How To Actually Accomplish New Year's Goals (Episode 396)

Speaker 1: What up, guys? Welcome to the Jujitsu podcast. Our first one in 2026. Um, this podcast, if you guys are getting ready to go after some new goals or, you know, you're using that uh, that that sort of arbitrary line in the sand of, you know, January 1st, 2026 to start anew, getting into something or getting back to something maybe you've been out of, right? Maybe you've been out of Jujitsu, maybe you've uh, been out of lifting, maybe you've never lifted before, maybe you're getting back on a diet, whatever it is. And if you find that you're one of those people that struggles a lot, like you get into things and for some reason, you start off with a lot of motivation, but you don't keep going and you never seem to like, you seem to be back in the same place you were the the next year, maybe even a worse spot. Um, we're going to talk about some different ways to actually hit those goals and also talk about probably the biggest reason most people fail in their goals and it's something that I remember a friend of mine who's a Navy SEAL instructor was talking about how he could get people to quit. Um, you know, these young motivated recruits who, you know, said they wanted to do this thing and then he gets them to quit. Um, during their their training and he'll talk about that, which I think is a good idea as to why most people fall short of reaching their goals year after year, even though they start with so much enthusiasm and like, you know, inspiration in the beginning. And so we'll talk about that, how to redirect your thoughts, what you should be focusing on instead. And I'm coming this from my standpoint, what's been useful to me. And so, hopefully this could be helpful to you guys as well. Big thanks to our sponsors for helping to make this thing happen. 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And then, you know, you get a couple extra percentage points here and there, um, which can become useful if you're doing all that other stuff. Um, you know, if you're not doing that stuff, I would say, you know, skip buying all the CBD stuff, skip all the the athletic stuff, skip all that stuff. Go get your diet in check, all that stuff, get your sleep right. But, assuming that you got those things right, or if you want a little assistance with them, that's when you start throwing those supplements in there, you can get a lot from them. Um, but again, if you guys want to check them out, you can go to their website at Charlottesweb.com. The promo code is Jujitsu 30 for 30% off the order. So you can take a look and see what they have, find something you like. And if you like it, try it, see how it affects you. And again, supplements are different for everybody. So you would kind of affects you get from it and see if you like it. And if it's good, good, great, keep using it. Uh, if not, no harm, no no foul. But again, good products. I've liked them, used a lot of their stuff and been happy with anything that I've used. Also, if you guys want to support the podcast directly, you can do so by going to our Patreon at patreon.com/thejujitsupodcast. Um, again, exclusive content on there. You guys know the deal. There's a bunch of different perks if you want to check them out. Um, Eugene, we we we just posted up the, um, sort of like the ex I don't want to call it the extended version, but we posted up some of the additional uh, daily habits, right? Speaker 2: Yeah, so we just went probably about 30 minutes in. Okay. About 30 minutes of uh, like almost like a one a 0.5, like another half episode of just kind of habits and cool. Kind of really cool stuff, like good ideas, useful ideas. Some of the stuff you've heard before, some of the stuff is definitely some newer things and um, I think really important. Really important daily habits to to kind of help you, you know, progress towards your goals. Speaker 1: So in particular in that video that we recorded, the the podcast extra that we recorded, we really got into like probably the biggest, like so like there's a, I'll be doing it in February this year, February or March. Um, I do this thing called the Executor's Challenge every year. And that's basically, well, last two years, it was really successful. It was like a New Year's challenge and then this year I'm going to push it back a little bit, get away from the hustle and bustle in New Year's. And like, let's let's do it at a different. I want to I want to test it out at a different time. And there's one specific thing that we did every year at the beginning. If you were in that group, then you already know what it is. But if you weren't, then you don't. But there's one specific thing we did every single year and literally, like people that did it, like it was like a, you know, their minds were open, their life was improved, all from doing one thing. It's one thing that everybody does and they just changed it and stopped doing it. You did that and I mean, like radical difference. And um, for anybody that actually did it, like they got a lot of a lot of value from it. And I have testimonials from people, man, that was such I felt so like relaxed. I felt so much more energetic. I had more focus for all the things that were more important to me. I didn't feel so stressed out. Like amazing what you feel like when you just simply change like one little thing that's become habitual in your life. And so we talk about that and some other things that I find useful. And again, this is all from my standpoint. I think of it's like Jujitsu, right? This whole episode and the the podcast extra that we did, it's all from the standpoint of, here's what's been useful to me, why don't you try this? I mean, that's what we're all doing, right? Is we do that as as teachers, we do that as parents. You know, is it it's Chris we just finished Christmas time, you know, for us. Um, but you know, with when if you have holiday rituals and traditions you have, what are you doing? You're sharing with those with your kids because you found them useful. If you thought, if you did some holiday tradition that you absolutely hated, that you thought was terrible, you wouldn't have shared it with your child. Because you're like, why would we do that? But you share the good stuff with them and you try to make it your own and make it better. And that's kind of what everything is as a teacher or as a person that's sharing things with you. This isn't the end all be all. You know, I feel like living life is more of an art than a science. Because humans are emotional. We're not like, you know what I mean? Like if there was one like if there was one way to do it, we'd all do it. But, you know, you think about there's things that like each one of us do, right? Like there's things that I do that you guys would find awful, that you just don't enjoy, but I really enjoy them. And there's things that many of you guys do and you probably find lots of enjoyment of that I would just hate doing. Life is it's it's an art. We have to figure it out. And so when you're talking about art, there's not one way to do it. And so when we're talking about all the stuff that we're getting into today, it's an idea. Hey, try this out. It's like a technique. Why don't you give this a whirl and see how it works for you, you try it, go from there. Um, and that's what we get into in that particular podcast extra is like one of the most important techniques if you will for avoiding all the um, the basically for getting more out of yourself personally, especially in a modern world right now. Um, also, if you guys want to get my daily email, which you can do and become a Chucur subscriber by going to my website at chujitsu.net/join. And when you join up, you will get access to a free ebook guide called Focus Jujitsu, which will give you a bunch of different strategies on how to improve your Jujitsu. Uh, it will also help you come with a video. So if you don't want to read it, you can also watch the video. And it goes through different ways to get more out of the training, to be deliberate with your training and to do so without having to have control of your training. Most of you guys are not coaches. You don't get to direct the training, but you still should be directing your training to some degree during your open training sessions and open rolls and things like that. You can get a lot from the training sessions if you know how to do that. This is what a lot of the the world champions that we've spoken to on this channel have done, whether they're in control of the room or not. Um, and it's something that everybody can do from the newest white belt to the most experienced black belt. So if you want to check that out, it's free to you at chujitsu.net/join. And then afterwards, you get my daily email, which goes in through God God knows what I'm talking about. Everything from Jujitsu to philosophy, to books I'm reading, to just life stuff. So anything and everything, if you like the podcast, you'll like the email. So guys, with that said, let's jump into this podcast with uh, with Eugene here and me and we'll talk about some stuff in the new year to help you avoid not coming back around in 2027 and uh, not having accomplished any of your goals. Speaker 2: You know, there's goals and New Year's goals and all that stuff and and you don't really have to be in that kind of mindset, but I think even people like myself who don't necessarily, I don't set New Year's resolutions necessarily. I do use this arbitrary arbitrary line in the sand of our calendar called into the New Year to sort of reassess. And I like I like taking that because there seems to be this natural sort of like just chilled period. You know, because for me as like as an example as a business owner with a few lots of stuff on my plate, right? Like it's busy. I don't really like, you know, I was talking to someone and uh, you know, they're like, oh, it must be so nice to just sort of do what you love. I'm like, hold on a second, like, like I own a business. There's a lot of stuff I don't want to deal with. There's a lot of things I don't want to deal with. Um, there's multiple multiple business that I have to mess around with and there's stuff going on. Like my wife would tell you, she she like laughs because like for instance, there was one day one of our students, um, basically a bunch of the guys came over to the the house and they were running hills on the property. This is like like two summers ago. They were running hills on the property. So like on a Thursday morning. I was sitting outside, I had some coffee and I was working on some content. It was a nice morning. So I'm sitting outside writing down ideas or whatever, sitting on we had some picnic tables out there and stuff and writing down ideas. And I remember he uh, he made a comment like, oh man, that must be nice to be able to sit out here like in the morning and just whatever. I'm like, like you