Start With A Win - Mastering The Art Of Showing Up

Episode Date: January 4, 2019

On this episode of the Start with a Win podcast, Adam talks with us about what he calls “mastering the art of showing up.” He says that today started yesterday and tomorrow starts today, and while the day’s tasks may seem monumental when viewed collectively, tackling them a step at a time is the best system to set up for yourself. Today, you can plan and prepare for the successes you are going to have tomorrow, from exercising to meetings at work to interactions with your fellow drivers to making the most of your time with your family. Find ways to eliminate excuses and commit to starting whatever is ahead of you by having a winning attitude.Specifically, in the morning, get up and away from your bed as soon as the alarm goes off. You will find that after a few weeks of waking up at the same time, your brain will get in the routine and you will be more mentally prepared to get up. Once you are up, your momentum is rolling and it is simple to put on the clothes you set out the night before and make it out the door for work or to go to the gym. These “micro-commitments” that you choose to make throughout the day will result in amazing productivity and the determination to do the same tomorrow.Links:“Atomic Habits” by James Clear – https://www.amazon.com/Atomic-Habits-Proven-Build-Break/dp/0735211299/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1544404331&sr=8-3&keywords=atomic+habits+james+clear “Good to Great” by Jim Collins - https://www.amazon.com/Good-Great-Some-Companies-Others/dp/0066620996/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1544404356&sr=8-1&keywords=good+to+great+by+jim+collins Connect with Adam:https://www.startwithawin.com/https://www.facebook.com/adamcontosREMAXCEO/https://twitter.com/REMAXAdamContoshttps://www.instagram.com/REMAXadamcontos/

Hello everybody, Adam Kantos here atop of the Remax World headquarters, 12th floor in beautiful Denver, Colorado. With me here today, Producer Mark. How are you, Mark? Good. How are you doing, Adam? Doing awesome. Sweet.

Yeah. Started with a win today. Did you? Yes. What was your win this morning? Hello. You know, it was one of those days where you get up and you go, man, that was perfect. I prepared for it, which we're going

to get into that. That's kind of today's topic, but it went seamless. It went the way it was supposed to. Don't you love that? It's the best. It's amazing. Yeah. It's the best. And that momentum, it just kind of carries you through the day, doesn't it? It's like a snowball. Yeah. Right? As you roll it down a hill.

It gets bigger and bigger. Yeah. I love it. I love it. That's the way. What are we talking about today? Hey, you know, I've been reading a book called Atomic Habits written by a guy named James Clear. He's been studying habits for quite some time and he had this saying in there and it was master the art of showing up. That struck me. So I want to talk a little bit about that today. So what is mastering the art of showing up? What does that mean? To me, it means a few things. When you look at what gets you to where you need to go, it's not just one process.

It's not just, hey, I'm going to go to the gym. I'm going to work out. I'm going to get a good workout in, and I'm going to go home and go to the office. It actually ends up being more than that. It's a series of steps. It's a home and go to the office. It actually ends up being more than that. It's a series of steps. It's a system in order to accomplish things. So in order for that system to work, you have to accomplish the different steps in that system, right? So mastering the art of showing up is the first step. Or as I like to call this, it's a micro commitment.

Micro commitment. Micro commitment. Yes. It's a tiny, tiny, tiny commitment. It is. You can't even see it. It's a micro commitment. A micro commitment. A micro commitment. Yes. It's a tiny, tiny, tiny commitment. It is. You can't even see it. It's so small. But it gets you there. Right.

Because really, making decisions, getting things done, or influencing people to take some steps in something is a series of micro commitments. It goes back to, psychologically, you look at how do we keep moving forward, the snowball effect, versus how do we stop? If we stop with these micro-commitments, with getting things done, we never get to the next step. If you come to a screeching halt, it's like your car runs out of gas on the highway. Then what? You're sitting there, right? So micro-commitment one, put gas in your car. Make sure it gets there. But let's break it down a little bit. Let's talk about, first of all, how today ended up being such a great day with these

micro-commitments. And by the way, it didn't start today. Right. Today started yesterday. What? What? Today started yesterday. Mind blown.

