This Habit Will Change Your Life

What if there was one habit that could achieve all of the following:

• Improve your learning ability and grow brain cells
• Alleviate stress, anger, anxiety, and depression
• Increase focus, attention, and alertness
• Improve mood
• Build self-control, resilience, and motivation
• Boost confidence and social activity
• Reduce the risk of age-related disorders such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and other forms of Dementia

Not to mention strengthen your cardiovascular system, lower blood pressure, regulate glucose levels, reduce obesity, boost your immune system, and fortify your bones.

If one habit could do all of this, would you build it into your lifestyle?

It turns out that this habit does exist, and it has been scientifically proven to do all of the above.

This habit is called Exercise.

John J. Ratey MD details all of this in his best-selling book, Spark, calling exercise “the single most powerful tool you have to optimize your brain function.” Ratey is an Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, a widely recognized expert in Neuropsychiatry, and has conducted extensive research to prove the remarkable effects of exercise on the brain. I highly recommend Spark for anyone who would like to better understand how exercise improves brain health.

But if you are short on time and just want to quickly know what to do, here is Ratey’s recommended exercise regimen for optimal brain performance:

• At a minimum, we should be following the Public Heath recommendations which call for some type of moderate-intensity aerobic activity for 30 minutes at least 5 days a week.
• Going a step further, Ratey says it is best to do some form of aerobic activity 6 days a week, for 45 minutes to 1 hour. Go on the longer side for 4 of the days at moderate intensity (65–75% of your maximum heart rate), and then 2 of the days should be on the shorter side at high intensity (75–90%). Make sure not to do the high-intensity days back-to-back in order to let your body and brain recover.
• For your aerobic exercise, activities like running, cycling, or swimming are great, but the best type of aerobic activity is really whatever you will truly be able to build into your lifestyle. If you haven’t been active in a while, the best way to begin is to start walking.
• On your shorter, high-intensity days, add some form of strength or resistance training to build muscles, strengthen bones, and protect joints (do 3 sets of your exercises at weights that allows you to do 10–15 repetitions in each set).
• Make efforts to mix in more complex activities that will build skills, challenge the brain, and help you stay agile — for example rock climbing, martial arts, gymnastics, dance, yoga, pilates, or balance drills. Racket sports are especially great because they simultaneously tax the cardiovascular system and the brain. According to Ratey, “The combination of challenging the brain and body has a greater positive impact than aerobic exercise alone.”
• Ratey talks up the benefits of exercising with other people. Social interaction is great for health, reduces stress, and boosts motivation. “Exercise cues up the building blocks of learning, and social interaction cements them in place,” says Ratey. So consider joining an exercise group to get going and keep you on track.

Overall, Ratey’s advice for people is to “get fit and then continue challenging themselves.” He advises to do something almost every day, but keep your program flexible and keep adapting to try new things.

Exercise is incredibly powerful for both the mind and body. We’re awake for at least 16 hours each day. Spending just one of those hours (or even half an hour) exercising will be the most important thing you do all day!

Why You Should Take Your Eye Off The Ball

Many of us become so focused and determined to reach a goal, that we create tunnel vision in our relentless pursuit of the end result. We know what we want to achieve and obsessively follow the steps that we believe are necessary to get there.

And this system works…to a point. This single-minded approach is often highly productive and reliable. Grit and drive will generate consistent results, and are two of the most important qualities for success.

But they don’t necessarily yield breakthrough innovation or creativity.

Take those qualities and add a willingness to explore things off of the expected path, and you have a formula that can produce greatness.

This is a concept that best-selling author Frans Johansson writes about in his book, The Click Moment, which is about seizing opportunity in an unpredictable world. Johansson says, “You need to take time, even schedule time, to explore things that are not directly related to your immediate goal. You need to take your eyes off the ball in order to see and connect the possibilities around you.”

One of the examples Johansson uses is Howard Schultz, who traveled to Italy in 1983 to attend an international housewares show to look at kitchen appliances, coffeemakers, and other items with the intention of bringing them back to Starbucks stores in the US (Schultz at the time was Starbucks Director of Retail Operations and Marketing). Starbucks was not selling coffee by the cup at the time, instead focusing on home-brewing equipment and specialty beans. But it was Schultz’s experience walking around Milan and stumbling upon the city’s popular espresso bars (including the friendly baristas, opera music, comfortable chairs, and café lattes) that gave him the “aha” realization that coffee was meant to be communal and social, enjoyed in a friendly and public atmosphere. “It was like an epiphany,” Schultz said.