think that, right? Like you think like it is nice. It's not a bad thing. And I'm not I'm not making this woe is me kind of story. But at the same time, like many people, like if they work like a regular job, they get to just turn their brain off. They leave. Yeah. They leave their job and they get to just not worry about it anymore. Like there is no such thing for me. There's work, you know, I work a little bit every day of the year. Not and again, this is self-imposed, you know, this is I don't have to do this and I do this sort of voluntarily because I do kind of enjoy the work that I'm doing and it's meaningful to me and things like that. Um, you know, but like I remember like what we the 23rd, I was buzzing around trying to get this we we were getting some to some stuff manufactured for the tournament. I'm like running around, dealing with my banker, dealing with this overseas manufacturer and there's this bank wire that's not going through. It's the 23rd. I wanted to like go get some stuff done for Christmas, but no, I have to go do this. Jess has to go do that now, you know. So there's stuff going on all the time. But nonetheless, you know, I I this time period from say the 24th of Christmas for for us that celebrate to, you know, January the 1st. It's just quiet. Even with the business stuff. There's things to do, but it's just like we, you know, we're we're kind of uh, you know, laying down our uh, it's like there's like a ceasefire for a little bit. All right, we're going to we're going to we're going to chill out for a little bit. We're going to enjoy this week. And so for me, this is a nice time to just kind of reassess, look at everything that happened the year past, look at what I'm like, look at, you know, it's almost like taking inventory. And I'll talk about how I do that with like my I have a master list and things like that where I have all my goals and stuff for the year. Um, things I want to get done. But, you know, you see it, okay, here's how this year went. What do we want the next year to look like? And kind of take inventory of that. And I think a lot of people naturally do that. It's kind of a natural thing to like kind of like what do we want to do in this next year? Um, because again, yeah, it's an arbitrary line in the sand, uh, you know, December 31st and January 1st. There's almost no difference, but we all know as us as humans, right? We deal with the imaginary, right? That that's kind of where we live. We we you have a name and your name is a set of mouth noises that was given to you by your parents. It's not we you can change that. It's not necessarily real and intangible to you. It's uh, or tangible to you. The there's money that you use, which again is just a sort of a made-up idea that we've agreed upon. We we're we're US citizens or maybe you're a citizen of again, made-up stuff. You go back 400 years, that what is it wasn't it? The dirt was still there. Yep. But you as a citizen of this country that didn't exist, it's just all made-up stuff, stories. And so it's a great story though, because it's like this thing where, you know, you maybe had this busy holiday season, it's over and now you're like, let's get after it. And you see a lot of people who use that story as motivation to get into the next year to do things that they wanted to do, do things they felt like they needed to do. And then they just wash out. You know, it it's it's it's so cliche, but it's true. Now, don't get me wrong. There are people that really did something with it. I remember my buddy Brandon McAffrey, who's a uh, black belt, uh, 10th Planet black belt, you know, runs the PGF. He started as a New Year's resolution. Started doing Jujitsu. I remember that. And he kept going. So there's there's some good turnouts to it. Um, but again, a lot of us, a lot of people get into the New Year's and they have these things they want to do and then for some reason, they look back at the next year and they don't do them. They didn't do them. And I think that there's reasons for that and maybe some ideas to chew on here. And so we'll um, we'll get into some ideas on how to get into the New Year and maybe a couple ideas that could be useful to you. We'll just say it like that. I because I again, here's what I want to say with this. I don't want to speak from this like as I'm some like guru like that has everything figured out. However, I will say that my life is pretty much how I designed it. Like, you know, there's some things I like there's still things I have to do that necessarily I don't always enjoy doing, but nonetheless, it's like by design. It kind of looks the way I want it to look. I was talking to one of the guys the other day about this. Like we were talking about, um, like me and Jess. Like I remember like because he was because basically he's his wife, he met her in Colombia, or he's getting ready to marry her. Met her in Colombia, getting ready to bring her over. And I was like, dude, you need to like, you guys need to sit down and design like your roles for each other. Like what's your role, you know, what's your role for this? Yeah. Like because like, you know, there's this whole like it's it's stupid. Like that there's not supposed to be like a okay, we could say, okay, there's not the the the sort of eradication of gender roles. Fair enough. You want to get rid of the gender roles. Fine. Well, let's figure out what our role is in this relationship uniquely to us, right? Because I mean, like for instance, Jess and I, I cook more than Jess. I'm a better cook. I enjoy it. Like I enjoy cooking. Stress her out. For me, like I like buzzing around in the kitchen, making food for people. I like seeing people eat. It's fine. Yeah. So like not a traditional gender role for the guy to be in the kitchen cooking, right? But I like I like doing it, so it's fine. I like cooking for the family. Um, but you know, we sat down and had like designed years ago. We sat down and said like, how do we want our life to look? What do you want to be doing? Like what kind of house do we want to live in? Do we want to have this is where like the land thing started coming in because she was like, she took me to an open house and I grew up in the city, had no idea that I wanted land and then I'm like, hey, this could be pretty cool. And then, you know, I'm thinking about the camps and stuff. Like, oh, this will be cool. We can have people over. So, okay, cool, land. We're going to have land. So we drew it all out and, you know, she's working from home. There's this whole, it's all written out. Um, I still have the journal entry where I sit down because she's like, I I asked her, like, hey, what do you want your life to look like? She's like, I don't know. I was like, let's brainstorm. What what do you want? You know, and with within reasonability, right? We're not like, I'm going to live in a, you know, a monstrous castle, like whatever. I mean, you could, you know, I mean, again, reasonable. Um, but wrote everything down. And then we wrote down like, again, for me, it's kind of like, what what's our roles in this? And I remember she really struggled with that because there's this sort of um, one she didn't she felt she felt she felt, you know, one of it was like, she hated working at the job that she was at. She was really frustrated with it. I was like, well, why do you why don't you just work less or not at all? Because, you know, at the time that was becoming a thing. And I was like, you can work from home or you can not work at all, right? Whatever. And uh, I remember she struggled one with like the sort of societal pressure, like, you know, you shouldn't be dependent on a man and, you know, there's that whole thing. Um, you know, because again, it's like you're you're you're underselling your potential, whatever. I'm like, no, no, no. Like because I need help here. Yeah. Like I'm not home as much because I'm doing all these things that make the money for us so that we can live how we're living. And it would be more beneficial if like, say, hey, like you cooked, like you you did our meal prep. So like you make our chicken and you make make some of our food and our rice and everything else that we need. And um, you're here with like the kiddo and you're helping take care of the house. Like that's really important. You know, because I think that at some point there was probably a, you know, back in maybe the day where that was underappreciated. You know, like maybe like the woman at home taking care of, oh, she's not really doing anything. Being at the home is really tough. It's a it's a hard job. So it's like, I appreciate it and you're more useful here to me in the relationship than us doing the same thing. We're both we're both now chasing the same sort of like sort of assertive sort of path in life and then instead of us sort of having sort of counter sort of supportive roles. You know, it's not it's like imagine like a military if they didn't have anybody doing logistics, everybody was shooting guns. It's not it's going to be a it's going to be a short battle. So anyway, designing all that, you know, we designed it years ago and we sort of made it look how we wanted it to look. And so like I by no means am I am some sort of guru, but I do get a lot of questions from people who do not accomplish the Jujitsu goals, the lifting goals, the things that they set, right? The things that I think I have some modicum of of of sort of authority to talk about. Um, and so we'll get into those, but at the same time, the ideas we'll share about it really you can do you can I I've done them with business, Jujitsu, lifting, whatever. And again, by no means am I like everything, whatever. But at the same time, I live a life that I I I truly enjoy and it was by my design. Yeah. I think that I don't think um, you know, we talk about gender roles and things like that. It's kind of I think traditionally, you know, there's certain, well, the man does this, the woman does this, but you you think about like when I think about it and I and I talk to my wife, it's like we're just a team. We're like, hey, like we get to help each other out and make this thing, which our home can be a business. Essentially, our house is like running the household is a business. Sure. Like, first of all, just for people that maybe don't work outside the home, only at home, like you're always working. Like, you're never off. The kiddo needs to be taken care of. Food needs to be done. Uh, you know, there's no break from. There's no breaks. It's like you're in there. You're not like societally, you're not getting paid, uh, you know, an amount of money for doing these things, but like you got to think like if you have somebody at at home that has like an efficient home, Uh-huh. You're allowed to do the things or or you have the capacity to do the things you need to do way more efficiently. Your mind is able to focus on those. It's such a um, it's one of the hardest