Routine, Willpower, and Winning: Secrets to Crushing Your Day

Ryan Hanley: Hello everyone and welcome back to the show. We have a tremendous episode for you today, a very special episode in which over the last two weeks we hit two milestones in the growth of this community. 10,000 subscribers on the YouTube channel and 25,000 subscribers on the Instagram channel. Absolutely phenomenal. I appreciate the hell out of you guys and I wanna do something different for this episode. I wanted to take questions that I've gotten over the last two weeks from people that subscribe, people, followers, you guys, the audience. I wanted to take some questions and answer these, and we got some really good ones here. And I just wanted to work through them because I think it's important. The questions that people ask, I always respond to almost all the comments that I get, especially the questions. If someone just comments, sometimes I'll say thanks or whatever. But for people who have questions, I try to respond to every single question that comes through either the Instagram channel or YouTube, and as well as the questions that come through Apple or Spotify. A lot of times people leave questions about the podcast in ratings and reviews of the show, which is an odd way to ask a question. But I also very much appreciate all the ratings and reviews that we've gotten continue to grow. And if you haven't left a rating and review of this show on Spotify or Apple, if you like to listen to the podcast, I'd very much appreciate you doing that. That helps those algorithms share this show with more people. It has a tremendous effect. If you've ever wanted to support the show in any way, leaving a rating or review on Apple or Spotify is a tremendous way to do that and everyone that has, I very much appreciate you. But I wanted to take some questions from the audience because I love the questions Q&A is my favorite part of keynotes. It's my favorite part of workshops. And whenever I'm on someone else's podcast, a lot of times they'll ask their audience for questions and hit me with those and those kind of off-the-cuff responses. That's always my favorite part. I love kind of real-time answering people's questions. So I pulled out five questions, which I'm gonna work through the rest of the episode here. And hopefully some of these are relevant to you. I think they will be. They seemingly are relevant to everyone. So the first question comes from Sylvie, is the name, S-I-I-L-V-I-I dot Z. Sylvie asks, what's the hardest part about staying this motivated? And the question is, I'm not always motivated. You're never going to be always motivated. Oftentimes, our work is done, our growth happens in the moments that we're not motivated. It is very easy to show up to the gym. It's very easy to show up for this podcast. It's very easy to show up to a sales call or for an individual when you're motivated. That's when it's easy. If we rely on the moments that we're motivated, we'll never move forward. We'll stay right where we are because motivation comes and goes. While we can do things in our life to increase the amount of what I'll call motivation, that sense of urgency, that desire to get things done, while we can do things to cultivate more kind of motivation in our lives, you are not going to be motivated every day. I am not motivated every day. Most days I'm probably not motivated, if I'm being completely honest with you. I don't wake up every morning. David Goggins may wake up every day and want to absolutely crush, and I'm probably taking him a little out of context, but I do not. However, I have goals. I have people that I'm responsible for. I have bills to pay. I have my own desire to create. And I know that at the end of the day, whether I start motivated or not, I'm unsatisfied when I put my head on the pillow if I haven't gotten the things done that are important to reaching those goals, to taking care of the people in my lives, to paying my bills. If I don't get things done associated with those items, then I'm unsatisfied. I find myself with my eyes wide open on the pillow wondering why I didn't get this done or why I made this excuse. And I hate that feeling. Honestly, I think I hate that sense of delinquency more than anything. I just, it makes me feel like less of a person. It makes me feel like I'm undeserving of the things that I have in my life. I'm blessed in so many ways. I had two loving parents. I was born in America. Seemingly good genes. My brain works for the most part. I have so many blessings. And to not get things done because I didn't feel motivated feels like I'm being disrespectful to those blessings, if that makes sense. So all that being said, to answer Sylvie's question, the hardest part about staying motivated is believing that you need to be motivated in the first place. Just do the fucking work. Just do the work. Whatever it is you need to get done, just do it. You don't have to be in a good mood. You don't have to like it. You don't have to feel awesome about it. You don't have to, you know, there doesn't need to be rainbows and sunshine and harp music playing in the background in order to get after it, just do the work. If you need to make 10 sales calls today, make 10 sales calls. If you need to put a deck together for a big pitch or an investor meeting, do it. If you need to have a tough conversation with your partner or your spouse, do it. If you have health and