Schultz, now Starbucks Chairman and CEO, brought this communal coffee concept back to the U.S. and, needless to say, revolutionized his company and the entire coffee-drinking culture in America.

Just imagine if Schultz had stayed focused on the housewares convention and not explored Milan.

Johansson says that if we always keep our eyes on the ball, we lose the ability to notice what’s around us, and miss the opportunity to make surprising connections. As he says, “We are conditioned to focus on the business at hand. There’s something satisfying about predictable, steady progress. But this approach makes it difficult to expose ourselves to the unplanned moments that enable us to uncover the ideas and opportunities that others have not.”

Here are some tactics that Johansson recommends to create and capitalize on moments of deliberate randomness:

• Schedule time to do something unscripted or unplanned (this requires leaving some flexibility in your schedule and not packing it with meetings)
• Explore and search for inspiration in fields, industries, and cultures different from your own
• Create diverse working teams (across functions, backgrounds, cultures, genders, ethnicities, ages, interests, levels in the organization, etc.)
• Organize social events
• Attend conferences, lectures, museums, and shows not directly related to your field
• Read 5 magazines you have never read before (and are not directly tied to your business)
• Take a day off
• Listen to and follow your curiosity

Some of this might seem like a waste of time and a distraction from the task at hand. And sometimes that’s right. In fact, most people probably think this way. But that’s also why you can have a competitive advantage by taking your eye off the ball.

So change it up, give yourself a break, and you might just put yourself in the position to create unexpected and game-changing discoveries.

Why You Should Do Your Work First, Others’ Work Second

I stopped checking my email first thing in the morning several years ago after reading Tim Ferriss’ The 4-Hour Workweek. He said that one simple change would be a life-changer, and it has been for me.

The reason why it works is because it enables proactive work first, reactivework second.

Even when we have clear top priorities for the day, checking email first thing can easily derail those plans by compelling us to react and respond to other people’s “urgent” needs. And before you know it, the day has been totally eaten up, and our energy drained, before we can get started on our own projects.

This is why Dan Ariely, James B. Duke Professor of Psychology and Behavioral Economics at Duke University, says “It would probably be best if managers went to the IT department and asked that email not be distributed between 8 and 11 every morning.”

The experts say that it is key to block off time in the morning whenever possible to do the work that is most important to you, including focusing on long-term projects without an immediate payoff. If you don’t build big-picture meaningful work right into your daily calendar, it will always get crowded out by the small stuff.

Best-selling author and researcher Tom Rath reinforces this point by saying,“What you will be most proud of a decade from now will not be anything that was a result of you simply responding.” He recommends to, “Manage your communications, online and offline, instead of letting them run your life. If you don’t, you will inadvertently spend a majority of your time responding to other people’s needs instead of creating anything that lasts.”

We are busier than ever and there are dozens of things every day to divert our attention, so it now seems that that maintaining our focus is actually our biggest competitive advantage. Entrepreneur Scott Belsky, named to Fast Company’s “100 Most Creative People in Business List”, says that “Whatever the future of technology may hold, the greatest leaders will be those most capable of tuning into themselves and harnessing the full power of their own minds.”

It is actually easiest to get sucked into a day of busyness and bouncing from one urgent thing to the next. Perhaps that’s why the best leaders and creative minds seem to agree that giving ourselves time to think, and focusing on our top priorities before others’ needs, is a key to long-term productivity and success.

In a world filled with distraction, I know that I’ll keep looking for ways to harness my attention and preserve more space to focus on the big picture. AsHenry David Thoreau said, “It is not enough to be busy. So are the ants. The question is: What are we busy about?”

Now just imagine if there were no meetings and no email before 11am — perhaps that is the way of the future!

The Life-Changing Benefits of Coffee & Wine

This might be a bold statement, but I think coffee and wine might just have life figured out. And for 3 main reasons:

1. They slow us down — In a world where we’re busier than ever, moving faster than ever, and more connected (technologically) than ever, coffee and wine are the perfect beverages to balance us out because they slow us down. Both coffee and wine are meant to be sipped, savored, and enjoyed slowly. They relax us and settle the chaos, even if just temporarily. In a world where faster is often considered better, wine and coffee deliver the opposite — the perfect excuse to slow the pace and enjoy the moment.
2. They build relationships — Both coffee and wine are meant to be enjoyed with other people. You meet a friend for coffee or catch up over a glass of wine. Coffee and wine are relationship-builders because they are “activities” that happen between people, not just beverages consumed by people. It is often said that relationships are the most important thing in life, and how your life is best measured. And just think about how many relationships have been forged or developed with coffee or wine as the main facilitator.
3. They are healthy — OK, OK, in moderation. But many studies have shown that both coffee and wine have health benefits when consumed in moderation(1 glass of 5 oz. red wine per day for women, 1–2 glasses of red wine per day for men, 2–4 cups of 8 oz. coffee per day). When consumed in these amounts, both coffee and wine have been shown to increase life span, improve blood flow, reduce the risk of diseases such as Alzheimer’s and dementia, and lessen the risk of depression, just to name a few of the benefits. There are plenty of articles and studies to support these claims, but here is just one from Time.com from March 2015 entitled, “Should I Drink Wine?” in which all 5 of their experts gave drinking wine a big thumbs up