jobs. Like I think staying home and like taking care of the house or like taking care of the kiddos. You got kids, the house, the whole thing. It's tough, man. It's mentally taxing. You know, it's like because like you said, it's not it's not hard in the sense like you're you're on some oil rig, whatever, doing but it's like mentally, man, it's taxing because there is like there's no separation. You're kind of always on. You don't know when that kid's going to get up from their nap and, you know, everybody that's been with kids, it can be stressful. But at the same time, there's there's a like just if you wanted to get into the economics, right? There was a guy I was listening to listening to who was breaking down like the economic value of like say a stay-at-home parent. Yeah. How like how valuable it is. And I mean, you know, I I know so many people who like who have a stay-at-home parent primarily because it would be more expensive for them to send kids to to daycare, to child care because they're like, well, we've got X amount of kids and it costs this much money per kid. This person makes this much money. So we'll be actually taking a net loss if they if they send the kids to child care and they work. So they're like, I guess I'll be a stay-at-home parent. Yeah. You know. Or or literally you work just to pay for child care. You're like, that's why would you just why don't you just take care of your kid? You're like, why don't would you just rather be with your kids so they can get a better experience, right? But yeah, but like this is like it's like a we talked before we got started on the podcast, it's like being a business owner. It's like you're never you're never off. Like yes, you have ebbs and flows in your in your workload, but you're never truly off. Like there's always something like your brain is always on. There's always something like in the background that's kind of like needs to be addressed or or something that needs that's coming down uh, down the pike that you have to take care of. So, but yeah, I I do think though when you look at moving forward, you have to kind of look to the past, right? We kind of talked about kind of there's any loose ends. Loose ends or anything. Yeah. So reassessing kind of where or taking inventory, which is the same thing. So taking inventory, reassessing. So we'll maybe chat about that a little bit with the kind of your process is, I guess, taking inventory of stuff and and figuring out what's been what's been accomplished or what's not and what's still some loose ends that need to be tied up. I mean, you're welcome to chime on this too. I mean, for me, like going into it, like is that, you know, this is like the perfect time to kind of look at like, you know, take like do a debriefing so to speak of like the the past year, how did it go? You know, what did you set out to do last year? Did you get any of it done? Um, for me, like in my I have a big whiteboard that sits in my office. And so I see it every day. And it's a list of I I just call it my master list. My my my list to direct me for the next year. Like what is it that I would like to get done this next year? And it's just a list of anything that I think's important. And you got to be careful here because a lot of times you can underestimate the amount of time it takes to do something. I think I'm I'm really bad about that. I have to be very careful because, you know, you see you think that you want to do something, you're like, I'll just get this done real quick. And then you realize it's it's takes a lot longer than you think. Real quick. Yeah. So yeah, right? So it's like that. But the, you know, big list of stuff. Hey, here's what I want to do and it sits in my office, so I see it every day because I'm very much a out of sight, out of mind kind of person. So I have to do I have to have a lot of physical reminders for stuff. Um, otherwise I sort of forget about them. Um, so it's like sitting up there and it's looking at me and then try to just I kind of go through the list and if I have one, I I I take one off the list and then I flip the board over because it's a two-sided board and on the other side of the board, I can write down what do I need to do to make that thing happen? And so I have that list. And so at the end of the year, I can look at the list and see like, what did I actually get done? What did I not get done? You know, and for me, like that's that's like the first part. Um, and then really what for me, what it really comes down to is is looking at like the habits that I like sort of part in the next year because again, it's what what is it? It's like something like 60% of your life is done automatically. It's gone off of habits. You know, like it's a good portion of your life is just automatic. You're just going through the motion, especially if you're if you're you've got a routine. You think about how fast your life goes on a daily basis. If you're in this rhythm, like it just days fly by. You know, whereas you think like when you go to a competition or you're traveling, you're you're basically thrown into a place where your normal habits and routines are gone, the day drags. And it's, you know, whereas when things are automatic and you're just kind of going through the motions, you're all you're almost doing things. Like you think about your drive to work. You're driving to to a particular place you've gone to every day. You're you're often your own world in your head sometimes. You know, you're you're driving and then you get to the place you're going to, you didn't even realize how you got there. Oh, man, I just 25 minutes passed and I was in my own head versus, you know, if you're driving to a new place you've never been before, you're kind of unsure about it. You're kind of looking around. You're really focused intently in that exact moment. You go to a competition or something as an example, the day drags as you're getting ready for it. Uh, but normally, like, you know, if you're going through your day where you're going to go train, you're just kind of going through, I'm going to go to work, I'm going to do this and then whatever. So anyway, um, you live a lot of your life is automatic and a lot of the things that we do is automatic. And so kind of for me, looking at like habits is really important. Like what what habits that I sort of take part in. And a lot of times when I'm looking at like the next year and sort of thinking about like what is it that I want to get done next year? I always kind of look at like what sort of habits do I have to create to make that happen? Because that's what's more important because it's like you can get lost in the, oh, I want the big goal. But like, what what what does that require? And we'll talk about more about this about the becoming of, right? But like really it comes down to like, what do you have to exchange for that? Because it's like, you know, you can think about it, oh, I want this to happen. Yeah, but like what is what do you have to do to make that thing happen? Because it's going to require something on an almost daily basis, more than likely, if it's a worthwhile goal, right? Like if you wanted to get good at Jujitsu, okay, well, like, you know, good is sort of a whatever that means, right? Um, but, you know, we we we we understand that there's something there, right? But it's going to require you to train on a regular basis. So you have to be committed to this habit of training X amount of times a week, as many times as it's like you can squeeze in there, two to three, four, five, whatever it is that you you your body can handle and you have the time and availability to and you're just going to have to do this consistently. That's that's that's the most important part. Um, you know, when started doing the podcast, doing the YouTube channel back in the day, right? And I was like, okay, I wanted to build that thing up. Yeah. Okay, I wanted to I decided that like I started dabbling it and I was like, I actually want to make a concerted effort to build it up. Well, then it was like, I have to have this habit of recording like making and recording videos and playing out videos like this every single week and multiple times a week. Just have to do it. You know, like there's you I want the big I want to have a bazillion followers or something. What are you going to do to get that? You know, or then like again, getting ready for a competition. I want to win a competition. Okay, great. Well, are you ready to train for that? How many times are you going to have to train for that? How many times are you going to do cardio, lifting weights? Like there's things you have to pay for it. And so I think that really for me, it always comes back to habits and I try to like look at what are the the habits that I'm not really too happy with or the things that I I I maybe I gave too much time with and then looking at, okay, like here's the habits that I need to form going into the new year. That really comes back down to lifestyle design. Like, I'm less this is me. Again, this is me personally. I'm not I'm less focused on specifically looking at like this random big goal that maybe whatever and more focused on like, how do I want my life to look? If that makes any sense because I think at least for me, that's more helpful. It may not be helpful for other people, but for me, like having some big random goal, see if I can word this properly. I think, okay, so there's this idea with money, right? A lot of people will chase money and material possessions. Because they want to be happy, right? A lot of people have found in the pursuit of those things that they they acquire the money, they acquire the thing that they wanted, but then they're not happy. Like they thought they would be. They got it and they're like, why am why where's the happiness supposed to be? I thought I was going to be just, you know, gushing for joy now that I'm making six figures or now that I have this big house or car, whatever. And so like a lot of times like wealth and money bring sort of an indirect happiness, right? Like for instance, if you got a big home, maybe the happiness you get out of that home is having friends and family over. Right. Or maybe, you know, you always wanted this big pool in your home, right? And maybe the fun part about that is seeing your kids play. That brings you happiness. Not necessarily the pool itself, right? Right. Not Yes. And then likewise with that, like a lot of times it's it's it's hard to like when you think about some of the things that make you the happiest, for many of us, they're kind of intangibles. They're really freaking hard to put your damn finger on what exactly that is. So like we just said, good at Jujitsu. What does that even mean good? Like you kind of know it when you see it, but it's pretty damn hard to put your finger on like like it's not a it's not a like a number, right? But you can say, oh, I want to make $100,000 or I want