Optimize With Brian Johnson | More Wisdom In Less Time

Horticultural vs. Clock Time Revisited   In our last +1, we continued our conversation about The Law of Cause and Effect by inviting Jesus to the party to share his thoughts.   As you may recall, he told us that we can’t expect to grow grapes from thorn bushes or figs from thistles.   In other words: If we want a noble, virtuous life, we must do noble, virtuous things.   Now…   It’s not possible for me to think about figs without thinking about another ancient wise man who happens to be my all-time favorite teacher, the great Stoic philosopher Epictetus.    Epictetus was born (into slavery!) in what is now Turkey in the year 50 AD—not too long after or far away from where Jesus taught.   Epictetus reminds us that, even if we’re doing it right and growing figs on a fig tree, we’ve gotta know that IT TAKES TIME for those trees to bear fruit.   As we discussed in an old-school +1 on Horticultural Time vs. Clock Time: When you want to grow something and you plant a seed, do you start your stopwa

Thorn Bushes and Thistles Won’t Do the Trick   In our last  1, we talked about The Law of Karma.    Also known as The Law of Cause and Effect.   Same thing.    All the great teachers have talked about it.    And the entire field of modern science is, of course, grounded in this causal relationship between things.   In short: If THIS then THAT.   Today we’re going to rewind the clock a couple of thousand years and see what another wise teacher has to say on the subject. Then we’ll explore some more related ancient wisdom in our next +1. Then we’ll talk about how modern science tells us we should be thinking about it as it relates to setting goals for our optimization.   So…   Let’s rewind the clock to almost exactly 2,000 years ago.    We’re heading to the ancient land of Israel.   Jesus is giving a sermon on a mount.   In Matthew 7:16, he tells us: “You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?”   Of course, in that context, Jesu

How to Apply the Law of Cause and Effect   As we’ve discussed, Michael Singer is one of my favorite spiritual teachers.   After reading The Untethered Soul and Living Untethered, I decided to follow Joseph Campbell’s advice and take a deeper dive into his work. I went to Amazon to see what else he’s written. I found a couple of books he wrote nearly 50 years ago.    One of those books is called Three Essays on Universal Laws. The book has a chapter-essay on each of his three Laws: The Law of Karma, The Law of Will, and The Law of Love.   Today we’re going to chat about his (and my) take on The Law of Karma.   Singer tells us we can also call this the Law of Cause and Effect.   The basic idea is really simple.   He tells us: “For example, when we walk up and touch a hot stove the body gets burned, and thus, we learn ‘a lesson.’ Or if we stay up too long without sleep the body gets sick, and, again, we have been taught ‘a lesson.’ This holds true for staying out in the rain, eating the w

Feed the Good Guys   In our last couple +1s, we hung out with a couple of wise Indian masters and their gurus.    We talked about what to do if we’re afraid of ghosts (approach them!) and how to deal with the bitter process of changing our behaviors (keep chewing!).   Today I want to chat about ghosts for another moment.   This time we’ll go a little further east and visit Vietnam where the great Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh was born and raised.   When I searched my Mac for “ghosts” to find the Yogananda wisdom I was looking for, I saw that Thich Nhat Hanh ALSO talked about ghosts in his great book No Mud, No Lotus.   Here’s the passage.   He tells us: “The Buddha said that nothing can survive without food. This is true, not just for the physical existence of living beings, but also for states of mind. Love needs to be nurtured and fed to survive; and our suffering also survives because we enable and feed it. We ruminate on suffering, regret, and sorrow. We chew on them, swallow them

Wisdom From Another Indian Sage and His Grandmother   In our last +1, we talked about Yogananda and his guru’s wisdom on what to do with ghosts/aka how to live fearlessly.   As you may recall, the trick is to APPROACH our challenges rather than try to avoid them.    The story is so good, we’ll quickly review it.   Yogananda’s guru tells him: “My mother once tried to frighten me with an appalling story of a ghost in a dark chamber. I went there immediately, and expressed my disappointment at having missed the ghost. Mother never told me another horror tale.”   Hah. Genius.   The moral of the story?    “Look fear in the face and it will cease to trouble you.”   As I read that moral from an Indian yogi, I thought of another one of my favorite Indian sages, Eknath Easwaran.    In his great book, Your Life Is Your Message, he tells us about a lesson he learned from his Indian guru—who happened to be his grandmother.   The short story?    Young Eknath was complaining about how hard it was to

