Direction Over Speed: Choose The Small Daily Wins That Change A Life

A missed calendar invite turned into a masterclass on making change stick. We kick off with a human moment and move straight into the real work: why resolutions collapse, how systems save you when motivation fades, and what it means to choose direction over speed. I read from my 1996 journal—days of high resolve followed by a quick slide—and use that honest snapshot to show how a plan you can live with beats a promise you can’t keep.

Across the hour, we reframe goal setting to fit real life. Goals are directions, not promises, and life will twist along the way. I share simple, durable practices: wake up and go to bed at the same time, build a morning routine, and focus on identity-based habits. Ask two questions: who do you want to be six months from now, and what daily behavior supports that identity? We talk about shrinking goals until starting is easy, tracking visible progress, and adding friction to the habits that hold you back—whether that’s late-night scrolling, sugar, or saying yes to everything.

We also get practical about patience. Change often feels boring before it feels rewarding, but quiet actions compound—ten-minute walks, five-dollar payments on old debt, one paragraph on the page. If you’ve given your all to old patterns, flip it: give six to twelve months of your best effort to being a better you and measure the difference. And don’t do it alone. Your top five people shape your path, so choose a circle that challenges and champions you.

If you’re ready to trade slogans for systems and resolutions for routines, press play. Then subscribe, share this with someone who needs a nudge, and leave a quick review telling me the one behavior you’ll start today.

