I've got to add to them. It's taps, it's the You project, It's myself and Robert Capuccio, who rocks up every Thursday at my joint. And when I say it rocks up, I'm talking virtually rocks up and just appears like a little body ferret out of a cage, although that's not where ferret should be, a ferret out of a tunnel in the ground, a virtual tunnel in the ground. There's a little bit of ferret about you, you know that, like in a loving way. You've got a bit of ferret energy.
Are you saying you suspect they steal things?
Is that what ferrets do?
They did they're incredible thieves. Apparently you could train them to neck nearly anything.
Ah well, who knew? Are they? Is that something that criminals do? They have ferrets that they train up gangs of ferrets to just run in the streets nicking things of value.
According to my teaste in cinema, Yes, a long time ago, like one hundred years ago, people had well trained ferrets.
I'm not going to steal anything from yours. It's a sandwich.
Yeah, well, I feel like the ferret's going to eat the sandwich before you get that. But I feel like I could be hallucinating that. Somewhere back in the cognitive archives is a recollection of a ferret that used to steal money and bring it back to its owner. Like quite a lot of money used to go into people's homes, steal passion, bring it pack. Is that possible or do I just make that up?
I don't know, I've only seen it in films, but yeah, I'm sure if they're really well trained and they're good at it, and they're kind of small, so you can't really you know, it's not like they attract a lot of attention to ferret, would they.
Yeah, And imagine trying a fingerprint a ferret down at the police station. I mean, that's going to be tricky, isn't it. How are you going to do that? Like it's going to get through the bars. You put him in the cell or her in the cell, they're going to be out at a minute.
No apposable thumbs, Like where do they put the ink? It's just it's a mess.
Yeah, imagine trying to handcuff that little fucker.
That's why I so few frereks actually get prosecuted. You never hear about that in the paper. It's just too difficult, spices. We'll just let them go. Hopefully they take that act of grace and use it to change their thieving waste.
Well, everybody's just jumped out, how are you, bro? What time is it over there? Where are you in San Diego at the moment?
I mean San Diego? So what time is it? Right? Yeah, it's eighteen forty four.
So it's oh, it's in the PM. It's called it to seven is for you. It's called it to one ish also in the PM. But we are Thursday are Wednesday evening. We would chatting in the bat. We're chatting a little bit before we went live about the idea of something that I talked to about about people a lot. Also something that's been an issue for me over the years, and something that I spoke about. I was going to say, yesterday wasn't yesterday, It was the day before. In I
was in Brisbane. I was talking to a room full of lawyers out to my lawyer friends that I met the other day, and we were talking about habits and patterns of behavior and almost like this unconscious programming that runs our life to an extent that may or may not work, like the auto pilotleness of our existence or the groundhog dayness of these repetitious thoughts and beliefs and ideas and behaviors and results that kind of are not optimal.
So in that kind of whole wheelhouse of you know, like everyone who listens to this show, if not everyone, nearly everyone wants to think better, do better, create better, Which is why people tune in is to figure out how do I change my thinking and my habits and my behaviors and my lifestyle and my results, and how do I be a better version of me whatever that means, how do I succeed whatever success means for me individually?
And you know, I guess trying to have enough self awareness to recognize the stuff that you do that doesn't work, Like, what is the thing that I do that really is hardwired into my normal operating system, that is, on a level a form of self sabotage, you know. So an obvious one for me was for about twenty years just eating everything that wasn't fucking nailed down, despite the fact that I didn't need more food. I just wanted more food.
I just ate more food. I just enjoyed more food, because I had, if not a food addiction, something in the zip code of a food addiction, you know. But you can't change what you can't acknowledge or you can't own up to. Is this something that you talk to people about. Is this something that you've had to navigate yourself? And if so, how do you go about it?
I mean, this is a big part of what I talk to people about, but it's also something that I've had to utilize in my life frameworks. Guy, as you know, So I have a whole model around this, and it's you know, it's basically what you would find in any habit model, except a couple of other elements that kind of connect it to certain things that increase the probability of starting and doing something until it becomes a sustainable behavior.
I mean, with turettes, I'm easily distracted, you know, Like my my attention span is kind of like a ferret. If you put that instead of training that ferret for a life of crime, you put that ferret on cocaine, which is also a very unethical thing to do to a ferret. But my brain kind of works the way a ferret on cocaine.
That brain need.
Work, so for me, if I don't have models, if I don't have rituals, if I don't have intentionality, I'm like completely all over the shop. So this is something that's extremely important to me.
Do you think that the is the mind bear, it's the main barrier to starting? Just the fact that it's hard, or it's uncomfortable, or it's unfamiliar, or it's uncertain.
Is it?
That? Is it? Just because even though the thing, even though I'm not producing the results I want to produce, even though I'm not in the health state that I want to be in or the job or the income or the whatever, I'm kind of familiar with it. So there's a kind of an ease to it. Is that part of the challenge?
Yeah, I would imagine that is part of the challenge.
