HealthyGamerGG - The Real Reason You Never Follow Through (And How to Fix It)

Episode Date: April 23, 2023

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Today, I'd like to teach y'all how to follow through. Because if we look at the world, there are two groups of people. There are people who are disciplined and there are people who are lazy. And the disciplined people have a bunch of willpower. So when they set their mind to something, they kind of focus on it, stick with it, day after day. They're kind of exercising every day, eating healthy every day, and they're able to actually follow through. And then there's the rest of us who get really excited about stuff, but inevitably end up getting less excited about it. And while we may order a bunch of equipment, like I'm going to order a guitar and I'm going to order all these like classes or books or whatever, or I'm going to learn how to code or I'm going to garden, like whatever the task is. I'm going to start doing yoga. I'm going to order a yoga mat and incense and all this kind of stuff. Eventually we'll sort of get bored of it, right? And even in that process, we'll sort of start to use willpower. So the mind naturally wants to, yeah, the mind doesn't want to do yoga today. And then what we'll do is we'll use our willpower to overcome it. And then we engage in a war with our

mind that we may win on some days, right? So you're like, yeah, I want to learn yoga. Today I don't feel like it, but I'm going to force myself. Hey there, thanks for watching, and I'm glad these videos have been helpful. A lot of times I'll read the comments and see people asking, well, what do I actually do about it? Which is such a great question. And unfortunately, my experience has been that the resources out there aren't actually that good at helping people create sustainable change, which is why I started HG in the first place. HG coaches are trained on a curriculum that integrates all of my understanding into what is motivation, what paralyzes us, and how to create lasting behavioral change. So if you're ready to take the next step, H.E. coaches are ready to

build the life that you want. They've helped people build careers, find relationships, build networks of friends, discover what their passions are, and pursue their hobbies. So if this sounds like something that you'd be interested in, check out the link in the description below. As the days go by, the number of days you can kind of force yourself to do it, start to decline. And before you know it, you take that guitar, you take that yoga mat, you take those books that you order that you were going to read, and they join the graveyard of other things that you used to be excited about. But now you don't do anymore. So in order to overcome this, in order to understand how to follow through, I'm going to teach you all a technique that actually makes it easy.

And the key problem is that we don't really understand how our mind works. And secondly, that we try to overcome our mind, right? Because that's what willpower is. The mind wants to do one thing, but we use willpower to overcome that and force it into doing something else. So instead, what we're going to do today is learn the natural tendencies of the mind and actually use the natural direction of the mind to follow through. And one thing that I want you all to pay attention to is the tendency of your mind to switch off of this video.

As best as you can, stick with it and make it to the end of the video. But if you get the urge to switch off, the way that you manage that urge will actually be really, really important data that will sort of prove the point. and really teach you how to use this principle. In order to get started, we have to understand two things about the mind. The first is that the mind is very curious and likes to engage with new things, which I'm sure you understand, right? So these new things, whether it's new TV shows or even like learning particular instruments

or whatever, it gets excited about that stuff. And once it gets excited, if it engages with that stuff, there may be some kind of dopamine release or something like that. The second thing to understand about the mind is that it develops tolerance to any kind of stimuli. So this is something that you can understand very simply by like when you put on your shirt in the morning, you feel the shirt when you first put it on, but then you acclimatized to it. Right. Even when you go into something like a public restroom, it smells really bad for the first few seconds that you're there. But the longer you stay in the restroom, the more tolerable the scent becomes.

And this also happens with dopaminergic stuff. So the first bite of, let's say, like a piece of cake that you eat or the second or third bite may be really, really tasty. but as you eat more bites of a piece of cake or a piece of pizza, the enjoyment starts to decline. And we see that, of course, with technology. And I was, like, addicted to video games at some point. I would play a particular video game for six hours, eight hours, and then I noticed I didn't even enjoy it anymore.

So I would switch to a different video game. And that's the problem, right? You decided that you wanted to do something, but then your mind is like, yeah, I'm bored of this. So what I'm going to teach you is instead of overcoming that tendency of the mind, overcoming the curiosity and tolerance of the mind, we're actually going to use the tendency of the mind to be bored to actually help us follow through, which may sound impossible, but this is actually like sort of an evidence-based technique that works in addiction psychiatry.