Social Media Links

Transcript

Upcoming Guest Lineup Announced

Book Plug And Themes Of Hope

Why Resolutions Fail Without Strategy

The 1996 Journal And Early Relapse

Systems Beat Goals Every Time

Focus On Today, Not The Whole Mountain

Don’t Wait To Feel Ready

Goals As Directions, Not Promises

Pick One Primary Goal And Behaviors

Identity Questions To Guide Habits

Direction Is More Important Than Speed

Practical Strategies: Shrink And Start

Build Friction For Bad Habits

Track Simple Visible Progress

Consistency Powers Real Change

Life Change Feels Boring Before Rewarding

Small Uncelebrated Actions Compound

Start Where You Are, Use What You Have

Your Circle Of Influence Decides Your Direction

Closing And Sign Off

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Welcome to Deep Dive with Dr. D. I am going solo today. And the first thing I need to do, if she's out there and watching, if you're on the live Mandy, is I need to apologize to my friend Mandy. Because I schedule things and I put it on a cannon. Long story short, she was actually supposed to be my guest today. And I screwed the pooch. I didn't put it on my calendar. So she is on the calendar now. And uh I'm looking forward to having her. And I want to tell you guys my list of guests for January and February. I've got a full calendar of guests coming over the next several weeks. Oh man, next Sunday, this will be good, is uh Kathy Day will be on on the 11th. The 18th is Cher, Share Bear. The 25th, yeah, Jay, Jay McDonald will be on. And then going into February, uh Tatum. Oh boy, that's gonna be a good one. Tatum Pine. That'll be really, really good. The Pine family has such a great story. Uh, February 8th, Brad Case. I've known him a long time. It'll be great to talk to him. Uh looks like February 15th. Oh god, did I screw up again? Let's see. Mandy must be the 15th. And oh god, I don't have my phone to oh, I'm gonna see if I can look in my text messages here. Mandy, I hope you have an iPhone. There she is. And so there we go. Um coming up. Okay, I've been following. Uh oh, no, it's not in there. Okay, so Mandy is February 15th. So a whole list of guests coming over the next month, almost two months. It's gonna be really, really good. But today, you get me, solo Dr. D at the beginning of the year. Uh uh, and I'm excited to talk to you and give you specific strategies on working toward goals. So I've got my kind of my plan here. Uh, and I uh just did a little uh update on my book on the websites. You can go get my book if you don't have it yet. Grit over shame. I call it the short story of the wild ride of my life. So if you don't have it yet, you can get it locally in Ellensburg at Pearl Street Books at Gerald's, you can get it online locally at Gerald's.com. And if you're somewhere out there in the world, you can get it on Amazon, you can get it as an ebook wherever you buy your ebooks, either through Kindle or uh Apple Books, and uh you can also get a hard copy from Amazon. And if you like my voice, I narrated it and you can get it on Audible. So, and and it's a crazy people who have read it, they're like, wow, what what a wild ride of a life, right? But what I also hear is they appreciate that at the end of each chapter, I give a message of hope, right? And and I have there's two chapters in here that are my real dark years in my mid-20s, and even at the end of those chapters, I talk about always keeping hope alive. So let's get the party started. Now, what I have is a plan. I have one, two, three, four, five, six sections. Planning is critical to getting to your goals. Okay, so I have a plan for this, and then I have some quotes I'm gonna share, and I have my personal journal. I'm gonna start with reading a New Year's resolution that I had made, and what happened with that New Year's resolution, the failure of that New Year's resolution, because I didn't have a plan, I didn't have a strategy, right? And I was just talking to a friend yesterday. We were watching the Seahawks game, Go Hawks, NFC West Division Champs, and first in our the NFC. We got a home field advantage, first week playoff by a man, super exciting, Gohawks. Now, and I was chatting with him and he kind of leaned over and he says, Did you make any New Year's resolutions? And I'm like, No, I don't I don't really do the New Year's resolution thing. I got my little vitamin in my mouth. So let me go ahead and finish that up. There we go. And I said, I don't do New Year's resolutions for a couple reasons. One, because generally they don't really stick for people. And I'm gonna talk about that why. And the why for me is I used to live a life where I, and I'm gonna read it here, where I was like, oh yeah, New Year, new me. There was no plan behind that. There was no strategy behind that, so they failed. And that's why most New Year's resolutions fail because we make it in one day. We set this goal in one day, and there's no strategy or planning or tactics to ensure we get to that goal, to ensure we get to that desired outcome that we want to have, and then we're shocked that it doesn't happen, right? So let me go right here. I got it marked to January 1st, 1996. Yeah, I'm going way back, friends. Well, here we have a new year. This year, I deem to be the year of change. I'm not going to look back anymore. I'm going to look forward with a positive attitude. And this all reads so well. As I well know, change is hard for me, especially when it involves changing for the better. I know where I've been, I know where I want to be, and from here forward, I'm going I'm going forward with a commitment to be a law-abiding citizen and do right in whatever situation I'm in, I'm faced with. As much as it is hard or different, I must always stop and look back when faced with or tempted to do bad. I love my son and I want him to look at his dad. Man, this reads so well. And be proud, not sad and disappointed. I want to be able to pace myself and know I've done right in the eyes of God. I will no longer accept failure in my life. If I do not succeed, I will try again. That's good. We're going to talk about that. I won't fall to the depths for which I've fallen before. And this was in the dark period, just coming out of the dark years of my life, the two chapters that I have in my book. They were dark. Although my friends now are few, I've learned who the real ones are. They're the ones who are still talking to me now. I have people around me who truly care about me, and I thank God for them. Your circle of influence, critically important. We're going to talk about that. I'm doing it all for me this time. That's important too. I've been down the road to recovery before, and I like the feeling of accomplishment. It will be nice to have that feeling again. I'm the one, I'm the only one who can change me. Love forever, David. That that is what I wrote in