You Are Heroic with Brian Johnson

Continuing our time with my dear friend Katherine Collins, let's talk about another micro-moment of Divine wisdom from our recent chat. Quick context. As you know if you've been following along, I've spent half of the last 20 years in Founder/CEO mode and the other half in Philosopher/Lover-of-Wisdom mode. Although I'm not really into astrological signs (lol), I happen to be a Gemini and that myth happens to describe one of my primary challenges pretty well. I often feel a pull to be one OR the other. A CEO or a Philosopher. Which recently made me think of the word ambivalence. Which led to a trip to my 2,084-page American Heritage dictionary. I flip to page 56. Here's the definition: "the state of having mixed feelings or contradictory ideas about something or someone." Alright. Got it. But what I'm really interested in is the etymology of the word. Get this: ambi means "on both sides of" and valence comes from the same root as valor and valence—it basically means "strength." So, I reflect on the idea that ambi-valence basically means to be on both sides of strength and that, from my perspective at the time, the result of that is WEAKNESS. Now, let's head back to my chat with Katherine. I share that little distinction with her. To which she replies by saying something along the lines of: "Well… We could look at it that way. Or… We could say that you have TWO simultaneously STRONG channels through which you can express your gifts." To which I say, "God Bless you, Katherine." (Hah. Seriously.) Which leads us to Today's +1. Do you feel any ambi-valence in your life? What if we could reframe that "ambi-valence" into "HEROIC-valence"?! I wonder… How can we take you and your multi-faceted awesome and channel ALL that awesome into heroic strength? Seriously. How? Get on that. We need you and ALL your gifts. One more time: Be not afraid. Give us all you've got. (Pretty please.)

In our last couple +1s, we talked about the 11 virtues that show up on our shiny new Optimus medallions and make an appearance in our Optimus meditation. Wisdom + Arete + Confidence + Purpose + Self-Awareness + Telos + Energy + Presence + Courage + Love + en*theos. I've been playing around with those virtues in my formal meditation practice and while I'm rowing and while I'm training and before I fall asleep and after I wake up and, well, a lot. (Laughing. "That's like me!") I'll either go through the meditation we walked through in our last +1 (with the I Am [Insert Virtue] on the inhale followed by the power-statement on the exhale) or just pull a virtue out that I think would be useful in the moment and repeat it in my mind—feeling its power flowing through me. Which makes me think of mantras. And makes me surprised we've done over 700 (!) +1s so far (go us!) and we haven't talked about one of the most powerful tools to train our mind. I mean… Do you know what the word mantra literally means? It's a Sanskrit word. Basically: The man part means "mind" and the tra part means "tool." So… A mantra is literally a "tool of the mind." Today's +1. Want to Optimize your mind? Mantras are a good place to start. Pick a word. Or a collection of words. (Virtues perhaps?) And get to work on your mind.

Continuing our exploration of how to endure the pain of walking over burning (psychological) coals in pursuit of the upper limits of our potential, let's talk about one of Matt Fitzgerald's recommended "coping strategies" to Optimize our perception of effort and get closer to that wall of our potential. Today we're going to talk about The Psychology of Pain. (Cue weird music?) Short story: Researchers have studied how different people deal with pain and have discovered that some people are MUCH better at dealing with it (and, as a result, perform at a much higher level in the midst of experiencing pain). Get this: There are basically two ways you can deal with the prospect of experiencing pain. You can accept it. Or you can try to suppress it. (Which one do you think is more effective?) Here's how Matt puts it: "Research on the psychology of pain has produced similar findings. A number of studies have compared the effects of two contrasting anticipatory attitudes—acceptance and suppression— on pain perception. Some people have a natural tendency to look ahead to the repetition of a familiar pain stimulus with acceptance. They tell themselves, 'This is going to hurt, but no worse than before.' Other people try to cope with the same situation through suppression, a form of denial. They tell themselves, in effect, 'I really hope this doesn't hurt as much as it did the last time.' Psychologists have generally found that, compared to suppression, acceptance reduces the unpleasantness of pain without reducing the pain itself. For this reason, it is a more effective coping skill. ... In common language, this attitude of acceptance toward an impending disagreeable experience is called 'bracing yourself.'" Today's +1. How do YOU deal with prospective pain? Here's to bracing ourselves, K N O W I N G pain is inevitable on our hero's journeys and then #OMMSing our way to awesome. +1. +1. +1. P.S. Check out our +1 on Kristin Neff's pain equation for more. Remember: Suffering = Pain x Resistance.