I was thinking, like the key to or the lock on any type of transformation begins with awareness, and I think it's a lack of self awareness. Why do I even want to start this? What am I expecting? Am I prepared for what it takes? Why do I even do the habits that I want to break in the first place? I think the first step is examining that because that is your level of intentionality that'll teach you
a lot about your environment, the rewards you're seeking. I also think we're not really aware of what it takes to get started. Like bj Fok in Tiny Habits talks about breaking it down to the most ridiculous. I think for a lot of people, it's like, Okay, I got to overhaul my entire life right now, and they're not really contemplate. Okay, well, what do I have to sacrifice? Am I prepared to sacrifice that? Where a tiny habit would be.
Okay?
I want to become an expert in this subject matter, so I'm going to need to start to read and study and explore. Sometimes a great place to start is five minutes a day because just starting it's like, oh wow, okay, one, I've proven to myself I can do it.
Two.
Once I start exploring something, I open that book, it's almost like an open.
Loop in your brain.
You ever have this experience where you just cannot start something, but once you start it, you got to go on the road and you got to go give a seminar somewhere, And whilst you're on the road, you know, if you didn't start, it would be out of your mind. But because you already started it, but it's incomplete. It drives you crazy a little bit, and just like you're thinking about, oh, I can't wait to get back from being on the road because I've got to complete this.
Does that happen to you that kind of like open loop scenario?
Yeah? Sometimes sometimes I find also that the days that I am busier, I'm way more I'm way more efficient, I'm way more motivated, I'm way more productive. And I know that sounds dumb, but what I mean is, like I was talking to you, Sam, Yeah, we're not full disclosure, but partial disclosure everyone. I've had a few challenges. My dad's beene a bit crook, right, So anyway, I've been up in more Well, which is four hours of driving
two hours each way. I was there all day yesterday, which is the place that I want to be, but I was in hospital with dad all day yesterday. And so what that means is there's about fifty things that I didn't do yesterday that I should have done, right, And so that's cool, but obviously he's the priority, so that it doesn't matter. But what that meant was last night I got home and I think I did.
About eight hours of things in three hours, and I did it really quite easily, because in my mind it is like, well, Craig, this is you don't you don't have an option.
You need to get this done. And it's like I think, I give my like if I've got three things to do today and it's not a busy day and there's no real pressure, there's no deadline. I'm not recording a podcast, I'm not doing a gig, I'm not traveling anywhere. It really doesn't matter. I'll look up it's three o'clock and I've done fucking nothing. Like people think I'm so busy and I'm so efficient, and I'm not like I can be. But it's it's like almost this this subconscious knowing or
this conscious knowing. I don't have to be productive, so I'm not. But it's like you know when you when I travel into state, like I said, day Monday, Tuesday, you know, plan strains, automobiles and presentations and meetings, and you know I am so efficient and so organized in that context, but there's this like almost subconscious part of my brain where I don't need to be that today and I don't choose to be less productive. I just
am it's like I sabotage myself. But maybe maybe having days where I'm less productive is actually what I need. Who knows.
It could be.
I noticed that I'm far more productive when I'm in perpetual motion. It could have something to do with dopamine, because it's goal focused and there's all these things you got to do, and every time you're completing something, you're getting another head of dopamine. So you're producing dopamine, You're activating the ventulustra atom.
To anticipate reward.
Orbital frontal cortex is scanning your environment for other goal achieving, you know, rather than tension relieving activities for that particular day.
So I think it has a lot to.
Do with the dupaminergic system and just the overall momentum in general. When I have a little bit of pressure on me, And that also makes sense from a stress hormone level, elev nor epanaphorin epinafferin you're just going to be in a different state than if you're in first gear for like twenty four hours, if you will.
I think also for me, there's the micro and the macro. The micro of my life is what I'm doing now in this moment. I'm talking to Bobby in this moment at twelve fifty three in Melbourne on a Thursday. Right now, I've got a coffee here, I've got my computer in front of me. You know, I know that we've got about thirty minutes more to go. This is the micro, but the macro is well. I've got this company called the You Project. We've got two thousand episodes of this
this podcast. I'm finishing my PhD. I've got parents who are that, you know. And then there's like, what's I think? Because there is the macro and the micro, so that most of the time our head is in the microw the micro the what am I doing now? What can I get now? What feels good now? What tastes good now? What's comfortable now? What can I avoid now and do later?
Like I wrote this thing the other day on social media, and it's just it's just a whiteboard thing and there's four words and the four words are tomorrow, soon, Monday, and January one. And the message is these are the fourth most popular times to start any kind of personal transformation. So tomorrow, soon, Monday, January one. Interestingly, today doesn't make the top ten You know, the funny thing is that, like, how many times have somebody said to you, hey, Bobby,
how do I do this? Or you know, at the risk of sounding cliche, I'm probably the single question I've been asked most is essentially how do I get lean or how do I get fit right? That's or a version of that question. I've been asked a million different questions, brain questions, human behavior questions, but over the totality of my career, it's from the eight and year old gym
instructor to now. And more than half of the time when I tell people or I give them advice, you know, I go, look, here are some things to think about. It's virtually never that they're going to start that today, Like it's always thanks, you know, it's always going to be soon or tomorrow or Monday or January one, but it's never now. And it just interests me because the issue is now, Like I have an issue now. I don't have an issue next Monday. I have an issue now.