Here’s What to Do…   Not too long ago, we talked about how I read a book.   I made the point that the most important part of how I read a book is how I decide what book I will read.   I also talked about the fact that, as I followed Joseph Campbell’s wisdom to immerse myself in the wisdom of an author who “grabs me” by reading everything that author has written AND everything by the authors who inspired them, I found myself going deep into Michael Singer’s wisdom AND deep into the wisdom of one of his biggest influences, Yogananda.   In fact, I read five of Yogananda’s little books/booklets in very short order.   They are PACKED with wisdom.   I was blown away by Yogananda’s PRACTICAL spirituality and I could see why Steve Jobs was such a big fan that he reread his Autobiography of a Yogi once a year and why he gifted that book to his friends as THE last thing they got on their way out of his memorial service.    (Think about the significance of that for a moment.)   So…   We’ll be ta

The Most Frequently Asked Question in Heroic Coach   In our last +1, we talked about some Ryan Holiday wisdom from his new book Discipline Is Destiny.   As you may recall, we brought Cato the Elder, Ben Franklin and Marcus Aurelius to the party to talk about the importance of focusing on all the ways WE can get better rather than worrying about all the ways other people need to improve.   Cato told us: “I am prepared to forgive everybody’s mistakes, except my own.”   Ben Franklin told us: “Search others for their virtues, thyself for thy vices.”   Marcus Aurelius told us to be: “Tolerant with others, strict for yourself.”   We could add Jesus’ wisdom to the mix. He told us to quit worrying about the speck of dust in your brother’s eye and to focus on the BEAM in yours!    Same thing.   This is a really important Idea.   And…   It’s funny because as I created that last +1, I thought of what is probably THE most frequently asked question from people going through our Heroic Mastery Serie

Strict with Yourself   I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again.   Ryan Holiday is one of my favorite writers. We’ve featured a bunch of his books including The Obstacle Is the Way, The Daily Stoic, Ego Is the Enemy, and Stillness Is the Key.   He’s currently working on “The Stoic Virtue Series” in which he’s creating a new book for each of the cardinal virtues of Stoicism: Courage, Temperance, Justice, and Wisdom.   We briefly chatted about the first book in the series: Courage Is Calling.   Today we’re going to chat about an Idea from the second book in the series: Discipline Is Destiny.   We’re going to talk about an Idea that didn’t make it into the Note. It’s from a chapter called “Tolerant with Others. Strict with Yourself.”   Ryan tells us: “’I am prepared to forgive everybody’s mistakes,’ Cato the Elder said, ‘except my own.’ Ben Franklin, many generations later, would put forth an even better rule: ‘Search others for their virtues, thyself for thy vices.’ Or as Marcu

At Least I Hope You Are, Hero!   In our last +1, we talked about Abigail Adams and her letter to her son, John Quincy Adams.    As you may recall, she admonished the 12-year-old who would become the sixth U.S. President to LIVE WITH VIRTUE.   And, as we discussed, she wisely declared: “These are the times in which a genius would wish to live. It is not in the still calm of life, or the repose of a pacific station, that great characters are formed. The habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great necessities call out great virtues. When a mind is raised, and animated by scenes that engage the heart, then those qualities which would otherwise lay dormant, wake into life and form the character of the hero and the statesman.”   As part of that +1, I mentioned the fact that I think she and her family would have been part of our Heroic movement—encouraging their kids to cultivate their virtue while doing the same on our Heroic app.   I also mentioned the fact that I think Be

Abigail Adams and Heroic Mothers Unite   Abigail Adams was one of the Heroic Founding Mothers of the United States of America.   I’m convinced that she and Benjamin Franklin and their families would be part of our Heroic movement if they were alive today.   Why?   Because they were intensely passionate about cultivating virtue in their lives and in the lives of their children.   And…   I’m pretty sure () they would have preferred to have their kids on the soon-to-be-launched social features for our Heroic training platform cultivating virtue together rather than on Tik Tok watching another absurd 20-second video.   What data supports that hypothesis?   Glad you asked…   That’s the subject of Today’s +1.   Have you ever seen this quote from Abigail?    “These are the times in which a genius would wish to live. It is not in the still calm of life, or the repose of a pacific station, that great characters are formed. The habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great

