015 - Starting a Business, Focus Rituals, and Actually Getting Up at 6 AM

[0:01] Welcome to build horizons, a show about picking the life you want to lead and how to make it happen. Uh, today we're going to be talking about starting a business. We're going to be talking about rituals, uh, and how our 11:00 PM self is definitely different than our 6:00 AM self and all kinds of other things. But first to the intro.

[0:58] subscribe if you missed what the graphic told you to do we'll just wait here sitting around uh katy what do we got this week what are we starting off with yeah so last week we mentioned that i was going to be gone for a good chunk of the week on a work trip to new york and i just want to follow up with our listeners how was solo parenting week yeah no big deal i don't know what you make a big fuss about the whole thing you have to have at least a few good stories of the chaos since mom was gone but maybe not you know i don't want to like put you in a stereotype but uh i mean here's the thing is uh you are definitely the more uh picker-upper around the house or type person than i am that's true uh and so you know that was uh actually i will give credit to the the seven-year-old girl in our household she did a fantastic job of filling in for mom she uh yep she took out the trash without being asked. She did the dishes. So yeah, I mean, I do have like a little mini you around the house, which does help quite a bit. Yeah. Yeah. She did really good. She's starting to figure out, you know, we probably should do better about chores for the kids, but she just kind of naturally is picked up on it a little bit. Yeah. She picks up on, on her

[2:13] mom and what she does. Yeah. When I walked, so I got in really late on, Oh, you should hit auto. Oh yeah. Good call thank you i mean we need to maybe we should put that in our show notes of jeff hit auto in all caps and then it won't oh is somebody on i mean there's so we're doing um youtube live and there's actually people on there right now um hi hi friends anyway so when i got it i got in like really late for some reason it's not moving from you jeff i don't know if it's stuck on me yeah there we go I don't know it just seemed a little weird but sorry guys technical difficulties um but I got in pretty late and I was very tired I don't know there's just something about work trips that just drain you they're fun and I was it was so cool to see New York again but way tired um and I wasn't too overwhelmed with the amount of things there was gonna be to do the next day so good job I'm really I'm proud of you good job but I did hear that your mom had to do our laundry because you started the washer as you were leaving for your work trip? She offered to do it. Can you go over there, and I'll talk a little bit about some other stuff and fix the camera angle because I have to lean away. Wait, which one? This one? That camera that I'm pointing at.

[3:28] Can you go fix that? This is great podcasting material. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. If only there was some way to figure these sort of things out ahead of time, other direction. There we go. Look at that, everybody. Give Katy a hand. This is live. I mean, we don't edit this podcast. Nope. This is truly like real life. And sometimes you accidentally forget to send our cameras. But no, one of the things that you normally do that we've actually talked about on the show is taking our son to personal training at the local YMCA. And I typically do not participate in that. That's a son and mom thing that you guys do together. Yeah, it's really fun. I've really been enjoying that. But when mom was in New York, dad's up to bat. And so I, I did that and, uh, man, I'll tell you, I, it was a good, uh, reminder that I should probably be doing more squats and lunges in my life because we did lots of squats and lunges and I was sore for about, uh, four days. Yeah. So Averyn told me that you guys did. Um, so what the, our personal trainer, he makes it so fun. And that was kind of the whole point of doing this with Averyn is to make it fun and make like let him see that fitness really can be fun but he does the Jenga so you have

[4:46] to did he do the Jenga game with you yeah and I'm not very good at balancing on the stupid ball half ball thing yeah yeah okay so did you get any freebies or did you have to get one freebie oh nice I ended up just doing stuff anyway so yeah no so like I don't know it's just it's so fun yeah I got I always get the worst Jenga so there's like different exercises depending on which one you're able to pull out and then you have to do it and then once you make it fall there's punishment what i was um so we also did like a tic-tac-toe game and at first i beat him because tic-tac-toe master over here uh and then i didn't know if i would get judged by our personal trainer guy for letting our son win uh but i did let him win twice after that did you do very much agility stuff no like on the ladder no we didn't oh i'm so surprised i was wondering what you would think about that like back in your football days of when you guys would do agility ladders but we've we do that a lot just lots of lunges and lots of squats and that's painful man i'll tell you oh yeah and you did the rowing machine how was that was that your first time on a rowing machine uh i've done it one other time i think yeah just randomly yeah um that's a good workout i kind of like it yeah it's like full body respect for rowers respect for rowers um anyway so then moving right along to

[6:01] another our intro topic which is just makes me I'm excited for this but Jeff maybe not so much so we're doing you're excited it's just outside of your comfort zone but we're having a game night tonight with some new friends and they're people that live in our neighborhood and our kids are really close to the same age and we've been invited to do a game night and I know this family maybe a little more than you know this family just because I go um work out with the wife and she's become a really good friend but how are you feeling about game night well I guess like what um we don't do a ton out in the world um no it's really sad actually is it though isn't it not just the most beautiful wonderful thing I feel like after being in New York for a week and how like everything there is just so fast and there's just so many things to do. Coming back to the Midwest and having, I don't know. It's just so much slower here. And I feel like there's a delicate, there's a medium. Like I feel like we should do a little bit more than we do, but yeah, I don't know. But anyways, continue. Well, I just like, what would be your