this 30, you know, $300,000 car, something, whatever it is, right? It's a Lambo. That's a that's a tangible thing that we can look at and we can go, oh, yeah. Right? And so you see people where they chase these tangibles when in reality, they're seeking something that's a little bit more intangible. And so sometimes you get the tangible thing, but you did it at the expense of all the intangible things that actually are going to make you happy. So for me, like when I'm looking at like my what I'm doing at the end of the year, I'm like, looking at stuff that like it it it revolves around lifestyle design and happiness. Does that make any sense? Yeah, no, no, I'm telling you. I don't and again, this is where I'm at now. I I think that's where I think you have to go back and figure out why do you want some of these things? You do. That's the soul searcher, right? And and you have to So I want to be good at Jujitsu. Great. Why? Do you want to win a gold medal? Well, we've talked to a lot of people that have won gold medals. And guess what? They did it and they're like, I got this gold medal. Now what? Yeah. Now what? I don't feel I think a lot of We have world champions. Like world champions, ACC world champions, IBJJF world champions. What now? What now? And they have like almost like a it's almost like they get down after it. It's like you did this thing. Now what? So I think getting good at something or wanting something, you have to realize why. Like I think that's that's great. Like the house. Well, do I want a big house just to say I have a big house to show people because nobody gives a shit. Really. I mean, some people will, but most most of your people that are close to you are not going to care that you have a big house. They're going to they're going to ask you, well, like they're not going to ask you, but it it's like like we bought a new house. And I was talking to my wife the other day and, you know, with with the holidays and stuff. She's like, it's really cool to have everybody over here. To have everybody come and spend time together. Like we have a space that will accommodate for people to come, family to come. We can all sit together at the table, have dinner, um, you know, talk and and everybody has a space and and you can see like the kids playing over here and and the adults sitting over here and having a conversation or playing a board game, whatever it is. And that's a special thing. She always wanted I've never had a big family, you know, and she's got a bigger family and she's always wanted like, hey, I want to have a space where the family can gather, everybody can come together. And that's been really cool to to to have that. Like, so we didn't just want a big house to have a big house. We wanted to be able to share it and have a place for for everyone to come come together. So, I guess you have to figure out your purpose, right? Because sometimes getting the big house is kind of a pain in the ass. Yeah. And it's it takes a lot of, you know, stress physically, mentally, emotionally to to get it. Why do you want it? Is it worth it? Yeah. Yeah. Well, and the thing is is like with that is the intangibles are easy. So like for instance, asking yourself the deep questions is why the hell do I do want to want this thing or want to do this thing? That that can be really tough because because, you know, you actually have to like dig a little bit, right? And a lot of times it's it's easier just to go, that looks nice. I want that. Yeah. Right? Because it's tangible. It's there versus like like, you know, like you see the car, you see the money, it's an easy number, easy you can easily put your finger on what that is versus digging into like your own psychology and figuring out why the hell do you want this in the first place. And then also you you kind of mentioned this, right? Like, this is completely off topic, but, you know, some but but not necessarily, I guess, because people will do things in order to gain people's respect or what they think respect, right? So you think, oh, man, if I have this nice car, this big house, people are going to really respect me or whatever. Think you're successful. Or think I'm successful, whatever, which is not necessarily the case. Um, and it's a really fast way to go broke or uh, to to basically imprison yourself in a life you don't like. Um, and there's a lot of other ways to do it, you know, that don't require that. Um, but again, there may be a reason why you want that thing, but you have to do the the deep soul searching. And so, you know, if you are going to embark on something, um, you kind of have to know what the hell you got to know yourself and know why you're chasing because I think that's really important. Um, because if you, you know, it goes back to that old like, uh, I'll I'll butcher it a little bit, like the the Nietzsche quote, um, which you don't have to like Nietzsche that much to sort of take the wisdom from it, which is if you know your why, you can deal with the how. Yeah. Right? So like if you know why you're doing something, then you can figure out, you know, how how to get it done. You know, and and that's really important. Well, there's a desire. Like if you have your why, then you have your purpose. You have your reason and there's a desire to do it. If you don't know why you're doing, I'm just doing this thing. I'm just working 50 hours a week, making all this money for what? What do you want? Right. Do you not have what you need now? Do you not have a car that drives you from point A to point B, a house, food? Like, I mean, what else do you need really? Right. Well, and then if you're like, okay, but then you're unhappy. Okay, well, you've got this money and you're still unhappy. And you got you bought more things and you're still unhappy. Well, maybe it's not that you're chasing. But then you go to Jujitsu and you go to like lifting and stuff like that. Like the physical stuff that people get into, especially around New Year's Eve, right? Okay, this is not easy. Like it's not going to be an easy road because first off, you're going to be changing you're you're you're let's say you guys have been out of the gym for a little bit or, you know, there's that coming back and kind of fighting through that like getting back into the routine. Yeah. If you're brand new and you're listening to this for some reason and you're getting into this for the first time, or maybe you're a Jujitsu person who's going to start lifting now because you know it's a good idea, whatever it is. You're changing up your routine. And I know that doesn't seem like a big deal, but like humans are creatures of habit and bro, it is a bitch to like alter your routine if it has been locked in place. Yeah. Especially if you're a little bit older and you got kids, you got a wife or a husband, you got things kind of going on. It's pretty tough to do. And I I I don't think people sort of they don't uh, they don't appreciate how difficult it is when you decide to say, all right, I'm now going to do this thing twice or three times a week or whatever. And then you have, you know, family and career and everything else. It's like trying to tug at you at the same time. And now you've got to fight for this little sliver of time in your in your week to to make these things happen. It's pretty damn difficult. You got to kind of know why the hell am I doing this again? And it has to be a good enough reason that's, you know, that means something enough to you to want to do to keep doing it. Um, you know, and you don't have to have it explicitly laid out. And it could be nothing more than simply it's something you find very enjoyable. Yeah. You know what I mean? It doesn't have to be any more deep than that. There could be something deep to it, but it could be but it could be literally like I enjoy doing this and it brings some some some sort of joy or enjoyment to my life or whatever and that could be that. But you got to kind of know what you're doing, right? Um, otherwise it's going to be a difficult thing. And you see so many people who come into this new year, who have these big goals set and they just completely wash out. And I don't think it's because they they don't even know why they're doing it. They're doing it because maybe someone else told them they should do it or because it's what society says they should be doing or whatever and they get into these goals and they wash out. Um, so, you know, there's that whole spiel. I think by the way, guys, this we're filming this in the morning. Usually we record a little bit later on the day. I just had coffee, so I'm buzzing all over the place. It's good. No, I mean, I think like it's almost like we're trying to unpack all these ideas on this stuff. It's like how like what what makes somebody what what gives you the goals that you want? What makes you successful in achieving those things? Like how do we how do you prioritize what I want and why I want it and what's your list, right? Like is it like is it sounds like, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, like for you, it's like, hey, how do I want my life to look and what makes me happy? These are the priorities in my life and then I build my goals off of that. It's not so much as like I want these physical things. It's like I want these things that make me happy. But also I think it's some kind of balance, right? It's like some kind of some kind of ebb and flow of of what you want and and because I mean everything like things are hard. Like to to get in good shape is hard. To get quote unquote good at Jujitsu is takes time, effort and you know, it's not not the easiest thing to accomplish to, you know, to achieve some kind of skill. Yeah. Those things aren't easily bought, I guess. So it's like you got to be able to commit and you have to I don't know, man. It's just you got to love it. That's the other thing too. So here's the thing. So I guess in like 2017, this is where this is maybe can kind of came from this whole lifestyle design thing. In 2017, um, I remember I was at a point where because like, you know, for any of you guys that have ever owned a business, a lot of times there's a period of like early on where you're not making anything and you're just scratching by and you're like, man, I would I would kill to just get this thing to off the ground a little bit. So by 2017, I was at a place where was the most financially secure I'd ever been at that point. And, you know, the gym was going, there was all these opportunities coming my way. Like everything was going, right? Because early on, you know, like 2010 is when I first started doing this stuff full-time. Broke was a joke, the whole thing. So pretty much at that point, I would say yes to everything, right? And I remember listening to one of my mentors talk about this. He would talk about kind of you want to design your lifestyle a little bit. He's like, you don't want to because I remember him, I