fitness goals, which you should, then just eat right. Don't put the cookie in your face. It's okay to look at the cookie. It's okay to daydream about what that cookie might taste like. Don't put the cookie in your mouth. Have a banana, have some grapes, have a salad or whatever it is that hits your nutrition or wellness goals. And if you don't know what those things are, go find someone that'll help you, that'll help you give you a plan in order to know what to eat, what to do. But if you're not, if your goals are to stay fit and healthy, if your goals are to grow your business or grow your position inside of a business, if your goals are to take care of someone, do the work necessary, show up, do it, and understand that all the people that you look at online and may have some sort of envy for the life and the situation and the work that they get done, know that they are not motivated either. Not every moment of every day. Certainly most moments. To be candid, it's probably most moments of most days. The people who you envy for the amount of work that they get done, they are unmotivated. The only difference is they have the discipline to do the shit that needs to get done regardless of that motivation. I think it's a wonderful question, Sylvie. Guys, how do you feel about motivation? I just, I hate the term. I use it, but I hate it. I hate, you know, I've been called a motivational speaker in the past. Oh, Ryan, your keynotes are so motivational. I'm glad that people take them that way. I certainly am, but I do not want to be a motivational speaker. I want to help people figure out whatever it is, whatever that trigger is that gets them through the day, but motivating them, I don't even know that that's possible. I think it's a placeholder term that we use to denote energy transfer, which is wonderful. It's part of the job of a keynote speaker. It's part of this job as a podcaster, as a content creator, as a leader, whether that's a leader of a business, leader of a household, right? The leadership that we have over ourselves. It's your job to transfer positive energy however believing that you're always going to have a full tank of positive energy every day to get things done is just not reality. So Sylvie, I appreciate that question. I love that question. Um, hope that answered your question and let's get on to question number two. Okay, next question comes from Tom. Tom asks, how do you balance work life and crushing it in the gym? I don't believe in balance. That's first and foremost. I do not believe in balance. Balance is, balance is, is, should not be a goal. Get rid of the idea of balance altogether. That's step number one, your life is never going to be balanced. There's balance. Again, it denotes this idea of a 50-50 split of all things being even and equal, and that is never going to be the case. There's a concept that changed my life and changed how I approached life, how I approached my work, how I approached my family. And it's this idea that we have seasons of our lives, seasons of a year, seasons of a week, right? Seasons of a week might not make sense, but the idea is at any given moment we need to find harmony based on what our needs are in that moment. There may be times when the gym just isn't as much of a priority versus other things, maybe you know you have some stuff going on in your marriage or in your relationship with your partner or your kids, and you need to spend more time there. You just need to be present. And taking an hour or an hour and a half out of your day to drive to the gym, get a workout in, come home, it's just not part of the equation. And in those scenarios, maybe just getting 100 pushups in and doing some air squats or some stretching or yoga in your basement or in your living room for 20, 30 minutes is worthwhile. In many cases, doing that work in front of your family has a tremendous amount of positive benefits. But my point here is sometimes harmony is pumping the brakes a little bit on your career, pumping the brakes a little bit on that full tilt, grind all day growth process, and backing into your family. Sometimes it's the opposite. Sometimes you need to have a conversation with your loved ones and say, look, like I gotta get after it for a couple of weeks. We have a huge presentation coming up, and I'm just gonna need to put some extra hours in, which means when you guys sit down at the end of the night to maybe watch a show and calm down or whatever you're doing, I'm gonna head back to my office because I gotta grind for a couple extra hours. Or I need to, honey, I need to get out of bed at 5 a.m. for a week because I gotta get this stuff done. Or my physical shape has spiraled out, and I need to build time in. And is it okay if I'm not home for the first hour with the kids because I got to get to the gym. And if I don't get my fitness back on track, I'm going to fall apart. I'm not going to have the energy I need to be present here with you. I'm not going to be happy. I'm not going to be content, right? Find harmony. Don't find balance because harmony gives us permission to be flexible in what we're focusing on at any given period of time, in any given period of our life, to reprioritize, right? There are gonna be times in your life where work is the most important thing, even if you have a family. There's gonna be times in your life where your family and the time you spend and be present with them is more important than