[7:18] ideal amount of doing stuff with other friend group type people I don't know like once every month or two I think is fun month or two yeah nothing crazy because I mean everyone's busy but I think game nights are so fun and I'm not even like I didn't really grow up playing games with the family but whenever I do it it's a lot of fun like I enjoy that and it's easy I feel like when you have a game night you don't have to it's just i don't know naturally you don't have to really try like it's just fun are people saying things oh i love your videos thank you what is this about do you want to say what this is about and then answer that question let me let me let's finish this topic and then before we go into anything else we'll kind of explain what all this is about if you hang around uh so the the thing okay so uh doing things with friends and stuff i am definitely an introvert and uh with my job right now the day job not the company job i have had to do lots and lots and lots of peopling so i'm pretty exhausted on most days and look forward to the weekends of not doing anything um the the thing of it is is like i it's not that i don't have fun i mean i i'll i'll have a good time and it'll be

[8:34] good um but i do feel like that it just comes at a trade off as everything does in life. And I, you know, with the company things, there's just a lot that I want to do. And if you have, you know, evening plans, then you do have a hard cut off on when you need to be done wrapping that stuff up. And so like, there's, there's that, which just changes the dynamic of like, well, I can just work until I'm tired. Um, and now it's, I can work till X time. So there's, you know, that trade off, but it'll, it'll, it'll be fine. It's just, you know, you only, you only have so much energy to give and it is a little bit of a hard time. And I know like next weekend, I'm also not going to be able to, uh, do much. So the, yeah, it, it, it just compounds a little bit. So there's that part. And I can sympathize with the fact that for an introvert things like this do require a lot more energy than somebody I'm a little bit more of an extrovert I would say definitely a people person just looking at the comments on YouTube well we'll get to we'll get to YouTube stuff here in just a second about what is it about so so give us just one second but definitely I can sympathize with you that this is a lot more effort

[9:49] so as a wife and partner I do appreciate you doing this because I think it's going to be a good time And I'm excited tonight. And we are going to bring our kids. It sounds like they have lots of fun stuff to do out there where their property is that they're going to have us come out. But yeah, it'll be really fun. Yeah, it'll be fun. So what's the show about, Katy? Oh, you're going to make me do it. So this is a show. So hello, you've stumbled upon our podcast and that's what we're doing. That's what this is. We're recording a podcast and you can go to our channel and listen to our other podcast. but this is a show about picking the life you want to leave and lead, not leave. Oh my gosh, that's lead and leave are very different. Picking a life you want to lead and how to make it happen. But that we talk about just things. Um, I don't know. We talk about a lot of different things. Yeah. I mean, I would, I would kind of summarize it into, uh, how to make positive change in your life and we, we answer questions, um, to that end, uh, and usually focuses around, you know, habit building, fitness stuff, uh, business things, work life things. Yeah. And family. I mean, we talk about our kids. We have two kids. Yeah. We were just talking about some, some family stuff and some, some more recent things. So

[11:04] just trying to, um, you know, just put some good vibes out in the world and enjoy spending time talking with one another. And also, you know, uh, if, if anybody else gets any amount of help from any of that, that is a time well spent. Yeah. And I guess a little bit of background on us. And I know people probably, if they've listened to the first episode, they'll have this background, but we've been married 15 years. And, um, Jeff has asked me to do this podcast for a really long time. And I finally said, okay, I'll try. I'll see what happens with the podcast. And now how many, what, what week are we on? Like how many podcast episodes have we done uh can you read out my comment please yes we can read out your comment there you go um what were you guys at baseball five in rg thank you yeah thanks for subscribing yes thank you that's so sweet um kind of lost my train of thought that's right oh about us and how you wanted me to do this podcast but one other thing in our intro i wanted to talk about is uh good luck to marathoners um i know it is prairie fire here locally which is so exciting because there's only one marathon a year here in wichita one full marathon yeah yeah full marathon

[12:20] as far as a boston qualifier um and then chicago marathon is also this week which we had the opportunity to run last year and both of us that's been our best run yet yeah um shout out to chicago yeah it's such a It's such a great marathon. I loved it so much. The majors really are. It is just a true, I mean the, the local one here will be fun. I don't know. We haven't talked about if we want to try to swing up there at some point, I guess. It's so hard. But yeah, we'll see. We'll see if we can make it happen. But anyways, yeah, good luck to, it's a big marathon weekend. So we'll see. And Chicago is an always an interesting one. If it is good weather, there's a chance that we could see another, uh, world record a second. I think it's supposed to be really hot though. Oh, in Chicago. I know it's going to be pretty warm here. So kind of a bummer. I know I feel bad, but just hydrate well and, uh, good luck. And, um, we're cheering you on. And I think that's so fun. Um, enjoy it. So, um, we do have a question, uh, for advice for a 20 year old. Uh, but I would love to, uh, ask that if you have something specific, I would love to talk through that. Um, just so you know, like background wise, um, I have, uh, hired a lot of people, uh, especially in the like technology space. Uh, Katy has done a lot of things to, uh, in a variety of fields. So if you, if there are, you know, any

[13:35] career type things or habit type things, that's the sort of stuff that, uh, that we specialize in. We can get into kind of some of the background on that, but if you have any specifics, we'd love to answer those. Um, but first we are going to do our first question. Yeah. Yeah. So we'll, um, we will get to your quite, let us answer this one and then we will keep an eye on it. And actually our next question might kind of be a good one. Actually, this question might be a great one to kind of segue into the questions that you have on there. But yeah, definitely we will we will get to that. So this question comes from upset train 4743. How did you know it was time to start your business? And then they go on to say, I've always wondered how people actually decide when to stop thinking about an idea and just go for it. Did you have everything planned out first? Or did you just start with what you had and figure out things along the way. I would like to hear how it happened for other people. Yeah, sure. So I can, um, speak to a little bit from our experience. So the, the current bravely.dev here in the corner, that's our company. Um, that, that company is not the first thing that I've ever tried to start. Uh, I, I've, I've tried lots of things over the past decade and change. Um, and,