my journal on January 1st of 1996. And reading it, it's like, wow, that's really, I had really set a good intention. I really spoke some good words. I really wanted to make change, but what I didn't have behind that New Year's resolution was a real plan, was any real tactics, right? And so what happens is uh January 2nd, I journaled, doing good, January 4th, right? Blah blah blah. January 7th, oh, I know I can make it, and then here we go. Oh, oh, January 8th, I'm going to work, right? Blah, blah, blah. Uh January 12th, still going okay. And then you ready for this? January 17th, 1996. Well, what will happen now? I've once again put an obstacle in my path. I don't know when or even if at this point something will come of it. God please help me again, right? Uh, I know I cannot drink because when I drink, my criminal mind comes out and I can't control my actions. I hope and pray nothing comes of it, but if something does, blah. And even my handwriting is so much different. Like I tripped and I fail and I returned to use and I had returned to that negative behavior that just kept that repeated cycle. So, what happened here? I set a New Year's resolution. The writing was great. Like I had good, solid intentions. And if you've set a New Year's resolution and you've set that good, strong intention, uh that's great. And if you've already done like me, what is it? It's the fourth. Is it January 4th? I think it is. And you've already tripped and you've had a setback, I want you to think about it for a second. One, I'm gonna give you some strategies today so that you can get back toward that goal. But why did I trip and fall? Why did that New Year's resolution not stick? Because I didn't have a plan. I didn't have specific strategies. I had kind of, you know, I was kind of talking about some things, but I remember this. I was just like, okay, let's just each and every day do something, right? And but I wasn't doing much. I did not have a plan. Now, so here's my opening quote for you, and then I'm gonna get into this. You don't rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your ready for this systems. The only reason I've attained the success and I have it that I have in my life today, like I I've gone from high school dropout, GED to Dr. D, that journey. The only reason that in March of this year I will enjoy 19 years of recovery. The only reason that I have the amazing marriage that I have to my wife today, the relationships that I have, is because I've employed strategies. I have very repetitive habits that I do on a daily basis to keep me moving forward. I talk about my morning routine with people that want to listen to me, and you're listening to me right now. Every day I get up at near the same time, right? We've been on break, so we've been sleeping in a little bit, but I'm getting back into action tomorrow, back on campus. I get up at 5:30 every morning. I get up at nearly the same time every day, and I have a very specific morning routine that I employed, a system, right, that gets me up and gets me moving every day. Every day. And it takes approximately 21 to 28 days to create a habit. So you need to think about that for yourself. What is a new habit I need to create and to stick to it, right, that can help me get to where I want to go? So that quote is so true. You don't rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems. Those things that you're doing in each and every day, they are either moving you toward that behavior change or that goal, or they are what? Moving you away from that, right? So if you're if this is new year, new me for you, it's gonna take work. Think about those systems you have in your life that are either moving you to or away from your goal. And this is true. Most people don't fail because they lack motivation, right? That like that journal, that journal I read to you from January 1st of 1996, man, there was a lot of good intention and motivation, right? Listen to this. Most people don't fail because they lack motivation, they fail because they don't have a plan they can live with. I didn't have a plan I could live with. I had to do some hard work. I had to do some hard shifts in my thinking and in my systems. I wasn't quite ready yet. It would be the next the end of the next month, right? Because I was starting to move toward that. But I wasn't there yet. I didn't have the systems in place. I didn't have the mindset I needed to have to change my negative behavior to positive behavior. So we're gonna talk today about goal setting, life change, and practical. Like I like simple things. Like I've done a dissertation and I like research and I like some theory, but what I like most most, and this is how I teach, is things that are that are palpable, things that I can employ in my life that make sense, right? Like theory and research is is all good, but we're gonna talk about things you can do to take practical steps forward. So, why do people get stuck? Why why do you find yourself getting stuck and not being able to move forward? Let's talk about that. I think in a lot of cases we are looking way too far down the road when what we need to be focusing on is what's right in front of us. And I have it here waiting for clarity before action. Let me give you an example. So I started a nonprofit in 2019. I created the board, right? And we were meeting in the living room of our home. And now, today, that nonprofit that I've let go of, I'm not a I'm just the founder now, right? That journey from then till now, man, it's a thriving entity. Like they are doing such amazing work. I can tell you that the only reason it's gotten from there, uh just a few community members as a board meeting in a room to what it is today, is not because I was thinking about all the things I had to do to get it to some point of being successful. I did the next indicated thing. This is what I say to college students who are working toward earning a degree. You know how you're gonna get to that graduation stage? Here's how you're gonna get, here's how you're not gonna get to it. Here's how you're not gonna get to a goal. If you start thinking about all the things you have to do to get to where you want to go, let's say weight loss is your thing and you want to lose 40 pounds. If you just start thinking about that, how am I gonna lose 40 pounds? Oh my gosh, that it's so hard. I hear people stop, focus on today. How can I take concerted action in each day to get to where I want to go? So back to the students. What I tell them how you earn a degree is one quarter at a time, one class at a time, one module at a time, one mod one assignment at a time, in each day taking effort toward that big goal. I remember I was completely stuck, you guys, in my dissertation when I was doing the writing, right? Which it was it was a great project that I was working on, and I really enjoyed