve got your entire life.

Once you’ve clarified your goal, it’s time to get specific.

Specificity

What will your life look like when you achieve your goal? Be as specific as possible here. Imagine what a day in your life will look like. If your goal is a specific event, imagine what the weather will be like. Feel the sun or rain on your face. Who is there with you? Picture their faces. What are you wearing? What can you smell? What do you hear?

The objective here is to engage as many of your senses as possible, to build a realistic picture of what achieving your goal looks like. Each of your senses is controlled by a different part of your brain, so by tying your goal to multiple senses, you actually store your goal in multiple parts of your brain. Think of it like saving a document to the hard drive on your computer, then putting another copy on a USB stick, copying it to your Dropbox account online, then emailing a copy to yourself, all to ensure that you don’t lose this document. When you engage all of your senses, your brain starts to get the idea that whatever this is, it must be really, really important.

And then, we have to consider the other parts of our lives.

Balance

In my experience, this has been one of the major causes of failure for my goals in the past. We often set a goal but fail to consider its impact on other areas of our life. For example: making more money. It can come in the form of a new job that requires long hours. Those long hours mean less time with our family, skipping days at the gym, and possibly eating less healthily because we are always at the office (assuming this goal takes place in a non-pandemic environment where interaction with people is allowed 🤣).

Thinking about your goal’s impact on the rest of your life allows you to overcome these obstacles before they become problems. It may cause you to rethink your goal entirely, or it may cause you to add more clarity to your goal. For example, a new job involves longer days at work. To prevent sacrificing quality time with your family, you set up a specific time dedicated to family time each week, and everyone participates. To avoid missing the gym and sacrificing your fitness, you get up at 4:30 am to work out before you start your day. What are the major areas of your life? Well… they happen to be represented by the five spinning plates we cover in this challenge: nutrition, physical, mental toughness, community, and financial.

Getting up at 4:30 may sound horrible to you right now. But if your goal is big enough and important enough, you’ll find that you actually look forward to it. Each morning when you wake up, you’re energized and excited because this is the path to your goal, and everything that achieving your goal brings with it.

Time

Achieving your goal requires an ongoing time commitment from you, and not in the way you think. Sure, if your goal is to lose weight, there is a time commitment to the gym and preparing food, but there is an additional time commitment to maintaining and grooming the goal. Review what you’ve read here today: the time it takes to clarify your goal. The time it takes to make your goal specific. The time it takes to balance your goal with the other areas of your life. And you can’t do this once and forget it. You need to write your goal down.

Every.Fucking.Day.

Never allow your brain to second guess if this goal is still relevant. Write it down daily to tell your brain it is. Incorporate this into your morning or evening ritual. If you’re not committed to doing this, you are likely working on the wrong goal.

Today’s Tasks

Don’t forget to complete today’s tasks for the challenge.

• Drink 1 gallon of water
• Workout for 45 minutes
• Read ten pages from your book
• Stick to your meal plan
• Meditate for 10 minutes

Once completed, head to the tracking site and mark them as completed to track your progress for the challenge. Tomorrow we will talk about the tasks you do each day, specifically how those tasks relate to the goals you’ve identified today and how to approach those tasks with intent.

Exactly What You Need

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. – Inigo Montoya, The Princess Bride

We’re down to two weeks left in this challenge. Maybe you aren’t seeing the progress you were hoping for. Maybe you skipped a few days and lost motivation. Maybe it hasn’t been what you were expecting.

It’s tempting to throw in the towel.

Maybe the next challenge will be better.

Maybe this isn’t for me.

Or, maybe, it’s precisely what you need. The temptation to quit is strongest just before the finish line.

The most critical reps for any exercise are the last two. In a set of 5 x 8 back squats, sets 1 - 4 and reps 1 - 6 of set 5 are just the prerequisites to get you to reps 7 and 8. Those last two reps are where the gains are made. This challenge is no different. We’ve covered nutrition, physical training, and mental toughness. All of it was designed to get you to this point. These last two weeks will define your success in the challenge.

If you’re struggling with one of your daily tasks, reflect on why. Dig in to understand the challenge with it, then create a plan to address it, but don’t quit. If you aren’t sure what to do, ask for help. Help can come in many forms, but no help comes if you don’t ask.

Adapt. Improvise. Overcome.

Finish this fight.

