Something You Should Know - How to Be More Creative Than You Ever Imagined & A Simpler Way to Change Any Behavior

Episode Date: August 26, 2019

People who have high credit scores are often quite proud of them. And there is no doubt that a high credit score is better than a low credit score. But is a high credit score better than an average one? This episode begins with some interesting insight into how credit scores really work. https://twocents.lifehacker.com/your-credit-score-doesn-t-matter-unless-it-s-bad-1785050429 Who doesn’t love those great stories of new inventions and other creative breakthroughs? But often there is a lot more to the story than the big breakthrough. Creativity is a process and joining me to discuss how to process works best is Michael Roberto, Trustee Professor of Management at Bryant University in Rhode Island and author of the book, Unlocking Creativity: How to Solve Any Problem and Make the Best Decisions by Shifting Creative Mindsets (https://amzn.to/2ZrqYDk). Having a lot of debt is bad for your financial health – and it appears to take a toll on your physical and mental health as we. Listen as I discuss the health benefits of paying off debt. https://news.northwestern.edu/stories/2013/08/high-debt-could-be-hazardous-to-your-health/ When you stop and analyze it, a lot of your behavior is habitual. And as everyone knows, changing a habit can be hard. But not always. A lot of it has to do with how you approach it according to Alexander Heyne. He is the author of several books including The Lazy Guide to habit Change (https://amzn.to/2ZkMutn) Alexander joins me to explain how to change any habit or behavior by taking the path of least resistance. This Week's Sponsors -Daily Harvest. Go to www.DAILY HARVEST.com and enter promo code SOMETHING to get $25 off your first box -Upstart. Find out how low your interest rate is by going to www.Upstart.com/something -Dashlane. For a 30 day free trial plus 10% off Dashlane Premium go to www.Dashlane.com/SYSK Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As a listener to Something You Should Know, I can only assume that you are someone who likes to learn about new and interesting things and bring more knowledge to work for you in your everyday life. I mean, that's kind of what Something You Should Know was all about. And so I want to invite you to listen to another podcast called TED Talks Daily. Now, you know about TED Talks, right? Many of the guests on Something You Should Know have done TED Talks. Well, you see, TED Talks Daily is a podcast that brings you a new TED Talk every weekday in less than 15 minutes. Join host Elise Hu.

She goes beyond the headlines so you can hear about the big ideas shaping our future. Learn about things like sustainable fashion, embracing your entrepreneurial spirit, the future of robotics, and so much more. Like I said, if you like this podcast, Something You Should Know, I'm pretty sure you're going to like TED Talks Daily. And you get TED Talks Daily wherever you get your podcasts. Today on Something You Should Know, is having a high credit score any better than having a medium credit score? I'll explore that, then an important discussion on how creativity really works and how anyone can be more creative. We have this false myth that great ideas come to these creative people with like a bolt of lightning, you know, that hits them.

And it's all of a sudden this perfect solution. When in fact, most creative ideas come through a process of trying things, experimenting. Also, the interesting way credit card debt affects your physical health and the fascinating science behind achieving goals and changing habits. If you can find the exact same place and time to do the habit, for example, exercisers that go to the same gym at the same time are more likely to stick with those habits months later than people who are varying the time and the day of the week. All this today on Something You Should Know. People who listen to Something You Should Know

are curious about the world, looking to hear new ideas and perspectives. So I want to tell you about a podcast that is full of new ideas and perspectives and one I've started listening to called Intelligence Squared. It's the podcast where great minds meet. Listen in for some great talks on science, tech, politics, creativity, wellness, and a lot more.

A couple of recent examples, Mustafa Suleiman, the CEO of Microsoft AI, discussing the future of technology. That's pretty cool. And writer, podcaster, and filmmaker John Ronson discussing the rise of conspiracies and culture wars. Intelligence Squared is the kind of podcast that gets you thinking a little more openly about the important conversations going on today. Being curious, you're probably just the type of person Intelligence Squared is meant for. Check out Intelligence Squared wherever you get your podcasts. Something you should know. Fascinating intel. The world's top experts. And practical advice you can use in your life. Today, Something You Should Know with Mike Carruthers.