like the the what I knew maybe was gonna be the outcome of it, but I was thinking about all the different pieces that I had to do, and it kept me stuck. And I employed help. I asked for help, please, please, please be willing to ask for help to get to where you want to go. But I hadn't been, and I was staying in my brain and thinking about all the things I had to do to get to the end of my dissertation. Well, how did I get it done? I'm gonna tell you how I got it done. One page at a time, one paragraph at a time. I had someone say to me, David, stop looking at section 10. Focus on section one, focus on the first paragraph in that section. Certainly, you need to plan, you need to have a strategy, right? Those those goals, but you need to focus on today. So waiting for clarity before acting, you're not gonna know the outcome. You're not gonna know exactly how things are gonna turn out, and that's okay. Don't let that stop you from taking action. This is another good one. Setting goals that sound good, but don't fit real life, right? And it makes me think of this. Um, so there was a guy I used to follow, he's since passed on, and so has his son. Man, they were great humans, uh, the Moads. And he used to, I used to watch uh videos of his in this program I was in in early recovery, and he used to talk about you can, and this is what I'm gonna say to you. You have it within you to do amazing things. Each and every one of you watching this, if you're watching it on the live, or if you watch this podcast on YouTube, or if you're listening to me through this podcast, I want you to hear this again. You have it within you to do amazing things. With that said, right, for David A. Douglas, I'm 58 years old. It would probably be an unreal, like I want you to think big. I want you to set big, lofty goals, but it would probably be unrealistic for me to think, yeah, at 58 years old, I'm gonna do whatever I have to do so I can be an NFL quarterback. It's like, oh like, could I? I don't know, maybe I could, but man, that might be a little unrealistic. Maybe I could set that goal to be a little more realistic. Like, and this this could be your situation. You might have a lot of financial wreckage. I remember the financial wreckage I had when I started early recovery in the mid-90s. I owed thousands and thousands of dollars, right? It would be unrealistic for me to set the goal of I'm gonna pay off all my debt in one year. No, no, you're setting yourself up for failure. Set yourself up for success. Say, I'm gonna set a five to 10 year plan, whatever it is, and I'm gonna work in each day toward that plan. So be realistic. Don't try to think you have to do everything in January, right? Don't think you have to do everything in the year 2026. It's really gonna depend on your surround, your scenario. And this is where I want you to have people in your circle of influence that you can bounce your goals off of, that you can bounce your ideas off of. They will help you. They'll tell you if you have trusted people in your world, they'll say, Whoa, wow, that that's a great goal. But thinking you can accomplish that in a month or six months, that's setting yourself up for failure. Set yourself up for success. Give yourself the time you're gonna need, right? So keep that in mind. You don't have to change everything at once, and you don't have to know what everything's gonna look like. Because that's where I used to be like, oh my God, I gotta do so much to get sober and to change my life. Well, I'd return to use because I was thinking about all the things I had to do instead of what we in the recovery world, which is something I love, just focus on today. This is all we got, friends. This is one of my life mantras. All I have is the time with you right now at 9.19 a.m. on Sunday, January 4th, I think it is. I've been on break, so I haven't been really focusing on the calendar too much. But right, all we have is now. All we have is each 24 hours we're given. Certainly, and again, I pulled up my calendar. I have I live by a calendar, I plan by a calendar, I strategize, but do the work you can do in each day. Don't think way down the road. And the last part in this section on why people get stuck is clarity. Keep this in mind, clarity often comes after movement, not before it. It kind of goes back to the it's gonna be real gray. It's gonna be kind of murky, it's gonna be kind of messy in your brain. That's normal. You're not gonna get real clarity of what everything's gonna look like until you get into action. I used to stay stuck, friends. I used to stay stuck because I I was so worried about how's it gonna work out. What's it gonna look like? What are they gonna say? What am I gonna have to do? Stop. That's actually a technique. Stop when your brain starts getting on that crazy train and your circle thinking. Stop. That was actually through counseling, through going to counseling and learning techniques to manage my thinking so I could get to where I want to go. Stop. Focus on today. Focus on now. So those are some of the reasons why people get stuck. Waiting for that clear, clear clarity, waiting for clarity before action, setting goals that sound good but don't fit reality. I see this a lot. People get completely overwhelmed. They overwhelm themselves. They set themselves up for failure, not success, because they're setting these huge, massive goals and not giving themselves enough time or not being realistic about what you can really achieve, right? And again, you have it within you to do amazing things. I'm a bright, shining example, and I have many friends who are bright, shining examples of taking lives that you would go, oh my gosh, that was you to like doing amazing things today. But also be realistic with yourself. It's really important. The next section we're gonna talk about is reframing goal setting. Okay, so the last section was why people get stuck. Okay. And this section is about looking at the goals you set. And I want to give you another quote. Why people get stuck at the end of that. So I should have said that at the end, but here it is. This is a good one. Why people get stuck. If you wait until you're ready, you ready? You'll be waiting the rest of your life. Story time. I used to sit on a porch and the apartment building's still there, just off the corner of Sixth and Sprague in Tacoma, Washington, in the mid-90s, right before that period where I read that journal entry. And I used to sit on that porch and used to have a lot of that good intentional thinking, but I was waiting for the right opportunity. I was waiting for the right time. Oh, today's not the day. You know what? I'm gonna do, I'm gonna start next month. Or people do the New Year's, I'm gonna do it January 1st. Like you might be going, oh, it's too late, it's already past the New Year's, I'll wait till next year. Or I'm gonna