And here is a great article that details nine specific health benefits of coffee, including everything from lowering the risk of Type 2 diabetes and certain cancers, to reducing the symptoms of Parkinson's, to slowing the progression of dementia.    

In fact, in Dr. David Perlmutter’s book called “Brain Maker”, he notes that on the Greek Island of Ikaria, home to the highest percentage of 90-year-olds on the planet (not to mention 20% fewer cases of cancer, half the rate of heart disease, and almost no dementia), “they generally drink wine and coffee daily, stay active long past 80 years old, and remain mentally sharp to the very end.”

So while all of this doesn’t necessarily mean start drinking wine and coffee if they are not a part of your current routine, it probably means you can feel good about it if you already are!

And wine and coffee seem to solve a few of life’s big problems — I’ll drink to that! Cheers.

Disclaimer: I fully admit that wine and coffee are 2 of my favorite beverages. In fact I really only drink 3 types of beverages at all — coffee, wine, and water.

Why You Should Ask 10 Questions Tomorrow

Ask 10 questions tomorrow.

You’ll be amazed if you do.

You’ll learn something new, stimulate ideas, or be inspired. You’ll hear something that will make you laugh, make you think, or maybe change your life in some way (big or small).

Questions lead to conversations, and conversations lead to important and lasting relationships.

It all starts with a question.

Creativity and leadership expert Paul Sloane, author of 17 books includingThe Innovative Leader, believes that asking questions is the single most important habit for innovative thinkers. He says, “Brilliant thinkers never stop asking questions because they know that this is the best way to gain deeperinsights.”

But here’s the thing — A question is really only a question if you actually care about the answer. Questions are meaningless if you aren’t engaged or interested in the response. You can’t just absentmindedly check a box with this exercise.

Learning from others is a conscious choice. It is an attitude and a mindset. It is believing that there is something interesting on the other end of your question.

This is a concept that Bernie Roth, Co-founder of the Stanford Institute of Design, writes about in his inspirational new book, The Achievement Habit.Roth says, “Even on a subconscious level, people pick up on it when you’re asking throwaway questions. Don’t fill the space with them. If you’re going to ask your co-worker ‘How’s your day?’ be present for the answer.”

It is easy to go through the day focused internally or talking about ourselves, or believing we already know the answers. Or asking questions for the purpose of making ourselves look good, or jumping in to someone’s answer because we have something seemingly better to say. Roth cautions against this, saying “Even if you think you know what they will be saying or you have heard it before, don’t interrupt or tune out. Don’t be in your head preparing your reply while they are talking. Be willing to lose your thought no matter how brilliant it is.”

Other people shy away from asking questions because it could make them look unsure or uninformed. But having the confidence to ask questions is actually an indication of great strength and leadership.

Your worldview and perspective will only truly expand when you engage externally with sincere questions and conversation.

Whether those questions are directed towards your spouse, friends, co-workers, neighbors, or complete strangers, ask 10 of them tomorrow.

Maybe the answers will help solve a problem you’ve been struggling with, or spark a new idea, or entertain you for a few minutes. Maybe they’ll lead to a new relationship.

Genuine questions will certainly lead to something valuable.

No question about it.

How to Deal With a Frustrating Email

We have all been there before. An email comes in that makes your blood boil. Someone got their facts wrong, or accused you of something you didn’t do, or asked a question that just rubbed you the wrong way. Whatever it was about, the email had you fuming.

In this situation, the temptation is to fire back right away, going into attack mode to make things right and quickly get across your point of view.

Whatever you do, resist this temptation. Don’t respond right away. Even if it feels urgent.

In fact, the more annoying the email, the more important it is for you to take time before responding.

As best-selling author and human behavior researcher Tom Rath says, “When you face a brief psychological stressor, it helps to simply hit the pause button in your mind. The more something gets under your skin, causes your heart to race, and makes you breathe a bit more quickly, the more important it is to step back before speaking or typing a single word.”