would call him up in the middle of the day and he would be taking naps in the middle of the day and he kind of lived his life on his own terms. And I remember kind of asking him like, hey, why aren't you doing this? And he's like, well, I have a manager for this and I have this for this and I have a system for this. And he was he was really big on, he's like, you kind of want to you you want your you want to build your lifestyle and have your business revolve around it rather than you revolve around your business. He's like, because he's like, if you're a business owner, he's like, you're making it. Like you get to design it. He's like, why would you why would you purposely create something that you that like doesn't support you if you're going to do this, right? He's like, then he's like, you might as well just go be an employee. He's like, what's the point? And so I remember him kind of talking about that and 2017 rolls around and I mean, dude, I'm like, I'm I said yes to everything for the last few years. So at this point, this is like when I was like, when I was really starting to get stressed because it was like, get up in the morning around like maybe anywhere give or take between like 4:00 to 6:00, 4:30 to 6:30. I'd get up, work out, go to the gym, do some videos and teach classes, work on marketing stuff, more classes, training myself. I mean, the whole thing, busy, busy, busy, get home, more videos at the end of the day, get home around maybe 10:00 to 11:00 sometimes, you know, and I would do that for a few days. I would crash, sleep in a little bit, do it again for three more days, crash. That kind of thing. Um, and then Friday was kind of like my sort of rest day after class in the after getting up in the early in the morning, whatever. I remember on Friday, I would just chill for the day after everything was over. So from about like 2:00 to 2:00 and on, I was done for the day. And I was like, this is ridiculous. I remember coming out like and seeing the sun in the middle of the day and I could realize I wasn't getting outside enough to see the sun because I was so busy like inside working and teaching classes and everything. Nothing wrong with it, just too much. Um, because I've been saying yes to everything. I'm going to do everything. I'm just I'm just going to do more. Every time we talk, I just load it on my shoulders. I'll do more. That was very inefficient, not really smart about it, whatever. So, you know, I've talked about this story before, but I went on a little solo vacation down in Florida by myself for about a week where I didn't have to talk to anybody. I didn't have to teach classes. I didn't explain anything to anybody. I was just by myself doing nothing. Um, I'd walk around. I was basically and I remember going there kind of asking myself the question like, what do I want this whole what do I want this thing to look like? Like, okay, I I I'm now at a place where I've said yes to so much stuff. The wheels are spinning. Okay. Like the money's coming in. I'm not like, I'm, you know, I'm not in that that because, you know, if you're I'm sure your parents felt this when they came over to the country, right? Like, when things are really tight, you're at that point where you're like, I just you don't you want to have some security. You don't want to feel like you're like, you know, on the edge all the time. Right. The gym was no longer failing. It had been. It wasn't, you know, because there was one point like 2000 like was it 2011 where like money got getting real tight there for a little bit. Like we were sitting right there on the edge and we're like, man, like saying looking good. Too many months of this and it ain't going to be good. And then, you know, sort of things started to work out. Okay, so we're not there anymore. We have the there's there's money in the bank. The gym's doing well. Like, okay. How do you want to steer the ship? Right? And then figuring out how to steer the ship and then kind of looking at it and I remember going to the beach and like writing down like, what do I want my days to look like? What's the perfect week for me? Within reason too, again. I'm not I don't I don't want to be like, I'm I'm sitting on the beach drinking drinking alcohol while I make a million dollars a month or some some dumb shit that like some internet guru talks about. Like I like doing my work. I just wanted to kind of get a handle on it. Yeah. You know, and like, all right. Wrote down the week. Here's the people I'm going to need for certain things to help me out with. Here's the days I'd like to do things. And, you know, for the most part, within about a year, that came to be. Actually a little faster than I faster. I I sort of like was like hoping it would come by a year. It was about like maybe six months. All of a sudden, like it was magical. It's like I knew what I wanted. I knew what I needed. And magically, like, hey, I need someone to do this. Could you help me out with this? Yeah, sure. I can help you out with that. You know, it's like I had people that filled in the gaps because I knew what I was looking for. Because I had set the I had sort of designed it and then started to shape everything around this particular sort of schedule that I had. So I was like, okay, great. And so I've sort of followed that wherever whenever like at the end of the year, I'm like, okay, if I'm going to do some of these things, how does that actually look in like the the week of of my life? How does that how does that all work in? And there's a lot of stuff I just can't do. There's a lot of stuff I just simply can't do because I'm like, it might be fun, but it's like, where the hell am I going to squeeze it in? You know, you can only do so much stuff and is it really that important to me? Is it important to push this out enough? Because in order to get this thing done, I'm going to have to do this like every day. Am I willing to do that every day? Maybe not. And, you know, you can only do so much. Yeah. And so I think it's really important on that aspect like when you're getting into this, this could be a useful exercise for you guys. A lot of people won't do it. There's value in it, but it requires you to like sit down, stop scrolling your damn phone for a minute and like just be in your own thoughts, which is tough for people. It's like sit down and actually like write it down on a piece of paper. It doesn't have to be anything like like if you're struggling with any of this stuff or maybe you just want to kind of like get a handle on it. You'd like to get more done. Just like, what does your week look like? Like what do you do in a week and like write that stuff down. Like write it down like in hour blocks. Like here's what I'm doing. And again, it's going to look a little different. It's going to get messy, of course. But in a perfect week, what does it look like? You know, and it's not to say that you can control it completely, but we do have some control over our lives and we can kind of put things into place. And it's a useful thing to have those just a guide. Because then you're like, this is what it this is what a perfect week would look like to me. And then you could kind of compare it with how are you living right now? You know, and a lot of us, you know, you could look at things you're doing, maybe, I'd like to change this around, whatever. You know, it's a useful exercise. And I I I encourage anybody really everybody to do it. Again, most people won't do it because it requires you to sit and just with a piece of paper in your hand and less distraction, which is hard for people. But it's a really useful exercise. I I think like being able to write stuff down, like just journaling, writing stuff down, it's kind of like a great way to get your ideas in front of you. Flush them out a little bit. Um, but one of the things you said, you know, which I think is super important if you have any kind of goal or something you want to accomplish is is it's hard to do all the research on your own. It's a lot of time, effort, like finding a coach or like a mentor is somebody that's been there. They can guide you, make you help you be more efficient, number one. And they'll show you things that work, that don't work, but also you may find some ideas that work for them that work for you as well. But the big thing about a coach is the accountability. Sure. I think the accountability is so I think it's one of the most important things. It it makes life easier for you in a lot of ways, but it also gives you somebody that that you're accountable to. That's why you go that's why you don't go and learn Jujitsu by yourself in your garage. You go to a gym or train with somebody that's got experience because they can kind of guide you. Same thing, you know, with Eli, who's does all the strength and conditioning for all of us and the diet for a lot of us. We've all been to the gym, most of us that that like to lift weights, we've lifted. We kind of know what we're doing. But hey, do you want to be a little better, more efficient? Do you want to also take that off our plate a little bit, take the the mental part of it, so I don't have to think about what I'm going to do. And the other part of it is, you know, somebody's like, I have to check in every week and I have to be accountable, so I can't, you know, I think it helps me be more consistent. Oh, of course. I think that's huge for me. I think that's huge for me. And with with his stuff, like with his lifting and nutrition, there's this thing where like, there's some really nifty things you can do with breath work, right? Like, there's a lot of things that you can do with breathing. And just because you breathe, because all of us breathe, right? Sort of required to live. Just because you breathe, doesn't mean you can breathe well. Yeah, yeah. Right? And like, I I meet people who can't even breathe into their like their lower like part of their lungs. Like they're not used to like their diaphragm can't fully expand, right? Um, well, likewise, a lot of people sort of think they know what they're doing with eating and lifting. They've gone to the gym and lifted weights. They think they know what they're doing. You know, you're like, well, why do you not look the way you want to look? Um, and then, you know, a lot of people because they have eaten or because maybe they've eaten a little bit and they've lost a couple of pounds at some point. They think they know what they're doing with weight weight loss, but they don't. And again, I I'm not saying this because I'm like the master. Like I I didn't realize how little I knew about the fact like, for instance, with food. If there is any mystery whatsoever about food, you have no idea what you're doing. And what I mean by what I mean by mystery is is if you can't lose weight or gain weight kind of on command, you just have no idea what you're doing. Or you're just really like undisciplined with it, right? And that that