I'm like, we have an issue now, so start now. And you've got an answer now, or you've got at least the very least you've got some direction, or you've got a framework or you've got some kind of resource or tool or strategy, so start now. And it's so funny when I and I generally don't push people, but every now and then I'm like, well, why wouldn't you
start this today? And you can just see people cognitively scrambling for some kind of rationale Bobby, not today, because fucking any day, but today, and then because every you know, we never live in any place but the present, so it's always going to be sometime in the future that place we never inhabit.
I wonder if that has And by the way, I have been exercising for my entire life and I have run into the same Oh my goodness, you know what I've eaten this today? Tomorrow I'm going to and it's like, dude, right, what are you doing? It's like, so I do a lot of the same things, although I'm really good at starting back up and staying consistent for a while. Yeah,
but I do have that pattern. And I wonder for people if it goes back to that all or nothing type of mentality, going back to bj fog where it's almost like, hey, if you you could do one small thing starting like today, now, what do you think would be an accessible behavior that might support that health and fitness goal of whatever it is that they said that
they were trying to do. And I know that I was once attending this class on food science and this medical doctor shoes brilliant, and what she had people do was just eat whatever you're normally gonna eat, but just pay attention to what it is, be mindful, and add plants to it or add vegetables, just throw it on. It's like, oh, that's very specific. That's like every single meal. There's no way to get that wrong. It's either I did it or I didn't do it, so there's no ambiguity.
Oh and I can start that today. And once they start that at a very small level, they start to shift their identity from someone who who doesn't do any health and fitness supporting behaviors to someone who does. And it's a lot easier jump making bigger and bigger commitments from that because a lot of habits, you know, James Clear and Atomic Habits talks about this where it relates.
To your identity.
Like imagine you got cast as the leading role in a major blockbuster film that they're producing, and you were playing the role of a lead character who just engaged in health and fitness type behaviors. Let's say you had a job that was really demanding and because of that, you had to elicit top peak levels of emotional, physical, cognitive performance. What would that person eat? How often would they go to the gym? Would they just like skip workouts?
Would they just be like eating sugar and ultra processed foods every single day, every single meal?
Like? What is that character? And where could you start?
Because every time you engage in that behavior, that's could ruin. It's a vote for your identity of who you're becoming.
And that's that's kind.
Of a powerful way to look at habit formation as well. But I think I think where the real magic is is looking at what you.
Currently do that you want to stop doing.
I think there's a lot of valuable information and we just go to, oh, I don't want.
To do this, I'd rather do this, but what we'll come back.
There's a lot to learn from what you're already doing if you can look at it with some objectivity.
And I think and that is the that is the ever present challenge, Like how do you look at your own shit with objectivity? When everything that you look at is the subjective looking is subjectively. You know your window, and I know what you're saying. I think part of it is for me. And this is again, this is This is not a recommendation or advice any on. This
is just my experience. So I needed to try to understand, for example, my relationship with food and understand the emotion around food, and to start to you know, because we are It doesn't matter how how logical we are, how intelligent we are, how much we know you know the research da da da da da da da. When humans are emotional, generally, the emotion drives the behavior, not the mind right or not the logic, not the rational part
of the brain. And so it's being able to say, listen, I struggle with this particular issue, with this habit, with this behavior, and it's it's quite emotionally driven, and it's driven out of fear, or it's driven out of resentment, or it's driven out of anxiety, or it's whatever it is, right, or it's driven out of a need to be comfortable in the moment. And so to try to turn down
the emotion, recognize the emotion, feel the emotion. We're not denying how you feel, but trying to turn up the logic and strategy, knowing that in a minute, you're going to be five years older. Right, in a minute, bro, you're going to be five years older, and you're going to be probably unless something changes. Because by the way, you've been having a version of this conversation since two
thousand and six. Right, So so if nothing changes, nothing changes, And being able to just like we would like, look at a business project or a financial endeavor, or you know, some kind of strategic thing that we're in the middle of. Imagine if we could take that analytical strategic thinking and apply it to the project that is us or we might even call it the U project, if there's a
name for a show. Right, But being being able to go, yeah, I unless something changes based on my current trajectory in the last ten years and my current trajectory in five years or two years or five months, I'm going to be in a shit place. So is that where I want to be? No, and we're not talking about self loathing. I always say this, we're talking about self awareness. Don't beat yourself up, don't throw yourself under the metaphoric bus. We don't need that. That's not the point. You're not
a bad human. You're not terrible, you're not weak, you're not shitouse, You're none of that. You're okay, you're human. But at the same time, this shit is not magic. You won't magically get better, you won't magically get lean, you won't magically get rich, you won't magically become a high performer, you won't magically build resilience. You need to do the fucking things that create the outcomes you want. And will you like it some of it? No? Will
it be hard, fucking oath? Will it be fun? Probably not at times? And is that okay? You know? For me this is the like we can analyze and reanalyze upside down inside out. But at the end of the day, you know, knowing matters, but doing matters the most. You know,
it's for me. It's just that I think that also, and I'll shut up after this, But I feel like for a lot of people, Bobby, there's got to be some internal shift, like something It shouldn't have to happen, because I think we have the capacity to do amazing things. But I like the times mostly where I've seen people
do fucking mind blowing incredible things like life changing. I can't believe what they're doing and creating is often after there's been a catastrophe or a near catastrophe now and then all of a sudden, there's a reset in their brain. All of a sudden, they have a totally different perspective, They're looking through a different window. Their values have just been turned on their head, or at least their priorities
have been turned up. So, oh fuck, you know what matters the most in my life is not dying.