anything that's going on at work. There's gonna be times when you have to get your physical fitness in shape. You may get a health diagnosis that says you need to completely rearrange your health and wellness program, and that may take away from your focus at work or your focus on family. But finding that harmony and being content in the harmony of that moment is the key. The last six months, I have not been, quote unquote, crushing it at the gym. I've been going to the gym, but I haven't been crushing it. Now, I've been kind of back on the grind the last few weeks, which has felt awesome. You know, I'm at my best when I'm doing four strength training workouts a week at a minimum, coupled in with maybe some ruck walks. I like to, I have a 40-pound ruck vest, which is a vest that you wear, which has weighted plates in it. Mine is not a ruck sack where you carry everything on your back. Mine is a ruck vest. So I have 20 pounds in the front, 20 pounds in the back. And I'll throw a podcast on and go for an hour-long walk, take the dog with me. You may have seen some of the videos I do on Instagram where a thought will hit me and I'll share that while I'm walking or whatever. But I'm at my best energy-wise when I'm getting those workouts in. But if I'm making time for those workouts, then other aspects of my life, like maybe reading, I love to read, but it is very hard to get a half-hour, 45 minutes worth of reading in. And, you know, if I'm really going to do a strength training workout, I like it to be 45 minutes to an hour long with 10 minutes on either side for, you know, kind of driving to and driving home from the gym, right? There are, there are many times in my life when balancing work, my kids, uh, uh, you know, my love life and, and getting that workout in and read, I can't do all those things and prioritize all those things all the time and get the necessary sleep and, and also be thoughtful and reaching out to friends. I mean, it's just, there's so many pulls on our attention that we have to prioritize and harmonize our life and then be content and happy in that harmony and know that if something is out of harmony, that we just need to take a moment and reprioritize. And I hope that answers your question, Tom. I think, you know, balance, it's a word. I understand the meaning and why we use it, but I do think words matter. And if you replace balance with harmony and really dig into that concept, I think you'll get a lot of value out of that. And I think you'll be able to reprioritize things in a way that fit the life that you want to live while still taking care of the things you need to take care of. So, all right. Guys, if you're enjoying this Q&A, let me know. Head over to YouTube and just leave a comment on YouTube or hit me up on Instagram. I'm Ryan underscore Hanley on Instagram. And just let me know if you enjoy these Q&A sessions. I would love to do these more often, especially when we hit milestones. It just seems like a cool time to kind of pull back for a sec and really dig into you guys. But no, anytime you ask a question, I'm always going to answer that question 99 out of 100 times. I really prioritize the questions that I get on any of the social channels and try to answer them as best I can and as in detail. And a lot of times I try to do it with video responses if the platform makes that available because I just think the, I think video and hearing someone talk and answer back is oftentimes a lot better and more valuable than just a typed response in the comments. But leave your comments or leave your questions and I will always get those answered. All right, let's move on to question number three. As we cruise along here in this Q&A session. This one comes from Joa. How do you balance, there's that word again, that grind with avoiding burnout, or is that just part of it? So we're not gonna address the balance part again. Let's talk about burnout. I wanted to, I picked this question because I wanted to talk about burnout. Burnout is absolutely positively real. Now, I do think burnout is the result of believing that balance is possible. I think that's part of it. If we believe balance is possible, we get burnout because we're trying to burn every wick, right? We're trying to be everything to everyone. We're trying to have a great morning routine, have a great night routine, be a great partner, be great to our loved ones, be present with our kids, also kill it at work, also kill it at gym, also eat healthy. It's so much, and understand that we start every day we start every single day with a given amount of willpower. Think of it like a video game for those of you who play video games or have ever played in the past. You start the game, this being every single day, with a given amount of energy, and every decision that we have to make pulls from that energy meter, a certain amount. Small decisions, small activities will pull a small amount. Large decisions, tough decisions, decisions that really force us to use our brain and dig in, right? Those are going to pull more. So routine helps burnout. Routine helps burnout because the routines that we have in our lives, these could also be considered habits. James Clear's book Atomic Habits is wonderful for this. I think 50 million people or some crazy number like that have read his book at this point. So if you have, then you know what I'm talking about. But if you haven't read it, I highly recommend