[14:53] and I think that, that, that part of it is helpful in the sense that you start to remove a little bit of the, the mystique, the, the, you know, the, the, the hill is just a little bit lower, uh, for actually being willing to start something. Cause you, you know, it's just like, I gotta, I gotta get rolling to see if this is a thing that I actually, um, can stick with. And, and, and lots of times the answer has been, you know, that that has fallen by the wayside, but you learn things along the, along the way and you never know what the thing is that is going to stick. So, um, for, for me, it really quickly becomes like, is this something that I want to pour my focus into? Like, is this, it doesn't necessarily have to be like your number one thing that you spend your time on. Uh, but it has to be pretty dang far up there. Uh, you have to be willing to put in the time to make a thing worth it. Yeah. And when you, when you feel like you're at a point where you can genuinely do that, then for me, that's a good time to jump off. But I certainly, and we've talked about this before, but I definitely would not want to be one to overthink getting started. You're going to change a thousand

[16:08] times along the journey, even if it is something that you stick with. It's not going to look the way that it's always looked. And so the willingness to hop in and get rolling on things and start to figure out the journey is part of the process. And the quicker you start, the farther down the road you're going to be. Yeah. And I think another thing too is, sorry, I keep looking at the, I'm losing my train of thought just a little bit, but it's, yeah, it's going to change. And then, oh yeah, now I remember. Consistency. So when you're starting something too, it's going to feel really, really exciting and fun, but there definitely is going to be a time where it gets harder and harder and harder to show up consistent and you just have to keep at it. You got to grind it out. And if you can keep that grind going and you show up for the thing that you're wanting to do, then it will, it will grow. But do you want to, so talk about, I know we have a question up here about what you were doing in your twenties. And I think honestly, you have some really great advice too, because what you did in your twenties was a really great foundation to what you're doing

[17:24] now in your thirties. I can talk professionally a little bit on that. So I I'd be happy to answer that question. So the, the thing that I, um, I, I started my career, um, at an entry level job and I was taking phone calls. I was, I was call center guy. And what I, what I have, um, talked to lots of folks about, and we've talked about on here is, you know, finding ways in whatever role that you're in to, um, find the edges of what you can work on that could be valuable to the company that allows you to like kind of grow your skillset. So, uh, and those opportunities, um, you know, they're, they're not gonna like just throw themselves at you all the time, but if you're, if you're looking out for them, I'm of the belief that, you know, there, there are ways into, you know, finding ways to expand what you do. So in my case, um, at one point, my, my boss at the time asked if I could do some stuff in Excel and that sounded like not taking calls. And so I'm like, heck yeah, I can do stuff in Excel. I'll figure out whatever it is that you want me to do. Um, and what that turned into was like just helping, you know, just a few minutes a day, I was allowed to get off the phones and put together some call metrics and send it to her and then i'd have to get back on the

[18:40] phones um and what i would do is when i would send some of those things i would come up with like some thoughts of ways that we could look at it a little bit different and then like in my email to her give that as a suggestion i'm like hey we could look at this like this way and maybe get a little bit better insight on you know how how many uh of our calls are getting answered on the first time that people call in versus them having to call back multiple times, stuff like that. And, and, and then, so that would turn into like, oh, well, yeah, that'd be really cool. Can you spend some time working on trying to figure out how we can look at that? And then that would turn into a little bit more and turn into a little bit more. And, um, ultimately, um, that turned into, you know, being able to do analytics for, um, the company more broadly. Um, and then that turned into some other technology roles, which then turned into other, you know, further things down in my career. Um, and, and in my twenties, I will say like I, I did, uh, when I had the opportunity to prove myself and to prove value, um, I worked real hard. Um, I, I, I was not the sort of person who looked for ways during their day to, you know, past time like i i whereas i maybe my

[19:58] very very early 20s um or like when i was 18 19 like that was my main goal is like i'll just screw around at work and do whatever the minimum is have lots of fun stories at blockbuster as blockbuster was a sinking type that's a probably a history book type thing for anybody who's currently 20 um but the but when i when i found out that like I can apply myself and I can have that value be recognized. And I can also see my own skill sets growing. Um, I did work a lot and, um, and then would even occasionally let that eat into, um, some personal lifetimes. Like there were some nights that I would stay up working for something that nobody asked me to do. Um, not nobody asked me to like, Hey, I need you to stay up all night working on this thing so we can have it ready in the morning. Um, but I was so passionate about it and so interested in the topic that I'm like, I want to, I want to get this thing done and I think it's worth it. And that's not a super sustainable way to do stuff. But I, I do think that in your twenties specifically, it's not the worst trade off in the world. Yeah. I was going to say that too is in your twenties when you're still trying to figure out what it is that you kind of want to do career wise. Um, it is a very normal thing to put in long hours and, um, you