Remember that an email is in writing and it is forever, so resist the urge to quickly get into a war of words. Taking time almost always brings more clarity of mind, and yields a more appropriate and productive response.

Harvard University neurology professor Rudy Tanzi has outlined a 4-step process to deal with these types of stressful situations:

1. Stop yourself from doing what your initial reaction dictated
2. Take a deep breath
3. Become aware of how you are feeling
4. Recall a past event that gave you a feeling of happiness and peace

Bernie Roth, Co-founder of the Stanford Institute of Design, cited this process in his new book about productivity and success, The Achievement Habit. Roth believes that it is only necessary to take the first three steps in most cases, but concludes that “taking a deep breath in any situation never hurts.”

Taking time before responding gives you better perspective on the situation, and will result in a more coherent response. Take a walk around the block, talk to a friend or family member, or do something else to calm yourself down. Give yourself at least an hour before writing back. And it might be best to take it off of email altogether, and instead handle it in person.

Taking a break before responding shows that you can control yourself and have a rational conversation, even when emotions are high. I have definitely been guilty of an all-too-quick response that only made things worse, so now I’ll be trying to think of the steps outlined above instead of hitting reply right away.

An angry email is almost always regretted!

Make Your Bed Change Your Life

 

I make the bed every morning as one of my household “duties.” Now, perhaps this task is expected of me, but I also know that it makes me feel better before heading off to work. And it definitely makes me feel better to come home to a neat and clean bed at the end of a long day, instead of a rumpled one. Pretty obvious, right? On the surface, it makes perfect sense why I (and many millions of others) perform this “chore” daily.

But I didn’t realize that the simple act of making the bed just might be the world’s easiest success habit. Not because it automatically brings upon fortune and fame, but primarily because it starts a chain reaction of other productive habits.

As Charles Duhigg notes in his fascinating book, The Power of Habit, “making your bed every morning is correlated with better productivity, a greater sense of well-being, and stronger skills at sticking with a budget.” Making your bed is what he calls a “keystone habit,” something that kick starts a pattern of other good behavior. And since it happens at the very beginning of the day, you’re apt to make better decisions for the remainder of the day thanks to your bed-making routine (exercise is another good example of this concept).

Navy Seal William H. McCraven, commander of the forces that led the raid to kill Osama bin Laden, echoed the same sentiment in his 2014 commencement speech at the University of Texas. He advised graduates, “If you want to change the world, start off by making your bed. If you make your bed every morning, you will have accomplished the first task of the day. It will give you a small sense of pride, and it will encourage you to do another task, and another, and another. And by the end of the day that one task completed will have turned into many tasks completed.”

If success and productivity aren’t enough, turns out making your bed is also one of the most effective and easiest triggers of happiness. Gretchen Rubin, best-selling author and happiness researcher, says “When I was researching my book on happiness, this was the number one most impactful change that people brought up over and over.”

So if you want to accomplish something first thing in the morning, set off a chain reaction of other success-building habits, and contribute significantly to your happiness, perhaps start by making the bed and then let the rest fall into place!

And it only takes a couple of minutes. Sounds like a good deal to me. Sweet dreams!

Why You Should Be A Morning Person

What is one thing most successful people have in common? They get up extra early and make the most of the morning. Here’s why:

Waking up early gives you time to think before the buzz of the day begins. To put it simply, the early morning is “you time” — a time to lay out your priorities for the day and make progress against them, before others are demanding your time and attention. It puts you firmly in control of each day.

Of course it is awfully hard to get out of bed, but that’s exactly why early risers have the competitive advantage over everyone else. They tackle the day while others hit the snooze button.

Here are just a few examples of ultra-successful early risers:

• Virgin Founder Richard Branson wakes up at 5:45am, even when he’s on his private island, and uses the morning for exercise and breakfast before starting work for the day
• First Lady Michelle Obama starts her day at 4:30am for a workout before her kids wake up
• Apple CEO Tim Cook gets up at 3:45am every day to catch up on email, hit the gym, and make a Starbucks run before heading to the office
• Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz gets up at 4:30am to get a workout in (often a bike ride with his wife) — and of course to make some coffee to get his day going
• Disney CEO Bob Iger rises at 4:30am and uses the early morning to read the paper, exercise, listen to music, catch up on emails, and even watch TV
• Vogue Editor-In-Chief Anna Wintour wakes at 5:45am to play an hour of tennis before work demands hit
• GE CEO Jeff Immelt wakes up at 5:30am and gets in a cardio workout while reading the paper and watching CNBC

Did you notice another consistent trend among all of these ultra-successful people? Everyone’s morning ritual includes exercise as a key component.