Which Will It Be, Hero? As we’ve discussed, Brian Cain is an inspiring human being.   He works with some of the greatest athletes in the world and has helped them go to the next (NEXT!) level.   We’ve talked about a bunch of Big Ideas from his two little fables: The 10 Pillars of Mental Performance Mastery and One Percent Better.   Today we’re going to revisit One Percent Better for ONE more wisdom gem.   But…   First…   Pop quiz!!!   Question: What’s 1% of a day?    Do you recall?   (And do you recall that trying to recall something is one of the most powerful ways to dominate Learning 101? Yep.)   Answer: 1% of the day is 14 minutes and 24 seconds.   Note: I’ve changed the countdown on my Timex watch from 16 minutes and 40 seconds (which is 1,000 seconds) to 14 minutes and 24 seconds (1% of the day!!) so I can measure my meditation and deep work time blocks and, well, a bunch of stuff in 1% increments. Super fun. We’ll come back to that more as we have fun seeing if we can ma

Of Self-Mastery: Reactive + Structural + Expansive   I’ve been thinking a lot about the three forms of discipline that make up Self-Mastery.   Here they are:   Structural Discipline.  Reactive Discipline.  Expansive Discipline.   We talk about them in Objective V of Basic Training and I’ll be writing about them in the Heroic book we’ll be launching in early 2024.   Now…   As I sat down to create this +1, I thought this would be the first time I’ve written about the three disciplines. Then, as I was going through the archives, I found that, in fact, we ALREADY chatted about the three disciplines.   We chatted about them in +1 #669 to be precise—over two and a half years ago.   Perfect.   Let’s dust that wisdom off and shine the spotlight of our attention on them again.    Why?    Because they’re SUPER important.   First…   A little more context.   As we’ve discussed many times, Phil Stutz is all about helping us cultivate what he calls “emotional stamina.”    How?    By getting to a

Personal Humility + Indomitable Will    Jim Collins is my all-time favorite business thinker.   He’s written a bunch of great books including Good to Great, Built to Last, and Great by Choice.   But…   My all-time favorite business book is Beyond Entrepreneurship 2.0: Turning Your Business into an Enduring Great Company. (Thanks again for the rec on that, Gibson. )   I still need to do a Note on all those books and create a series of Notes for all the business books I’ve read but have yet to distill.   For now…   I want to talk about one of Jim Collins’ Big Ideas on what he calls “Level 5 leadership.”   Here’s how he puts it: “Our research showed that having charismatic leadership doesn’t explain why some companies become great and others don’t. In fact, some of the most disastrous comparison cases had very strong, charismatic leadership in the very era that the companies fell or failed. Rather, our research found that the critical ingredient is Level 5 leadership. The essence of Lev

I Read Archeologically (Like Twyla Tharp)   A couple +1s ago, I promised to tell you more about how I read a book.   Here’s the very short answer…   I read like it’s my job to find Big Ideas that can help me activate my Soul Force so I can help YOU activate YOUR Soul Force.    For one simple reason. It is.    Now…   Let’s go to one of my favorite books for a passage that best captures how I read.   In The Creative Habit, Twyla Tharp tells us: “When I’m reading archeologically, I’m not reading for pleasure. I read the way I scratch for an idea, digging down deep so I can get something out of it and use it in my work. I read transactionally: How can I use this? It’s not enough for me to read a book. I have to ‘own’ it. I scribble in the margins. I circle sentences I like and connect them with arrows to other useful sentences. I draw stars and exclamation points on every good page, to the point where the book is almost unreadable. By writing all over the pages, I transform the author’s work i

Do a Gritty, Flourishing Hero Good!   In our last +1, we talked about how I read a book.   More specifically, we focused on how I choose the books I read—which, I believe, is ALWAYS the most important first step in how to read a book.   In short, I said that I follow Joseph Campbell’s wisdom to “read the right books by the right people.”   Campbell tells us: “When you find an author who really grabs you, read everything he has done. Don’t say, ‘Oh, I want to know what So-and-so did’—and don’t bother at all with the best-seller list. Just read what this one author has to give you. And then you can go read what he had read. And the world opens up in a way that is consistent with a certain point of view. But when you go from one author to another, you may be able to tell us the date when each wrote such and such a poem—but he hasn’t said anything to you.”   Scientists would agree with this approach of trusting yourself and doing what really grabs you—with books and with other things in life.   

