The Mindset Mentor - How to Change Your Life Through FOCUS

Episode Date: July 5, 2021

Need more focus? In this episode, I will teach you how to get better at focusing, then use that focus to change your life! Thank you to our sponsors: Blinkist: -- Rob Dial @robdialjr Want to learn more about Mindset Mentor+? For nearly nine years, the Mindset Mentor Podcast has guided you through life's ups and downs. Now, you can dive even deeper with Mindset Mentor Plus. Turn every podcast lesson into real-world results with detailed worksheets, journaling prompts, and a supportive community of like-minded people. Enjoy monthly live Q&A sessions with me, and all this for less than a dollar a day. If you’re committed to real, lasting change, this is for you.Join here 👉 www.mindsetmentor.com My first book that I’ve ever written is now available. It’s called LEVEL UP and It’s a step-by-step guide to go from where you are now, to where you want to be as fast as possible.📚If you want to order yours today, you can just head over to robdial.com/bookHere are some useful links for you… If you want access to a multitude of life advice, self development tips, and exclusive content daily that will help you improve your life, then you can follow me around the web at these links here:Instagram TikTokFacebookYoutube

Welcome to today's episode of the Mindset Mentor Podcast. I am your host, Rob Dial. If you have not yet done so, hit that subscribe button so that you never miss another podcast episode. Today, we're going to talk about how to change your life with one simple skill talk about how to change your life with one simple skill through focusing. So I'm going to give you a five-step process to making sure that you're better at focusing to get stuff done every single day. And if you can take this one daily habit and put it into every single day, I promise you this, it will change your life. Slow and steady wins the race. I promise you it'll help you. If you follow this to a T, you'll get more shit done than you ever have in your entire life. And the reason why I say this is because most people work, quote unquote work, eight hours a

day. But in those eight hours, how much do you really think people are getting done? Maybe 10 minutes here, then they go talk to somebody. Then they do five minutes here and then they go to the bathroom and then they do five minutes here and then they go scroll on Instagram when their boss isn't around, isn't looking. It's not really any focused, productive work to get stuff done. And I'm not the most talented. I'm not the most skilled. I'm not the smartest person in the room. But one thing that I think I've been able to figure out with my own brain through learning about neurobiology and learning about human interaction, how humans work, is I feel like I've been able to get really good at mastering the skill of focus. And I call it a skill and not a talent because I think that anybody can learn to

focus when you can learn how your brain starts to shift and starts to move and what chemicals are going through your brain at this time. And it's the ability to literally sit and lock in and focus. And the number one thing that I want to tell you is every single day, your goal is not to work for eight hours. Every single day, your goal is to be completely locked in for just two hours a day. That's it. Full locked in two hours a day. Now, everybody has different times that is easier for them to lock in. Some people are morning people. They've got a ton of energy. They've got a ton of focus in the morning. Some people are afternoon. Some people are noon. I'm usually my best time to lock in is about 11 o'clock to two o'clock. Somewhere in that area, my brain seems to be like, it's just easier for me to lock in.

So you have to figure out what works best for you. And it's just two hours. And this is going to be really big for you guys to realize. If you have a company, this is going to be really big for you because you're going to get more productivity from yourself and from all of your employees. This is also going to be big for people who work for another company, but you don't want to work there anymore. Because the average person that has their job and they don't enjoy their job, the average person thinks they have to go home because they hear people like Gary Vaynerchuk, who I love. But at the same time, I think that he puts a little bit too much emphasis on hustle and pushes a lot of people away. But instead of going home and working from eight to five and then going home from six o'clock until 1 a.m. working on your side hustle to build

it, I would say go home, eat some food, and then lock in from seven to 9 p.m. or from 8 to 10 p.m. Go to bed, get some good rest. Fully locked in for two hours a day at the end of the year is over 700 hours of being locked in. If you put 700 hours into deep locked in focus, into a brand new business, into a skill, into making money, into whatever it is that you're trying to create. 700 hours, it's a lot of hours. Over 700 hours is what you get if you're just doing two hours a day, every single day. 730 hours, I think is the number, right? That's a lot of hours. So it's beautiful because if you are trying to create a business, if you have a business, or if you're trying to leave the place that you are currently at. So I'm going to give you the five steps to hardcore focus.

