How to Change Step By Step

Chris Albert 00:00:00 (link to this point)

What is going on, ladies and gentlemen? Welcome to the Warrior Soul podcast. My name is Chris Albert, and I am your host. And this is where we deliver tools, tactics, strategies, and ideas to help The US military veteran community and anybody else willing to listen to live their absolute best lives. And what I wanna talk to you about today is something that I've been thinking about quite a bit lately.

It involves everything that's going on. Right? So the world has been in chaos in 2020. I'm sure you guys are all well aware of that. We've got this COVID nineteen crisis.

We've got racial divides going on. We've got a country that, you know, seems like it doesn't know where it's going. And at the same time, we have America still happening. Right? And and I need you all to understand that.

If you look at this country, there's still people working hard. There's still people who are pursuing their dreams. And and for lack of anything else, you know, America is still a place where people want to be. And if you don't wanna be here, you know, go to another country, take a look at what's going on in some of these places, and then ask yourself, do I really, really have it so bad? And I think one of the problems that we have in this country is that we have it so good that we focus on issues and problems that other people would kill to have.

And I think that in situations like this, it's easy to take your eye off the ball. It's easy to start feeling sorry for yourself. It's easy to sit here and say, oh, my life sucks. You know, I I'm never gonna get ahead. I can't catch a break.

And it's the it's really the wrong way of looking at things. And when you start looking at things like that, that's what really keeps you from moving forward. It keeps you from doing anything at all that's actually gonna help you. So, you know, what I wanna do is I wanna lay out a few things that that could help you, that could push you forward, that could get you to, you know, improve your life even during these crazy times. And the first one is this, you gotta open your eyes up to the world.

You gotta actually take a look at the world, and you gotta start asking yourself, alright, how much of my problems, my issues are actually being caused by the circumstances of society? And then how much of my issues and problems are actually being caused by me, my shortsightedness, my pig headedness, my stubbornness, my inability to want to change. Right? It's something you really got to think about. And I don't think enough people think about it.

They they think, okay, the world's like this right now. This is how my life's gonna be, and so they don't ever work on it at all. But you really need to sit back and you need to ask yourself that. What can I change about myself? What can I do right now to actually help my situation?

And the first step is is really to take a look at yourself in the mirror and ask yourself, what have I done to get here? What have I done to get here? If if you're short on cash, are you there because you're overspending? Are you there because you need to invest in yourself a little bit more and get a little bit more education so you can earn a little bit more? If you're overweight, is it because you're overeating?

Is it because you're consuming a bunch of junk? If you're tired all the time, is it because you're up watching Netflix and not sleeping? If you're having problems with your significant other, is it because of something she did or he did, or is it because of something that you're actively doing every day? Are you actually listening to the problems that they have to you? Are you actually listening to them and hearing them out on their issues, are you turning your brain off and walking away?

This is a really, really important step that people just skip. Something bad comes up, they immediately just just pull back and shut down, and they say, you know, screw this, fuck this. I'm not I'm not gonna do anything about it. I'm I'm in the right here. And when you do that, it it turns everything off.

It keeps you from actually improving, and then it puts you in a position to where you're never gonna change. The next step is to think about that end goal, where you wanna be. Alright? What what is that end point that you actually wanna be at? And what you need to do is from that end goal, you need to reverse plan.

Right? And and think about all the steps that you need to take to get to that end goal. Right? Because what a lot of us do is we set goals, and they they become like these pie in the sky things. I wanna be a a real estate investor someday.

I wanna be an accountant. I wanna be a billionaire. I wanna be this. I wanna be that. I want six pack abs.

But we don't actually think about the work involved, the process involved in order to get there. And when you reverse plan, it helps your brain actually think about, okay, rather than this just being this pie in the sky thing, I can actually take this step by step by step and can actually plan on getting there. Right? So what you do is you start at that end goal, and then you take the step before that, and then you take the step before that. So for example, if I wanna save $10,000 over the next six months, I think about that end goal, and then I divide up the amount of money that I need to save each month over the next six months, and then I figure out a way that I'm going to actually be able to save that money.

And you do that by thinking about what are the specific things I need to do each day in order to ensure that I'm going to be able to save that money each month. Right? So we took it from the end goal of $10,000, then we divided it up to how much we need to save each month, and then think about how much you wanna save each week, and then think about the actual actions that you have to take each day to be able to save that money. Alright? So maybe that involves, you know, not buying coffee every day at Starbucks.