So I was bound and determined to have an amazing morning this morning. So I started last night in preparing for this morning, which I think is key to anything. And I know we've talked about this a little bit before, but you got to plan for success the next day, really the day before. So last night, I ended on a win. I ended on a huge win. And that was, I planned for today. I knew what my workout was going to be today. I knew I was going to do upper body. And I knew I was going to do 10 minutes of cardio before, 10 minutes of cardio after. I had that commitment down. I've got my little workout card, exercises I'm going to do, things like that. So done. So that game plan is in place. That's not the only thing. So I also, last night, wrote down things I'm grateful for.

Because I wanted to go to bed positive. Going to bed positive helps you wake up positive, thinking, God, that was a great night's sleep. I love it. I was happy. I was thankful for yesterday, thankful for the people in my life that I love and the things that I've accomplished and my dogs and my kids and everything else. So I think that's really important. I recently started actually leaving my phone in another room because before I'd go to bed and I'd read through Facebook or the news and it was like always so depressing. And then I'd like go to sleep, you know? And so leaving my phone and focusing on the things that are important before you go to sleep and the things that are like awesome in your life. What's the last thing you want to remember when you go to sleep? Because that's really what your brain's functioning on. Right. All you're doing is you're reprocessing

that. You're kind of playing what if with it. You're dreaming about it, stuff like that. And let's say you go to bed with some horrible news story in your head. Horrible news happens. Yes, tragic things happen in this world. But is that what you want to be dwelling on when you sleep? No. No. Not at all. No. I mean, you want to have some positive thought and that way you can have content in your rest. Yeah. So you got to have gratitudes.

Everything from just the fact that you could put your feet on the floor and stand up. The fact that you could take a breath. The fact that you could go and hug and kiss a loved one or pet your dog or look outside and see some amazing sunshine, something like that. I mean, just, there's so many things to be grateful for. And you could even be like micro grateful, like the sound of crunching leaves or the smell after a rain or like, you know.

Totally. Got to appreciate those things, right? I'll tell you, in my previous career, I was in law enforcement. And you go from call to call to call. And you're dealing with such, a lot of times, horrible, horrible things in society. And you're going, oh boy, this starts grating on you. What's good in this world? Right.

Right. You got to go find some gratitude. You got to stop and have a positive interaction with people. And that's why I talked in one of our earlier episodes about, I have to wave thank you to three people at least every morning when I'm driving to work. And I got to say hi to people in the elevator. You got to smile. Let me tell you something about smiles.

Yeah. It's something you never run out of right you can give them away all day long because you never run out of them that is good that's like a not a dad joke but a dad quip a dad positivity yeah my kids never run out of smiles nerd but hey you know what it's true yeah no it is is it just it is like super contagious. It is. You walk up to somebody, smile and say hi. And they're like, oh, wow, that's cool. You can't be frowning when you're smiling.

Good point. Unless somebody like turns you upside down, right? Yeah, it's true. But that's not going to happen. Smile, laugh, enjoy it. Anyhow, let's get back into my morning routine here. Actually, my evening routine, the day before. That's right.

We're still on the day before here. So I put my clothes out because if i get up and my clothes are there all i'm doing is i'm eliminating excuses yeah instead of wandering around my closet bumping into things you know when you crash into the door that's half closed or whatever and you're like oh you just need to go back to bed because you're looking for a reason to do it nobody wants to get up at 4 15 or 4 30 in the morning the morning and barrel your butt out of bed and go, oh, yay, I'm going to the gym. That's right. The other thing is I had to put in my head

that I'm committed to start. I'm committed. You just got to say it to yourself. I'm in. I'm going all the way. You got it. Yeah. There's no turning back.