Hi, welcome to Something You Should Know. If you're a regular listener to this podcast, you know we often have advertisers that offer special discounts, special deals using a promo code or using a special website. And, you know, depending on what you're doing when you're listening to this podcast, it's not always easy to write it down or remember it. And just so you know, all of the websites and promo codes are in the show notes for the episode in which you hear the commercial. And they're also on our website. We have an entire page of promo codes and you just go to somethingyoushouldknow.net and right at the top in the navigation, you'll see promo codes. Click on that and there they are. I want to start today by talking about your credit score. A lot of people are very proud of their high credit score. And do you know what a high credit

score will get you? Not much. It's really kind of strange the way the system works. If you have a low credit score, that can really cost you. You can be charged more for cable and telephone and insurance. And your interest rates on credit cards and other loans can be charged more for cable and telephone and insurance, and your interest rates on credit cards and other loans can be higher if your credit score is low. But a high credit score doesn't get you discounts on any of that. Plus, if there are two people applying for a loan together and one has a high credit score and the other has a low credit score, they don't average them out. The terms will most likely be based on the person with the lower score. The high score means very little. The average credit score is

about 695. On a practical level, once your score is over 740, it really doesn't matter much. At that point, you will get the best terms. The point is that bad credit can really cost you, but great credit, while something to be proud of, doesn't really do anything more for you than just having good credit. And that is something you should know. There is a lot of talk about creativity on podcasts, in books, magazines, seminars. Yet I think people still believe to some extent that there are creative people and then there's the rest of us. That in an organization, creativity is best left to those who have that special creative something. So let's come at this from a different angle with my guest, Michael Roberto.

Michael is a trustee professor of management at Bryant University in Rhode Island, and he's author of the book, Unlocking Creativity, How to Solve Any Problem and Make the Best Decisions by Shifting Creative Mindsets. Hey, Professor, welcome. Thanks, Mike. Glad to be with you. So how do you look at creativity? Do you think that some people just have it and other people have less of it or none of it? Or how do you look at it? I don't think that we lack new ideas because there's a lack of creative people. See,

I don't really look at it as there's creative people and there's non-creative people. I think of it as there's a tremendous capacity for creativity in lots of us, in all of us, but that hasn't been tapped into. So how do we tap into it? Well, I think that a big part of it is around mindsets. And that's what I talk about is that, you know, as we work in organizations, we unknowingly, we begin to embrace certain mindsets that are pretty pervasive in a lot of organizations, large and small, that those mindsets kind of get in the way, unfortunately, of our ability to be creative. And so that's so, you know, not only is it that we sometimes perceive creativity incorrectly, we think of it as, you know, great art or great music and the like. We don't think of it as making a product a little bit better, improving the service. Any kind of new way of doing things is creativity, right?

But we don't think of it that way. But the second thing is that there are these mindsets that basically get in the way. And they're mindsets, when I say that, I mean belief systems about how we think about original ideas, how we evaluate them, how we go from idea to execution. Some of those belief systems that we take for granted are unconsciously getting in the way of our ability to be creative. How so? How does that work? So let me give you an example. And a lot of us, as we go through school, you know, and achieve our education, we do a lot of linear thinking. There's a path from A to B,

and it's kind of a linear path. When we have to solve a problem, we frame the problem, we gather data, we analyze the data, we look at some options, we select a course of action, we execute. But when it comes to creativity, I would argue it's a fundamentally nonlinear process. It doesn't work that way. It's much more about the ability to test ideas, experiment, to prototype. It is a nonlinear process. It involves trying things out, gathering feedback, and then making revisions. We have this false myth that basically ideas,, great ideas come to these creative people with like a bolt of lightning, you know, that hits them. And it's all of a sudden this perfect solution

to a perplexing problem that just hit us. When in fact, most creative ideas come through a process of persistent iteration, where people are trying things, experimenting, learning, adapting, improving. And over that process of iteration, through that process, they're getting to a great solution, not in one fell swoop. And so that failure to recognize the nonlinear nature is, I think, getting in the way of a lot of our ability to be creative. So what's a good example or two of that, of creativity that's the

result of lots of little changes rather than ta-da? Yeah, well, you know, I actually talk about the fact that, you know, we have this perception even in the great artists and musicians that's incorrect. And so I actually look at the life of Leonardo, Leonardo da Vinci. And we have this view that, you know, he must have sat in front of these canvases and just out came these incredible works of art. In fact, Leonardo worked in fits and starts. He did a lot of experimenting with sketches and models and mock-ups before he ultimately built his great sculptures or painted his paintings. And even then, he worked on some of these paintings for years and years and sadly left some of them unfinished, a number of them unfinished,

over the course of his life because he was constantly tinkering. And I acknowledge, you know, Steve Jobs once said, real artists ship. You know, in the business world, you can't tinker forever. Ultimately, you have to ship out your product. But a little bit of tinkering is a good thing. And the idea of what Leonardo did, which was to constantly be looking at, hmm, how do I test out this new brush stroke or this new way of sculpting something? And that ability to do that led to some of these amazing works that he was able to produce. He didn't do it by just sitting there and pouring out on a canvas all these great ideas in his head, and all of a sudden, voila, there was this great painting. It didn't work that way. What you just said about what Steve Jobs said, that great artists