wait until the kids are out of the house, or I'm gonna wait. Guess what? It's like I say to young couples, um, and I get it, there's you should plan in a lot of ways to have a child, right? But I I hear couples say, Well, we're waiting till the right time to get married or to have a child, or I'm waiting for the right time to go back to school, or I'm waiting for the right. When's that gonna come? The right time's never gonna come. Again, there are some situations where I don't just pop out kids just to pop out kids, but you you get what I'm saying. If you wait until you're ready, you'll be waiting the rest of your life. And I made a conscious decision along the way to stop waiting. To ask. Here you go. Here's one of my mantras. What's the worst that you're gonna hear if you ask? Right? In a lot of cases, someone will say no if you ask for the job or if you ask for the promotion, or if you apply for a job that maybe you're a little less qualified. I tell students who are graduating, new college, apply anyway. What's the worst they can say? No. At least you ask. Employers, here you go. Employers will hire over attitude, hire over higher attitude over skills in a lot of cases. If they have someone who's in front of them who has a kin do attitude, who's willing to learn, who wants to thrive, over someone who maybe has decades of experience but has a terrible attitude, and you can kind of tell like they're just like, oh, well, yeah, I want the job. I kind of want it. Yeah, I'm qualified, and look at me, blah, blah, blah. They'll hire you, the person who's like has positive energy and a willingness to learn. Now, so reframing goal settings. Goals are directions, not promises. My life that I have today is an amazing life. But I can tell you that it's had twists and turns along the way. I'm not giving you permission to say, well, why set goals if I'm not going to be able to achieve them? Well, why set goals? Why change negative behavior to positive behavior if it's not going to go how I want it to? Well, guess what, friends? That's life. Right? Things change. Life changes along the way. My friend group, right? This is a shift that I had in my brain at least a decade ago, that it's very normal. It's very normal that some at life, there's transitions. People will come in and out of your life. Certainly, I have had friends that I've had now for 20 plus years that are still in my life. And I've had other friends that have come in in different seasons of my life, right? So know that when you set a goal, that it's probably not going to go exactly how you want it to go. I go back to my dissertation, which I don't recommend. It's a crazy process, right? But I learned so much for that from that about kind of life. Like what I had in my brain as of what I wanted my project to be, my dissertation and the outcome. Guess what? At the end, it would it looked a lot different. And someone said to me, and I apply this to life in a lot of ways, they said to me, and it was someone who had gone through the similar process, please have people in your circle of influence that can help influence you. It's so important. They said to me, David, you have to let go of what you think it's gonna be and allow yourself to be influenced. Oh, oh God, right? I resisted, like, oh, oh my god, no, I got this idea of what I want this goal to be, what I want this project to be. It can't be different. And I resisted, but finally, when I just let go, wow, the in the end product is great, it's beautiful, right? So now here's another thing. If you're if you're doing a complete reboot on your life or you have a specific behavior change, this can be helpful in you. Focus on one prior primary goal. This is where strategy comes in, right? If you have, if you had, if you're like me and you're you have had or you're currently have a really messy life, right? Like I had a lot of different areas of my life that were really messy. And it says here, focus on one primary goal, right? Overall bettering of my health, overall improving of my employment situation, right? Just try to focus on one thing at a time, and that's where you go back. Don't look at the whole package. If you look at the whole thing, well, I need to work on this, and I see people in early recovery do this. Well, I need to work on this, and I need to work. Well, this is you hear this in the recovery. Well, the first thing you need to focus on is staying sober, right? Let's focus on that now. And I'm one about get busy. Don't just, don't just do that. Maybe pick two areas. I'm gonna stay sober, go to meetings, go to church, use exercise, whatever you do for that, and and I'm going to start tackling my financial situation. So, what does that mean? I need to get a job. I tell people in early recovery, I'm telling you, if you're unemployed, get a job, any job. Get something that will get you responsible to some per person, place, or thing. And go do the best work you can, whatever you get. All I just thought of this. All jobs matter. Like all jobs are great. My very first job in early recovery in the mid-90s was at a subway in Sumner, Washington, right? And I had some goals, and one of them was finances, and I had to get a job, any job, so I could start earning some income, right? That was one area that I was looking at. And I remember getting that job at Subway. I was 29 years old. I had I'm a military veteran, I had had cool jobs, and there was part of me, the pride part of me, that was like, oh, Subway. No, you know what? I was the best damn sandwich artist in the land while I was there, right? So think about that for yourself. Whatever you're working on, focus on that one primary goal and do it to your best ability. Put in all your energy, be willing to learn. Okay? Now, here, listen to this. Shift from outcome goals to behavior-based goals. Ah, right? Be a better human. If that's if that's your goal, that's a behavior-based goal. I want to be trustworthy. I want people to be able to count on me. I want to be a I said a good human, right? I want to put good energy out to the world. Right? Think of it in that way. Now, here's a couple questions for you. You you can you can you can type responses if you're watching in the live. If you're watching the recording, get out a piece of paper and a pen or type, right? Get out your phone. Here we go. Who do you want to be six front months from now? Ah. Who do you want to be six months from now? That really forces you to focus on more of that behavior-based side rather than those more specific outcome goals. Who do you want to be? Right? And I remember for me, and even me in my life today, what's really important for me is I want to be someone people can count on. So, what does that mean? That means I need to suit up and show up. That means if I say I'm gonna do something, I need to do it. That means if I screw up, I need to