probably becomes from like you said, you don't have accountability or you don't have a good relationship with food. I struggled with this a long time ago. Um, I'm better now, but like it used to be that like I could not have anything in the house sweet wise. Could not have it because if it was there, I was going to eat it and it was bad. Yeah. Now, it's like I can I can I and I this sounds like so small, but I can scoop out, I can take a scoop of ice cream. I can measure out a serving size and eat it and then that's it. And I don't have to go back for it. Back in the day, it was like, if there was a pint of ice cream, that was my serving size. I mean, I ate the pint because that it was just going to happen. Um, you know, now I can I can sort of like we went and we went to family dinner like this yesterday and they had Tres Leches cake. I love Tres Leches cake. It's my favorite. Um, it's it's amazing. And I had a real I got a nice little square. That was it. Done. Yeah. That no more, right? Um, whereas before, I would have eaten half the damn tray and then like, you know, not left enough for everybody else. Um, but so, you know, you see this where people don't have the relationship with food, whatever. And so if food has a situation where like you don't know how to eat to get the performance that you want. If you don't know how to eat to support your workouts. If you don't know how to eat to lose weight or gain weight, then you just don't know what you're doing. And a lot of people mistakenly think that they do. Right? It's kind of like money. None of us grew up for the most part in America, understanding how to like properly make and use and invest and like handle our money. And it's it's abundantly clear by the way that people are just crushed in the amount of debt that they have. Yeah. Right? You're like, I mean, and this is this is not me like poking the finger. This is me just growing up in the system and realizing what it is what it is. Right? So you have to learn what to do with it because you have no fucking idea with what you're doing. Now, just because you bought a pack of gum at the the store, doesn't mean you know how to properly spend your money. Yet you have spent money, but you don't know how to spend it properly if if you if you're trying to like take care of yourself for the long term. So a lot of people think they know how to lift. They think they know how to eat, but for some reason, they don't look the way they want to look. You don't. And and you have to admit it. And like that's me. Like I I I remember telling Jess, like I was sort of ignorant ignorantly arrogant about there's those people. There's ignorant people, which are okay. If if they realize they're ignorant, right? Because ignorance is not a bad word, by the way. Ignorant just means you don't know. People a lot of times you can say uninformed if you wish. People a lot of times you say ignorant, they're like, oh, that's so mean. What does that mean? It's just a word. Ignorant means you just you're unaware, don't know. And then there's like arrogant people who maybe know what they're doing and they're arrogant. And then there's ignorant arrogant people. People who don't know what they're doing and they're really arrogant as if they think they do what they're doing. Those are the worst people. And sometimes like there's a lot of us that are like, oh, I know what I'm doing. I'm good. I'm good. I'm good. You're like, well, again, it goes back to it. So with that, you know, like with lifting stuff, that's where like guys like Eli are really freaking helpful. You know, and hiring a coach in a particular area sometimes requires a lot of humility because you're going to say, I don't I can't do this on my own. And that's hard for a lot of us to say that I can't do this on my own. I need a little help. Just like throw me a bone. Um, and that's a really it's it's a it's a useful thing. And that's like why um, in my book that I wrote, the little survive book, like one of the first chapters is talking about like when you come into the gym, the first act is of of one of submission. Not in like you're rolling over and showing your belly like a dog, but submission to like learning the stuff, right? Because like a lot of people come in with these guys like for me, for instance, I came in with wrestling. I thought I was going to be really good and so forth and so on. First thing you have to do is submit yourself to like, I have no idea what I'm doing. Teach me. You know, and there's that aspect of it. Um, and there's a submission to that. And then time you hire a coach, you're submitting to having them help you and you got to listen to them and be coachable. You do the same thing when you go to the gym, hopefully. Like when someone who knows more about what they're what you're doing, you are listening. Doesn't mean you don't ask questions, but you are taking what they're they're doing. Um, one thing I I did want to bring up and this is kind of like what I think's really important for any of you guys when it comes to like getting into the new year or if you're going to maybe you're listening to this and it's not the new year. You're you're starting to put something else new on the plate. Like let's say you're going to you've never really lifted before and you're going to go into the gym and lift. Or maybe you've never done Jujitsu before, you're going to start doing Jujitsu. Or maybe you've been out for a while and you're going to get back into the gym for again, right? Your goal is should not be anything big. You should aim really low. Um, and what I mean by this is just aim low in the sense that you want to choose something relatively small that you can hit on, gain that momentum from, but it but it works you towards your goal. This is why I go back to daily habits versus the big goal that I was talking about earlier with the list. Like once I figure out what I want to do, I'm like, what what habit do I have to figure out? What do I have to do in my lifestyle? How does it have to be plugged into it? The reason why I say that is like, for instance, if you're going to be like uh, going into the gym and lifting weights, if you're going to change your body radically through lifting weights, it's not about like a a massive PR. It's not about having six-pack abs. It's about first you becoming the kind of person that goes to the gym every day. That's what's important. And it may not be every day, maybe every other day, maybe two times a week, whatever you can manage. It's about you becoming that kind of person. Right? And this is what it always is. It's always about becoming the kind of person that can do the thing. Right? If any of you guys have ever accomplished a particular goal, you realize that like there's it goes back to this tangible, intangible thing. There's an intangible quality that made the tangible goal that you had possible, right? So for instance, if like, okay, um, I trained and then in 2022 won like no-gi worlds in my weight class. Okay. That's a tangible goal. I got a medal for that. There's a title associated. I was first place sitting on the pole, all numbers and nice, whatever. How did I do that? With a lot of intangible things that talk about skill acquisition, me being able to use certain techniques. It's really tough to put your finger on, right? How do you measure that? That's tough. And so again, it goes but it went back to I was doing these these certain daily habits, regular, whatever. And I became the kind of person that could win worlds. Okay. Like you, you and your wife, you have you have a beautiful home. You guys own a business here where your wife has her massage therapy practice and stuff like that. Um, you have a lot of you have, you know, nice cars, all this stuff, right? So you you have a you have a good life. Well, the good life wasn't brought about by some like one quick snap of whatever. It became like 20 plus years of stacking certain habits and behaviors and you became the kind of people that could do these things. You acquired skills. Your wife acquired skills. You guys used your money in particular ways and you learned certain things and so forth and so on. And you became the kind of people that could do these things. And if we took everything away from you, now, sure, maybe it would be very frustrating, but you could build back up because you were the kind of people that could accomplish those certain things because of the skills and everything that you'd learned. It's always about the becoming that matters, not the thing. The tangible thing, you can use it, the external thing that you're chasing after, that's great. Have it if you like it, put it out there, use it as motivation. But ultimately, like, you know, again, if you're a black belt, let's just say this, right? We belts get kind of touchy sometimes. It's not about becoming the black belt in the sense of like the getting the belt wrapped around your waist. It's about becoming the person who can uphold the skill of the black belt. That's what matters. We all know that, right? But that's an intangible thing, right? Because you're saying like skill and being able to do it. Those are hard to like, again, put your finger on. You know it when you see it. You know like you you you know a good Jujitsu practitioner when you see him roll and you see him move around people and they're able to, you know, roll up humans in pretzels. But putting your finger on what exactly that is, like how many milliseconds they're responding to, I don't who knows? You see it though. And I think that's the thing, right? So it's never about the goal itself. It's about you becoming the kind of person that can reach that goal. And I think that's really important. So, you know, if if maybe it's some other goal. If you guys are thinking about doing something in the next year, I think the big the big thing is becoming that kind of person. What kind of person do you have to become to make that particular type of thing happen? You may not know that yet, but you can start to figure out things that you can shoot for to make that happen. And if it's lifting weights, if it's dieting, whatever, like if you're trying to get ripped, trying to get shredded, what kind of foods does a person eat that's shredded? You know, what kind of what kind of habits do they have? What kind of person are they on a daily basis? Okay, well, then it goes to the coaching thing, right? You can hire some of those people and say, hey, what kind of food do I need to eat? And you can quickly realize that. Um, but again, you kind of have to put yourself in that place. Like, sitting around to eat a cupcake. Is this what the kind of person that's shredded eats on a daily basis? Probably not. You know, like, um, getting ready to like skip your workout. Oh, but I want to get leaned out. I want to get more muscular. What what kind of person that was in good good shape, what would they do? Well, they'd get and go to the workout. So