ship, I think is so important, and what really separates real creativity from tinkering. And that is, how many people have an idea, but nothing ever happens with it. It's, you know, they draw a little picture and put it in a drawer and that's the end of it. But it never goes anywhere. And I guess that's a little bit of creativity. But as Steve Jobs said, you know, real creative people ship something. And this is the thing. When I talk about testing and experimenting, I don't mean just in your head. I mean, you know, what great companies do and what great people in those companies do is they

get their ideas in front of customers, in front of users, right? So they prototype an idea, or they build a mock-up, or they sketch something, or they, you know, mock up some software, and then they get it in front of a customer. Crude, simple, low cost, but quickly. And they get some feedback and they make it better. And if you look at all of the great software firms, that's what their people are doing, right? They're not sitting there and spending years and years building the software, trying to make it perfect and then going out to market. They are getting something pretty quick and dirty in front of people to get their reaction quickly. So I think that's the difference. You know, the tinkerer who just talks and thinks in his head about an idea and never does anything with it,

that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about the people who put their feet on the ground and get their idea in front of a customer and get some feedback and then iterate quickly. Now, here's the big problem, Mike. We all aren't very good at iterating for a couple of big reasons. The biggest reason is once we have an idea, we fall in love with our ideas. And then we don't listen very well. So what we really look for when we bring our ideas out to people is validation instead of feedback. And so we often end up, even if we do put our ideas out there,

not actually doing a very good job of making them better over time because we fall in love with our idea. So how do you do that? And how do you stay objective about an idea that you've created? And as you say, you've fallen in love with, how do you keep from falling in love? One of the other mindsets that I talk about that gets in the way of creativity is, I call it the naysayer mindset. You know, we often run up against naysayers who are finding all the reasons why our idea won't work. And what I talk about is the fact that you don't, you know, we don't want naysayers in the organization, but the answer isn't to say, well, I'm not going to put my ideas out there to be critiqued or I'm not going to listen to people who might push back. What we need is to find and to cultivate people around us who are constructive devil's advocates, who can actually help us by asking good questions, can help us by providing good feedback, but aren't the naysayer who's just looking for why it won't

work. And if we can, there's a difference. And I make this distinction. I think it's really important. We need the devil's advocates, the sounding boards. We don't want the naysayers. And if we can do that, that'll really help us. Don't they look alike? They sure do. That's the thing. At first glance, if we don't look carefully, they look alike, right? But in fact, what my research looks at is there is some subtle differences, important differences. I talk about who, when, and how. The who is who's playing the role. The person, the same person who on every idea is always the contrarian, that's probably a naysayer, not a real devil's advocate. Like,

if there's somebody who, because they just become a broken record, right? They're never seen the glass half full. They're always seeing it empty. Well, we start to say, is this really good, honest, genuine feedback? Because they're always seeing the glass half empty, right? So, the naysayer is the person who, right from the get-go, is going after that idea. Constructive devil's advocate actually is the people who don't begin the criticism right away. They actually hold off on judgment and help you flesh the idea out first and build on it and generate several different options before they start critiquing. And the how, the naysayer is the one who just delivers a lecture to you, you know, on what's wrong with your idea. The devil's advocate is trying to learn.

They're asking questions. They're trying to understand your thinking. They're trying to be helpful. They're on your side. They're not an opponent, I think. So they're subtle, but really important differences. We're talking about creativity today, and my guest is Michael Roberto, author of the book Unlocking Creativity, How to Solve Any Problem and Make the Best Decision by Shifting Creative Mindsets. Hi, I'm Jennifer, a founder of the Go Kid Go Network. At Go Kid Go, putting kids first is at the heart of every show that we produce. That's why we're so excited to introduce a brand new show to our network

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There's so much for you in this podcast. The Jordan Harbinger Show. There's so much for you in this podcast. The Jordan Harbinger Show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. So, Michael, how do all these pieces of creativity fit together into a process? You've talked about lots of elements of creativity, but let's put it into a process that works. We always have, of course, first and foremost, the desire to execute. We've got some existing products and services, and look, we've got to deliver those to our customers. But in order for the organization to thrive in the long run, they've got to have an engine of new ideas as well. And not just new products and services, but enhancements to the way we deliver

our current products and services. And so, and it can't be that we just have this separate group off in the corner. Oh, you're the creative people, you know, that are going to think of the next things. What we really want is everyone in the organization saying, how can we do things better? You know, so yeah, we're trying to execute,

but we're not just doing the same thing we did yesterday. We're trying to do it in a better way. You know, so once we start thinking that way, that we're all trying to find better ways of doing things. Some of us are taking the existing product or process and trying to improve it. Others are trying to come up with new products and services, but we're all in the, in the, in the game. And that's the way I look at it. I don't think you can look at it as these people over here execute, and those people over there, they're the ones generating the ideas for tomorrow. So is this built into the DNA? Are we always constantly on the lookout for new ideas, new ways of doing things?

