How to Make Success Simple

0:07Welcome to today's episode of the Mindset Mentor podcast. I am your host, Rob Dial. If you have not yet done so, hit that subscribe button so you never miss another podcast episode. And if you're out there and you love this podcast, you want to get some texts from me sporadically throughout your week, some mindset tips, tricks, text me right now, 512-580-9305. Once again, 512-580-9305. Today, I want to talk to you about how to make success simple. Whatever your definition of success is, I'm not going to be blowing your mind and telling you things that you've never heard before. It's going to be a really good reminder, but it's going to be very, very simple, but also very, very important.

0:50Because one of the things that I find with people is that we overcomplicate things way more than we'd need to, like incredibly more than we need to. If people didn't have fears and limiting beliefs and stories that they told themselves about themselves, everybody would have everything that they want to in their life. And we all want to create amazing lives. We all want to be the version of success that we know we could be in 10 years that we see in our mind's eye. And that's great. But you know, what's more powerful than all of that is just figuring out a way to win today. That's it. Just figure out a way to win the day.

1:32Just today, not tomorrow. I don't give a damn about next Tuesday. I don't care about two years from now. I care about today and today only. And I think it was Will Smith that gave this quick analogy. He says, if you're going to build a wall, you don't want to set out on building a huge, beautiful wall. What you want to do in order to build the best wall you possibly can is take each brick that you have and the brick that's in your hand and say, how can I lay this brick as perfectly as a brick can be laid right now? And if you do that with every single brick, eventually you'll take a step back, you'll look at this wall and you will have created a beautiful wall.

2:08And basically the wall is a metaphor for life and one brick at a time is basically today. And that's it. Just win today. Not next Tuesday, not five years from now, not when you're ready, just today. And so let me break this down for you. One of the things that I have found with being in self-development as long as I have is that if we think too far in the future, like it's good to think in the future and say, here's where I want to be in five years and 10 years. But then after you figure that out, just let it be. Because if you obsess too much over the future, the future can actually paralyze you.

2:46When you're obsessing over long-term goals, what happens is you start thinking to yourself all of the stuff that needs to be done in the next 10 years. You don't think about the next 10 years, you think about every single action you need to do over the next 3 ,650 days. And your brain doesn't do very well when it's got that much that it's focusing on. That's a lot. So your brain will spiral. It gets overwhelmed. It shuts down because you're thinking about all of the things that need to be done over the next 10 years and you get paralysis by analysis. But let me ask you this. Have you ever had so much to do that you ended up doing absolutely nothing?

3:28I hear it all the time. Yeah, that's what focusing too much on the future can do to you sometimes. And like I said, it's almost every day I hear from someone that they're so overwhelmed when they think about all the stuff they need to do to create the life that they want. So what I want to do with you is I want to zoom in. Like, I don't want to think macro anymore. I think micro. You don't need to change your life this year. I don't actually give a damn about this entire year. You don't need to make one habit stick forever. You don't even need to know what your purpose is, to be honest with you.

4:02You just need to show up today. 100 % all in best version of yourself. That's it. I just need you to win today. You don't need to win this year. You don't need to win at life. You just need to win today. All in 100%. And so in the morning, what you want to do is you want to ask yourself, who do I want to be today? What's the version of me that feels right just for today? hey, I don't care about who you want to be this year. I don't care about this week. What version of me feels right just for today? Because some days you have Saturday and you've got kids and you got to take them to soccer. That's a different version of you that's needed that day than it is for Tuesday and you've got a big presentation coming through.

4:43So what kind of energy do I want to bring into this room, this task, this conversation, this day? Forget about all of the goals for a second. Forget about all the habits you need to create. Forget about all of the shit that you have in your head that you want to change and all the stuff you're guilting and shaming yourself over just today. That's it. If you want to change your life, that's all you got to focus on just for today. And then what you do is you start thinking to yourself, okay, if we're going into today, who do I want to be today? You know what? Today's going to be a lot of stuff I need to do for work and then I need to go to the gym.

5:22and so today I want to be somebody who follows the broom. Okay, cool. Maybe tomorrow you wake up and you say, you know what, today I want to be someone who shows up with a lot of heart. Maybe tomorrow is Sunday and you say, you know what, today when you wake up on Sunday, I'm going to be someone who leads with love. Cool, I love that. You know, maybe the next day you wake up, you say, I will commit to today, I will commit to doing something, just one thing that matters the most to me. And here's the magic of all of it. You just act like that person today. Like I really want to be able, I wish I could just shake every person in the world and be like, you could just be somebody different today.

6:03Like you don't have to be the same person you've always been. If you look at the cells in your body, they change all the time. If you compare yourself to, I think it was like a couple of years ago, there's not a cell in your body that's the same. The only thing that's keeping you the same is you thinking that you're the same. And so you just act like a different person today. And then when you wake up tomorrow, be somebody different than you were today. And then the next day, guess what? Exactly. Just whoever you want to be. And eventually you'll find someone where you're like, I really like being this person.

6:38I don't really, you know what? I didn't really like playing that old version of me, but this new version of me that I've been stepping into, it's like putting on the same shirt, right? Like I really liked this shirt. I'm going to keep putting this one on. You know, those other colors didn't really look good to me. This one looks really good. I'm going to wear this again tomorrow. I'm going to wear this again the next day. And you're just choosing to put on the same personality once you find the one that you like. And what happens is you're not chasing this new life. You're not focusing on long-term goals.

7:04You're becoming a new you. And the best part, if you don't like it, throw it away and be somebody else tomorrow. It's like, stop putting so much pressure into all of this stuff. And so one thing that I recommend that you do when you wake up in the morning is you look at what your day needs to be and you look at what you got going on for today. And this quick practice that takes like 30 seconds can shift your energy for your entire day. And we will be right back. And now back to the show. Every morning, once you figure out what your day looks like, what you got to do, maybe you get your to-do list, you visualize what your day is going to look like.