What we're going to learn how to do today is urge surf. So urge surfing is a technique that we use in addiction psychiatry to help people withstand the cravings to substances that they're addicted to. So I've used this very successfully in people who are addicted to things like alcohol, and heroin and cocaine. And the general principle is that if we look at the mind, urges or cravings arise, but if we're able to tolerate that for some amount of time,

if we're able to surf on top of the urge instead of give into it, over time, that urge will actually go away. And just think about it for a second, right? So our mind develops tolerance to particular things and gets bored of stuff. So if you have a particular urge or craving, over time, the mind will get bored, of the urge or craving if you don't give in. So you may want, like, let's say a piece of pizza,

but if you can't get it, let's say you're on an airplane and you want a fresh piece of pizza. You can't get a fresh piece of pizza on an airplane. So your mind wants the pizza for a little while, but do you spend six hours of a flight wanting that pizza over and over and over again? Of course not. Your mind naturally develops a tolerance to its own craving, and then it'll shift to something else. And cravings can be incredibly incredibly intense. So I'm not saying that this is easy, but this is literally a technique that we can use in people whose brains are addicted to a substance. So their whole brain is aligned towards wanting this thing. And that's the only satisfaction that their brain is interested in. And yet

urge surfing works. So paradoxically, all we're going to do when we urge surf is, first of all, notice that you have the desire for something. And let's say, and this is what's kind of interesting, is if I'm trying to follow through with one task, what we really need to recognize is the desire to switch is a craving in and of itself. And so here's the thing to understand. When we're talking about follow-through, what our mind essentially does is develop tolerance to the current activity and then craves a different activity. So if we sort of think about what follow-through or why follow-through is difficult, it's not so much that staying on task is hard. The real challenge is that our mind desires something else. And I invite you to just think about that for a second when

you are struggling with following through. So it's not just that, Okay, I started reading this book and it's hard to read it, but the question is, why is it hard to read it? It's because your mind would rather do other things. Oh, watching a TV show or checking something on social media or looking at memes or texting a friend or playing a video game or watching pornography. There are all kinds of other things that your mind craves rather than finishing the book. So what we really need to understand is that our mind's difficulty with following through actually has to do with cravings for other things. And the way that we manage those cravings is through urge surfing. So anytime that your mind wants to switch, that'll feel like a craving.

And then what we want you to do is surf on top of it, right? So notice the urge arise within you. Notice the desire for your mind to do this, do that, do all those kinds of other things. And your mind wants you to give in to it. It'll tell you all kinds of things. It'll say things like, oh, this is boring. It's a waste of time. We'll do it tomorrow.

It'll use all kinds of different dialogue to try to trick you. But underneath all of that, That dialogue is a craving, a craving for something else, a craving for dopamine. And so what we want you to do is just surf on top of that urge. Notice the craving and just don't give into it, right? What we're asking you to do, remember that following through is about doing something consistently, but what y'all may be way better at is doing nothing, right? That's so much easier to do.

It's not actually because resisting a craving is difficult. But some of us are pretty good at doing nothing. We're pretty good at procrastinating, and that's what urge surfing really is. No cravings will last forever. That's a natural tendency of the mind, that no feelings will last forever. So joy from your wedding day does not last a lifetime. Joy from graduating does not last the lifetime. The heartbreak from a breakup or getting dumped, thankfully does not last for a lifetime.

And if we surf on that urge, what we'll find over time is that our mind will get bored of wanting something. And then instead of following through on switching tasks, our mind will naturally return to the thing that we want to do. And so paradoxically, the best way to follow through if you struggle with like willpower, discipline, have low conscientiousness, is to just surf on top of the urge, just sort of tolerate that craving, and then kind of return back to the task. So there are a couple of things to consider. The first is that some of you all may be saying, okay, well, but my cravings are really, really powerful. And this won't work for me because my cravings are really, really powerful. It's so hard to do. So notice what your mind is doing right there, right?

Instead of actually trying the technique or even starting with something small, what does your mind do? It uses the one case where you're destined to fail. And it sort of says, no, no, no, don't even try this, right? Because don't even try this. It's not going to work. Notice what your mind is doing. It's even resisting the desire to try it. And that's what the mind does when you actually stumble upon a technique that will

work with the mind. What it'll do is try to convince you as best as possible to not engage in it. The next thing to consider is that you don't have to start with the biggest craving, right? Because that's not what your mind says. Your mind just talks about the scenarios in which this won't work. It doesn't say, oh, yeah, this may work for 25% of our cravings. This may help us fall through 25% more. What the mind naturally jumps to when it doesn't want to do something is the scenarios in which you'll fail. And the other thing to understand about urge surfing is it is a skill that is to be built up over time. So even if you think that your cravings are way too powerful, and I get you, right? I've worked with a bunch of people who have really

strong cravings. I've struggled with them myself. There are some cravings that may be too hard to handle. You don't have to handle those. Let's just focus on the 25% that you can handle. And the last thing is if you've made it to this point in the video, I want to invite y'all to pay attention to your desires to switch off of the video. I would bet that chances are over the course of this video, at some point your mind wanted to switch off. And notice how long that impulse lasted. So have you been struggling? Has this whole video been sort of a long-term struggle with the desire to switch off of this video?

If you really pay attention, what you've actually already done is urge surf. You've already had cravings to switch off to something else, maybe pull out your phone, or maybe you did pull out your phone. And what you'll notice, so I invite you to kind of pay attention to how you made it to the end of this video, because chances are you notice the craving, the craving are really. rose, and then the craving actually melted away. And that's urge surfing. And if you've made it this far, you've already done it. So all you need to do is just apply what you've already done today to the other dimensions of your life.