Or in an organization, Thursdays at noon, we're going to get together, have lunch, and talk about new ideas. Well, it's certainly not always, right? I mean, we do, you know, the phrase that one manager told me is, today always gets in the way of tomorrow. You know, I mean, there are some pressures to deliver today that definitely are going to make it impossible for us to be thinking about how to make things better tomorrow. So that's always going to be the case, right, where we just have to go in, you know, when I'm in the middle of teaching a class, right, I am not thinking about how to do it better. I've got to be in the moment, right, interacting with my students, doing the absolute best I can.

And then after class, I've got to go, okay, what did I do wrong there? How do I make it better? Maybe I collect some feedback. So there's certainly moments where you're in pure execution mode in a business. So it's not always. But what we don't want to do is wait till the end of the year and say, okay, let's look back at how we did this year. How do we make it better? Business is moving too fast. Customers will defect much more quickly than ever before. They're very disloyal in many

cases. If they have a bad experience, they're going to bail. So I don't think we can wait the way maybe we used to be able to wait and say, oh, at the end of the year, we're going to look at our strategic plan for next year and we'll look at how to do things differently. That's just not possible anymore. You don't succeed anymore if you wait in that way. So, Michael, how do you know when you're in that creative process? How do you know when you get to the point of, that's it, that's good enough? I mean, okay, so we're going to make this widget better, and we've iterated it to death, and it's as good as it's ever going to get. Now, we could sit around and talk about, do we paint the tip of the widget red or not,

and retool for that because it would make it just a little more sparkly. But at some point, enough's enough. Yes? Or are we always going to have to make this better? Well, I think the one thing you have to think about is there obviously are diminishing marginal returns, right? Eventually, you know, you say, well, you know, is it worth the effort? Maybe we could do that one additional improvement. Is it worth the cost and the effort, you know, or the delay in going to market? So a big part of this has to do with understanding your competitive

environment. In some markets, being first to market is really important. And, you know, maybe you go to first to market with a product that's not quite perfect, but you really need to get there first. It's really important. Other markets, being first might not be as important. You can be a fast follower and succeed. So you have to understand your market and understand, you know, where are we relative to the competition? And in some cases, you know, we got to get to market and we can't be tinkering any further. It's really important. But the other

piece is we also have to look at the cost, right? I mean, you know, I can make, you know, this laptop that I have a lot better, quote unquote, but at the end of the day, do I want to pay, you know, the incremental price that might be necessary to cover those costs. It's always a question of how much value does the customer have on that? What are they willing to pay? Is this, in your mind, is this a very kind of formal thing? I mean, are we getting the janitor involved in this and the receptionist, or is this the creative team that does it?

Who's doing all these things you're talking about? I was reading this one great anecdote about a hospital where someone asked a janitor, it's interesting you say janitor, what's your job? And the janitor said, my job is to save lives by preventing infection in this hospital. Now that's a really cool response, right? That is a very cool response. That's a manager who really engaged people who you might say, well, how are they part of making this better? They're just cleaning the floors and wiping the tables down. And that's someone who went, huh, the janitors actually, infection kills a lot of people in America in hospitals and healthcare facilities. So how do we get the janitors involved to help us reduce the rate

of infection? And they engaged them and they worked with them. So how do we get the generators involved to help us reduce the rate of infection? And they engaged them, and they worked with them. So I think sometimes there's people that we might say, well, what do they have to do with being creative and making things better? I think we have to be careful about that, right? Because sometimes those people are vital to making things better. How do you decide when you're creating? Probably especially when you're creating? It's probably especially when you're creating by

yourself. How do you decide when you're going down the right path versus you're going down the wrong path? How do you decide, yes, this is the right way to go? I always say, let the customer decide, right? At the end of the day, it's about getting your notion in front of the customer. You and I could sit here and debate it forever. Is this improvement in the Starbucks coffee shop ordering process? Is this better or worse? Should we do it or not? Is it worth the cost, et cetera, et cetera?

We could debate that forever as two managers at Starbucks or two employees. At the end of the day, who's right and who's wrong? I have no idea, right? There's only one person who can tell us. You let the customer decide. So I always say, the more you can engage your customers in that process, they're going to tell you whether they think that change is worthwhile or not, whether they're willing to pay for that enhancement in your product or not. The mistake a lot of people make, right, is they wait to reveal, they work for months and months and months without putting their idea in front of a customer and never getting feedback.

And I think that's a big problem. The other thing I'd say is, you know, one of the other mindsets I talk about, Mike, is a benchmarking mindset. We get obsessed with the way we sometimes evaluate ideas is we think, well, it's all about looking at what the competitors are doing. And we have to keep abreast of them. And that will tell us whether we need to do something or not. The problem with that is that what I find is that when we benchmark, what we end up often doing is simply copying what the competitors are doing. Instead of asking ourselves, wait, no, the reason we want to keep abreast of what they're doing is so that we can learn from them. But also, we have to remember that what we want to be is unique, right?