apologize. My friend Mandy, I screwed up. She was supposed to be my guest today, and she messaged me, and I was like, the first thing out of my mind, oh my gosh, Mandy, I'm sorry. Right? Owning when you're wrong. Right? Whatever it is. And this the next question before we go to the next section is here you go. So you've got the first part. Who do you want to be six months from now? I'm looking if I don't have any comments. That's okay if you're thinking about this for yourself. Who do you want to be six months from now? Here's your next question. What daily behavior supports that identity? Here you go. True to life example. So I wanted to be someone people could count on. I wanted to be someone I could count on for myself. And so I started doing some really simple but heavy lifts. One of my things is I get up and I go to bed at nearly the same time every day. Your body needs rest. And guess what? I can also, I can also be more consistent when I get good rest. I have a specific daily routine that I do on a regular basis in the morning before I start my day. It's getting out of bed, it's opening all the blinds and the curtains, it's making the bed, it's going for a walk. And then I come back, I do my quote of the day if you see that, right? And then I and then I get ready for the day. You can do simple things to really move you toward that person you want to be. I'm gonna say this a few times through this. You have it within you, you can't tell me you don't, to do amazing things. Each one of us has has it within us to do amazing things. Next section. Oh, did I read oh, here we go. Here's your quote. I like this one before we go to the next section. Direction is more important than speed. I felt the pressure of wanting to have a behavior change, wanting to have a goal, and thinking, oh, I gotta, I gotta get it done. You know, time's short. I gotta, I gotta, oh my god, I gotta get it all done. Like, oh, just just doing that. Can you feel the stress? And I'm just messing around, right? Direction is more important to speed. If you are doing things on a daily basis, employing habits and behaviors that are moving you toward your goal, that's good. You don't have to get there in one day. You don't even have to do it in a week or a month. It depends on the goal, right? It's better than overwhelming yourself with thinking about all the things I have to do to get to where I want to go. And what happens then? We get stressed, and and here it is, I'm gonna cuss. The fuck it switch comes out. Oh, it's too much. Oh, it's too overwhelming to even think about. Oh, I can't do it. No way. Oh, whoa, whoa, slow down. Can you do something in each day to move toward that goal or behavior change? Okay. Here we go. Practical strategies. Huh. I've talked about this in a couple ways. Shrink the goal until it's easy to start. I go to finances. If you have financial wreckage, right? Which I did. Whew man, I had a lot of financial wreckage. And I I was I was teachable. I was I was listening. I was willing. I was like, yeah, I want to do this. And of course, I'm sure I gotta get it done. Like I had friends, I had over$13,000 in back child support. And it and it was adding up every month, right? Anyone who's paid child support, it still keeps clicking. I had I owed courts across the Puget Sound thousands of dollars in money. I had a stack of bills. This is old school, now it's all online, but I actually had a stack of bills with rubber bands around them. It was like a huge weight. They were heavy, but the weight of the finances was ever all the time. Like, oh my gosh, I'm never gonna be able to get caught up. I'm never gonna be able to pay all that off. And I had someone in my life who helped me do this shrink the goal until it's easy to start. So listen to this. This goes back to this get a job, any job. Start producing some income and then start chipping away. And I remember hearing this and I was like, oh, that's crazy. Like uh I owed collection agency thousands of dollars for tickets that I didn't pay, blah, blah, blah. And she said to me, she said, call them and say, tell them what's going on in your life, be real, right? I was like, oh my god, I'm uh the fear of just calling them was too much communicating because I hadn't, right? And then she said, make a chart, put it on paper. You have to really see what you need to do, and it's gonna be overwhelming to do that. And then what do you do? Just start with one and just start chipping away at it. I literally to pay off those that thousands and thousands of dollars worth of debt because of advice from someone. I had some I was paying five dollars a month. And I remember saying, that's nothing, that's never gonna get paid off. No, you're building momentum, you're creating the habit of paying the bill every month. You're focusing on it, you're thinking about it, you're communicating. I had places that some might say, Oh my god, why would you call them their jerks, blah, blah, blah. But you know what? When I was real with people, places, and things, they were willing to work with me. So, whatever it is for you, break it down in digestible chunks. Okay. Build friction for habits that hold you back. What? Yeah. Build friction for habits that hold you back. And what how do you do this? It's what I tell it's an area that I think a lot of us could could work on. It's your body, your physical body, right? If you think you get overwhelmed or you have a lot of stress, well, how do you build friction for habits that hold you back? Change those habits. Get good rest. Force yourself to change your sleep habits. Have people hold you accountable, right? Go to counseling and learn skills if that's what you need. Read about how to manage the stress of daily life. Okay. Pay attention to, and I'm no pillar of health, but pay attention to what you put in your body on a daily basis, right? So friction for habits that hold you back could be you take in too much uh caffeine or sugar on a daily basis. So, how do you build friction for habits that hold you back? Cut it in half. I'm I'm I what I don't like is I hear people do this real all or nothing. Like, well, then I just said to someone, well, I think if you want to quit vaping, just just knock it off, right? Just go cold turkey. There might be something to that, or there might be something to balance, right? Try to start shifting the pendulum from all this friction that's holding you back in life to you know what, I'm gonna I'm gonna cut it in half. Some of my friends in recovery might cringe at what I'm about to say. Maybe reduce your drinking. Maybe quitting all at once might be too tough for you right now. So maybe we call it harm reduction. Maybe stop using heavy drugs and just drink. Again, my friends in recovery are like, oh my god, that's crazy. Well, it might be crazy for us or you, or but maybe not for them. And it can