What do you tell? I mean, obviously, it seems like working out, being fit is very important. Oh yeah. And it seems like something that you look at a lot of successful people and they say that that's how they start their morning out. Yep. What about the person who doesn't like to work out? I guess it's, even if it's not running a mile or whatever, maybe just getting out and walking

or doing something that gets your blood flowing in your mind. Right. Like kickstarted, I guess, right? You know, there's always a way out. I don't like this. It hurts my knees and I'll be the first, I have arthritis in my knee. I used to have them both before I had this knee surgery, partial knee replacement, which was just the most fabulous thing you can ever possibly do for six months as you know, sit around and nurse that pain or whatever. But Hey, you know what? It's behind me and my knee works better than it ever has yeah you just have to get over yourself yeah if you don't like something or you don't want to do it find a way there's always a way find something different but be the best that you can be if you're stuck on mediocrity you're stuck

on i can't do that i don't want to do that then you're right you can't or you won't do that. I don't want to do that. Then you're right. You can't or you won't. Yeah. But if you're stuck on, I'm going to be the best. Let's say you're in a wheelchair. Let's say you're a paraplegic. If you swear to yourself, you're going to be the best paraplegic you've ever been. I'm going to be the best I possibly can. I know some guys like that. I know a couple of guys in wheelchairs and they're like, I don't care. This is me. Let's say you can't see as well. I have nerve damage in my neck and my left arm doesn't work as well as my right arm. And I'm like, you know what? I'm going to prove my neck wrong. Screw your neck. I'm going after this. And you know what? It works.

My physical therapist and my doctor, they're like, whoa, what happened? You didn't do surgery. I'm like, I PT'd my way through it, which is just intensity is what it is. So you just got to work your way through it and never give up. Never, ever, ever give up. Go after it, man. Yeah, that's good. You got to give yourself some runway and that runway is preparation, preparing the day before. Nobody likes to rush. Nobody likes to feel like they're behind. Nobody likes to look at things and go, I don't want to do this, but I have to do it. It's, I set myself up for this. I get to do it.

And that's the attitude you got to have. Yeah. You got to have a winning attitude or you've lost from the get-go. Yeah. That's good. All right. So we got the night before set up. Yep.

Okay. So you go to bed after preparing and you're like, I am psyched. I am so excited because I did all this work. I'm not going to do it for nothing so i'm ready to go you almost want to wake up real quick because you've already set yourself up to win yeah yeah so you're looking at me like this guy's nuts no but it's true no it is true yeah so true and i think at the end of the day right it's every person has to ask himself like what do i want my life to be and then when you say that then you say, okay, what is it going to take for

me to get there? Right. And these are some of the simple things that it takes. You know, it's funny. Your decision. This is all you. Nobody's making this decision for you. This is on you.

This is about you. You get to decide whether or not you start with a win or not. Boom. There you go. On your shoulders, my friend. Yeah. Life responsibilities. No, that's good. All right. So then the next morning, here we are. Boom. There you go. On your shoulders, my friend. Yeah. Life responsibilities.

No, that's good. All right. So then the next morning, here we are. Yeah. Next one. Here we go. Get away from the bed. That's it. Get up and get away from the bed. You just got to get up and you go, that alarm is going off. By the way, I mentioned this before. The snooze button is your enemy. Oh, yeah. Do not give yourself an excuse you know and i'll tell you those cool little sounds that steve jobs put in the iphone when you know when he was so instrumental i think he's still you know like the spirit of steve jobs is still kind of going make this sound in the iphone and there's some subliminal steve jobs voice going get up yeah the alarm one that's just like red alert. Yeah.

You're like, ah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. All those, I don't care what you start with on that. It's just not pleasant. Yeah. You're going, whoa.

But it's weird because then you start waking up like five minutes before it and you're going, oh, come on. Right. Why did you do that to me, brain? Yeah, that is interesting. When you start putting yourself into that routine and habit and even telling your brain before you go to sleep, like, I need to wake up at 4.20 or 4.30, you find yourself waking up a couple minutes before your alarm. Yeah, totally.