that that's really important. I think the becoming and figuring out things that help you towards that. That's a far more important goal in the beginning. And that doesn't require anything crazy. That's like a daily goal thing. That's like you just did your daily action for the day and you can take satisfaction knowing that you did what you're supposed to do versus like, there's this big long goal far off. Do you think um, you start with the goal and then backtrack? Like figure out like say I want to be this I want to accomplish this thing. Then then you you have that goal and start to backtrack. What's the person I need to become to achieve this? I mean, is that kind of the way to think about it? I mean, like how do you even like That's the way I think about it. Yeah. And how do people even like You don't know. Yeah. Is that you're going to is that you're going to ask? Well, I just mean, how do you even like figure out what that goal is, I guess. I well, we talked about it, maybe just figuring out what what makes you happy, right? What what you want to what you're willing to, I guess, in some ways sacrifice with time and that those type of things. Like what's your balance of of of like your happiness? Like is is your happiness, is your time away or whatever, is that worth it to achieve this thing? Um, knowing that. Um, but yeah, I guess figuring out the goal and then figuring out your why and then going back and figuring out, hey, who do I need to become to achieve this this thing? And what is that what is that person do? Yeah, what does that person do? What does that person do? And what do they have to do on a regular basis? And you may not know, like that, you know, that could change, right? Because you go into it with one sort of head space, think, okay, here's what I need to do. And then you get into it, you realize you have to do something else, but you're still moving. There's there's there's there's power in momentum. When you look at the the root word of motivation, Yeah. Comes from like mover and motivus, like Latin words, essentially they get down to move, direct. Yeah. And so movement. The word motivation is derived from movement. So like when you're you're not motivated if you're sitting around waiting for motivation to strike you, well, good luck. It's motivation like waiting for motivation is like waiting around for like your really unreliable friend to pick you up for something. It's not going to happen. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like they're not coming. Motivation is something you create. You know, what you guys are looking for is inspiration and that's like be ready for that. That's like who who knows when that's going to happen. Right? That's like something that comes from us from somewhere else. So the idea of inspiration is like to inspire, to breathe in, to be like hit by some divine spark. But motivation comes from you. You create motivation when you're taking action. Everybody that's like you if you if you've set some goal for yourself and you've taken like just some small action towards it, you feel satisfied about doing that. It feels good. And that's what you should be focused on. That to me, that's like what the most important part because that's a daily action you can take satisfaction from. You can feel you can feel motivated that you did the damn thing and that's who leads you to become that kind of person because like again, going back to if you're going to become like a Jujitsu black belt, well, Jujitsu black belts, they train consistently. Unless you have a lot of money and then you buy it. But otherwise, you're training really consistently. Right? We're not talking about anybody for training. I'm there's plenty of there's a few of them, right? Um, you know, but I mean, you're you're training consistently, right? If you're doing it for the right reasons because you want that skill, not the not the belt itself, right? You're training consistently. That's what you got to do, right? That's that's just part of it. There's no work around to that. Um, I mean, there you go, right? If you're if you're trying to get in better shape and get leaned out, well, then you're on you're on your diet, not a diet, but your diet, the diet that you're going to live on like every day, all the time and you can just you have to figure out foods that work within that diet and you just stay on the diet. That's it. There's no like get on the diet sometime. Just stay on the diet. Like make it your diet because that's what the kind of person that's going to be in that kind of shape is going to do. Um, you know, I I I was listening to uh, our friend uh, Andy Stump. I was listening to him. He was a Navy SEAL instructor at one point. And he said that I was I thought this was just really useful. He said that like the the thing that he could do to get the people to quit, you know, because like when they're in these the, you know, they're they're going through their training, they're just, you know, harassing them basically to to to to test them mentally. He said it wasn't the push-ups, it wasn't the water. It wasn't anything. He's like, what could get the people to quit the most is if you could get them to see how far off their objective is at that point, right? And he said that was the one that would just nail in the coffin for him. If you could get this person mentally to start thinking about how far off the goal is, how far off the objective is, that's that was the thing that would make them quit the most. He's like, because if they were like mentally like just repping their push-ups out, dunking the water, whatever, and if they were just holding mentally, they were just thinking about one step in front of them. And this he's I I've I've shared this idea before from I thought it was really good when he was talking about making your world small. He said like, basically, you know, you just you you make it really small. Like what is the thing you have to do right now? And if you're thinking about like, okay, if you're, you know, you have some ungodly number of push-ups that you're doing in cold, frigid water, you're not thinking about, well, we have to do 40 more push-ups. You're like, I just got to do one. One. And if you're like, you know, if you're running a really long race or something, it's like one foot in front of the other kind of thing. That's kind of idea, right? Um, and a lot of times when, you know, you think about people set these big goals. I want to do something big, right? And I know people have I've gotten messages from people and like, what's your big goal this year? I'm like, I don't really have a big goal necessarily. And sometimes it's it's a struggle because I work with people like in different things that I do and they're like, what's your what like they're thinking big. And then me, I'm thinking about like, kind of like, I I don't I don't get me wrong. I think strategically long-term, but but I'm very like much in the what do I got to do right now? Yeah. Because like that the big the big goal doesn't really like interest me that much. It's like it's set. It's there. I know what I'm looking at, but then I'm going backwards and saying like, what do we got to do right now to like make this moment successful? Because that to me, because those stack. It's almost like money, right? Where you if you're trying to like, let's say if you're you have an an investment account of some sort and it's gaining like a certain amount of interest every every uh, month or year or whatever. And you're trying to reach some big number. Well, early on when you're first investing, it doesn't move much. But once you get that sucker packed in there and there's there's some money in it, it starts to get some momentum behind it. And then it happens with us, right? Like when you start taking action towards something, in the beginning, it's like, you know, again, it's that adage I've used before, drops in a bucket. You know, it's a drop. One drop in a bucket, not a big deal. You got a leaky faucet going, you put that bucket underneath of it, a couple drops, no big deal. Keeps going though. Eventually that thing's thing's full. It's overflowing and you got there's plenty of water there. Um, it's the same idea. Like when you start training, like the your your early training sessions are so crappy and unremarkable and you suck and it's just the way it is. And then five years later, you're like, wow, I'm really good at this stuff. Like you if you've trained five years consistently, the new people come in and think you're a damn wizard. You know, like they're like, dude, like because they're you're you're rolling them up in a pretzel, they can't do anything and they're like, this guy's so good. Five years of staying on a diet. I have pictures of myself from about five years ago when I first started with Eli, right? And this is the first time I got on like a really regimented diet all the time and I weigh about the same. Actually, I I weigh less than I did when I first started and I look bigger. I'm more defined muscularly. Like, I mean, it's it's wild to see the difference. And again, it's so not noticeable on a daily basis because you're changing so gradually, you know? It's like when you if you have a kid, they're grown and then all of a sudden you're like, oh, snaps, like you just you you realize they just grew out of a shirt or you you you measure them on the little marker and you're like, whoa, or you see a picture from them from a year ago. Um, with Luca, our son, he's like grown so rapidly because he's young and I'm like looking at him from like last year. Like last year, he was babbling a little bit, couldn't speak very well. Like now, like almost full-blown conversations with him. It's wild, right? Um, but, you know, so you see those changes like that. And so, um, I think that's like the the really important thing. So like you you you set these things and you just do those little actions, those little drops in those buckets, those little deposits. And that builds up over time. And it's not the fun, it's not the sexy part, whatever, but that's kind of what leads to it because like when you talk to someone that's really good at Jujitsu, there's no magic about it. They just trained. Now, don't get me wrong, there's good training and there's probably less than optimal training. But if you're just if you're if you're putting your best foot forward, you're getting you're going to get some results. Um, you know, and you look at people that have like impressive physiques and everything else. You know, sure there's some people that have some good genetics and things like that. They maybe got a little bit easier, but generally it's because they freaking busted their butts. You know, it's not it's not magic, you know? Um, when you look at a lot of like athletes and stuff like that that have these amazing results, their lives are relatively boring because they're doing this thing, you know, it's