And… How I Pick the Books I Read   I’m often asked how I read a book AND how I pick the books I read.   In fact, I was asked this question in one of our recent Heroic Coach Soul Force Forge sessions in which I have 1-on-1 coaching sessions with our Coaches in a group environment. (These sessions are among the highlights of my month!)    Today I’d like to chat about that for a moment or three.   So…   In a recent Zoom, I had an opportunity to connect with Franco—an incredibly inspiring 19-year-old Argentinian Heroic optimizer who is going through our Coach certification program.    Franco told me that he was getting an ARETÉ tattoo for his 20th birthday (!!) and then asked me how I read a book.    I kinda went off.    Here’s the video clip of our time together.    And, here’s the short story…   The most important part of how to read a book, from my perspective, is to make sure you’re reading THE RIGHT BOOK.   If you’re reading a book because you think you “have to” or because everyone els

The Place to Live to Dominate the Day   In our last +1, Dale Carnegie joined us to complement some Brian Cain wisdom about the importance of focusing on THIS moment (RIGHT NOW!) to crowd out any potential stress about the past or the future that might be eliciting some feelings of depression or anxiety.   As you may recall, and, don’t worry! I promise that I will continue to unapologetically repeat all the important themes we discuss to make sure we’re practicing one of the key tenets of Learning 101 known as “spaced repetition” …     Here’s how Cainer put it: “Remember, depression is obsession with the past, anxiety is obsession about the future, and optimal performance is obsession about the present.”   And…   Here’s how Carnegie put it: “George Bernard Shaw was right. He summed it all up when he said: ‘The secret of being miserable is to have the leisure to bother about whether you are happy or not.’ So don’t bother to think about it! Spit on your hands and get busy. Your blood will star

And Its Antidote (Found in Spit!)   In our last +1, we spent a little more time with Brian Cain and his wisdom on the fact that “depression is obsession with the past, anxiety is obsession about the future, and optimal performance is obsession about the present.”    All of which begged the question: What are YOU obsessed about these days?    And…   All of that led to my admonition to activate our Soul Force by getting our Energy to Heroic levels and Focusing it on What’s Important NOW all day every day.    Today I want to revisit the topic and bring another peak performance guru to the party to share HIS wisdom on the subject.   We’ll go old school and invite Dale Carnegie to join us.   As you almost certainly know, Carnegie wrote one of the all-time best-selling personal development books How to Win Friends and Influence People. He wrote that book in 1936. It’s sold over 30 million copies. (Check out the Notes for more.)   What you may not know is that he wrote another great book called

Past? Future? Present? = Depression, Anxiety, Optimal Performance    Not too long ago, we spent some time with my friend Brian Cain—who happens to be, in my opinion, at least tied for first as THE world’s best mental toughness coach.   One particular line from his 10 Pillars of Mental Performance Mastery has been popping up in my brain and I want to make sure we take a moment to chat about it.   Here it is.   Brian tells us (via Coach Kenny in his fable): “Remember, depression is obsession with the past, anxiety is obsession about the future, and optimal performance is obsession about the present.”   Let’s think about that for a moment…   Depression is obsession about the PAST.    Anxiety is obsession about the FUTURE.   Optimal performance? That requires an obsession with the PRESENT.   Of course, that’s a deliberately hyperbolic oversimplification of depression and anxiety.    And…   It’s a powerful perspective.    All of which begs the question: What are YOU obsessed about these da

We Love You… Let’s GO!   In our last +1, we talked about the fact that I’m hitting 101 Heroic Targets a day so I can keep my daimon in play.   You try it yet?     Of course, as I’ve said many times, you don’t need to be quite as crazy and ALL IN as I am to get the benefits of using the Heroic app.    Early research shows that hitting as few as THREE Heroic Targets a day can boost your Energy 40%, your Productivity 20% and your Connection 15%—all in a few minutes on the app per day.   Why does the Heroic app work so powerfully?   Because there’s E X T R A O R D I N A R Y power in living our lives with a clear intention and shining the spotlight of our attention on the things that matter most. Then, of course, DOING the things that are in integrity with that vision of our best selves.    Not once in a while but EVERY.SINGLE.DAY.   Now…   One of the Heroic Energy Targets I commit to every morning these days is:    “Cold Plunge (2:43 after 30)”   That’s short-hand for: Get in the cold plunge for