[21:16] know, we didn't have kids then, and you were able to put a lot of that time into growing your career. And I mean, obviously to each person's going to have to decide what's best for them, but in your twenties, I think that is, if you are going to work those long days and those long hours, that's probably one of the best times because most people you know are starting families or you know yeah not not you know as as far into it as what we are right now because i think if we were to try to do the things that we were doing in our 20s it would be a lot harder well it would be just because of how life is but yeah um so first off uh one uh production no i can't really see anything on there so you're gonna have to be our like if there's anything interesting questions or comments wise i'm just gonna rely on you and i'm gonna stop trying to look at that around the camera Okay. Okay. Um, and the, the other thing I wanted to say was on, on the note of maximizing the value that you, cause I mean, we all have to work, right. Um, unless I don't know, you just inherited a bajillion dollars or something. Um, and I would really fight back against the urge to try to show up and do the minimum amount possible. Um, I, I know that, you know, there's a lots

[22:31] of, lots of lines of thinking on this, but I, I think that you can take a great joy in what you do by even just taking the opportunity to ask others that are maybe in other departments or have other roles, you know, what, what they do in their day to day or things that they're interested in. People love talking about the stuff that they do usually, and you can build relationships. You can learn how business works, which is a very transferable skill, even within the company that you're in potentially. And, and, and really just taking the opportunity to, to add feathers in your cap of things that, you know, um, I, it, it can really take you far and you never know, like which little piece that what's little nugget of insight or wisdom that you've gained is going to be, you know, useful for, you know, whatever the next step in your career may be. Yeah. And so just really showing up and applying yourself. I, I think it's just, it's a way undervalued thing. Yeah. And I also think, I know we've talked about this a little bit, but if mentorship, somebody, if you are able to find somebody to mentor you, especially within your career. Um, I think that's also really valuable because there's just a lot of good insight and you can really, you know, talk about aspirations and, and, you know, they'll spend that time with you to tell you what worked for them and, and advices to what might be a good next step for you. So I

[23:47] definitely think if mentorship is something that you're able, if you're able to find a good mentor, then spend the time to try to do that too because i think it can be really valuable for you um okay are we ready to move to question number two sure so it's kind of fun i like this question let's do it it was kind of unique um so the question comes from user former plankton 8658 and it says anyone use ritual or intention setting to survive the founder grind and they go on to say i started doing this thing where I light a candle before I open my CRM and try to cold and try to cold call. Not because I believe the candle does anything magical, but because the ritual creates a threshold between regular Derek and sales Derek, who I hate being. It is stupid and it helps. And then they go on to say, I've also have started writing things down. Um, uh, what I want from the week on Sunday nights and burning the paper in a coffee mug. Does performance of rituals create an actual psychological shift or is that something else? That's the question. Yeah. So I, I was curious

[25:03] when you selected this one, Katy, uh, and plucked it out of the question void. Um, are there certain ritual things that help you get into a mode where you have like, Hey, I got a lot of work to do, or, or, or it doesn't even necessarily have to be work. It can also be other, you know, household things that like, you feel like I need, I need to kind of phase shift a little bit. And is there, is there anything that helps you transition from one mode to another? Well, I know we've talked about this too, in the sense of habits. Um, but I definitely think I have a couple, I guess I could consider rituals is like my morning coffee. If I don't have my morning coffee i do feel like my whole day is a little funky um so i guess i would count that to be kind of like a morning ritual especially when we get to like weigh in bed and talk together with our cup of coffee yeah i don't know i feel like that's definitely something i i enjoy it's i would almost consider that more of a ritual than a habit in a way um but then also if i need to really zero in on a task and I know that I don't have a bunch of meetings I'm not going to be interrupted

[26:18] I will definitely put on my noise canceling headphones and basically listen to EDM and music I enjoy literally just as background noise I don't even really focus on it at all and then just try to zero in on what it is that I'm trying to do but I have like a Pandora radio i've had for years that i've i feel like it's like a baby i and it's so it's cool because no i don't know how many people do pandora anymore i'd be so curious if like a you like our listeners said who does pandora because i think most people are spotify but the thing i like about pandora is it's all random and it's like randomized and i don't really know what i'm gonna get and sometimes I can find new artists I like and new songs I like, but I'm sure you're so old. I know. Anyways. So those are a couple of rituals I would say that I do to help me kind of one, get started on my day. And then two, if I have, you know, a good chunk of work that I need to do, that's going to require me focusing that that's what I do. But what about you? Yeah. I think the thing that I have that is closest to something like this is, um, and it's something that I've done for over a

[27:35] decade now. Um, so big part of my background is writing code, uh, and there is a level of focus required for something like that. And as a person with undiagnosed ADHD, that's certainly something I've had to figure out how to mitigate and to make that happen. I heard somebody on a podcast back in the day when podcasts were, um, not even a really well-known thing this is a very old uh old piece of advice but there was um a uh a particular um song or album that this guy had mentioned that he uses when he is trying to focus on things and um and he that he listens to it over and over and over again um it's a album by girl talk of all i was gonna say you have to share it because you still do this yeah and um and he talked about the merits of like listening to the same thing on repeat again and again and again and again like a crazy person while you know coding or writing or similar things like that because you start to be able to block out like any of the words if you're a person who's distracted by words and it also you know just signals in your brain like this is time to work and he's found that really