And then you're like, ooh, do I roll over and wait for the alarm or do I just get up? Yeah, you do. You just get up. Just go with it. Just do it. Do you think that, first of all, you're not going to get back into some sort of a deep rest between 4.15 and 4.20 or whatever it is. So you might as well just get up and go, all right, let's see what I can get done early. I'll get to the gym early. I mean, that's like win plus one, right? Right.

So you just go with it. Get the extra points. Yeah. And I'll tell you, if I wake up a few minutes early before my alarm, my dogs are not going to let me go back to sleep. I get a German shepherd nose in the face. And it's over after that. Oh, totally. Seymour's like, hey, dad. Hi, dad. You're up. Yeah, you're up. I'm up. Let's do something. I want a bone. Come on. Anyhow. All right. So get away from the bed. You're right. Start momentum. Start moving. Put your feet on the floor. Stand up. And this is, I have teenagers, and this is one of the

biggest things. Because if they lay in bed, bed and it's weird because their alarm could be going off for like two hours. You're going, geez, do you hear that? Yeah, I'm ignoring it. Come on, get up, get out of bed, turn off your alarm, get moving. And then obviously you've already laid out your clothes and everything like that. Get dressed, get ready to go. And then here's my big key because you can get dressed and go back to go. And then here's my big key, because you can get dressed and go back into bed. Yeah, it's true on a cold morning. People do that, right? There's nothing more fun than walking across a cold floor, right?

You're like, oh, why did I do that? You don't have your fuzzy slippers on yet or whatever. But you got to do something to keep yourself from moving backwards. Brush your teeth, get a cup of coffee going and take a drink of that. Or I usually have my pre-workout drink. And I know if I take my pre-workout drink, which has like caffeine and stuff like that, you are amped. And there is no getting back into bed at that point. And you're like, well, I got a hundred milligrams of caffeine in me, so I might as well go to the gym. Absolutely. Well, it stops my, you know, starts the time ticking. It's like a time bomb. Right. My brain is going, you only have so much time on this drink, so you better giddy up. Yeah. I don't want to waste it. Right. I'm going,

all right, that was worth like 72 cents or something like that for that scoop of whatever I put in the drink. But it causes you to move forward. Yeah. Whether or not it actually helps you, you know, it could be some sort of a placebo, some sugar or whatever it is, I don't know. But, you know, the reality is it helps you move forward because it gives you another reason for positive forward movement. Right.

Positive momentum. It's another step towards a win. So you just get going. Get going. And then here's where the whole theme of this, you know, the master of the art of showing up fits in, get to the gym. Just get there. Yeah. Get yeah get there i'll tell you if you get there there's a little peer pressure involved at that point i mean you may be the only one there i can't tell you how many times i get

there and i'm going uh where is everybody no one's as motivated as me which is great i mean i'm cool with that yeah i'm good with that that happens in the hotels also you know if you're traveling i was traveling last week and four days i was in the gym nobody empty not a soul so it was great i set up my own little circuit there must not be any other ceos in the building here apparently not apparently nobody's caught on to my podcast yet that's right they will yeah at some point i was i need a i need a sticker or something yeah you need a gym sponsorship so that more people start showing up. There you go. That's it. So some little sorry I missed you.