James Clear's book, Atomic Habits. But in that book, he talks a lot about willpower. There's another great book, Willpower Is Not Enough. Another great book to check out. And both of them hit on this concept of willpower being a resource that we lose throughout the day. And that habits and routines allow us to make decisions once and execute on that decision day after day after day. So if you decide you're going to go to bed at 9:30 every day and get up at 5 and the first thing you're going to do every day when you get up is read for 30 minutes, then the decision to read no longer pulls from your energy meter. If you decide every day you're going to get up and work on a side hustle or you're gonna work on a book or you're gonna get ahead on your email, whatever that is. Building a routine and time blocking that routine into your calendar reduces your need to decide whether or not you should do a thing. The reason we wanna build these habits and routines in is not just for the benefit of doing that thing every day that hopefully is positive, but so that we have more energy in the moments throughout the day that require us to pull from our reserve of willpower. Willpower should be like your savings account, right? Hopefully, month to month, you are operating out of your checking account. And that your checking account, you know, money comes in, we save some, and then we work out of our checking account. And each month, our savings account is growing a little bit and a little bit, investments, whatever. I'm not an investment advisor, so please don't bang me with, you know, well, you should be investing in stocks or whatever. That's not the point. The point is, assuming you only have a checking account and a savings account are the only two things that you have available to you, right? We wanna be operating out of our checking account most of the day, right? That's auto pulls on our mortgage, on our cell phone bill, on our utility bill, et cetera. Those things take zero decision-making process. They're bills we know that are coming due every single month. And for the purposes of our analogy, habits and routines are pulling from the checking account automatically every day. I'm going to read first thing in the morning, then I'm going to hit some emails. By that time, the kids will be up. I'm going to make them breakfast, spend some time with them, get them on the bus, get to work. I didn't have to make any decisions in that process. I know that that's what I do every single day. I didn't have to pull from my willpower reserve, right? Now, when you need it, say you have to buy, like, I have a big purchase coming up in so much as I have to buy a generator, right? I know I have this generator I have to purchase. I've been not avoiding it, but putting it off mostly because procrastination. I just need to do it. I live in the north. Storms hit and I live in an older part of town, so we do lose power, and I want to get a generator. Now, the decision to purchase a generator that comes out of your savings account. That's a big decision. Do I purchase a generator? Do I not purchase a generator? For purposes of our day-to-day, that may be, do I want to make, have this tough conversation, or I need to make a tough conversation with a team member or employee or a peer or my partner. And that tough conversation is gonna pull on our willpower because every part of our body and our mind is gonna tell us, don't do that hard thing, don't have that hard conversation. And our willpower is what we're gonna draw on to say, no, I have to do this thing. But if we have used up our willpower on little micro-decisions all day because we don't have a routine, we don't have habits, then when it comes time for that tough conversation, our brain starts screaming, don't do this, don't do this, and we don't have any willpower to draw on to push past that hesitancy. Steven Pressfield calls this the resistance, that constant and opposite force to our positive energy, right? That draw, that don't do this. It's going to, having that tough conversation with your partner, she's going to hate you, she's not going to respect you anymore, whatever it is, right? He's not going to respect you, he's going to hate you, right? All these negative things start coming out of thin air, fighting against us getting that thing done, and it is our willpower that allows us to push through it. And if we've used up our willpower throughout the day, then we burn out. We don't make those hard decisions. We become exhausted. We get to the end of the day, we start self-medicating with alcohol or pot or whatever we use, binge-watching TV, playing video games to one in the morning because we've used up our willpower. So habits, routines allow us to build in the positive activities that we don't need to make a decision on because we just do them regardless. Time blocking helps us make sure we have that time and we're saving our willpower for the big tough decisions. And in doing so, what you'll find is you never burn out because you've gotten the things done that would otherwise apply pressure to you to burn you out. Joa, I hope that answers your question. Um, burnout is absolutely real. I've experienced it many times, and it is always because I am off my routine and my habits. When I fall out of good routines, good habits, I start making bad decisions or I start struggling with tough necessary decisions, and you get that feeling of