[28:50] helpful and so uh i tried doing the same thing and i i didn't get too creative i literally just used the exact same um it's like an hour-long single track uh album and uh i'll be darned like if you listen to the same thing over and over and over and over again like a crazy person um it really does get you able to be able to kind of like shift your brain like once you start listening it's like i'm i'm in coding mode and yeah to this day like i can i can still tap into that same thing if i need to do you still listen to the same song or do you listen to other things by girl talk uh it there's a couple other things i'll listen to but really yeah it's still the same song like i don't know 14 years later or something crazy do you feel like it would depending on what task you're trying to do you would change up the song like if you're gonna code then you have a specific song you listen to over and over and over if you're gonna do something else you'd have another song so then your brain gets into that mindset yeah i kind of have um i kind of have shifted a little bit um because i do less coding by hand and a lot of the things

[30:05] that i need to focus in on are more writing uh than anything and so i i have switched to like just listening to like some medium stuff uh when i write but is it the same thing and yes well it's the same it's like the same playlist of like 30 things um so like it more or less is the same uh i i hear the same songs a lot in that yeah um i keep getting oh no they're good they're bye i'm gonna say i'm gonna uh dorita 77 i i don't know if i did that right but i'm not very good at saying usernames sorry i did try um the uh the other thing that i have found that has helped with being able to focus it on things that uh is kind of a niche thing but uh i listen to or i i listen to music but also use my apple vision pro to write in that's like my writing thing and that's been kind of new i mean obviously because the apple version pro is a new thing but you really thought when you did that when you got that that that was gonna i mean it's been a really cool thing for you yeah no it it is um it is

[31:21] pretty great and the ability to to focus in on stuff um when you're in vr is it's just it's it's a very interesting experience yeah and again especially as a person who can be a little distractible uh being able to remove the the outside world and turn, literally turn down the outside world. Um, that is a pretty, pretty tremendous productivity pack there. There's been some downsides to it though. Hasn't there done? There have been some downsides. Um, I am a very jumpy person. Very jumpy. I mean, I think you are the jumpiest person I've ever met in my entire life. Like you were the easiest person to scare. Yeah. I, uh, when we were i was i had my headphones in when you were gone and uh alice our daughter seven years old um came up to me to ask me something i don't even know what uh did she tap you um no she like just came in and like yelled dad and but like maybe from me to you is how far she was uh trying to get my attention and i yelled so loud and i made her jump so bad and it was just like i feel so bad you little girl I think I I scare you

[32:37] almost every time you have your VR your Apple Vision Pro on and you put in your voice cancelling headphones I don't know what to do I I probably I guess you say to text you because you'll see it but sometimes I just don't think about it because I'm like surely we're not gonna scare him he's he knows we're here every time though never fails yeah And it's not just like, huh, it's like full body, like, huh. It's a very visceral, physical thing. And then you can't do it anymore because you're having a mini heart attack from being scared. Yeah, it turns out that's not very conducive, just pumping your body full of adrenaline and cortisol. Oh, my gosh. Oh, is there anything on this that you wanted to talk about, though? Any of the rest of the— Like rituals and— I will say finding certain things to get you in a mode of thinking, I find that tremendously valuable. And you don't need an Apple Vision Pro or to listen to the same song a thousand times on repeat to do that. There's lots of different ways that you can do it. But I think acknowledging I need to shift into this particular role for this amount of time, I think there's

[33:52] a lot of intentionality behind that. And in a world of infinite amount of distractions and an infinite amount of things to do, um, being able to be intentional with, Hey, I'm, I'm going to spend this next block of time working on this thing is, uh, an important skill to build. So regardless of the specifics, I do think that being able to do that is, is really valuable and really important. Well, and I think, you know, this person likes a candle and then, you know, writes their things down on Sunday nights and burns it, the piece of paper. And I think too, like, um, in corporate or in any, just some applicable things, you know, a lot of people really enjoy time blocking on their calendar, um, where they turn off all notifications, they have it blocked on their calendar to be able to work on a thing. But I know a lot of people think time blocking is super helpful. And I, and I actually do that quite a bit. And another thing that I find also really helpful is, um, I have my, you know, my calendar and my, um, outlook. And then I also have a planner that I write my daily tasks that I need to be getting done that day. And I think there was just something about the intention of writing it down that really helps make sure that I accomplish that. And then if not, you know, then I'll transfer it to the next day. But I think for

[35:07] me too. Those are just two really, I don't know, easy things that I've heard of or that I do that you can also apply. But yeah, I think it ultimately comes down to setting that intention and however you need to do that for you to be productive in what you need to get done. Finding those tools is really helpful. One thing I've always struggled with is actually adhering to the thing that I'm doing time blocking for. How often do you feel that when you block stuff on your calendar, or do you actually do the thing that you set out to, that you blocked it for? I haven't personally done a ton of time blocking, but I know my boss is, does it quite often, um, where she will put a time on her calendar. Um, so we can't schedule meetings over the top of it, um, and actually get that done. So I, I find, I think she finds it very productive and she actually can get the things done. And then if not, then she'll move that block to another day if something else came up but I think just being intentional on okay this is the thing I need to get done so you know regardless if it's today or tomorrow then I'm going to allow you know a lot that time yeah for it so I don't know I don't know if I really answered your question I haven't personally done a lot of time