Let me get.
Onto that, you know. So I think there's that, and I've seen that. You've probably seen it. I saw it with my dad when he had his first heart attack. Just the complete one eighty in thinking, in behavior, in habits and lifestyle, in everything. And the dude who couldn't lose two kilos for thirty years was overweight. That dude lost twenty five kilos in five months and never regained it because he had a reset. But the thing was that ability to create this amazing transformation was always there.
Yeah, that is interesting. I observed a lot of that Joe nine to eleven in both through actions, like people who became completely different, people live their life completely differently.
I experienced that you just remind mind people that, yeah, because a lot of people might not know you were in the middle of that.
Oh yeah, I lived. I lived at ground zero Joe, nine to eleven.
Like the World Trade Center came down on top of my building. Like the whole place was just this dark dust cloud. So I got I had the opposite.
Happen to me.
I got very ill living in that toxic dust cloud. It was let's just say it was extremely unhealthy and dangerous for people to be living down there. And I started to notice a lot of things related to illness. And when I came out of that, I became so much more relaxed with so many of my behaviors I was I was told that prior to nine to eleven. I know, you can't imagine this, Craig, but I was hard to be around. You know, people like you were so uptight. I wouldn't eat anything.
I wouldn't go out for a drink. I wouldn't I wouldn't even just go to a film.
I wouldn't do anything if it didn't have to do with growth development and my career trajectory.
Nothing.
And when all that stuff happened, well, I had this thought like Okay, you're gonna you know you're gonna die someday, and you know, now you've been living in this place for a while, that someday might be a lot closer than you think. And I'm not going to go into all of the details about why.
I came to that conclusion. It's pretty sad.
A lot of people, again, their health was significantly impacted living at ground zero, and I just started taking on behaviors and living in the moment and behaving in ways that prior to nine to eleven I never would have engaged in, or I rarely would have engaged in. Then I would have liked engaged in like self flagellation and self loathing, and got back on track and not went out and spoken to another person in a social setting for another three years because I had to catch up
on work and studying. So I've seen that go in both directions. I want to talk about something that I was recently struggling with, and it's not it's not a huge thing, but you know how you one thing is out of alignment, and it throws so many other things out of alignment and it becomes kind.
Of a big thing. So for me, it was late late night snacking.
Where I would just eat, you know, after dinner late at night. And I'm not talking about necessarily really sugary, fatty foods, you know, I would just you know, snack on pistachio nuts or almonds or quote unquote healthy choices. But I noticed that I would go to bed and feel like shit, and my stomach would heark because I'm eating too late at night, and then I wouldn't sleep very well. Then the next day I would wake up and I'd be exhausted. So I'm not switched on, and
that further exacerbates my stress. So I started looking at this talk about examining habits, like what's the information?
And you know, my framework.
Is core habits, right Q observation, ritual, and enforce Like what enforces that the reward there that perpetuates that behavior. And the first thing you look at is all of your cues. So my fridge was a cue. Also I was keeping stuff like nuts like on the counter. Cornell University did the study and they found out that people who kept food readily visible out like on counters in the kitchen were on average anywhere from they weighed four to thirteen kilos more than people who didn't who had
their food tucked away. So environmental cues, like what's going on in my environment that's prompting this behavior?
You know.
The second thing was like observation, you know what what am I experiencing? So you take a look at external environment, the cues, the observations more internal. What is happening at the times where I'll reach for food late at night and I noticed I'm feeling anxiety. I'm thinking about stuff that happened during the day. I'm thinking about the next day. Even when I write that stuff out in a to do list, you know, which does help. There was a certain time period I was going through and it caused
me a lot of anxiety. So I'll just like reach, I'll just open up the fridge, or I'll go rummage through all the bags. That's my ritual. And then the last thing I took a look at is well, how do I want to feel like I'm doing that for a reward? Every behavior you have, even if it's like smoking something that's quite damaging, there is a positive intention. Maybe that's to get relief, to get a break, to
feel like you have some locus of control. There's something positive that you're after, like, what is that exactly?
I thought, Okay, now, not maody smugs. Nobody smugs because it makes them feel bad, Like the obviously in that smoke is anyway that that process of sucking on that dot in the moment anyway it makes them feel good or they wouldn't do it. Yeah, so I totally agree.
Or at one time it made them feel good, and maybe they're chasing that benefit. So I started to realize that what I was looking for is relief. It wasn't even comfort, it was a relief from this constant anxiety. And I also noticed that another thing in my environment that provoked this behavior was when my wife was home. So she's not at home, I don't do that as readily.