Setting Intent

There’s a saying from Marcus Aurelius, “Joy for humans lies in human actions. Human actions: kindness to others, contempt for the senses, the interrogation of appearances, observations of nature and events in nature.”

I think it serves as a compass when pursuing your goals and setting the intent of your pursuit. When we set goals, we tend to focus on the end product: that moment when we achieve the goal, whether it be a week, a year, or a decade from now. Over time, you learn that it’s not really the goal itself that brings joy but the pursuit of it. To lose sight of that is to lose life in the days that pass between setting the goal and achieving it.

That’s where intent comes in. Make it your daily intention to pursue your goals and take joy in them. For example, if your goal is to back squat twice your body weight, make today’s intent to do your back squats with perfect form and deliberate action, regardless of the weight on the bar. This has the effect of funneling the joy awaiting you at the end of your goal to today. Even though your goal isn’t complete, you still get to partake in the feeling of completing it by taking deliberate action toward its completion.

This works for non-goal-related items as well. Throughout life, we all must do things we don’t like but are necessary. A recurring example for me is paying my quarterly taxes.

It’s amazing to see the number of bullshit, useless, trivial, non-productive tasks I can devise to avoid doing this. The task takes about 20 minutes, but I can spend weeks avoiding it. How can I set the intention of this task in a way that aligns with my goals?

First, I have to consider why I avoid it. The root cause is I’m horrible at accounting. I’m horrible at accounting because accounting, in a nutshell, is a disciplined process of categorizing money coming in and money going out.

I suck at this.

So, when my taxes are due- there has been a lot of money going in and out but not categorized, so now I have to look at each transaction and figure out where it came from or went.

The solution is straightforward: every time I make a transaction, I open the app on my phone and enter it. Do I do that?

So every quarter, I relish in self-degradation over my lack of discipline.

Discipline.

Wait… that happens to be one of my core principles. It’s something that I believe is a fundamental skill that I must possess and be proficient at. In some areas, I’m very disciplined. In others (like tracking my expenses), not so much.

So now, when I sit down to do my quarterly taxes, I specify the intent of this action is to work on a core principle: discipline. With this philosophy, I turn a dreaded task into an opportunity to improve a skill I value and consider essential.

TL;DR:

For every task you do in a given day, ask yourself how this task moves you closer to your goals of a well-rounded life. This applies to tasks you want to do and those you don’t want to do.

Today’s Tasks

Don’t forget to complete today’s tasks for the challenge.

• Drink 1 gallon of water
• Workout for 45 minutes
• Read ten pages from your book
• Stick to your meal plan
• Meditate for 10 minutes

Once completed, head to the tracking site and mark them as completed to track your progress for the challenge. Tomorrow we cover one of my favorite topics: getting comfortable with being uncomfortable.

Getting Comfortable Being Uncomfortable

Life can be uncomfortable at times. You might reflect on 2020 and agree. Consider Viktor Frankl’s life, though, in comparison. He spent three years imprisoned in Nazi concentration camps. His family had been killed. His life’s work was destroyed. His freedom was taken away.

How did he respond?

He discovered he had one thing that couldn’t be taken from him: his ability to determine what this suffering meant. From there, he found that he could find positives in this grim situation. He could test and revise his theories. He could be of service to others. He even took some solace that his loved ones were spared the pain and misery that he faced daily.

Find The Good

I’m not promoting some happy, hippy, peace and love bullshit here, but I am saying that we can use the lessons learned by those who have gone before us to our benefit. You choose how you feel about it in even the most dire situations. No one can force you to feel a certain way.

Hope Is Not A Strategy

We can all hope and take action to minimize our chances of ending up in a situation like Frankl did. In the end, that may not be enough. It may not be a concentration camp, but plenty of other difficult situations can and will arise: losing a loved one, destitution, cancer, disease, or war. How will you respond when disaster strikes?

Seneca said “set aside a certain number of days, during which you shall be content with the scantiest and cheapest fare, with course and rough dress, saying to yourself the while ‘Is this the condition that I feared?’” He lived according to that principal and would routinely live as a homeless person for a period of time to remind him that, if it happens for real, he will survive.

We can use this tool in our own life as well. One way to do it is to take away modern life’s comforts, such as hot water.

The Challenge

So today, I’m introducing a new challenge: take a cold shower. Between now and the end of the challenge, take a shower with no hot water for an extra 10 points in the challenge.