[36:25] blocking I've used it sometimes um but I'm more of a write down everything I need to get done for that day and kind of depending on what that day looks like will depend on what block of time i use for that task yeah that's kind of more of what i do the thing that i end up slipping into is because it's still useful in the sense that like i don't have meetings during that um which is obviously valuable um but i feel like all time blocks that i do even if they were for something else just end up molding it or melding themselves into um just time to work on whatever the most pressing thing is which is not the spirit of what time blocking is. Um, so I dunno, it's, it's just a thing where I don't know if it's just, that's a habit that I would need to spend a little bit more intentionality behind. Yeah. And it's habit forming. Yeah. I think if you, if you commit to it and it's something that you really want to do and you, you commit that to yourself and you start the habit and then you are, um, oh gosh, what's words are hard right now. This is what we get for doing. Um, but have that discipline to actually do the thing then it will become something that consistency that's the word if you have that consistency to do it um then it will be something that you just

[37:43] naturally do and commit to and have that as a thing that you're not going to let other things seep into but one thing that i also would toss out there to think about this sort of stuff is the danger of having these sort of ritual type things that result in habits that you don't want to do. That's true. Um, and so, you know, like if you have a, like, let's say you want to spend less time on your phone. This is a thing that is true for me. Um, if your way that you get home from work and then transition to home, Jeff is that you scroll on your phone for however long, um, that can turn into, you know, just a default, like the habit of how you spend your time that you don't mean to, but then it just becomes like a thing that you do in phase shift. So some of these things we're talking about the, how to use this for good sort of stuff. But I also think that oftentimes our bad habits are also the phase shift events that have just become habits

[38:59] through you know path of least resistance water flows downhill this is what i want this is what my brain thinks it wants to do and and so i'm gonna you know get home and plop on the bed and scroll my phone for a while and then that becomes like a default thing that you end up spending way too much time on in the evenings for example yeah yeah it's definitely a discipline to figure out what are the good habits and what are the bad habits which i actually think is a good lead into the next question that we're going to talk about um so do you mind if we move into that one okay so this comes from user upper leather 43 99 and they go on to say i think my 6 a.m self is a completely different person from my 11 p.m self so this is them at 11 p.m tomorrow i'm waking up at 6 i'm going to work out study actually get my stuff together 6 a.m alarm yeah screw it 10 more minutes. 610. Okay, seriously, last one. 730 regret. I've Oh, yeah, then you didn't highlight that. So they go on to say, I realize the problem isn't setting the alarm. It's the person making the decision at night isn't the person making this decision when the alarm goes off. So how do you genuinely fix this habit and what finally worked for you? And then they say,

[40:16] I'm interested in like what actually works other than just having more discipline. Yeah. Yeah. I, I think, um, I think there's like a couple of different slants at this. So, I mean, we can spend a second talking about the actual question asked here, um, with, you know, alarms and stuff like that. But then also, um, how do you connect the dots between, uh, the person at night who's maybe filled with aspiration to the person in the morning who has to make good on it, um, which are often, I would agree, very different people. Um, so, but yeah, let's, let's, let's start morning routine wise over the years. What have you found has helped you be successful versus not? I don't feel like I'm the best person to answer this question because they say just have more discipline. I think some of us just naturally are more disciplined individuals and I do feel lucky enough that I am that if I make a commitment to myself, I usually follow through on that. Um, but I know that's not everybody, but even, well, aren't you just fancy? Well, and I do think there's, there's a caveat to that. So I have, I'm a, I've always been a morning person. I love the

[41:32] mornings. Um, so I find it easy or to commit. If I have something I want to commit to in the morning, I have the discipline or the commitment or the consistency to do it. Um, whereas like in the evenings, I'm pretty tired because I have had an early morning. Um, so if someone struggles in the morning, I have a hard time sometimes cause I'm like, I don't know. I've always been one to get up and go and do stuff in the morning. So I don't feel like I always have the best advice for this one but i don't know so specifically with the alarm question are you a set a single alarm set a bunch of alarms do you use snooze what what's your what's your thoughts on that i don't usually so very very very very very rarely i will set an alarm and accidentally fall back asleep um i'm usually just a set an alarm once kind of lay there for a minute like wake up i might look at my phone to try to get my brain working which again I don't know if that's like the best thing but that just is what I do um and then usually get out of bed I do feel like with the kids and you know going

[42:48] through seasons with them it's been a little harder to just jump right out of bed I think pre-kids I was more of a jump right out of bed type of person yeah where with having the kids i seem to want to lay there a little bit longer before committing to my day and i don't really know why i i don't know maybe that's just the mom and knowing that as soon as my feet hit the floor there's gonna be people that need me and i just want to lay here for a minute longer um but i don't know i've been more of a once the alarm goes off i i wake up i i don't but also another thing about me is i'm not a super heavy sleeper yeah i don't have issues waking up which is a good thing and a bad thing but i don't know what about for you when the alarm goes off how do you usually yeah i mean over the years i've done varying degrees of good and not at this sort of thing um i mean there's definitely been times where i've had a thousand alarms set and just ignored the first 40 or whatever um the the thing i definitely have found with that is just live your life without a parachute just have the one alarm and you won't get like that'll you just naturally break that habit because you

[44:03] know that there's no fallback um and i usually don't snooze i mean occasionally you'll know like i'll i'll i'll tell alexa to to chill out yeah let's just try again here in 10 minutes um but usually not yeah the the thing that i i think i would actually use as advice would be, uh, knowing what the first thing that you're wanting to do in the morning is. So, and I don't mean like work out, I mean, like get my shorts on, like I'm going to wake up and put shorts on, or I'm going to wake up and, uh, go get coffee started or like, like, or I'm going to wake up and I'm going to let the dogs out of their kennel. And if you go to bed and like, all right, when I wake up, I'm going to fill in the blank. Um, it just makes it easier when you're just like, Oh, I'm going to die. It's like, well, I just need to do this. I need to do the first thing. And I know what that is. So I'm just going to five, four, three, two, one and up and, um, I don't normally say blast off out loud, but maybe I think it, um, and then go do that one thing. And then honestly it is, I always think it's the funniest thing. It's like a revelation every morning is I go from feeling so tired to completely fine in about 10