burnout, that sense of overwhelm. And we all want to avoid that as much as possible. So, okay, uh, great question, Joa. All right, on to our fourth question. And guys, I appreciate you so much. 10,000 followers on YouTube, 25,000 followers on Instagram for a channel like mine growing, trying to add value to your lives. It's just amazing. And if you're not subscribed or not connected, please do hit me with questions, share with your friends. That's how the show grows. That's how the show grows. All right. Our fourth question comes from Jack Francis. Jack asks, what advice do you have for someone who struggles with morning productivity? When I was thinking about this question, the first thing that came to my mind is we're not all morning people. Most of us are. There are far fewer night owls statistically. There have been tons of studies done on this. There are far fewer night owls than we want to admit. A lot of our night owl nature is us trying to deal with a sense of not getting things done during the day and by not having good routines, good habits, we push into the evenings and then we call ourselves night owls. That's often not the case. Many more of us are productive in the morning, but you may be a night owl. So first, try to figure that out. Where do you have the most energy? And I would assume for most of you listening to this, it is in the morning, especially after a good night's sleep. If you're struggling with morning productivity and you are a morning person, then the first place to look is the night before. What are you doing at night? Are you going to bed at a reasonable time? Are you getting seven hours plus of sleep a night? There are very, very few people. Again, this is another kind of common myth. There are very few people that can productively operate on less than seven hours of sleep on a consistent basis. Now, many of us do that, right? We get five, six hours of sleep, but then we're groggy in the morning and we don't wake up until we've had a pot of coffee and it's 11 a.m. So much of our lack of productivity in the morning has to do with our what we're doing the night prior. So if you're properly hydrated, if you're going to bed relatively unintoxicated, if you are in a dark room getting good sleep, I use a Whoop strap, not a product mentioned. I'm not sponsored by them, but I use it for those looking on YouTube. I keep it on my wrist right here. I track my sleep. I track my sleep performance. I know what positively impacts my sleep. I know what negatively impacts my sleep because I've been tracking my sleep for almost four months now. I have been tracking how different types of physical activity, different amounts of strain impact my sleep because when I get seven hours of high recovery sleep or more, I absolutely dominate the next day. Today is one of those days. I got 92% recovery rate and 100% sleep performance last night. I slept for seven hours and 33 minutes. I feel so motivated today. It's unbelievable. I've just been dominating since the moment that I woke up. And that's because I went to bed at a reasonable hour, slept in a dark room. I find that sleeping with my partner, when I sleep in the same bed as her, I get better sleep. I find that when I sleep in a dark room, I get better sleep. I like a weighted blanket that helps me sleep. Being properly hydrated helps me sleep. There are a few other factors, which maybe we can address on another podcast that positively impact my sleep. But when I get a highly productive night of sleep, I wake up the next morning ready to crush. I'm not questioning things. I just get up. I do what I have to do. And I get into my day. And from moment one, I'm getting after it. Now, we all have different situations, right? Some of us have to work second jobs to pay the bills. Some of us have young kids that keep us up. There's all different scenarios in which we're not going to get a perfect night's sleep every night. It's not going to happen. But if we can get more good night's sleep than bad in a week, say if you get four to five good nights and two or three not so good nights, you're going to be okay and you're going to wake up ready to go. So the energy that we wake up with is a big part of being productive in the morning, and knowing what impacts our sleep and making sure that we're prioritizing good, high-recovery sleep. You get eight hours of sleep and have it be very low productivity and wake up tired. That often happens when you drink too much alcohol or you're inebriated, et cetera. There are other factors that go into that. Maybe you didn't exercise the night before or the day before. So knowing what impacts your sleep is important. Getting a good night's sleep. Okay. Second, having a set routine, a set routine for the morning. What are the things that are important to you? It could be working out. It could be reading. I really like to read in the morning. I really like to get some sort of positive, educational, something into me, some sort of educational material. And just, I really love reading. Getting that in for, you know, 30, 20 to 30 minutes in the morning is really sets my day off on the right path. After that, I like to get myself situated. I like to make sure the house is put together, get dressed, get ready, get all my stuff together. If I have to get the kids to school, I get them up and out the door. But if I get that reading in in the morning and maybe follow up on some emails that have to go