Instead of trying to make your life perfect, give yourself the freedom to make it an adventure, and go ever upward. – Drew Houston

I like this idea.

Quit trying to be perfect.

Give yourself some freedom.

Go on an adventure.

Go ever upward.

Are you struggling with any of those?

Trying to be perfect and allowing the fear of failure to hold you back from enjoying life’s adventures?

Spinning your wheels thinking about how to start and continue perfectly while life passes you by?

Keeping yourself in a box instead of moving forward and breaking out of your comfort zone?

Make it a point to create some little adventures for yourself. Get outside of your normal routine. Be ok with things getting a little messy. Just move ever upward.

Make it a great day.

Jake

You grow up the day you have the first real laugh at yourself. – Ethel Barrymore

Maybe I’m a grown up after all….

Being mature enough to admit our shortcomings and laugh at them is an important step in life.

Instead of trying to cover up for our weakness we can laugh at it and recognize it for what it is.

Our shortcomings can be seen as lessons to learn from in order to grow and become the person we want to become.

So, laugh at yourself today.

Make it a great day.

Jake

Nothing will work unless you do. – Maya Angelou

All of our plans for success and happiness required effort.

None of our dreams and goals will happen without consistent and disciplined work.

Remember that the payoff is worth it and get to work.

Make it a great day.

Jake

https://youtu.be/V5EGN3O5Rs8

This one even comes with an awesome video…

To stretch the theme a little, this song reminds me that all great accomplishments require a leap of faith.

We must make the leap between what is known and what is unknown.

Between what is possible and what might be possible.

Between our comfort zone and being uncomfortable.

Is there an area of your life where you need to take the leap?

Make it a great day.

Jake

Go for it now. The future is promised to no one. – Wayne Dyer

Great reminder for today.

Today is the day. The day for you to get started, to take that chance.

There are no promises about the future, don’t let another day pass.

Make it a great day.

Jake

Yesterday’s email with the 3 Jake’s talking to each other got some interesting reactions. Justin Wampler posted on the Daily Attitude Email Blog an interesting way that he had tricked himself into being more disciplined. Justin was gracious enough to let me share his thoughts with you.

“I’m a big fan of tricking myself too, but I have to approach it a little differently. Using your example of working out, I’d have to make a deal with myself, once I felt the urge to skip the workout. I’d say, ok self, if you want to skip this workout, go put on your exercise clothes and stand on the treadmill, to prove to me that you did originally intend to workout. Then I’ll consider skipping it. Of course, once you’re standing on the treadmill with your exercise clothes on, it’s much easier to follow through.”

And then he followed up with some more:

“I was thinking about this some more, trying to figure out why this kind of trick works for me, and I think your analogy of the Three Jakes was the missing piece. I’m not sure how to avoid sounding like a crazy person when trying to describe several metaphorical parts of my consciousness, but here goes…

I guess you could think of those separate parts of you as roommates. They spend a lot of time together in a crowded space, so they must always make an effort to reconcile their differences.

Turns out that although Lazy Me tends to get the final say in arguments with Aspirational Me, Lazy Me is not a bad person. As such, he feels guilty whenever he lets Aspirational Me down. So when Aspirational Me tells Lazy Me that he can have a guilt free pass for exercising that day, on the condition that Lazy Me proves he was honest about his intentions to work out by putting on the exercise clothes and standing on the treadmill first, Lazy Me is eager to do so. So he does. Once he’s there he either promises Aspirational Me he will do better tomorrow (and not want to let him down twice in a row) or more often than not, he’ll just decide to go ahead and work out since he’s already standing there.

The human brain is weird, huh?”

Thanks for sharing, Justin.

Make it a great day.

Jake

BO – “Discipline is doing what you don’t want to when you don’t want to do it.”

EB – We impress people with our strengths…but we connect with people through our brokenness/weakness” – Craig Groeschel

JD – I believe that if one always looked at the skies, one would end up with wings. – Gustave Flaubert

JW* – Courage is the ladder on which all the other virtues mount. – Clare Boothe Luce

MS – Answer not a fool according to his folly, Lest thou also be like unto him. Answer a fool according to his folly, Lest he be wise in his own conceit. Proverbs 26:4–5

Mr. O’Shaughnessy responded to the Daily Attitude Email this morning saying that he had the quote above attached to his monitor.

My story of trying to trick myself into a more disciplined version of myself reminded Brian of this little trick he was using.

Visibility.

A great trick to get yourself moving or continued down the path is to put a reminder where you will see it at the point it matters.

The swimsuit you want to wear this summer on the fridge.

The workout clothes laying right in your way as you get started on the day.

The password for logging into your accounts that reminds you of what is most important.

Find some way to get in front of “future you” in a way that will wake him/her up.

My advice on this one is to make the reminder kind of ugly and not cool. This is not an area to try to be cool or cute. You want it to stand out and not be able to ignore it.

Awesome idea, Brian.

Make it a great day.

Jake

I’ve learned something interesting about myself lately that might be useful to a few of you.

I’m not always trustworthy.

Sometimes I say to myself “I’ll do that later” or “next time I’ll….” and then I don’t do it.

I flat out ignore my own promise to myself.

I’m sure this doesn’t happen to you, but in case it does, I came up with a little trick that works (some of the time).

I trick myself by just doing it right now. Whatever it is that I am about to promise myself I will do, I make myself do it right then.

Let me give you an example, using three Jake’s – Aspirational Jake (who wants to do the right thing) and Lazy Jake (who wants to do the easy thing) Realist Jake (who realizes that Lazy Jake will win out in the end):

Aspirational Jake: I’ll work out tonight after I finish a few other things.

Lazy Jake: Great idea. You are totally going to follow through on that.

Realist Jake: Yeah right. Go downstairs and get your lazy butt on the treadmill.

Brilliant, right?

Ok, maybe not, but I’d bet I’m not the only one this has ever happened to.

If this happens to you, tap into your inner realist. Make yourself get started. Or make it so it’s harder to be lazy later (put your workout clothes on). Just find a way to force yourself into getting it done.

Make it a great day.

Jake

"It doesn’t matter which side of the fence you get off on sometimes. What matters most is getting off! You cannot make progress without making decisions." — Jim Rohn

The last part is what really gets me on this one. You cannot make progress without making decisions.

All progress is proceeded by a decision.

When we overanalyze and take too long to make a decision, we are delaying our own progress.

Are you feeling stuck on something?

Thinking about the same thing over and over again?

Make some kind of a decision. Pave the way for progress.

Make it a great day.

Jake

https://youtu.be/kbE2YOYk5rc

This one is a bit of a slow tapper, but the message is good.

Never give up.

Never give in.

Never let a ray of doubt slip in.

You are worth it. If you are stuck on something, don’t give in.

Make it a great day.

Jake