[45:19] seconds. I know it's so weird. Yeah. And it's like, once I get the, you know, I opened the stupid kennel doors for our dogs, uh, and you know, get them all riled up and ready to go outside. Um, like I'm fine and the day has started and it's all good, but yeah, knowing it's, it is hard, um, for me in the initial piece of it, um, to, to figure out what, you know, or it's, it's hard to overcome that, that part. But if I actually spend the time to think through like, okay, here's my thing that I'm going to do when I get up, then it's just that much easier. Yeah. And another thing I was going to say that I actually have done before, um, I don't do it as much now, but when the kids were younger and I, um, I mean, I had long nights, I would, you know, have to get up in the middle the night with them a lot of the evenings um so when the alarm went off it was really hard um I would have some sort of mantra to myself or encouraging you know words to myself of I think my alarm that I had um labeled as so it would pop up and I wasn't using Alexa at the time but I totally think you could do this with Alexa too or however you do your alarms um is remember why you

[46:35] do it like it's okay it's okay to be tired but once you get going you're going to feel so good once like remember what that feeling is whatever whatever words you need for yourself be kind to yourself and and and try to be your own cheerleader of getting out of bed and and doing the next thing I think that's always really helped me and I know there's like there's been a lot of studies on this too and it would be really I wish I should have spent a little more time looking at this but I know a lot of people like to do um there's like alarm clocks now where it's like a orb and it gradually gets like lighter and lighter and lighter and to help you gradually wake up and i think that that could be another really great thing if that's something that would help you to get to that point to get out of bed um so i don't know i think being kind to yourself being your um cheerleader and giving yourself encouraging words if it's saying alexa and the alarm and the alarm in the morning tell me this that i'm capable that i can do this that i'm going to be happy once i get going and you know sometimes hearing those words first thing in the morning from yourself at night when you're setting that alarm can actually really help your morning self get going yeah i think that i think that's good even if it is coming from robot alexa

[47:50] yeah absolutely um one one other thing i wanted to say it was with regard to figuring out like what you're going to do in the morning um don't wait until you're exhausted the night before to figure that out yeah um two reasons one um you when when you're tired and you're just like trying to survive uh long enough to get through the evening routines to go to bed um you're not going to come up with a super solid sustainable plan of, you know, what you're going to do in the morning. And so I think you just get higher quality stuff if you're figuring that out at, you know, 6 PM rather than 10 PM. Yeah. Um, the other part of it too, is if you spend the time early to figure out what you're going to do the next morning, then you know what you're up against and you're a lot more likely to go the Frick to bed on time. Cause like, if you know, like, Oh Frick, I just did the math and I'm going to have to wake up at five o'clock in the morning. Um, which it was the case for us doing this podcast basically. Um, it's like, well, I'm just going to go to bed now because like, I, I know that like, if I only get, you know, six hours of sleep, I'm going to be dead and I don't want to waste my Saturday. So as much as

[49:06] I would love to keep watching a show or something tonight or keep working on some random stuff for the business, I'm going to lose a big chunk of productivity on Saturday if I don't just go to bed now. So it's like, well, I'm just going to set my phone aside and go to bed. And if I know for people that have listened to multiple episodes, we sell my broken records about sleep. But yes, it is so important to prioritize that, commit to it, and go to bed, get your sleep in. I know there's different seasons of life everybody's in, But, you know, do the best that you can with where you're at and make it a priority to get enough sleep. Because that's literally what we did last night. We were watching a new show, which was so good. It's so cute. Rooster. We love Steve Carell. So it's been really fun watching him in a show again. But I know from you, you really wanted to watch another episode. But I'm still recovering from travel this week. And I pretty much was like, nope. I need, I gotta get to bed. I know I'm going to be so tired tomorrow if I don't. Did I ever tell you? Uh, so, uh, AJ is our person who, uh, like helps edit this afterwards and get our shorts and stuff

[50:21] out. Yeah. And anytime that we talk about sleep stuff, he feels called out. Um, so calling you out, AJ, get your sleep. Yep. Um, so I'm curious on the other part of this so the the other theme in this question is um i have aspiration but i don't follow through when the actual rubber needs to meet the road on that um and so how do you how do you close that loop of i i want i have these things i want but when it comes down to it i end up doing other I make other decisions how do you how do you reconcile those those two things I don't think I have the best advice on this because like I said I I just do it I've always been that way though um so I don't know what what about you I feel like this is something where you can lean into a little bit more because I think about it like even in high school which we've been together since high school so we've known each other a really long time um even when we first got married, I was always the one to get up and take us to the gym and do all that. So this is something I don't, I don't struggle with and I don't feel like it's fair for me to try to give advice on something that I, well, I,

[51:39] I think, um, I think for starters, uh, it, it does help to know that that habit that you can build of keeping your word to yourself, how strong that can be. Um, and, and so I think in that regard, I think you could be a good example to strive toward and the strength that that brings, because, um, now if you have something that you are wanting to commit to doing, and like that actually is something that you really do want, um, you're going to follow through on that commitment because that's what you do. You're the person who follows through on what they do. And you build that. It is a virtuous cycle. And I want to make sure our listeners know she's perfect yeah I'm not perfect but like I just I especially but there's so many things though like I guess I should caveat this a little bit working out is always been a really big important thing to me keeping myself active but there are other things that I've tried to commit to in the mornings that I genuinely have just failed at like I have not and I haven't figured it out I'm still trying to you know there are things I would like to do more in the morning, but I find I run out of time. And so please, please hear that is I am not perfect.