We want to be distinctive. And we don't want to simply copy everything they're doing. But for a lot of companies, unfortunately, a lot of employees are being driven to simply, they make the judgment on what to do or not by looking to the competition. If they're doing it, we must do it. They're the leader in our industry. And that's just a mistake.

The best firms zig when others zag. They aren't trying to be all things to all people. They truly are being distinctive. And I use example, one of the examples of companies I studied was Trader Joe's. They don't look like any other grocery store on earth. They zigged when everybody zagged and they created the most profitable grocery store on earth with customers who love them, employees who love them, they don't look anything like the competition. So they were careful about how they judged what to do and what not to do, and they didn't let the competition drive them, which I think unfortunately happens in a lot of instances. Yeah, but you can also zag in the wrong direction. I mean, there's a million ways,

there's one way to zig, there's a million ways to zag, and Trader Joe's may have nailed it, but a million other people may have not nailed it because they zagged somewhere else. You got it. And this is exactly why people end up just copying the competition, because it's the safe way out. If I do what other competitors are doing, I'll be an average performer in my industry. If I'm an average performer in my industry, I'm not getting fired. If I go a different direction, there's a 10% chance I become Trader Joe's.

There might be a 90% chance I fail, I lose my job. So the safe thing to do is to copy and not to do things differently. At the end of the day, you know, though, that's not where we get real breakthrough performance. And so the question then becomes, you know, how much risk are we willing to tolerate on that? It's a tough decision. And I imagine that, you know, Trader Joe's opened one store, and in fact, not far from where I'm sitting, their first store, and it was such a success that then it made sense to open up more stores, but that one store could have come and gone.

So actually the answer on that is really interesting, is that it took them years to really perfect the model. So they had a few stores in Southern California, but they didn't really start to grow nationally for quite some years because they called it their, I can't remember the phrase they used, but they basically had this period of time in the 70s where they basically evolved the model. They tried a bunch of things. And when they finally had it nailed, that's when they really started to open stores outside of Southern California. So they didn't get it in one fell

swoop either, right? They had to work it. Well, it's good to hear that creativity isn't just magic or something that a few people have. Really, anybody can be more creative, and it's more of a step-by-step and a formula than it is something that you're necessarily born with. My guest has been Michael Roberto. He is a trustee professor of management at Bryant University in Rhode Island and author of the book Unlocking Creativity, How to Solve Any Problem and Make the Best Decisions by Shifting Creative Mindsets. You'll find a link to his book in the show notes. Thank you, Michael.

Thanks, Mike. I appreciate it. Thanks for reaching out. I'm glad to be part of the podcast. Do you love Disney? Then you are going to love our hit podcast, Disney Countdown. I'm Megan, the Magical Millennial. And I'm the Dapper Danielle. On every episode of our fun and family-friendly show, we count down our top 10 lists of all things Disney. There is nothing we don't cover. We are famous for rabbit holes, Disney themed games, and fun facts you didn't know you needed, but you definitely need in your life. So if you're

looking for a healthy dose of Disney magic, check out Disney Countdown wherever you get your podcasts. Hey everyone, join me, Megan Rinks. And me, Melissa Demonts for Don't Blame Me, But Am I Wrong? Each week we deliver four fun-filled shows. In Don't Blame Me, we tackle our listeners' dilemmas with hilariously honest advice. Then we have But Am I Wrong, which is for the listeners that didn't take our advice. Plus, we share our hot takes on current events. Then tune in to see you next Tuesday for our listener poll results from But Am I Wrong. And finally, wrap up your week with Fisting Friday, where we catch up and talk all things pop culture.

Listen to Don't Blame Me, But Am I Wrong on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. It's interesting to look at and realize that so much of our behavior is habitual. We do things because, well, that's what we do. And often trying to change those behaviors can be very hard, even when we know it's the right thing to do. And yet some people do it. Some people can lose weight or quit smoking or find a better job or somehow change their routine. So what is it that they know or what is it they do? Well, with some really fascinating insight into habits and goals and change is Alexander Hain. He's the author of several books, including Master the Day and The Lazy Guide to Habit Change. And he has some really

great advice for anyone who wants to change a habit but finds it hard to do so. Hi, Alexander. Welcome. Yeah, thanks for having me, Mike. So I've always thought this is an interesting topic, but why do you find it so appealing? You know, for me, I think every person has this aspirational version of themselves. And we really do want to change, but something happens when we think, you know, this is the person I think I can become. Like, I think I can become that, but then the actual gap is something we all tend to have a hard time bridging. So I don't know anyone that's like, you know what? I want to

