AP 0402: Which Habits Do You Wish You Had Started Sooner?

Episode 402 Episode Transcript

Pat Flynn: Hey, what's up everybody? Pat Flynn here and welcome to Episode 402 of AskPat. Thank you so much for joining me today.

We have a great question today from Alex, but before we get to that, I want to thank today's sponsor. This sponsor has saved me, or is saving me, a lot of money right now. This is Mile IQ. If you haven't heard of this, you are missing out, because here's the deal. The average Mile IQ user logs $535 in drives per months, so if you're one of the 60 million Americans who drives to work and you aren't using Mile IQ, then you're losing money fast. What this app does is it automatically tracks and logs your miles, making sure that every dollar is accounted for, leaving you to focus on what's important. You can try it today for free by texting “Pat” to 89800. That's “Pat” to 89800. And already, since using this app, I've saved, you know, I've logged in hundreds of dollars worth that will be a tax write off come April, so check it out. Text “Pat” to 89800.

All right, and here's today's question from Alex.

Alex: Hi Pat, this is Alex Barker. And my question for you is “What habits do you wish you had started 5 or 10 years ago and why?” I would love to know this because I am always looking to see what people a little bit further down the road in life. . . what habits they have now and what habits they are trying to grow because I'm just dedicated to the idea of constant improvement. Always trying to get better at the things that I like doing. Right now I'm doing a 66 day experiment where I'm reading a book a day and I'm exercising and writing every day. And I'm recording all of the lessons and, I guess the wisdom, that I'm learning, in a podcast at 66DayExperiment.com.

Thank you so much for what you do and thank you so much for your SPI community on Facebook. I've met a lot of awesome people there like Brandon Hufford and Dave Chesson and Trevor Page, so those guys are awesome. So thank you, Pat.

Pat Flynn: Hey Alex, what's up? Congratulations on the upcoming experiment or challenge. I think it's a really great idea because it's always great to improve ourselves. You know, self improvement is huge, you know? We always want to better ourselves and actually, I did a Periscope today. If you aren't following me on Periscope, follow me @PatFlynn. We have a great community there and a lot of fun and I was, I just finished up a run today and I had Periscoped how I was feeling and I talked about how I was so upset that I had hit the snooze button when I woke up.

So this goes, you know this is, this whole idea of waking up for ourselves to be able to develop our personal selves is huge. What I'm kind of hinting at is everything that was mentioned in the book called The Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod, I wish I had started that much sooner, so that's the first thing. And within this is a lot of stuff that you already mentioned.

So Hal talks about in that book a lot of things like meditation or silence, as he called it. You know, affirmations, visualizations, exercise, reading and also scribing or writing. And all of those things I've started to do and make a habit of doing in my miracle morning routine and it's been a game changer, an absolute game changer. So I wish I could start those. And really, each for specific and different reasons.

Meditation, for example, I wish I started that earlier because it's helping me be more clear. It's helping me get back into focus. It's helping me kind of get rid of all that traffic and noise that's in my head and yes, it's always going to be there, but it's allowing me to kind of, you know, dissipate that, and just focus on the thing that's right in front of me which is obviously very important as an entrepreneur.

Reading, for obvious reasons, is very important, and making a habit of that is very good because you're taking years of somebody's experience and just kind of essentially downloading it into your own brain when you're reading. You know, those sorts of habits are really good.

Also, making it a habit of when I'm on a run or exercising or maybe even on a car drive, listening to podcasts or listening to books as well. But going along that, and this isn't mentioned in The Miracle Morning, but this is a habit I also wish I had started sooner that I implement right now and that is Just-in-Time Learning.

That is something I learned from Jeremy Frandsen over at InternetBusinessMastery.com. This is learning only what you need to learn for that next task that you have to do. This is, as opposed to what most of us do is we see this thing that's incredible and exciting and could be very useful and we read that, but it's different than this other thing that we read and we're consuming podcast after blog post after video. It doesn't necessarily have to do with that next task that we're on. As a result, our energy, our direction gets pulled in this way, and it gets pulled this way, and it gets pulled this way, and that thing that we're supposed to be working on either never gets worked on, or just gets touched a little bit, but then these other things get in the way.

So, Just-in-Time Learning is a habit that I learned a few years back that has been really helpful. Now, that doesn't mean, just kind of just to further this, you don't have to ignore everything that's not related to what the thing is that you're doing right now, but you put those things aside. So, using a tool like Evernote to be able to categorize and make sure that they're in a place that, when you get to that point where you need that information, it's already there for you and you don't have to search for it. So that's another thing.

Another big habit that I'm very excited about is my writing habit, you know, I write in my Five Minute Journal. You can find that at FiveMinuteJournal.com daily. Excuse me, FiveMinuteJournal.com, and I write in that daily. Both in the morning and in the evening before I go to bed. And that's been a really great exercise and habit for me because it's allowing me to wake up and be grateful for the day and what I have to look forward to, but also go to bed understanding what I have accomplished and what I could do a little bit better. Just thinking about those things, it doesn't take more than five minutes, has been huge as opposed to other journals and writing opportunities that are just a blank screen, Five Minute Journal has prompts that you answer. Same prompts every single day and it's been incredibly useful. I shared some answers that I've written in my Five Minute Journal on Periscope as well, so you can check that out.