This is just something that I've learned after talking with Dr. Andrew Huberman and learning about focus through him and also reading some of the stuff that he's put out. Other things that we've learned neurobiologically inside of your brain of how to make yourself focus. Okay. So the first thing is this, write out a to-do list. Now you're probably like, Oh no shit. Right. Right out of to-do list. And I mean, right out to-do list, like just brain dump every single thing that you need to get done. It could be laundry. It could be the dishes. It could be pick the kids up from school. And then you're going to get every single thing, all the things that need to be done around the house, all of that. But then you're also going to get the stuff that really

needs to be done. And what I want you to do is I want you to look at that massive list that you just created, 10 things, 20 things, 40 things, whatever it is. And I want you to rank number one, number two, and number three. I want you to identify your three most important things. And in my mind, even if you don't get to number two and three, but you conquer number one, that's a successful day in my mind. If you can knock out your most important thing every single day, that's a really good day. Isn't it? I would love to just get my number one thing done every single day.

That's 365 number one things done over the course of a year. So you're going to write out your to-do list. You're going to figure out what number one, number two, number three is. You're going to take a three by five card, cue card, and you're going to write number one at the top, number two, right under that, and number three right under that. You're going to take the to-do list with all of the other stuff and you're going to put it somewhere else so you don't have to look at it. You don't have to worry about it. You don't have to focus on anything that is not your most important stuff. And you're going to take number one, two, and three, and you're going to set it right next to you

so you can make sure that you get it done. And you're going to focus on number one first until it's done. And if you don't get it done, you get a half done, well, you still got tomorrow. You can go back and go to it, right? So that's number one is to write out to-do list and then come up with number one, number two, and number three. The second thing is to create a space that is conducive for focus. So create a space for focus. What does that mean? For me, I'll tell you

what it is for me. For me, headphones. I've got noise canceling headphones. I put them on. I can't hear anything. My girlfriend tries to talk to me. I can't hear anything that she's saying. My dogs are barking. Can't hear anything she's saying. Someone's at the door. Can't hear anybody knocking. The only thing I can hear is the music that I'm playing inside of my ears. That's it. Music never has any words to it.

It's not a song that I know. It's just, if you go to YouTube, you can look it up. It's called Focus Binarial Beats. That's what I listen to every single day, no matter what. I've literally trained my brain to know that when this song comes on, it's time to get shit done. It's like a dog that's peeing inside the house. You take it outside, you take it outside, you take it outside, you take it outside, you take it outside. Eventually it goes, oh, when I feel this urge inside of my bowels, I have to go to the door. That's exactly what my brain is doing with this

song. Oh, I'm listening to this music. It's time to focus. I'm listening to music. I'm trying to focus. I'm listening to this music. It's time to focus. Literally, I'm training my brain is doing with this song. Oh, I'm listening to this music. It's time to focus. I'm listening to music. I'm trying to focus. I listen to this music. I'm trying to, it's time to focus. Literally I'm training my brain. So create a space that's conducive for focus, whatever that means for you. For me, it means headphones. Number two, turn all of your notifications off. I don't know why people have notifications on their computer in the first place. Like every time they get an email, that sounds terrible. And it sounds extremely unproductive to just stop what you're doing to go check an email or do something else. But not me. I turn off all my notifications on my computer. Put your phone in another room. Don't put it next to you because you're going to be drawn to it. Put it in another room.