have like a 10 out of 10 in terms of my body and fitness and health, but I want to have a two out of 10 in terms of my career or my dating or my emotional life. But the thing is, how do you actually go from the person that says, I want the 10 out of 10 to being the person that does that. And I think at the same time, all of us humans, we want those things. And we're also phenomenally great liars to make ourselves feel better. So, you know, it's like, it's really, I'm both an optimist and a pessimist, but I think in the middle is the realist because at the end of the day, what we say and what we do is often not aligned. And so I embarked on this study to figure out who are the people that both say and do, you know, they do exactly what they said. So they have that inner

character, that kind of inner strength that allows them to do the things that then ultimately help them reach their goals. And we'll probably get into it in more detail, but I would love to know in just kind of a general way, what is that thing? When I see somebody who is, you know, as fit as a fiddle, not an ounce of body fat on them, and I think, how did they discipline themselves to get there? What's the difference between that guy and the other guy who goes to the gym? He means to go to the gym three times a week, but maybe he gets there once or twice a week. And what is that thing? To me, that one thing is a story. They're just telling themselves a different story in their head. When I say that, what I mean is that that one, let's just say the guy, that guy that may have no body fat, what drives him may have been the pain from being the short, fat, bullied kid, oh, it's a nice to have or yeah, I really, really want this. But when things get tough, the story that's driving them is not strong enough.

Whatever story or narrative they've compiled and created in their head, it's not something that drives them when things really get tough. And so for me, all real change has to incorporate at least some part of psychoemotional or psychological changes, as well as the actual tactical habits. So for example, I can say, you know, I'm like, let's just make it really emotional. I got dumped by this woman I really loved. And it was primarily because of, I wasn't taking good care of my health. That can be the driver to get fit. But I think ultimately it comes down to one thing. And you could have asked the same question about why do entrepreneurs fail or succeed? Why do marriages fail or succeed?

Why do some people attain, you know, spiritual enlightenment? And I think ultimately it comes down to hunger. And for each person, it's very situational. The hunger is going to be different. Whether the hunger is for greatness, the hunger is for simplicity, the hunger is for the big rock in my life I want is I want a great love and a great marriage. It's the hunger that's really, to me, the only thing that can predict whether or not a person achieves that outstanding, unusual success in that part of their life. And so when people talk about and think about changing a habit, either doing something or stop doing something, part of the definition of habit is it's hard.

It's tough to do. Otherwise, it wouldn't be a habit that you're trying to change. And so what is the, aside from the story, you then have to take that story and do something with it. You have to, you can't just sit and think about your story. You take it and then you apply it somehow. One of the things I've noticed working with a lot of people is that people tend to set the bar way too high from the jump. So for example, you know, let's, we'll just go with fitness or we can go with entrepreneurship or whatever, but people are like, I really need to lose this 20 pounds of chub I've been gaining. And so rather than creating a practical action step, which is, you know what, I'm just going to start with the 10 minute walk after dinner when I feel, you know, indigested.

For some reason, we have this idea that I should go right for the two hour workout on day one. And so practically speaking, in terms of the habits themselves, the two things I find work the best are really on some level the most unsexy. Finding the exact same time every single day and the same ritual. So one of the most interesting things you find in the research regarding habits is that if you can find the exact same place and time to do the habit, for example, exercisers that go to the same gym at the same time and tend to do the same overall workouts are more likely to stick with those habits months later than people who are varying the time and the

day of the week. So that by itself is you're anchoring in your brain and your subconscious that, hey, 6 p.m. is my workout time four days a week, non-negotiable. Or 9 a.m. on Saturday morning is my yoga time so that, you know, Friday night I'm not going out drinking with friends. So on one level, I find that anchoring it to the same time, the same place, and the same ritual, that trifecta works really well. So that's why, for example, you see morning and evening routines are really proven throughout history to be really, really effective.

And every tabloid from Entrepreneur Magazine or Forbes, the top 20 morning rituals of successful people, the things they all do, at the end of the day, the morning is just a window that you get every single day. And you have control over it before anything happens. And so that's why you really see that as a consistent time to review goals for spirituality. Sometimes creatives like to work at that time and for fitness as well. So the first thing is I would find the same place, the same time. And if it is related to a day of the week, the same day for that exact ritual. Ultimately, though, it would seem that if you want to make a change, if you want to, you know, exercise and get fit or quit smoking or, you know, the usual things that people talk about when they want to make a change, that ultimately you have to develop the discipline to do it. Discipline underlies all of this.

If you don't have the discipline to do what you have to do, you're not going to do it. Discipline is obviously, to me, one of the most useful traits to cultivate in life, but there's limits to what discipline can do. And often when you become a very, very, very disciplined person, it can tax your happiness just a little bit. So what I find is that we often underrate the power of doing habits that we actually enjoy.