While doing so, pay attention to how your body reacts. Notice the negative self-talk and pay particular attention to all the creative stories your mind comes up with to get you to either not do it or stop it once you start. Harden your mind, body, and spirit by ignoring these thoughts and persevering anyway. Ask yourself “Is this the condition that I feared?”

Today’s Tasks

Don’t forget to complete today’s tasks for the challenge.

• Drink 1 gallon of water
• Workout for 45 minutes
• Read ten pages from your book
• Stick to your meal plan
• Meditate for 10 minutes

Plus, the bonus cold shower challenge.

Once completed, head to the tracking site and mark them as completed to track your progress for the challenge. Tomorrow I’ll introduce box breathing and show you how to use it to calm yourself, redirect, and focus.

When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with the fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero going home. – Chief Tecumseh

Box Breathing

Box breathing has been incredibly useful to me. Some days, it’s hard to calm the mind during meditation. Other times, I find myself needing a way to gain control of my mind while sitting in the doctor’s office, waiting for an important meeting to start, or driving. Box breathing provides more structure than focused meditation, keeping my mind from racing off but still providing the same benefits.

How To Box Breath

Box breathing is as simple as it sounds. Imagine a box viewed from the side- it has four equally sided-squares:

1. Breathe in through your nose while silently counting 5 seconds
2. Hold that breath while counting another 5 seconds
3. Exhale slowly through your nose, you guessed it: for another 5 seconds
4. With empty lungs, count the final 5 seconds
5. Go back to step one, repeat for 5 minutes

The How and the Why

Evidence has shown that box breathing can calm and regulate the autonomic nervous system, which runs our automated functions, like pumping blood and regulating our body temperature.

The slow breathing introduced by box breathing allows CO2 (Carbon Dioxide) to build up in the blood. The buildup of CO2 triggers a cardio-inhibitory response of your vagus nerve. A build-up of CO2 usually indicates that your body is working hard and using all of the oxygen available, so the parasympathetic nervous system kicks in and sends signals throughout your body that everyone needs to chill out and stop burning so much energy.

The end result is a feeling of calmness and relaxation. This reduces stress and can improve your mood. Box breathing is an exceptional treatment for anxiety, panic disorder, PTSD, and depression. It can also help with insomnia by calming your nervous system before bed.

Box breathing is also effective at pain management. This works for two reasons: first, it calms your nerves, body, etc. Second, it takes mental focus to perform, which diverts your attention from the pain to the counting of the breath. After all, pain is nothing more than an electrical signal to the brain. So by giving the brain a different job, we can control the pain level.

Advancing The Practice

There are a couple of things to know about box breathing before starting:

• You may get dizzy. Depending on your oxygen levels, focused breathing may increase the level, resulting in feeling dizzy. This is ok. Over time, this will go away. When it happens, it’s ok to pause the exercise for a few breaths, then resume.
• You may feel like you aren’t getting enough air. Most of us don’t practice holding our breath; for some of us, even holding our breath for just a few seconds can trigger the fight or flight response for air. I encourage you to ride this out. It’s mind over matter. If this happens, focus on the following:
  • You know the next breath is seconds away. Nothing is preventing you from breathing
  • You can go 4 minutes without air. We’re just aiming for 30 seconds, so… chill. (Note: I didn’t say it would be a pleasant 4 minutes; I just said that’s the upper bounds of the physical limit)
  • This is mental training. Use this as the opportunity to command mastery of your mind.
  • Absolute, positively, worst-case scenario: what could happen? You pass out. What happens when you pass out? You stop holding your breath and start breathing. #problemsolved
• As your lungs get more efficient (you’ll notice this in your workouts), you can try increasing the count from 5 to 6, 7, or as high as you feel comfortable.
• For variations and taking the practice further, look into Pranayama Breathing.

Today’s Tasks

Don’t forget to complete today’s tasks for the challenge.

• Drink 1 gallon of water
• Workout for 45 minutes
• Read ten pages from your book
• Stick to your meal plan
• Meditate for 10 minutes, or 5 minutes if using the box breathing technique

Plus, the bonus cold shower challenge.

Once completed, head to the tracking site and mark them as completed to track your progress for the challenge. Tomorrow, it’s sleepy time.

Sleep

It’s important.

Great. Glad we had that chat. I feel better.