And I was like, well, why is that really? Not blaming amy, but it's like, oh, because when I'm anxious, the last thing I want to do is have that anxiety bleed into all the stuff that she's got going on. So I was like, all right, let me just sit here and nibble on a whole bag of something. You know how that goes. And then once I understood what provokes the behavior, what I'm feeling when I engage in the behavior and how I'm really trying to feel well.
Now there's all these replacement behaviors. So I spoke to Amy elicited her social support is a critical element of either habit cessation or positive habit formation. And we just started going out for walks every night and not talking about the stuff that was giving me anxiety, just talking about anything, and that walk gave me the same feeling with Amy next to me, which gave me a much better feeling than sitting in my house and ruminating. I
was like, oh wow, that's a great replacement behavior. And after a while that became the habit without even thinking about it.
It was just automated.
After dinner we would go for a walk, which is a really good idea to do anyway after a meal. And there was just so many things that fell into place. I was getting what I wanted from a behavior that was constructive and not working against me.
What about I love what you're saying. What about people who need to change your habit and maybe they've got a habit that really is on some level controlling then rather than the other way. And I'm not necessarily talking about let's just put aside the big ones at the moment. Let's put aside booze and drugs and addiction, but it's
like the more kind of mundane stuff. And of course all of that matters, but for the moment, just things that we do that are somewhat ineffective or potentially a little bit self destructive, or at the very least, we're just wasting our talent and time, you know, based on who and how we want to be. And we have this cycle of which I think is nearly all of.
Us starting and stopping. Start, lose motivation, lose focus or whatever. Something happens, hurt my back or get busy at work, or get distracted, or fall in love, fall out of love.
Oh fuck that thing I started and I did for three weeks six months ago. I better do that, but this time, fuck, I meant this time, now, this is the time. And then it lasts for two and a half and then we wake up and now we're sixty. How do how do we outlast our motivation? How do we how do we be the you know, and I know there's no single answer to this. This is conversation starter, but and I've got some ideas on it, but like,
what's your go to? Because so many people that you and I work with and talk to, and so many of our listeners on some level. And I don't know if you've done it, but I guess you've done it. I've definitely done it. Where there are things that I literally tried to change some things fucking sixty times before
I actually got it across the line. You know. Like I've said many times, I had really unhealthy eating habits till I was about thirty five now, and I was working in the health space for seventeen years up to that, right, So I was simultaneously telling people how to eat or giving people advice that I wasn't executing myself. I was one hundred percent a fraud, not trying to be but a fraud in the sense that I was not doing people. I was not doing things that I was advising people
to do. And it wasn't I wasn't trying to be bad. I wasn't, but it just took me so long to get my own shit together, you know. And by that
I mean the when nobody's looking stuff. When people were looking, I was amazing, of course, because that's my ego, right, But when people weren't looking, I was eating everything that was not nailed down, and then I would then I would train and live and eat like an elite athlete for two weeks, and then I'd go on a one week bend or an ice cream and fucking cheesecake, put on six kilos in a week, and you know, and still all the time having enough knowledge and awareness, but
still not doing it. What are your thoughts around that, because it's it's so easy to sit on a podcast and about the theory of change, but at the call fights, at the miss emotional psychological behavior call fights and change, it's wayh.
Yeah, that's that's absolutely true.
And I think one thing that's important to remember is everybody struggles with this stuff. You know, some people claim they don't put they're liars, And I think the you need you need a system. Right, everything that we do habitually consistently, we are either leveraging a system or we had a system originally. So you will rise or fall to the level of your systems or I like to call them frameworks. Let's go back to the core framework, right,
cor in habit formation rather than habit cessation. First step is getting very very clear, like you said, something that we can all relate to you just feel like, oh, I'm just wasting my potential all day long. Okay, that is an interpretation. What exactly is happening? Like, what is the behavior that you're engaging in? Because if you don't get down to like, okay, wasting your potential doing what
by just like not being born smarter? Is there something that you do that you should be doing something else? Is there something you do that kind of puts you in this state or sucks your time with no real benefit.
Like let's talk about doom scrolling for a second. Now, how many of us have done stuff like that where you're just posting something, You look at one thing, it's like oh wow, okay, and the next thing, and the next thing and the next thing, and then whatever you're looking at, whatever you draw your attention to, the algorithm figures it out. So now it's just gonna feed you that stuff. So if you're living in high anxiety and
you know it's gonna feed you fear based stuff. If you love cats, you're gonna watch cat videos all day long. So oh, it's this doom scrolling thing. And it's not the doom scrolling, it's how often and how long I do it for? I would say the first step is just being aware of that, like how many times a day are you doom scrolling? Like how long? And what creates that? Like, there's got to be a queue for
the behavior. So Wendy Woods at University of Southern California, she estimates in her research that over forty percent of the things we do in.
A day are not intentional.