In our last +1, we talked about you feasting on your Hero Bars—using memories of your past success as fuel to walk through fear doors today. (You grab three for Today?) All of those Cookies and Hero Bars remind me of an idea from former Navy SEAL Alden Mills' great book Be Unstoppable. I read it years ago and recently re-read it with Emerson. It's a fantastic parable about a young captain who meets a wise, older mentor-captain who teaches him how to Optimize and actualize his potential to become a "Master and Commander." Emerson and I loved it. The Master Captain (who goes by Persistent Pete), has eight actions he teaches his young protégé. (One of which reminds me of the Hero Bars! We'll talk about it tomorrow.) The Actions form the acronym UPERSIST. Emerson can rattle them off. In fact, let's invite him in so he can share! Action #1: Understand Your Why Action #2: Plan Action #3: Energize to Execute (Alden may go with "Exercise" to Execute but we expanded it to "Energize" so we can include our other fundies of eating and sleeping!) Action #4: Recognize Your Reason to Believe in Yourself Action #5: Survey Your Habits Action #6: Improvise to Overcome Obstacles Action #7: Seek Expert Advice Action #8: Team Up! Today's +1. Do UPERSIST?! Let's do a quick run through: First: What's your #1 goal these days? (Seriously. What is it?!) What's your why? How's your plan? You energized? What reasons do you have to believe in yourself? (← Hint: Those are our Hero Bars!) How are your habits? You improvising to overcome (inevitable!) obstacles #OMMS style?! Need to seek advice from any experts? And… How can you team up a little more today? There ya go. A super-quick take on how to Be Unstoppable. WEPERSIST!!

In our last +1, we talked about the wonderful little book-gift I received from Cal Newport and we reflected on a particular passage from that book (Leadership: In Turbulent Times by Doris Kearns Goodwin) that really jumped out and grabbed me. The essence of that passage? Our presidential luminaries differed in many ways. But they ALL shared a "fierce ambition." Of the heroic kind. Today I'd like to talk about another passage from the book. This one's from page 106. I actually STARTED reading the book on this page because, in his thoughtful gift note, Cal told me that the wisdom on that particular page made him think of me and of our recent chats. Here's how page 106 starts: "What fired in Lincoln this furious and fertile time of self-improvement? The answer lay in his readiness to gaze in the mirror and soberly scrutinize himself. Taking stock, he found himself wanting. From the beginning, young Lincoln aspired to nothing less than to inscribe his name into the book of communal memory. To fulfill what he believed to be his destiny, a different kind of sustained effort and discipline was required, a willingness to confront weakness and imperfection, reflect upon failure, and examine the kind of leader he wanted to be. The passage continues: "The diligence and studiousness he exhibited during this period of introspection would have been remarkable in a young student; in a man of forty, it was astounding." Um. Yah. That's powerful. (btw: Self-efficacy 101 style, this is one of the reasons reading biographies of great humans is such a wise thing to do—we gain strength in other people's examples!!) That passage is from Part II of the book in which we learn about all the EXTRAORDINARY (!) challenges our heroes faced in their quests to fulfill their destinies. (Lincoln's was dramatic. He was so depressed after letting down his constituents in Illinois after his tenure as a state legislator that his friends feared for his life and removed every sharp object from his house.) Fierce ambition. Equally huge failure. Then what? Then our hero doesn't feel like a hero. Then what? Then he (or she) gets to work. As we've discussed countless times, this isn't supposed to be easy. (And, thinking that it should be easy is probably the biggest challenge we face.) Echo: We're not sidestepping lizards en route to our destiny. We're battling dragons. As such, building our heroic strength for two demands a FIERCE commitment to self-improvement (Optimizing!!) to match that fierce ambition to make a difference. As Lincoln said, "I must die or be better." Today's +1. How about YOU? How's your fierce ambition? And… How's your strength-building going? Here's to having the audacity to dream big and the heroic humility and self-mastery to do the work we need to do so we can most fully give ourselves to the world. Starting Today. Continuing forever. +1. +1. +1.