out early and just maybe have come in through the night before, I feel like when I hit work, I'm ready to crush. So I don't miss reading. I read pretty much every single day, first thing in the morning. And by having that kind of routine that I'm not going to negotiate with myself on, there's no, I'm going to do it regardless. So there's no lack of productivity because I'm going to do it. It's literally in my plan. If I go to bed and I get good sleep and I wake up in the morning and I know the first thing I'm going to do is read, and then I'm going to maybe answer some emails, get back to some people. I feel like I got to, that now I've done some work stuff. I get that off my brain. I can then fully focus on my family and my kids and make sure they're taken care of. And then I step into that first minute of the work day and I'm ready to go. And there's no regret feelings. There's no, man, I feel tired. I feel good. I feel ready to get after it. But I guess my real question to this is morning productivity is a result of having a routine and making sure that you're taking care of yourself the night before and getting a good night sleep. You do those two things, you're gonna be very, very productive in the morning. All right, Jack, I hope that answers your question, my friend. I appreciate it. We are on to our fifth and final question. Now, this one actually comes from a few months ago, but I thought it fit the vein that we were talking about today, and it comes from Blue Axelot Fam. On YouTube. That's the handle. With a, looks like some sort of Minecraft emoji face for the profile picture, but it's a great question. You ever get stuck on a project for a long period of time? Yes. Just like every other human being, yes, I do get stuck on projects for long periods of time. And I think where this particular individual, because I have no idea if it's a man or a woman, where this particular individual was getting at is, and then how do you get unstuck? Okay. So, and this is why I wanted to finish with this question, because it all comes back to routine and prioritization. Oftentimes, the reason we get stuck on a project for a long time is we don't prioritize that project. That is the most common reason that we get stuck on a project. It's not because we don't know how to execute on the project. It's not because we don't know who to call to help. It's not because we don't know what the answer is. It's because we don't prioritize it. We get stuck on projects for extended period of time because we don't prioritize the project. I'm going to give you an example. So I am co-authoring a book, The Civilized Savage, From Mediocrity to Mastery in an Age of Cultural Conformity. I've been co-authoring this book with a good friend of mine, Chris Paradiso, and for the last few months, it's been on me to kind of do the final edits before it goes to our actual book editor. And I've been working on narrative and flow, and I just kept getting stuck. And getting stuck is real. I really was getting stuck. But the reason I was getting stuck is because I wasn't prioritizing the project. Not because it wasn't important to me, it was. But I was prioritizing. My kids are involved in a lot of the youth sports. I was prioritizing their practices and their games. And then I'd get home and I'd be tired. And I'd work on it tomorrow. And then I wouldn't. And then finally, I was like, this project, which is so important to me. I mean, I'm in love with this book. I think you guys are going to love this book. I can't wait for it to be, you know, kind of real and tangible, and I can put it in your hands. I'm so proud to be working on it with Chris. I'm proud of the message. It means a lot to me. Yet, here I am, not prioritizing it. And finally, what I did is I took an afternoon on a Saturday, and I literally blocked four hours, and I just freaking banged out the last piece that needed to get done. I just focused on it. I just told my friends and my family, I just said, hey, I'm going to be out of communication for the afternoon. And if I don't respond, don't take it personally. And I put focus mode on my phone, turned off all my other apps on my computer, and I just finished the freaking project and got it out. You have to prioritize it. Time blocking, time blocking, time blocking. If you're stuck on a big project, look at your calendar, find an hour, two hours, however much time you think you need or can afford, and just put it in your calendar. Just put that time in your calendar. If it's something that's, like say it's a house project, right? Put it on your calendar. Put it on your calendar. Put, you know, work on this, you know, I wanted to paint this room. Put it on your calendar. Saturday morning from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m., I'm gonna paint this room. Bam, that's what it is. That's what you're doing. You're not doing anything else. Put it on your calendar. Prioritize the thing. It's the best advice that I have for getting unstuck on a big project. Is just to focus on it. And if you get there and your mind is wandering. And you're thinking about 15 other things you have to do. That's natural. Do the fucking project anyways. You think my mind didn't wander during four hours of working on that, of finishing that book? I knew exactly what I had to do. I had two more sections that I needed to kind of reorganize and I wanted to rewrite a few portions of certain chapters that just I