So I shared the story of how when I wrote my first book, Master of the Day, it was actually – there's a story about authors that the first book is the one that's kind of like bursting out of you. It's like you've been feeling angsty. It's something you've been wanting to share. And then after that, they get tough. For me, I really looked forward to that one hour a day I spent writing that book. It was the first hour of my business day. It was exciting. I had all these ideas coming.

And so frankly, you know, authors don't like to hear this. It was an easy book to write. And I've had others that are much more difficult. But if I followed all the typical writing advice I saw online, like you need to sit down and like you write for three hours and you just grind and get all this done, it never would have happened. So what I find is that people will often get much better results finding what you can do every day regarding that goal. So let's say if it is exercise, if it is writing a book, if it is building a business, what is the smallest amount that you

can do every day as opposed to the largest amount you can do once in a while? You know, what's interesting to me is that often when people decide they're going to make a change, for example, they're going to lose weight and they're going to make a change, they're going to, for example, they're going to lose weight and they're going to get fit. So they're going to go to the gym. And at the beginning of that process, they look at this as this is going to be drudgery for the rest of my life, that getting up and going to the gym every day or every other day or whatever is going to be hard. It's going to be difficult and it's going to be something I don't enjoy.

And yet when you talk to people who have been doing it for a while, they actually like it. It becomes part of who they are. They hate it when they miss a day. But it's hard to see that at the beginning, because at the beginning you think, this is going to take a lot of willpower for the rest of my life. Right. My thoughts are the less willpower you can use, the better. So there's almost like two schools of thought in almost every field. It seems like there's people who want you to just be more iron willed and there's people who want you to be more in flow.

And in my experience, the more you can be in flow and inherently like the process, be intrinsically motivated, almost like the artist who's so engrossed in their work, they work for 15 hours a day. That to me is an energy that will last. That's an inner resource that will last, you know, till the end of time and not forcing myself for the next 50 years. And so from your research and working with people, how do you set this up? How do you formulate a change to succeed? What does it look like? What is it you do in the beginning that really sets you up for success? So for me, one of the things that I've noticed works really well with a lot of people

is there needs to be some kind of replacement. So a habit that I and a lot of other entrepreneurs struggled with, for example, was drinking less coffee. I've never been like a huge daily coffee drinker, but just that ritual of the warm cup of coffee, the smell, starting with my hardest project first thing in the morning when I know I'm going to be front of a computer all day, that was a really difficult habit to stop. And I found that with the coffee habit, because again, remember it was anchored so strong because it was the same place, the same time, and really the same ritual. I had to figure out some way that was different than just going cold turkey. So for me, what I ended up doing was I would find myself working until I reached that certain, that where I got that itch, you know, almost like the,

it's like the itch to smoke a cigarette, the urge where I wanted that coffee. And really what I was craving was a break or really what I was craving was just something to drink. And so for me, just replacing that with something else, I mean, there's even herbal substitutes, Ticino, whatever that's called. For me, it was replacing that urge for a break, either with a literal break. So for me, I worked in like a WeWork and a co-working space and just going walking and talking to someone or using like an actual coffee substitute was one of the ways I replaced that. Now for me, you know, sometimes it is just knowing the stakes itself.

You know, a lot of people I hear they start to get fit as soon as they notice a death in the family or one of their parents gets ill. what's the real driver and then also figuring out what is the real feeling of relief you're getting from doing that habit and trying to find something else that gives that relief. And did you try to kick coffee completely or you just like instead of five cups, we stopped at two or what was your goal? Yeah, for me, it was really purely because I was having already digested problems from it. So even just two cups a day was enough to give me indigestion and acid reflux so here's a kind of a two-part question and that is what do you find is the driver for the momentum to make changes like this

stick and on the reverse of that what is it you find that people try to use as momentum that fail? Things that I'm thinking, for example, of somebody's spouse wants them to quit smoking and that's the reason they're going to try to stop, but they don't really want to stop, but they're doing it for somebody else and maybe that's not the best reason. My belief and observation is that people really don't change besides through pain. And the sad truth is that often when the pain is not great enough, people will not change. And that's why you have people who are diabetic and the physician says, you need to stop eating so much sugar, stop going to McDonald's, no more Coca-Cola.