Continuing our theme of seeking/conquering fear, let's have some fun with Jon Eliot and his wisdom from Overachievement. Here's how he (brilliantly!) puts it: "Working on techniques to manage stress is a bit like trying to win the Indy 500 by putting a governor on the engine of your race car or swapping out a powerful V-12 for a V-4 because it offers a 'quieter ride.' You wouldn't do that. Not if you were after the checkered flag. Not if you were racing star Jeff Gordon. No superstar is about to give his opponents an edge. Nor should you by trying to relax when the pressure's on." So… Important question. Do you want to win the race of life? Or… Would you simply prefer to have a "quieter" ride? (I say "YES!!!" to both, please! lol) Ideally, we show up with THE most powerful engine possible AND we have fun learning how to handle that Beast as we drive at record-shattering speeds, eh? Let's do that. But let's agree not to get so overwhelmed by the sensations of fear that we swap out our race car engine for a lawnmower engine, eh? P.S. More wisdom from Jon Eliot: "I have discovered that I cannot enhance anybody's performance without getting them not only to live with the butterflies that come with high-pressure jobs, but to embrace that kind of physical response, enjoy it, get into it. That's the real first ticket to being a performer who thinks exceptionally." P.P.S. Another John comes to mind here. JFK once said: "Don't pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men [and women]."

Gary Taubes wrote a great book called The Case Against Sugar. Basic idea: If you were a detective in charge of figuring out a series of crimes and you noticed a common pattern among those crimes, you'd be smart to put the pieces together and see if you could narrow your search down to a single suspect. Right? Well… That's what Taubes does in his book. The crimes? All the chronic diseases wreaking havoc on our society—from diabetes and obesity to heart disease and cancer. Short story: All those chronic diseases are associated with metabolic dysfunction. And the fastest way to make your metabolism dysfunctional? Sugar. Enter: The case against it. Remember our Nobel Prize winner Elizabeth Blackburn? She discovered telomerase—the stuff that replenishes telomeres. Here's how she puts it in The Telomere Effect: "When we want to spot the parties responsible for metabolic disease, we point a finger at the highly processed, sugary foods and sweetened drinks. (We're looking at you, packaged cakes, candies, cookies, and sodas.) These are the foods and drinks most associated with compulsive eating. They light up the reward system in your brain. They are almost immediately absorbed into the blood, and they trick the brain into thinking we are starving and need more food. While we used to think all nutrients had similar effects on weight and metabolism — a 'calorie is a calorie' — this is wrong. Simply reducing sugars, even if you eat the same number of calories, can lead to metabolic improvements. Simple carbs wreak more havoc on metabolism and control over appetite than other types of foods." Blackburn is at UCSF. She references her colleague Robert Lustig when she makes the point above. As we discussed in our last +1, Lustig is one of the world's leading research endocrinologists. You know what he says about sugar? He tells us that sugar is the "Darth Vader" of the nutrition world. This little statistic might be THE most powerful one we'll ever read regarding just how dangerous sugar is. (I repeated it half a dozen times in Optimal Weight 101). "If you had any residual doubt about 'a calorie is not a calorie,' this analysis should remove it. Every additional 150 calories per person per day barely raised diabetes prevalence. But if those 150 calories were instead from a can of soda, increase in diabetes rose sevenfold. Sugar is more dangerous than its calories. Sugar is a toxin. Plain and simple." I repeat: "If you had any residual doubt about 'a calorie is not a calorie,' this analysis should remove it. Every additional 150 calories per person per day barely raised diabetes prevalence. But if those 150 calories were instead from a can of soda, increase in diabetes rose sevenfold. Sugar is more dangerous than its calories. Sugar is a toxin. Plain and simple." That's crazy. 150 additional calories from any source? No big deal. 150 additional calories from a CAN OF SODA? DIABETES GOES UP SEVENFOLD. Know this: "Sugar is more dangerous than its calories. Sugar is a toxin. Plain and simple." Please tattoo that on your consciousness. (Right after throwing away your sodas!) And… To be clear: This isn't just about risk for diabetes. It's a metabolic issue—which is all about how every cell in our bodies produce Energy—which means it affects EVERYTHING. Today's +1. If you feel so inspired, go throw away all the sodas in your house. (Hah. Seriously.) The Case Against Sugar is REALLY solid. If we're serious about Optimizing our Energy and well-being (for ourselves and for our kids), reducing/eliminating it should be a top priority. #caseclosed