Yeah, so it sounds like the whole idea of Master of the Art is showing up. It's even showing up to putting on your shoes that morning, showing up to taking your pre-workout. Those little tiny commitments that you're doing, they're compounding. And even saying, all right, I'm just going to go to the gym, maybe not even work out, right? You just sit on a pushup bench, whatever. And then you get there and then you're like, well, I'm here. I might as well start lifting some weights. And that was something that James mentioned in his book. He goes, even if you don't go and work out, just go there 10 times. The 11th time, say, all right,

I'm going to do some pushups or I'm going to do some sit-ups or I'm going to, you know, whatever, but just get there. Step one is showing up, right? And showing up does not mean hitting the snooze button. That was like 10 steps ago. So get out of bed, get there. And then inherently we've built this momentum. It's that whole, I think it was Jim Collins talk about the flywheel effect in Good to Great, where you start the momentum of this giant flywheel moving forward and it's hard to stop. It's this giant flywheel moving forward and it's hard to stop. It's hard to get going, but now it's hard to stop because you got this forward momentum. It's about getting things going and not backing off from continuing their momentum. You've got momentum going. You've gotten to this point. There's one more thing that I want to add

to this, okay? Yeah, what is it? Decide how hard you want to push yourself. And we're going to talk about getting better, some different ways of incremental improvement, things like that in a future episode of the podcast. But the reality is you got to decide how hard you're going to push yourself. Now, I'm guilty just as everybody else. I got this little devil on my shoulder called an iPhone in my pocket. And it is really good at distracting me while I'm in the gym. In fact, I pride myself on being a relatively observant individual, but I was actually sitting on the machine, a weight machine in the weight room the other day, and I was working on my iPhone instead of working out. So working and working out are two different things, right? So I'm working, sending some emails and stuff like

that on this machine. You do like leg extensions or whatever. And one of my friends in the gym was walking by and he saw my wife and she's like waving her arms. I didn't see her and he sees it. So he walks up, sneaks in behind me and adds all the weight to the machine. I go to use it and I can't move it. I'm going, what just happened? And I look around, everybody in the gym's laughing at me, like, ah, lesson learned. Don't use your phone while you're in the gym. I listen to stuff. I listen to podcasts, I listen to books, whatever. But the reality was, as I regressed, I caught myself working. Everybody else caught me working and kind of shoved it in my face there. But I was working instead of working out. So the next day, and even like today, consciously, I put my phone over with my jacket. So my Bluetooth would still reach to the gym, to wherever I was.

I could still hear what I wanted to hear, but I couldn't touch it. I couldn't get to it to distract myself. So that was a big, big learning experience for me the other day. Wow. That's good. Here's another one. We're social creatures. Me, my buddies, everything. We like to talk in the gym. Don't talk to people. Exercise. You can say hi,

you can share gratitude, things like that, help each other, whatever. But when we sit there and start talking about the football game or whatever else has been on TV or what's happening in the news or something like that, I mean, why? That's not what you're there for. Do what you're there for. Especially if you're limited, right? You're trying to get to work by a certain time. Yeah. And you're eating up your time not working out. Totally.

Yeah. You can't get through that cool little routine that you wrote down on the night before, by the way. You can't get through that if you're just hanging out jawing with people going, hey, Mark, did you see the game last night? And you're like, yeah, did you see that guy? Missed this shot. And you're going, uh, we just ate up five minutes, dude. Right.

There's a red gone. Yeah. Yeah. There are only so many blocks of five minutes in an hour. Yeah. So let's get gone pretty quick. That's where we're at. You got to master the art of showing up.

You got to get through things. And it's all about these little micro commitments. Putting your phone over there, not sitting around and socializing, getting the things done that you need to get done. It's pretty simple, isn't it? Yeah. When you say it like that, it sounds pretty simple. It's yeah. It's simple, but it might not be easy. Yeah. It may be a little more hard than you think, a little harder, a little more complicated,

a little more challenging than you think. But if you constantly remind yourself of this and ask yourself, you know, am I winning right now or am I losing right now? Am I moving forward or am I regressing? You realize that you got to master the art of showing up every time on these little things. So that's today's lesson, Mark. Dude, I love that. I think that's really awesome. And I think it's something that's really attainable, right? When you break it down to these very small commitments, making it very digestible, then all of a sudden you wake up one day and you're like, wow, it's easy for me to do these. That's it. Just one little step at a time, set yourself up and you find your successes.