If you struggle with sleep, it sucks. It can get better, but there’s no magic cure. When your sleep finally improves, it will result from many trial-and-error sessions to identify the right conditions for you. That’s a common theme throughout this challenge: for you. No one can give you the perfect nutrition plan, fitness program, meditation path, or financial strategy. What works for someone else may be the worst possible solution for you.

The only way to figure it out is through trial and error.

Sorry. There are no magic bullets, and sleep is no exception. There are some common starting points, though.

Making Changes

When making changes to your lifestyle to improve your sleep, trying something for one night isn’t going to cut it. If you are sleep-deprived, it may take weeks to recover enough to notice a difference in your sleeping habits. The key to successful changes is to make one change at a time and try it for two weeks before reaching a conclusion or trying something else. Make sure you document the changes you make and make daily notes to track how you feel when you wake up and throughout the day.

Caffeine

We discussed this in the section on caffeine, but it’s worth repeating here. Caffeine can and will impact your sleep. Caffeine takes up to 5 hours to pass through your system, and a long-standing relationship with caffeine (a.k.a. addiction) may impact that even more. But, if you’re not sleeping well and waking up rested, refreshed, and ready to start your day: this is the first thing that must go.

Duration

Here’s the weird thing about sleep: we do it in cycles. There is a period when you first fall asleep where transition from wakefulness to sleep. Then you go into a period of light sleep before entering deep sleep. Next, you go into a deep sleep, the kind of sleep that leaves you feeling refreshed in the morning. Finally, there is the type of sleep most of us have heard of: REM sleep, when most of your dreams take place. The interesting part is that this isn’t a linear process; ideally, you go through each cycle multiple times per night. The duration of each cycle is also different from individual to individual but usually consistent for the same person.

Who cares, right? Well, you do if you’re sleeping poorly, and here’s why: Ideally, you want to wake up at the end of the cycle. If your alarm is set to go off right in the middle of your stage 3 deep sleep, you will feel terrible waking up. The entire sleep cycle ranges between 3 - 5 hours for each person, with 4 hours being the average. So, the recommended 8 hours of sleep results in 2 complete cycles for the average person.

If that’s not working for you, try getting 7 hours of sleep, 9, or whatever variation is needed to find your ideal number. But that requires falling asleep promptly, right?

Falling asleep quickly

Tossing and turning for an extended period of time can be frustrating at best. To maximize your chances of falling asleep quickly,

• eliminate all caffeine 5 hours before bedtime
• no electronics 30 minutes before bedtime
• take a warm shower/bath before bed
• lower the temperature and lighting in your bedroom as much as you can

Look at this article for tips on how to fall asleep in 2 minutes or less.

If all of that fails, get the f@$k up. Don’t allow your bed to be turned into a pity zone. If you can’t fall asleep, get up and leave the room. But here’s the deal: don’t mindlessly watch TV or scroll through Instagram. Do something productive and useful with your life: read a book, work on your goals, plan a trip (even if you’ll never take it), get started on tomorrow’s tasks, or do anything to make your brain work. When you get sleepy, go to bed.

Tomorrow morning when the alarm goes off, get up. Sure, you’re going to be sleepy. Get up anyway. Doing so will ensure you’ll be ready when bedtime comes around tonight.

Polyphasic Sleep

If you’re adventurous, you may want to experiment with polyphasic sleep. Polyphasic sleep involves spreading your sleep schedule throughout the day. Word of warning: this is for the seriously committed only. To succeed, you must stick to it and completely control your time throughout the day. I did this a few years ago when I needed more time in the day. There are different schedules, but I went with a 20-minute nap every 4 hours and a 2-hour nap at 2 am. I’m not sure how long I stuck with it. Time loses meaning in this plan. But as far as being productive: it was a huge success. The main reason for not continuing this plan for longer was its impact on my social and family life. If you’re interested, research polyphasic sleeping or hit me up for details on how my experiment went.

Today’s Tasks

Don’t forget to complete today’s tasks for the challenge.

• Drink 1 gallon of water
• Workout for 45 minutes
• Read ten pages from your book
• Stick to your meal plan
• Meditate for 10 minutes, or 5 minutes if using the box breathing technique

Plus, the bonus cold shower challenge.

Once completed, head to the tracking site and mark them as completed to track your progress for the challenge. Tomorrow, we move into the final section of our 45-day challenge: Community.