It's not like I'm going to sit down and waste ninety minutes by scrolling through utter nonsense on social media. We are just responding to conditioning within our environment over forty percent of our day. You do something long enough, it's going to become habitual. What's the whole point of this first thing? It's like, well, where where is that? Like for me, it's my desk right, And for me it's like, let's say it's a device. I've got my mobile phone. When I take a look at this, this
becomes a cue. So one of the things I did is I took all of my social media apps off my phone and I put them on a completely different device. So now I got to go looking for this thing. So that's intense. I can't be responding to my environment because I put it out of my environment also, and I know everyone's living situation is different. Where I live, I have a lounge, a business center, and a courtyard. Just get out of the house sometimes the hardest thing
for me. And this is the thing about working at home, where used to have space in between meetings, like you walk from one meeting to another. You don't have that everything's next, next, next, next, so you don't get out of the house. It's like, Okay, go downstairs, because I know if I'm outside and I only brought with me what I'm looking to work on, like my computer, I've just changed my environmental cues. Or a coffee shop is where I benefit from the white noise of having people
around me. Once I'm at a coffee shop, I can zone out and in focus to such a greater degree as long as I don't interact with anyone than in any other environments.
That's one. That's the cue. What's the environmental cue?
I was just going to say, I'm exactly the same. I mean, you've had coffee with me at the Hamptons, where I shout out to the Hampton spolk, and I can be in Mayhem where there's people in and out, there's tradees coming in getting coffees. There are kids, there are school kids, there are it's a very busy cafe. I'm sitting in my corner, a special little spot, and I'm more focused and more productive than sitting in a
quiet room at home. Most Yeah, I get. I mean, I love my quiet room at home with it I'm in right now. But there are times when my attention is so diverted, like my ability to focus and concentrate depending on the time of the day. But if I came in, if I got out of bed and I came into this room at six fifteen and I just sat here, I know that my productivity would be one. I wouldn't do it, but it would be way less than when I'm I don't know why it is. It's
maybe it's just habit. Maybe it's just there's this Maybe my brain gets in that environment because I've done it for so long where it knows. Oh, this is where. This is where we get set for the day. This is where we plan, this is where we post something, or this is where we respond to emails or I don't know why I'm talking in like we I don't know, maybe I.
But yes of personality is living in that head.
Yeah, that's right, I'm with you. There's something about being in that white noise is a good is a good description because it's yeah, okay, core.
See see And that goes right into oh right, and oh is observation and what am I observing?
Imserving?
I'm observing three variables basically that deal with readiness and probability of engagement and sustaining long term behavior.
One is enjoyment.
How much am I enjoying this if my environment is white noise, having people around, and I could write that chapter sitting in a coffee shop more readily and more creatively than sitting in a quiet room.
Go do that.
Another thing sometimes is when I'm going through creative work and in the beginning, before you're in a state of flow, it's just painful, it's tedious. What is it that I enjoy that would not only compliment this, but I can attach an activity I don't want to do to something I.
Really enjoy doing.
I mean, if you go to see a film, try this, or go watch a clip on YouTube and watch the most epic scene in your favorite film with the sound off.
It's kind of stupid, like they make the it's not just the dialogue.
They make these soundtracks, there's this background ambient music to elevate your level of emotion and engagement.
I use that.
I listen to soundtracks that are not overwhelming, but they're is and I listened to them softly, and it keeps me so focused on my work in the moment. So that's one is how much am I enjoying it?
I just elevated that, And I just want to jump in and say, isn't it interesting to understand the way that your brain and your.
Creativity and your focus and your productivity work best because you'll go in one environment where like that's your dream space to just produce, but for somebody else that wouldn't work at all, you know, So recognizing individually, it's like like right now, I'm sitting in you know, my office, which is air conditioned. I'm looking out the window, which I've spoke about too many times, at all these beautiful trees. I've got bare feet, black T shirt, shorts, and I'm
really comfortable. And if I'm in a really comfortable environment, my brain works better, you know, like for doing things like if I had just sit here and do this in an office space in a suit, and a tie. I don't know why, but just for me. And even the other day when I was in Queensland, I spoke to them last week about the gig and there was all of these lawyers in a corporate space and then I said to the lady who's organizing it, please tell me I don't have to wear a suit. Then she laughed,
I go, you don't want me in a suit. I'm not as good. I'm literally thirty I'm thirty percent more stupid. I go, you just want me wearing whatever I'm comfortable, and then she goes, wear whatever you want. And it's like, I know, I could probably overcome this, but even down to what I wear affects how well my brain and my emotion and my creativity and my mind in general works. You know, So having that contextual and that situational awareness. Oh, you know, on top of all this, food works for me,
like eating nuts before Ben doesn't work for Bobby. But we might also find well, creatively, Bobby's better when he's around other people and there's lots of kind of human interaction and white noise. Then if he's sitting in some office space with white walls and the windows, you know.
Yeah, for me, when I'm by myself in silence, sometimes that just doesn't work for me. I'm not saying I want to interact with people, because a lot of times when I'm doing creative work, I absolutely don't. But just knowing they're there, I can see them, I can feel their presence.
And another thing is is importance. The stronger what you're.