[52:54] And there are things that I am definitely still trying to figure out how to do it. It's just in particular, um, fitness wise, I've always enjoyed working out in the mornings. I find that, you know, really valuable for my day. And I've always just been someone to do that. So please hear that, that I'm not perfect, that I don't, I just, I find it hard to give. I don't know. I I guess I've kind of said the things that I think have helped me, um, with, with the rubber hitting, meeting the road is, you know, having those like kind words to myself. Um, but I know that there's probably like a hundred better things, but please hear that. I am not, I am not perfect at this. Yeah. And, and I think that, I mean, for starters, you only have so much time and energy and so being realistic. Um, and if you have aspirations to do something, I think looping back through and if you fail trying to understand like spend the time to understand like why what what did i do instead and why did i want to do that instead and more often than not unfortunately like it really does come down to you know i i wanted to do the other thing more than i wanted to do the thing that i was aspiring yeah i think reflection and writing things down and trying to plan but yeah i think that

[54:10] that's a super valuable and just shifting into like i'm trying to figure out how to do this as opposed to i i wanted to do it and i failed and i wanted to do it and i failed and then like thinking like well that's just i'm just the person who wants to do it and fails i if you think of it more of like i need to experiment to figure out how to do this um then it re you can reframe some of this as i wanted to do it and i i've learned a thing that didn't work. And now I'm going to try this thing and see if I get any more progress. And maybe, maybe that thing lets me stick to my habit that I'm trying to create for a couple of days, but then I fall back to the wayside. Um, that's really good. And, and just, you know, don't, don't give up on things just because you've failed a handful of times. Um, it, it could be, it could be 30 times before you really nail it on the thing that you're wanting to do. Um, and that could just be part of the process and that could be completely fine. Yeah. Um, I, I would also add to that. Gosh, dang it. I'm blanking on what I was going to say. I bet it was really good to really helpful. Um, the gosh, darn. I know it's hard when you're talking and then you lose your train of thought.

[55:25] Yeah. That happened to me earlier too. If you talk long enough, I'll eventually. Um, no, I think, you know, I think understanding that. it is gonna take time to form a habit. And if that way of forming that habit didn't work, don't give up, just keep trying because it does take time to figure out what's gonna work best for you and what's gonna work best for your environment and the season of life that you're in. So to give yourself grace and yeah, get back up, try again. If it's something that's really valuable to you and something that you really do want that to be, um, your identity that you want to be somebody who does do whatever, fill in the blank in the mornings or fill in the blank, you know, whatever it is. It can be any part of the day. This is just for in the morning example, but, um, to give yourself that kindness and know that if something doesn't work, then that's okay. Just get up and try again. Yeah. I'll give a good example of a thing that I write in the middle of. This is what I was going to say. Um, so one of the things that I want to be able to do is when I am working on company stuff that I want to not be so distracted by my phone at the second that I'm like waiting for something to finish. Um, and so what I've done

[56:41] in order to do that is, uh, I have a, a focus mode on my phone that has a big red X on it, uh, and a bunch of all like a ton of notifications start off. And the reason I have that is for one, the big red X as a reminder of like, I purposefully, I wanted to not do this. And so I pick up my phone and see the bigger red X it helps. Um, so that focus mode is actually really effective to help me do that, but I still suck at it. And the reason why I feel like maybe is an opportunity for me to like experiment on the next thing is, uh, I don't put it into that focus mode. And so if I, if I remember to do it it's effective but if i don't remember to do it then i just find myself scrolling on whatever and uh and that can be super distracting and it snaps me out of it even though i might be waiting for five or ten minutes i need to figure out a way to like stay focused in and i i can be somewhat successful on that but i certainly am not successful on that when i pick up my phone and it doesn't have the big red x and then i just go into natural whatever clicks happen subconsciously and then all of a sudden now i'm watching random freaking reels or whatever yeah um and so for me like as i reflect on

[57:58] that it's like okay i need to figure out a way like if either one i need to figure out something different that is effective and keeping me from doing that or two i need to find a more automatic way or something to get my phone into that focus mode. Uh, and there's probably some creative ways that I could do that. I, I mean, I, as I'm thinking about this, um, you know, I could probably figure out a way to have an app that like, if I'm using my Mac, that it automatically flips my phone into that. And that would be a way to, to make that be an automated process instead of just something that I have to rely on remembering. Yeah. Okay. All right. Well, uh, we're at time and, um, you need to go do some working out. So we're going to move on to the, the, the housekeeping part of the show. So, uh, first off, it was fun having y'all. Uh, yeah. Thank you for listening. Um, if you've gotten to this point, you should hit subscribe. Uh, we do this every week, uh, and lots of shorts from clips from the show and stuff like that. Uh, if you have any questions or topics or just want to say hi, You can email us at buildhorizons.com.

[59:14] You can follow us on socials. And with that, Katy, I'm going to turn it to you to send us home. Thank you for building with us and we are cheering you on.