A meditation on Michelangelo's choice to capture David at the moment of decision. A reminder that the most heroic instant is the split-second we decide to step up. A celebration of the tiny, everyday micro-decisions that shape who we become.

In our last +1, we met Joe De Sena's kettlebell named Leo. (I laugh as I type that.) As you may recall, little Leonidas goes everywhere Joe goes. Traveling around the world? Mr. Leo gets checked in. Heading to the office in the morning. Leo's going, too. All day every day. Joe and his 44-pound cast-iron little Leo are BFFs. Now, as I was preparing for Greatest Year Ever 2019, I was reflecting on that epic love story and thinking about the importance of having symbols to capture our most important intentions. For Joe, that kettlebell represents his commitment to obstacle immunity and to honoring the pledge he's made to help 100 million people Optimize their lives via his Spartan Races—which I find to be SUPER inspiring. I wondered: What symbol can I create for myself that will capture my commitment to stepping up and into the next-best version of myself as a social entrepreneur and leader—doing my part to help 100 million (!!) people Optimize their lives by combining the power of Wisdom + Community + Virtue? For about 5 seconds, I considered taking Joe's lead and carrying around my own 44-pound kettlebell. But, a) that's crazy (even by my standards—lol) and b) that's Joe's thing. So… I scratched that idea and simply placed my 44-pound kettlebell a few feet from my wall calendar so I nearly trip over it every time I capture a micro "That's like me!!" WIN. Then it hit me. I'll wear the little Spartan sweatband you get when you do a Spartan Race with the competitive folks. Yep. That's it. I used to keep it on the corner of my desk as a reminder but I picked it up and put it on. Obnoxiously obvious = perfect. So… I hereby formally introduce you to my own little Leo. You met my Suunto Spartan Ultra watch not too long ago. Well, here's his pal. He prefers to go by his full name: Leonidas. Every time I glance down at him I think of the ancient Spartan King and of my commitment to be Spartan (and Athenian! lol) strong as I strive to cultivate my virtue and give the world all I've got. All of which leads us to Today's +1. How about YOU? What are you most committed to in this precious life of yours? What symbol can you create to capture that commitment? Note: If you're feeling particularly iconoclastically feisty: The more obnoxiously obvious (for you and everyone around you) the better.

Cal Newport joins us as a guest teacher for this class! He is one of my favorite thinkers. He got his Ph.D. in Computer Science from MIT and is now a Professor at Georgetown. He's also a bestselling author of a number of books. Given the fact that the fastest way to Optimize your life is to STOP doing things that are sub-optimal AND the fact that (for nearly all of us) our use of technology is the #1 thing that "Needs work!," it's SUPER important for us to figure out how to best use all the technology available to us WITHOUT becoming lost in a tsunami of inputs. Enter: Our new philosophy of technology use: Digital Minimalism.