Maybe that involves not drinking beer each weekend at the bar. Maybe that involves, you know, riding your bike to work rather than taking a car. Right? Maybe in the long run, it involves, you know, downsizing from a truck to a sedan. I don't know.

You know, it it it's your fight. It's your world. It's your goal. But take it from that end goal, and then reverse plan, and then break it down to the actual steps, the process that you need to do each day. Same thing with fitness.

You want six pack abs. In order to get six pack abs, what do I need to do? I know that I probably need to reduce my caloric intake each day. I probably need to increase my activity each day. I probably this is then you think about it.

So in six months, I want six pack abs. Alright? So each month, I have to get this amount of workouts, and that means that each week, I need to schedule times so that I can get those workouts, and then each day, I need to plan for how I'm going to get the requisite food and to eat the requisite calories for me to get six pack abs. Right? It involves reverse planning.

You need to take those goals from those pie in the sky things and break them down into process. The things that you gotta do each day to get to where you wanna go. And again, this stuff might sound super simple. It might sound, well, Chris, hey, that's freaking common sense. Right?

That's common sense. But I'll tell you right now, if you've been constantly wanting to go for things and you haven't been getting there, it's because you haven't been doing this. Yes. It is simple, but it is not easy. And in practice, we're not doing the things that we need to do to get there.

Alright? And then the next thing you need to do once you break down your process is you need to be evaluating yourself every single day. So at the end of each day, you need to sit down and you need to think, okay, did I do what I was supposed to do or did I not do what I was supposed to do? And if I didn't do what I was supposed to do, why didn't I do it? And this shouldn't be something where you're ripping yourself apart.

Like, hey, I'm an idiot. I'm never gonna get there. I'm so bad. Things like that. No.

Sit back and take a look at why it happened. Maybe you didn't schedule yourself out properly. Maybe you had some crazy expense come up that kept you from saving the money that you needed to that week. Well, you need to think about well, right, it it it might have been a a surprise expense, but why was it a surprise? What didn't you plan?

What didn't you think about that led you to have that surprise expense come up? Right? And you could sit there and you could blame the world all day, and you could say, oh, man, this stuff always happens to me. Or you could really sit back and you could say, hey, you know what? Maybe I should be thinking about these things.

Maybe I should be thinking about, you know, my taxes before tax season. Maybe I should be thinking about my cable bill before the due date comes up. Maybe I need to set something in my calendar that's gonna remind me of this so I don't get these late charges. Right? Gotta think about these things.

It's normally a problem with the process that's keeping you from getting there. It's not bad luck. It's not the universe coming after you. It's not society coming after you. It's not people being out to get you.

It's not the evil companies. It's it's because you didn't plan something properly. And when you do this, that liberates you. It liberates you from being under the thumb of fate and luck and all this other bullshit that we tell ourselves. So hope this all makes sense, guys.

I'm trying to keep it really simple. I'm probably oversimplifying it a little bit, but the fact is it is simple. It's just not easy. We're not sitting here and actually thinking about these things, and that's why we stay in the same place over and over and over again. I wanna thank you guys so much for listening.

You know, a few different things coming up. Here at the Warrior Soul podcast, we are starting starting a partnership with The Citadel, the Military College of South Carolina. And, yeah, you might know of The Citadel as being a military school, but one of the things they've got going on is they do a lot of programs for veterans where you don't actually have to be part of the corps cadets. You could be going to the Citadel in your civilian gear, going to classes with the cadets, and, you know, taking advantage of a lot of the awesome programs that they offer for veterans and active duty military. So we're gonna be having some announcements on this coming up.

I'm gonna be bringing on some people from The Citadel to talk about the awesome program programs that they've got going on there in South Carolina and some of the programs that they're gonna make available nationally. So stay tuned for that. And if you guys ever have any questions, if you guys ever have any issues, please reach out. I am at Warrior Soul Agoge on Instagram. I am at warrior soul gear on Twitter, and you can always reach out to me at chris@warriorsoulagoge.com.

Get out there and live your best lives while you can. Take advantage of every moment, and we'll be back at you soon with some more awesome content. This is Chris Albert, Warrior Soul Podcast, and I am out.