be different things in different areas of your life. Track something simple and visible. I told you about the financial area. I I is what she said is it was an Excel sheet, and I still have one, an Excel sheet, and she said, put it all on there, get it on paper, and then start tracking progress. Like, wow, that it actually worked. It was great, right? So do that for yourself. Those are simple practical strategies you can use that can help you not get into that all or nothing thinking, focusing on each day, not getting overwhelmed with all the things you have to do, simple things that you can do to keep you on track. All right, as we go into the next section, and it's titled Life Changes Take Time. I'm gonna read to you a quote. This this quote that I'm gonna read to you with the meaning behind it is I'm just gonna tell you it's how I've achieved the success that I have in my life. It's how I enjoy 18 plus years of recovery. It's how I've been at my employer for 13 years, it's how I've been in my marriage, it's how I've kept relationships well and alive, right? Here it is. Do not underestimate the power of consistency. What feels small today becomes everything later. This is what we've been talking about. Small steps in each day, small but meaningful, consistent behaviors in each day to be a better you, whatever that looks like for you. So do not underestimate the power of consistency. I think sometimes, like, God, I do the same thing every day. And sometimes I can and I have to check myself. Oh, it's boring. And then I go, wait a second. No, it's not. You know what it is? It's actually calming. It having the the consistent daily behaviors, habits that I have in my life that I'm unwilling to give up, right? Like I get up and go to bed at near the same time, and that doesn't waver much at all on. Purpose by design because what does that do for me? It really helps my mental health. Getting good rest in each and every day helps my mental health. Paying attention to how much sugar and caffeine I'm putting in my body helps my physical and mental health. So, what does that mean? It also helps me keep a neutral to positive attitude and a willingness to work toward my goals, right? So some might think those are small things, but they're huge. I go on a morning walk every day. I live in a small town. If you're watching this live, you know Ellensburg, you can you can walk most everywhere you go. We live downtown. It's easy. So I move my feet every day. Might seem small, but it's actually huge over time. So don't underestimate the power of consistency. And what might seem like a small act, it builds up over time. Now, talking about time, life changes take time. Oh, I'm gonna say it again. Life changes take time. We're living in an era of what? Instant access to information. We get instant access to the things we want in our life. If we don't get a text reply immediately, like I'm not a I'm not a huge fan of a lot of areas of technology. I'm a techie guy, right? I teach IT management, and there's a lot of it alike. But here's one little thing that I think hurts our mental health more than it does any good. And it's that thing of when you can see if someone's typing, right? And what does that cause? That causes, oh, they're gonna, they're gonna respond. Oh, they're gonna give me the the information I want, when, right now. Like Amazon. Like I it's actually wow, it's super cool that I can click order on Amazon and a package will hit my door in Ellensburg, Washington, in a little Ellensburg, Washington. I've had it happen the next day. And now we're moving toward in big metropolitan cities where you can click order and it comes within an hour, right? All of these things have produced some negative outcomes, some negative behaviors in us. In that, when do we expect to have behavior change for ourselves? Right now. When do we expect in our brains, in some cases, to achieve our goals? Right now. That's not realistic. That is not realistic. That is completely setting yourself up for failure. Life changes take time. And here it says here, change often, here we go, you ready? Change often feels boring before it feels rewarding. Why? Because it takes time. Uh, there's there are a lot of good quotes out there about it's the quiet work when you're alone and you're having to figure out a plan. It's the quiet work of writing a paper for a class, it's the quiet work of choosing in your brain to not go and do negative behaviors when you know you need to just stay home, right? That's the quiet work that nobody really sees that is going to get you to where you want to be in life, right? So change often feels boring before it feels rewarding. The next area, and I talked about this just now, small, quiet actions compound over time. It's for those who say, you know what, um, you might may or may not know this, but uh January is Super Bowl month for gyms. Yeah, it is. It's the busiest time of the year for gyms because everyone does the New Year's resolution and everyone's in the gym, and it's like, yeah, I'm gonna change, right? And guess what happens? It doesn't stick because there's no real plan. People don't have the strategies. So by the end of January, the gyms empty out again. And so here's where you're the one still going to the gym. You're the one still working toward those goals for yourself. You're the one who's still showing up when no one else is. You're the one who's doing the work behind closed doors in your brain or in your world when there isn't a light shining on you saying, Hey, yeah, look at me, right? Small quiet actions compound over time. The last area of this one if what you're doing feels uncelebrated, you ready? You're probably doing it right. Yep. If what you're doing feels uncelebrated, you're probably doing it right. And again, this goes to social media, right? We we you hear this and you see this, you see people's best parts of their world on social media, right? And you're like, you're comparing yourself to that person. Well, you're not you're seeing small snippets of their whole life, right? That's what you're seeing. You're not seeing the uncelebrated part. Like yesterday, man, I was I was posting, oh, the Seahawks. I posted uh pictures and comments, and everyone was like, Seahawks, yeah, yeah, blah, yay. We're the best, right? But what we haven't seen is those players who are working out every day, those players who are paying attention to their nutrition every day, every day, not just on game day, right? The quiet, uncelebrated parts of their life. We're gonna go to the last section, and here's a quote for you. And this is a beautiful one. This is a good one. So we still got some listeners there, some listeners there, and you're listening out there. Start where you are, use what you have, do what you can. I'm gonna say it again. Start where you are, use what you have, do what