like, you know, there it's like a look at a racehorse. Like a a champion racehorse isn't out like running this out in these like open meadows and and plains. It's like, they run them, they stuff them in a stall, they let them rest and whatever. They're trying to keep you wouldn't be I mean, it's kind of what happens with athletes. You look at athletes and they're like training really hard, they're doing all this stuff and then they go home and like take naps, play video games to try to cool their mind off, eat some food and then they go back and do it again. It's it's not a glamorous lifestyle. So, I think sometimes, you know, you have to uh, you have to just kind of be boring and just do those little daily actions and it's it's far more it's more important to be focused on all those little things. And again, going back to it, I'll I'll re-tie the sole idea and I think that's why it's really important where when you take on these new goals and these new things, you got to figure out like what am I doing right now? And then what do I have to do or what do I think I need to do in order to make this happen? Because we may not know. Yeah. Um, and then how will that sort of work its way in there? And I think that's important. That's like that's the big that's the big takeaway. I think for me, at least for any of you guys today, is like if you if you're trying to chase after something, it's focus on the small stuff. Little small stuff. The unimportant stuff, the unsexy stuff, the stuff that like you can do in a day that you can get some motivation from, that keeps you moving, that builds the momentum, that kind of gives you that like that forward like energy. Like, yeah, I'm doing something. That's really important versus, man, I suck at Jujitsu. I'm never going to do this. Or, God, I I want to bench press 400 and something pounds and, man, I I can barely lift the bar right now. Yeah, just keep going. You know, that's it. All right, guys. So hopefully you enjoyed that podcast. Hopefully you got something from it. Um, again, just a reminder, if you guys want to check out our Patreon, you can do so. Our Patreon's at patreon.com/thejujitsupodcast. And a bunch of different perks for being on that podcast extras. If you want to check it out, you can go to the website to see what's all available to you. Uh, one of the things we do talk about on that podcast or extra is basically one of like we talked about like one of the biggest things that today about not reaching your goals, which is, you know, looking at the big thing versus the little small action you got to do right now. Um, we get into that podcast on daily activities, things you can do daily, but one of the first things I talk about in that is probably the just the biggest thing that just kills people's ability to like accomplish anything. Um, and I remember when doing our Executor's Challenges the last couple of years. By the way, if you're listening to this and you didn't hear it earlier, we'll be doing the next one in February or March, a little bit later in the year. But with that, one of the biggest things that typically takes away from people, um, it it's it's one simple activity. And the first thing we do in the Executor's Challenge on day one is like I sort of put the challenge to them like, here's your first task. If you can't do this, let's not even do this because we're not going to be able to make any headwind or any headway. Excuse me, headwind. Headway. And so we talk about that sort of thing in that challenge. And a lot of people got a lot from just that one thing alone. And so we talk about that in the uh, podcast extras. If you want want to get it, it's available to you at the Patreon, patreon.com/thejujitsupodcast. Um, also, guys, thanks to our sponsors for helping to make the podcast happen. Epic Roll's been a long-time sponsor. They make Jujitsu gear. They're a Jujitsu brand, but they make Gees, Rash Guards, shorts, all the training gear you need to compete and train in. They make amazing t-shirts and joggers and fanny packs, anything and everything Jujitsu related, they make it. Good quality stuff, good material. It feels good. I I guess that's what I'll say. Like when I get some stuff, I there's a company actually that sent me like a nice package of stuff and I got it and I I did not like it at all. So actually a big name company. And I remember getting it and I felt like it was almost like a the Rash Guard felt like a a wet suit. You ever worn a wet suit? Like almost rubbery. I don't know if I have one. But I know what you mean. I I think I put one on. I was like, man, I was like, what is this? And the shorts weren't very comfortable. I just didn't like the fit of it. Now, I'm sure some of the people liked it, but for me, like Epic Roll is like it's a good mix between good quality, reasonable pricing, right? And I get I get all my Rash Guards and stuff made through them. And I like the fit too. You know what I mean? Like the fit's good. Like for a guy that's like trying to like, I don't want it to be too tight, but I don't want it to be too big, you know, and that kind of thing. I want to be able to show off the arms a little bit, but at the same time, I don't want to be wearing like some thick wet suit, whatever. It's good quality stuff. So I like it. I like it a lot. And again, all their t-shirts and stuff are great, great designs, great customer service. I like to support the guys over they've become friends to me. Um, and they do a good job. So if you guys want to check them out, epicrollbjj.com and the website is Jujitsu 20 for 20% off the order. Also, guys, if you want to check out our sponsor Charlotte's Web, they've been with us for a long time. They make a lot of good products. All their stuff is third-party tested, meaning that, you know, whether it's CBD or all the mushroom stuff that they make, right? Because they make a lot of different functional mushroom products like Reishi, Lion's Mane and stuff like that. It's all third-party tested. So, with their CBD products in particular, third-party testing, they make sure that what's in that bottle is what's in it, right? So that doesn't maybe seem like a big deal, but with the market that's FDA unregulated, right? Which means that people can put all kinds of crazy stuff into those products and they're free to do so. They make sure that their products are a notch above. And, you know, they're sort of anticipating or hoping for some regulation so it can just be a widely spread thing. Uh, but again, they make good products. Um, they've been tested, they're good. I've used them for years. I like their stuff mostly for recovery. So again, you know, I I've said this before in the earlier podcast, so maybe this is just repeating for some of you guys, but, you know, if you're going to like if you want to really get detailed into recovery, drop the ice baths, drop all the the the the light stuff, whatever, it just scroll that stuff first. Start with good sleep, good eating, and limiting your stress. You know, and like like stress meaning training too. So like there could be work stress and everything else, but if you're just training all the time and you're never giving your body a a minute to rest, you know, you can undulate your training to make it not so intense, but if you're just banging your body up too much, it's going to be hard to recover. You know, and so as we get older, a lot of times we're always trying to tweak the recovery. And then those are your big three, right? Everything else is sort of extra. You know, that's where you get the ice baths and the supplements and the light therapies and whatever else you want to. Um, add those things into it. Make those other things right first. Um, but if you guys want to check out the products, I do like them for recovery primarily because I feel like I get better rest with it. I feel like it helps put my mind into a more relaxed state. And so I like it for those reasons. And if you guys want to try it and see if it does the same for you, you can do the do so by going to their website at Charlottesweb.com and the promo code is Jujitsu 30 for 30% off the order. Also, if you guys want to check out my website and get a free guide that'll help you get better at Jujitsu more quickly, you can do so by going to my website at Jujitsu.net/join. So one of the things that most people do when they train is they go into the gym and they just don't have an idea as to what they're doing. They're just training. They're going through the motions. I'm here, right? If you want to get better at Jujitsu, one of the things that sort of is shared amongst all the best people I've ever met in Jujitsu, all the world champions, and even all the guys in my gym, all my best students. When they come into the gym, they kind of have an idea of what they're doing there. Doesn't mean that's the only thing they're doing, but they have a goal in mind as to what they're chasing after right now. They know what they're trying to work towards. And so when they go to those their open rolling sessions, they're not just sort of going there and like, hey, let's see what happens. I mean, sometimes there might be a little bit of that because you just want to enjoy training. But if you're trying to actually get better, right? And that's a lot of times for people that are like, oh, I'm just not getting I'm not improving. I'm not getting better. I'm not What are you focused on? And a lot of times that happens. I'll tell people, hey, you're not they're saying I'm not getting better. I feel like I'm hitting a plateau, whatever. Okay, what are you focused on right now? Usually crickets. Not a lot of information there. So, you want to have something you're actually deliberately training towards. And again, I give some strategies, about 12 of them, to help you get more from your training. And it's stuff that can be done and has been done by world champion black belts. But it can also be done by your newer white belts that are coming into this thing and they're just getting started. So you can do a little bit of everywhere. There's some strategies for anyone. And it also comes along with a video in case you don't want to read. So if you want to check that out and join my Chu Crew email subscriber list, you can do so by going to my website at Jujitsu.net. You'll get my daily email afterwards, which goes through just anything and everything that I want to share with you that I think might be useful to your training or your life off the mat. Uh, check it out there. And so, guys, with that said, I think um, that's a wrap for the day. Hopefully you guys are doing well. Hopefully you had a good holiday, whichever one you celebrate, celebrated because I think there's a bunch of holidays that happen at towards the end of the year. And then we're in 2026 now. So hopefully you guys are off to a good start with your training and everything else that you're doing. And uh, appreciate you guys for being here.