Again, FiveMinuteJournal.com, you can get the paperback book, the hardcover book, which is what I have, and I write in everyday. There's just something about writing things down, you know, physically. But there also is an app if that's more your style, so again, FiveMinuteJournal.com. Not getting paid for that, it's not an affiliate link. Just a big shout out because they've really been helpful.

The other thing that I like to do and make a habit of doing now is thinking about the reward on the other end. So, when I have these tasks to do every day, whether it's record these sets of AskPat episodes or the interviews that I have to do during the day, or write that next blog post, I think about not just doing that, but what happens when I'm done? What I like to do is reward myself at the end of those and I make a habit of that so that I can get excited, I keep pushing forward, and I'll feel let down if I don't finish that task. So it's just, today for example, and this isn't business related, well it kind of is because it involved Periscope again, for the third time here in this podcast, but what I mean is, I started running again today, and I say again because I've been doing a lot of swimming and biking for my triathlons. Well, it was a little bit harder than I wanted it to be because I hadn't used those running muscles in quite a while, but I said “you know what, if I get to three miles and I do that under 30 minutes, I'm going to reward myself by doing a Periscope. And if I don't, I'm not going to do a Periscope today.”

Now, I've done a Periscope for the last 30 days straight, pretty much, and I would be very sad if I wasn't able to do that. So that pushed me forward and that also made me feel really good when I reached the end. So, the idea is to appreciate these small wins and, you know, make your brain understand this habit of getting these rewards once you complete these small tasks. So, when you do this in your personal life and in your business life, it's just going to make sure that you keep pushing forward with those things as well.

I also want to make a habit of scheduling things and, as my buddy Chris Ducker says, “If it doesn't get scheduled. It doesn't get done.” And I truly believe that now. Especially as busy as I've gotten and all the things I have on my plate, scheduling things, even things like when I go on my run or when interviews happen, or when I write my blog post versus when I write in my book or for my book, all those things are now in my calendar and that has been a good habit as well. Before, I would just know that I'd want to accomplish something that day and then it would be near the end of the day and I haven't done it yet and I have to kind of scramble or push it back or stay up late. So scheduling it ahead of time, just knowing that that's what's going to happen during those hours or those minutes, it just makes it a lot easier as well.

Now, another habit I like to do is make sure that I'm always exercising and eating well. This is going to be the last tip here and these are things that I wish I started sooner. When I started my online business, I wasn't paying very much attention to my exercise and what I was eating. As a result, I'm guessing that I was not as productive because now that I've been very focused on what I'm putting into my body, what I'm doing with it, in terms of making it more fine tuned and optimizing it, it's optimizing my business as well. I've gotten, you know, for every hour I put in the gym or on the road running or biking or swimming in the pool, I feel like I get hours back in terms of focus, creativity, energy, drive. And when I'm on the podcast I have much more personality and am just more energetic and all those sorts of things.

So, hopefully that helps you a little bit, Alex, in terms of some of the habits and I feel like you're on the same page or on the right track in terms of helping yourself improve. And I hope everybody out there listens to this as well.

I have an episode, I believe it was episode 150 of the smart passive income podcast, you can find that at SmartPassiveIncome.com/Session150, and that's the episode where I talk about really switching from a night owl to a morning person, thanks to Hal Elrod's The Miracle Morning. It's been a game changer. You can find that again at SmartPassiveIncome.com/Session150. I talk about my new routine and also the previous routines that I've had as well and all the habits and daily routines that I'm putting into place that are helping me become a better, more productive, stronger, happier, less stressed person.

So hopefully you guys can feel the same way too, so Alex, best of luck to you. I look forward to learning more about your challenge and, of course, we're going to send you and AskPat t-shirt for having your question featured here on the show! Thank you so much and all the best.

For those of you listening, if you have a question you'd like potentially featured here on the show, all you have to do is head on over to askpat.com and you can ask it right there on that page.

I also want to thank today's sponsor, I got a chance to talk to these guys and these guys are on it. This is an amazing app. MileIQ. And again, the average user logs 535 dollars in drives per month. So just imagine how much money you're going to save by actually reporting and having data to back up that reporting in terms of how many miles you drive for work. So what happens is, you either drive to. . . you drive somewhere, it just automatically knows, you don't even have to open the app, it just knows when you drive somewhere. And then you either swipe “This is Business” or “Personal.” It keeps track of all the business ones, and then it spits out a report for you and it just makes it very easy for you to report. Again, if you want to try this for free, go to your texting application and send “Pat” to 89800. That's “P-A-T” to 89800. It'll calculate and log all your miles for you automatically, ensuring that every mile's accounted for and no dollar is lost. Check it out. Again, text “Pat” to 89800. You'll love it.

Cheers. Take care. Thank you so much and, as always, here's a quote to end the day and this is from the book The One Thing by Jay Papasan and Gary Keller. One of my favorite quotes in it. they say “When you do the right thing, it can liberate you from having to monitor everything.” This is trying to figure out what that next task is, that first domino in that domino effect. If you figure out what that right thing is, it can liberate you from having to monitor everything. So good.

Cheers. Thanks, guys. Take care. And we'll see you the next episode of AskPat. Bye.