In addition to the overall health and fitness benefits, studies have shown that moderate-intensity exercise for 20+ minutes produces a mental and emotional boost for the following 12 hours! This means that these business leaders are likely more clear-headed, effective, and productive at work as a direct result of their morning workout. The exercise time also allows them to think and problem-solve without interruption, so they hit the ground running once they get into the office. Morning exercise is an incredibly efficient use of time.

In addition to waking up extra early and exercising, here are a few more morning habits to get your day moving in the right direction:

• Drink 16 oz. of Water Upon Waking — Rehydrate after your 7–8 hours of sleep
• Make Your Bed — Making your bed every morning is correlated with better productivity throughout the day
• Eat a Healthy Breakfast — Fuel your body for the demands of the day (led by energy-packed fruits and vegetables)
• Drink 1–2 Cups of Coffee — Give yourself a morning boost while reaping the proven health benefits
• Catch up on the News — Use the quiet time to know what’s happening in the world around you
• Prioritize Your Day — Establish your top priorities and think about how to tackle them

All of this sets you up for success before your “work day” even begins, whatever form that may take for you. Being a morning person isn’t reserved for just C-level execs. Everyone will benefit from implementing these good habits.

Think it’s not possible for you because you need the extra sleep? The experts would say to get to bed earlier the night before to make the early wake-up call tolerable.

These tips and success stories help motivate me to get out of bed when all I want to do is sleep a bit more, and hopefully they also inspire you to make the morning your secret weapon!

Benefits of Morning Exercise

I never go into a big day without running first thing in the morning.

There is no doubt that running in the morning makes me better at work throughout the day — I think more clearly, multi-task better, and overall have a more optimistic outlook on work and life.

Knowing I’ll be sharper all day is exactly the motivation I need to get out of bed at 6am when sometimes my body is screaming for more sleep. The overall health and fitness benefits are nice bonuses, but it’s really the mental benefits that keep me running each morning, day after day.

Morning is also the time when nothing else gets in the way. When I used to put off working out until later in the day, something would inevitably pop up — being buried in work, an unexpected meeting, last-minute requests, a co-worker’s birthday celebration, or just general laziness and fatigue. But nobody is looking for me at 6am (helped by the fact that I don’t check my iPhone before lacing up and heading out)!

I find that my morning run also gives me a great opportunity to think about the day ahead and my top priorities. Sometimes this gives me the aha moment I need to have a breakthrough at work, and at the very least it gives me a chance to think about things — work or personal — without being interrupted or distracted. Once I get to the office, the day is often jam-packed with meetings, conference calls, and other demands. So my morning run really sets the tone and calibrates me for the day ahead.

And I see all of these benefits with just a 30-minute run at a very manageable pace (9–10 minute mile). I rarely run any longer on the weekdays, but it’s all I need to feel better for hours and hours after the run finishes. Maybe it’s mental, but now when I don’t run, I feel lethargic, cloudy, and more irritable. My thinking isn’t as crisp and I’m sure my friends, family, and co-workers notice a difference in my attitude.

I will admit it is really hard to actually get out of bed, but once I do, it’s pretty easy to throw on a pair of shorts, t-shirt, and running shoes and go out for a 30-minute jog. Even on days when I’ve slept poorly the night before, I find that pushing myself to go out for the run actually makes me feel better than if I would have gotten an extra 30 minutes of sleep. But I definitely highly value my sleep and aim for 8 hours per night if possible (asleep by 10pm).

And it’s a nice bonus that I run in the mornings with my wife and push our 2-year old daughter in the running stroller. So it makes for a little extra family bonding time.

I started running in the morning about 10 years ago and it has changed my life and career. So I wanted to share my routine just in case it might be right for you too.

I’m sure there are other forms of excercise that produce similar mental benefits, but running is what I do and what works for me — Inexpensive, limited equipment, and available right outside my door. But first thing in the morning is the key.

I just finished an inspiring new book by Tom Rath called, “Are You Fully Charged?”, and in it he notes that just 20 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise has been shown to improve mood and make people feel better for 12 hours afterwards. So I’ll include a short passage from his book to finish this post that sums up why I run in the morning — hope it helps!

“Working out in the evening is better than no activity at all, but if you work out late in the day, you essentially sleep through and miss the boost in mood that exercise produces. The more activity you get in the morning, the less likely that 12-hour mood boost will go to waste…Instead of thinking about exercise in the morning as something that will drain your energy, as it sometimes does over the first few days of a new routine, keep in mind that it will eventually give you more energy throughout the day. Even brief activity can produce major gains in creativity and productivity. You simply think better when you are active.”