7:41I recommend visualizing your day and how you want it to be. you write down three words, just three. And these words are three words that describe how you want to live today, how you want to show up today, who you want to be today. And these can change every day. In fact, they probably should change every single day. And so these are basically your North Star of your day. So you might wake up one morning and you visualize your day and you think about your two lists and you say, you know what, what really hits home for me today? I want to be loving I want to be hardworking and I want to be fun. Cool.

8:17Next day, you might say, I want to be present. I want to be playful and I want to be bold. Beautiful. Next day, you might say, I want to be focused. I want to be honest and I want to be gentle. All right. Next day, maybe you got a busy day at work. You got a lot of, you got to really bring in that, that energy. Today, I'm going to be persistent. I'm going to be a go-getter and I'm going to be confident. And here's what you do. You figure out your three words and you write them down on a three by five index card. Just write them down and take a marker if you want to put them in bold, you know, persistent, go getter, confident.

8:53You put them on an index card and then you just put them in your back pocket. If you want to see it even more, you just tape it to your laptop in the morning. And then when you're getting your work done, it's right there for you. And those three words are basically your compass for when you're going through your day of how you're going to show up. And you're like, oh man, like, I don't know. today's been really hard. I'm kind of tired. I don't feel like I really slept well. Well, hold on. I did say that I was going to be persistent today. So today I'm going to need to be persistent. I'm going to not give up on the goal that I had of doing X, Y, and Z today.

9:24You don't have to tell anybody. You can just decide to be these three things. And really what it comes down to is it's not about building habits. You don't need to build the perfect habits. People become so overwhelmed by, oh my God, I screwed up one day on my habits. I haven't been perfect. I was perfect for 17 days and then I screwed up. I'm a loser and I'm shaming myself and I'm guilty myself and now I feel like crap and now I don't want to do the habit anymore. Like you don't need to build perfect habits. You don't need to be hyper productive every single second. You just need to do the right things today.

9:59And sometimes today is different than tomorrow and different than the next day. Because here's what happens. You show up fully once and you're like, this was great. I really like how today went. And then you do it tomorrow and you do it again and you do it again. And then suddenly you're starting to realize that some of the actions that used to be hard for you to do don't really feel hard anymore. And then you're starting to notice that some of the things that used to be hard for you to do are now starting to feel a little bit more second nature. And if it's starting to feel more second nature, it means it's starting to kind of feel like a habit.

10:33So it's not forcing, it's not obsessing, it's just living in alignment with who you want to be and deciding in the morning, this is who I'm going to be and this is what it's going to look like. And so you gotta let today just be enough. Just lay the one brick as perfectly as you possibly can. If I could reach through the screen and just hand you one thing, it would just be a note that would say, you're allowed to let today be enough. You're allowed to win the day without knowing what the week looks like. You're allowed to show up messy and brave and scared and still be proud of yourself because momentum in your life doesn't come from being perfect in everything that you do.

11:13It comes from being present and taking the action that needs to be done when it needs to be done. To win the day, the first thing that you want to do, I'm going to make it real simple for you. It's just a four-step process, okay? Number one, just journal. You know, ask yourself, who do I want to be today? What energy do I want to bring in? What matters the most to me? What would make today amazing? My favorite question to ask myself in the morning. That's step number one. Step number two, choose your three words. Write them down, carry them with you, breathe them in, try to see what it would look like.

11:42Number three, act in alignment with those words. Try for just the day, try to walk and talk and live like the person that you aspire to be just for today. Just try it out. If there's someone in your life that you can think of that maybe is your inspiration, you can say, hey, for today, I'm going to act like this person. If Samuel L. Jackson was in my life, how would he deal with this right now? And you just decide to act like Samuel L. Jackson. I don't know, whoever it is that you want to be. He's the first person popped into my head. Okay. And then number four is to visualize what all of that could look like as well.

12:17As you're going through your day, visualize yourself showing up more in alignment, more on purpose, more focus on today, the person who follows through, the person who persists and the person who's loving, the person who's kind, whatever the words are that you decided to choose. And let that be enough for you. That's it. Let it be enough. I don't care about tomorrow. We all know that we could be driving home from work today and get hit by a truck and tomorrow never comes. And we were focusing all today on something that's coming up tomorrow that we didn't even get to go see. So what really matters is how can I be as present as possible and show up with 100 % of me in who I want to be today?

12:51And that's how your life is built. It's built one day at a time. And so I really want you to think about this for a second. You don't need to have all of your life figured out. You don't need to know where you're going to be two years from today. You don't have to have everything figured out. You don't have to think about being perfect for the next 10 years. You just need to win today. You've got to think to yourself, the thing that matters the most is that when I put my head down on my bed, I am better than I was when I woke up this morning. And so go be that version of you that you're proud of.

13:21Show up today. Show up for yourself. Show up for your family. Show up for your co-workers. Show up for your employees. That's all that's ever really needed. And if things don't go as planned, hey, good thing is you got tomorrow. If you screw it all up today, you got tomorrow to be different. Oh, you screwed it up today? All right, well then tomorrow I'm to be a little bit different. Maybe I should have been a little bit more persistent. Maybe I need to change my words because today I get smacked in the head with reality. You're never more than one good day away from momentum in your life. So that's what I got for you for today's episode.

13:50If you love this episode, please share it on your Instagram stories. Tag me in it, Rob Dial Jr., R-O-B-D-I-A-L-J-R. And with that, I'm going to leave you the same way I leave you every single episode. Make it your mission to make somebody else's day better. I appreciate you and I hope that you have an amazing day.