you can. And that that motivational speaker that I used to follow, Bob Moad, he spoke to this so well. It's like if you're alive, if you are alive and listening to this, you have some ability to do something. Right? If you have access to the internet and you're listening to this, if you're watching this on the live, you have something. If you have a roof over your head, food in your refrigerator, a bed to sleep in, close, you have a lot more than many, right? I think of when I see this one, this quote, start where you are, use what you have, do what you can. It reminds me of the term and it's called radical acceptance. And if you're out there listening and you know what I'm talking about, you're nodding your head because it's a really great skill to have to kind of just stop where you are and just look at your life as it is. And it's not like accepting your situation and being like, yeah, this is great, because you might be in a tough situation, but just kind of looking at it as it is and saying, I'm gonna start where I am, I'm gonna use what I have, and I'm gonna do what I can. That's kind of a radical acceptance mindset. I may not have everything I want, I may not have all the tools I need to get to where I want to go, but I'm willing to do what I can in each day to get there. That's really, really important. So that goes back to pick one goal. My challenge to you, my challenge to you is pick one goal for yourself and employ some of these skills that I've given you and give it a shot. And I always say this, I say this to people who are who are navigating a life in recovery. I say, you know, and some people might be against me saying this, but if I've gotten to know someone and I know their story, I'll I you know what I say, and I say this in lectures. I say, you know, have you given your all to active use of substances? I asked that question. Have you given it your all? And usually hands go up in the room. Yep, I I've given years and I've given lots of effort toward active use. And what I and I might say it to you if you if I say, have you given your all to eating shitty all the time? Or have you given your all to unhealthy habits in life? Whatever it is. Have you given your all? And usually people, yeah, I've really put here's my challenge to you. I want you to flip the script. I want you to give your all to be in a better you. I want just just for a year. This is what I say. Six months, a year. And if at the end of that period of time, write it on the calendar too. Put your all, put your all, and this is what I did to really quit drinking and using and all the behavior, is I had given my all to 14 plus years of chaos. And if I include my childhood even more, right, I had given my all to that. And I made a decision to give my all to being a better David, to being a better father, to being a better husband, to being a better community member, to being a better employee, to being a better human. And I say, do that for six months or a year. And if at the end your life hasn't at least improved some, then you can always go back. Right? I actually did that. I hadn't really given my all though. But what usually happens is you get to the end of that period and give your all. Do the things I just talked about. Give your all your true honest effort toward improving in any area of your life, in any one goal, and give it a shot and see what happens, right? Because I believe you have it within you to do amazing things. You don't need permission. If you're waiting for the right day, time, month, whatever, stop. Stop it. You don't need permission to start today. You don't need perfect conditions, the perfect day, the perfect month, the perfect season, the perfect moon. They're never coming. I'm gonna say this, and this comes, I think Mel Robbins says this. Other people have said it, and I'm gonna say it, I'm gonna try to say it in a kind way. I don't want to guilt and shame because guilt and shame never help people make true effective change. But here's the truth is nobody's coming to save you. It is true. Like I used to think, God, why can't I get lucky in life like that guy? Why can't I get the girl like that guy? Why can't I get the cool job? Why can't I have I wasn't doing anything? And then what I what was I waiting for? Someone to come knock on my door and going, hey, I'm here to help you, I'm here to save you. It's never gonna happen. The perfect weather is not always gonna be here, the perfect alignment of the stars. But here's what I'm gonna say to flip the script on that. I've had amazing success in my life, and I still have stuff I want to accomplish, and I'm working toward and I'm doing. I've done none of it in isolation. I've not been able to achieve any of the great things that I've achieved in my life and all the areas I've talked about without the help of many. Yeah. My circle of influence is so important to me. Those I'm closing this up with this. Those four or five people that I communicate with on a regular basis. So here we go. I want you to just just close your eyes and think about this for a second. Think about the four or five people that you communicate with on a regular basis. Put them in your brain. Think about it. It could be your husband, could be your spouse, could be your boss, could be your child, could be your a friend or two, hopefully. I don't know. But think about the four or five people that you communicate with on a regular basis. It's really important to me who's in my circle of influence for the reason I'm about to tell you. So you got those four or five people in your brain. You have them, you know who they are. You've you yep, I talk to this person all the time, I talk to this person, I spend time with this person. Here we go. You ready? You are the sum of those four or five people. Yep. They influence your decision making on a daily basis. They guide you either. You ready for this? They're either guiding you toward that goal, that behavior change, or they're influencing you and pushing you, you ready? Away from that goal or behavior change. And here's what I say: delete the naysayers, friends. Yeah. Delete the naysayers from your life. If you have a negative Nelly who's like, oh, you can't do that, you're not capable, you're not good enough, you're not smart enough, you're not delete, hit delete. Kindly walk away, right? Ensure that the four or five people you have in your life that you communicate with on a regular basis are your champions, are the people that will challenge you to be a better you, are the people that know you, that you've shared with the behavior change you want to have, that you've shared with the goals you want to achieve, that they can check in with you and you can check in with them. Start where you are, use what you have, and do what you can. I hope everyone has a great rest of their day, and until next time, signing off.