And then there are however many tens of thousands of limbs getting, you know, amputated each year because that pain wasn't great enough. And even to the point where, I mean, there are millions of Americans that die every year early because of that. I'm in pain, but I can take this little white pill and it, it kind of puts sedates the pain enough that I don't have to worry about it. I think ultimately it's almost like, I don't know, do you know Grant Cardone, Mike? Okay. Grant Cardone is like a sales trainer online. He's got this online presence and he talked about how he was a drug addict, had a lot of issues with hard drugs. And even to the point

where he landed himself in the hospital multiple times. He was beaten to a pulp by a drug dealer. And even to the point where all of this happened, but the moment that it actually stopped for him was when his mom said she never wanted to see him again. And so that was the strong enough, you know, hit in the chest that made him realize, wow, like the stakes are really high now. And I think for each person, it has to be the stakes and it's going to be different for each person. But ultimately, I think what doesn't work is when we try to do it for another person, but we don't even really want it for ourselves. When we're doing that for our partner or our friends and family and for us, the pain hasn't

gotten bad enough. But what about when the stakes aren't that high? What if it's just, you know, I'd really like to drop 10 pounds, but there's no harm if I don't. So, you know, it's a change people would like to make, but the stakes aren't particularly high. For me, I would go with something that's as maximally enjoyable as possible. I know a lot of people who are lifelong, you know, kind of in between struggled with their weight. And it wasn't until they decided that, hey, I'm going to go with four of the people I work with at lunch. We're all going to go to the gym first.

And then we're all going to get healthy lunch and bring it back to our desk. That to them, because suddenly now it was fun. There's camaraderie. That by itself, I found to be one of the best ways as opposed to the Puritan, you know, I'm going to punish myself. I'm going to set up bad stakes that don't feel good when I don't do this. For me, it's the more you can make it fun and honestly with other people. So that

means if you don't like going to the gym, then maybe, you know, go play ultimate Frisbee or whatever it is that you're into. If you don't like going to the Zumba class, then find something that really, really is exciting you. For me, it's more about regulating your internal state first, because if you can enjoy the process, like you said, this is never ending. You know, it's not like I lose the 10 pounds and I can stop. This is like the next 50 years of my life. So if you can't do it for every day for five years, maybe it's time to choose a different activity. You know, that's so interesting because when people think about making these kinds of changes

of losing weight or quitting smoking or getting fit or whatever, the immediate thought is this is going to be hard. This is a negative. This is going to be grueling. And what you're saying is, why? Make it fun. You're much more likely to succeed if it's fun rather than this torture you think you're going to put yourself through. For sure. And entrepreneurs do the same thing, where it's like, we tell ourselves the story, I've got to grind today. I just got to do this. I've got to keep going. But do you to do this. I've got to keep going.

But do you want to be doing that five years from now? I mean, you look at the epidemic of suicide among entrepreneurs. That doesn't happen when you really love the day and you really look forward to it. And I think it's highly underrated, really, really enjoying the intrinsic experience of doing what you're doing. So what is it you want people to take away from this, from all the research you've done on this? What's the magic bullet here? To me, bridging that gap between whatever it is, whatever part of your life you are in right now, whether it is dating or it's your financial life or career or something else, bridging the gap between where you are and where you want to be is always the two aspects of whatever story I'm telling myself, the story about dating, the story about men or women,

the story about money, the story about what it takes to be successful. And then is the external manifestation of those habits and those thoughts and beliefs, which is your actual specific habits. And it's just like, if you want to become a master at something, to study masters, you study their daily habits. So whatever it is that you're not getting results in, that usually indicates there's both unhealthy beliefs and unhealthy stories about that aspect of your life, as well as some aspect of your life where you're not taking enough action

and you're not specifically doing the exact rituals that are going to help you get there. And this quote unquote idea of making each day your masterpiece is just the idea of if you break down who you want to become in that domain of life into specific daily habits, it's only a matter of time before you ultimately get there and become that person. Excellent. Well, that's some really good advice and some good insight into how people can and often do change their habits. Alexander Hain has been my guest.

The book is called The Lazy Guide to Habit Change, and you'll find a link to that book in the show notes. Thank you, Alexander. Great. Thanks, Mike. If you want to do something that's really good for your health and doesn't take a lot of physical effort, try paying down some of that debt you have. Being in the hole isn't just bad for our psychological well-being, it can take a serious toll on our physical health. The higher the debt, the sicker we get. Researchers found that those people with high debt also had high diastolic blood pressure, which puts us at risk of hypertension and stroke. Those who owe a lot are also more prone to depression, stress, and heart attack.

So if you can, pay off the debt. And that is something you should know. Wherever you are listening to this podcast, there is most likely a way to leave a rating and review about this podcast, and I would appreciate it if you would do that. I'm Mike Carruthers. Thanks for listening today to Something You Should Know. Welcome to the small town of Chinook, where faith runs deep and secrets run deeper. In this new thriller, religion and crime collide when a gruesome murder rocks the isolated Montana community. Everyone is quick to point their fingers at a drug-addicted teenager, but local

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We were both on a little show you might know called Supernatural. It had a pretty good run. 15 seasons, 327 episodes. And though we have seen, of course, every episode many times, we figured, hey, now that we're wrapped, let's watch it all again. And we can't do that alone. So we're inviting the cast and crew that made the show along for the ride. We've got writers, producers, composers, directors, and we'll of course have

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