Doing is connected not just to an outcome or goal, but of value, something that is inherently sacred to you, the greater the chance of you engaging it and sustaining it. So how important is this related to your values? How is important? Is again identity? Like who do I want to see myself at? Who do I want to be? It's almost like the whole the Bukowski example. Charles Bukowski struggled and was dysfunctional in just about every hour of his life, but he was an infinitely prolific writer because
at his core, his identity was I'm a writer. So it's not like he would stay up till three in the morning writing because he was so disciplined. What else does a writer do? A writer by nature writes, So it was so ingrained in who he was he could not not write In interviews, he talks about how painful it was to not sit down at the time think about this. This is something that most people struggle deeply with. For him, he's so identified with being a writer. He
deeply struggled in trying to abstain from writing. So who do you want to be? And you know, where are you starting? Like, what's your level of confidence? Basically, and that's where you select. You want to select something that is challenging. The more challenging the habit, the greater the drive and sustainability. But not at first, at first start where you can develop evidence that you are able to do this as small as you need to make that habit.
And then as you start expanding the size of that habit, you want something that's not so far out of your capacity that it frustrates and overwhelms you, but enough that it stretches you. Because that's actually a motivational force. Because if what you're doing is aligned to your true values, intrinsic motivation is connected deeply to the pursuit of mastery. That's not going to deter you, that's probably going to
engage you. And the third aspect is rituals. And I see people really get into a lot of trouble here because it's vague ambiguities rather than meaningful specifics that lead them into habit formation, something.
Like I want to lose to.
Side that again, people run into a lot of trouble around rituals because it's vague ambiguities rather than meaningful specifics that guide them into habit formation. And this is why they struggle. It's like, well, I want to make more money. Okay, what are we talking about here? Are we talking about two dollars three five? Or are we talking about a million? Like what exactly do you mean by that? Well, I'm going to lose weight, Okay, Well, what's the behavior that's
kind of creating a barrier for that? And what behavior would you rather do instead? So, like when are you going to do this thing? How often are we talking three days a week, five days a week, every day? How long are you going to engage in this? For like have a beginning and an end and it could be just five minutes a day to start. That's great, but that is a definitive metric. And what that does
is it gives you all of these variables. Each variable is another point of evidence increasing your self efficacy, your level of confidence that you can engage in this. But it also creates a lot of variability around resilience. Resilience has to do it adaptation. So if let's say on a Thursday, I miss a meal, that's only one variable. If it's like, okay, I'm going to eat better, well that's all or nothing. Wow, I screwed up mine as well. Eat everything that's not nailed down in your language, and
I'll start again Monday. But if it's only one variable, that was just one meal, one meal is specific time, and then I could start.
To learn from my failures.
The failures become more important than the successes because it's like, Okay, what was different about lunch on a Thursday versus Monday when it wasn't an issue? Ah, Okay, I know how to modify that variable. So you're not only having behaviors that are modifiable. You don't have to go through the whole story about I failed on this and you're explained toy style becomes dysfunctional, becomes permanent and pervasive and personal.
No, it's just something that happened.
Oh and by the way, that gave me information that allows me to plan better and move further along my goals than if that setback never occurred, And finally, like, what are you doing to reward this cycle? And sometimes it could be just stopping and recognizing, going okay, how do I feel right now?
Other times it.
Could be elictiting social support, like sending a text message to someone who you know cares about you, supports you, and is not trying to derail you. You know this person, now what, Oh you're doing this whole health kick thing.
One drink? You can't have one drink, crag.
It's like, not that person, I hate it, but someone who's like, yeah, you know, I think this is a really great idea.
You know what do you mean for me? I love you. Yeah.
By the way, I just went seven days without touching a drink. I just went seven days without eating a cake. You know, I went seven days by adding plants to my food. Wow, the awesome job. That's a reward, that's an enforcer, Rinse and repeat. So if you have a framework, it's not like, oh, wow, now I've got a system that will guide me through a series of successive wins.
That's not how life works.
But you have something to navigate through, and when the inevitable setbacks occur, you can get back on track because your success is connected to the system, not how you feel about it in the moment, not the story you're telling yourself in your mind.
Wow, that was a lot. That was good, though, I also think your honor, Like when I talk to people about where they are now, Okay, so we're in a place metaphorical, literal place of financial place, or physiological place, or spiritual or sociological situation that we want to change, right, So this where I am, this where I want to be. Being able to recognize that I've kind of started and stop this process a lot, and you know, it's it's
I make progress that I lose motivation. Then the motivation goes, so the behaviors go, so the results go, and now it's July or now it's January or whatever. I think part of it is also being able to be really practical about what happened the last twenty times. So Craig, you've tried this before, Yeah, cool, tell me what happened, Well,
this happened. That happened. Cool. So the thing is that, well, how do we how do we outlast that emotional kind of state, that excitement that euphoria, that motivation, that inspiration that's probably going to disappear in the next week or two. Well maybe you'll maintain it for a month or two because you're a unicorn, but you're definitely got it. Not going to stay permanently excited and motivated and inspired in perpetuity. So how do I keep doing the thing that works
when I can't be fucked? How do I keep doing the thing that works when it's not fun, quick, easy, or payments, or how do I keep doing the thing that works when in the middle of the doing it's not very rewarding, Like today it's not very I would rather just eat that fucking pizza because that is rewarding. It's like I skip the pizza. I don't have instant weight loss. I eat the pizza. I have instant mouth gasm. Right, And so that initially I think it's yes, we need structure,
we need process, we need accountability. But over time we want to turn that thing that sometimes behavior into an all the time behavior, which then becomes just a cognitive, emotional, and behavioral default setting. So now this is just me. This is not me trying, This is not me ticking a box, This is not me being resilient. This is not me making an effort, this is this is what I do every day. Of Course I don't smoke, of course I don't drink. Of course I lift weights every day.
But that's not me being disciplined. That's me being Craig Harper. So there's no accolades for me in that. I don't need a pad on the back for that. That's just my you know. It's like you don't need to give me a round of applause for cleaning my teeth or
having a shower. This is what I do. And so in my mind it's always been how do we turn that thing that you keep starting and stopping into something that is just ingrained into your daily operating system, Because when it just becomes part of who you are and how you are, now you don't need to keep trying to find discipline and self control and motivation, you know, because now that's you. That's you. You're the guy, You're the girl who you don't drink. It's not like, oh,
you're being very good, you're on the wagon. No, you don't fucking drink. Sure you used to, but you don't now and you really don't. You're not just abstaining. You're not just being disciplined, You're not just eating well. No, this is how you eat full stop. This is how you live full stop. This has become something which was once a part time kind of operating thing to now
this is you. And I think that you know, for me, that's the challenge of trying to create habits, you know, subconsciously programmed, behaviorally programmed, socially programmed habits and behaviors which truly reflect or align with your values and your goals. Because I mean, life's always going to be hard work on a level. But when we can kind of build those behaviors or those habits that really kind of serve us rather than sabotage us, then that makes that makes
some things much easier anyway. You know, like the things that I like for me and you, I'm sure there are so many things that I do that just work well for me that don't require effort. It might require physical effort because I've got to go and lift away, but there's no sacrifice in that because I like it and it works for me. And this is the other thing. When the things that you once did that you didn't enjoy actually become the things that you now enjoy because
they are positive in your life. Then it takes more effort to stop it than to maintain it, if you know what I mean.
Oh absolutely.
I think anybody who has started exercise and struggled with it but then has found themselves consistently exercising for years, missing or workout is so much more difficult physically, emotionally, mentally than getting to the gym. And again you're eight. It's at that point it is not this plan. Exercise is not something you do. It is a reflection of who you are. I think a lot of it has to do with how we talk to ourselves and how we talk to each other when we're going around and
we're building these habits. So University College London, Philipp Lally her research on habit formation, right what she found was consistency was the number one success factor and it takes anywhere from eighteen to two hundred and fifty four days to form a habit. And I think that depends on quite a few variables, so it's a wide range. But let's talk about motivation. I just I just want to talk about what I mean by motivation because I know
different people have different meanings they attached to it. For me, motivation is a reason for doing something or behaving in some way, So motivation becomes really important in doing anything. I think when people say motivation, a lot of times what they're talking about is excitement. Am I excited about doing this? And you can be really excited about something and get on the motorway and nobody's excited on the motorway.
I got the five Interstate out here by me. Nobody has ever driven the five Interstate and in a state of excitement except psychopaths because it's horrible. So you're not going to be excited about doing something all day every day, so you need something there. One value, aside from how much is what I'm doing aligning with the identity that I have or I want to have or my highest values of a value that I'm placing a lot more
emphasis on developing is curiosity. Lately, I feel like curiosity is an antidote for so many things, Like when you're engaging in something, you got to understand that you know, success is what comes to fruition as a result of right, where behaviors are not going to bring about your outcome, but they can be successful if they're rewarding in and of themselves, Like what are you observing? What are you curious about? What are you learning from the behaviors you engaging?
So let's say I went to the gym three days this week and that's the first time in the years I've done that. What you learn about yourself, Like, what do you know about yourself now that you could put because that learning becomes an immediate reward attached to a behavior, and also understanding that you might have to restructure things because discipline fails, especially when you're exhausted, especially when you have decision fatigue. Like you talked about eating a pizza.
You know, I am much more likely to eat pizza in a pizza rhea than I am in a coffee shop. I'm just weird that way, right, So like maybe avoiding having pizza in the house or if you have family members that will just have an absolute fit over that because I'm not giving up my pizza because you're like at least not having it with such a high degree of accessibility. So there needs to be a space between stimulus and response. You got to think about stuff before
you just reach for that food. And if Jill brings pizza into the office and you wind up eating it again. That's where a system is really important. What's the story you're telling yourself? Oh my god, I always do that. No, you just had one slice of pizza. One slice of pizza is not going to matter a month from now, Not to mention a year from now, get back on track. I think that becomes critical.
Yeah, what's always interesting to talk to you? I'm always learning something. You are the perpetual teacher. You are the coach of coaches. Love talking to you. How do people find you? Follow you, connect with you?
That's places LinkedIn Robert Caapuccio dot com, self help, antidote dot com.
And what's your home addressing case people want to drop by.
Yeah, that's that's two twenty two High Street. That's my take home address. Don't don't bother the sending a letter there.
A nice good mate. Appreciate you. Thanks for being on the show again as you do every Thursday, well Friday.
People love chatting to you.
Thanks buddy.
Thanks bybe