You know, give it to your spouse and say, give this to me and don't let me get this until two hours from now. Whatever it is you got to do. So create a space for focus. There's a few things you can do. Hey, these days it can be hard to find some time to sit down and learn a little bit more. And it's not easy with how addictive social media can be and Netflix and all of the other stuff that can take your time. And you might think to yourself that you don't have time to develop yourself, but there's an app that I highly recommend. It's called Blinkist. Blinkist is for anyone who cares about learning but doesn't have a whole lot of time. And Blinkist takes the key ideas and insights from over 4,000 nonfiction bestsellers in more than 27 categories and gathers them into 15-minute text and audio explainers

that help you understand the core ideas. And 15 million people are already currently using Blinkist to broaden their knowledge in 27 categories, including self-improvement, personal growth, management, leadership, mindfulness, and happiness. And right now, Blinkist has a special offer for you. Go to Blinkist.com slash mindset, and you can start your seven-day free trial offer and get 25% off a Blinkist premium membership. That's Blinkist, spell B-L-I-N-K-I-S-T.com slash mindset to get 25% off and your seven-day free trial. Another thing that helps as well, if you're creating space for focus, is create a body that's ready to focus. What does that mean? If you need to do a workout before, do a workout before. If you need to do some pushups, if you need to do some stretching, some yoga, do that. Do you need

some caffeine? For some people, caffeine makes you focus. Actually, for most people, caffeine will make you focus. Too much caffeine will actually make it really hard to focus. For me, whenever I've got to focus, I put on the headphones, I turn my notifications off, I put my phone in another room, and I drink Yerba Mate. For those of you guys that are watching on video, this is what I drink. Literally, it's right next to me. I was drinking it earlier today. It's a company called Guayaki. They should sponsor me. They're not giving me any money.

Actually, I give them a lot of money because I have one of these a day. But it's Yerba Mate, Guayaki, G-U-A-Y-A-K-I because I get 40 messages a week about what Yerba Mate I drink. What Yerba Mate is spelled Y-E-R-B-A-M-A-T-E. And I take the traditional unsweetened because if you get the sweetened one, it's a lot of sugar and I don't need to sugar crash.

So this is what I drink for those of you guys that are watching on video. Here you are. For those of you guys that are listening to the podcast, go onto my YouTube, my Facebook, you can find it. We'll put it up there. So I drink yerba mate throughout the day. And that's what makes me focus. I don't remember what it is, but there's also a chemical that's inside of yerba mate. It's just a tea. That's all it is. Yerba mate is a plant. Yerba mate is a tea that's made from a plant. And I don't remember what it is, but according to the neurobiologist, Dr. Andrew Huberman, it's got something that's really good for your brain in there. I trust him. But he drinks Herbamato and he needs to focus.

I've been doing it for years. So that's number two. Create a space that will help you focus. Clear off all of your stuff. Don't have anything on your desk. Just your computer. Whatever it is you need to do. Number three is to use the Pomodoro technique.

Pomodoro technique is 25 minutes on, five minutes off. 25 minutes on, five minutes off. 25 minutes of hardcore, intense focus on one thing and one thing only. After those 25 minutes, you take five minutes off. Don't take five minutes off and go to Instagram. Take five minutes off. Now that you've been in deep focus, the best thing is to go outside, stare at the trees, allow your brain to go to wandering. You can have a conversation with somebody, whatever it is you need to do. to wandering. You can have a conversation with somebody, whatever it is you need to do. Five minutes completely off. And then you go back into 25 minutes. And I do four rounds of this.

25 on, five minutes off. That's 30 minutes. I do four rounds. That's two hours. You will get more cranked out in these two hours than you probably have on a typical eight-hour day over the past 10 years of your workday normally. And that's what helps. So the Pomodoro technique. Also, you might say, well, how do I know when the time is up? How do you know when the time is up? Literally go old school kitchen timer and put it next to you. If you're needing to see the time, you can get a clock right next to you, have an alarm clock and have that alarm clock literally go off at 25 minutes. And you don't do anything except for one thing in those whole 25 minutes. And it's intense,

intense focus. Cool? Step number four, when you ask yourself, how do I get intense focus? What you're trying to do actually chemically inside of your brain is you're trying to turn off your peripheral vision and focus into one thing. So what you're actually trying to do is basically see, like if I'm working on the computer, what I'm going to do is I'm going to stare at the computer screen and try not to blink. When you blink, it actually resets neurologically different aspects of your brain. So when you literally stare at your screen, for those of you guys watching the video, I'm staring at my screen and not blinking. What I'm trying to do is I'm trying to tell my brain that this is what we're going to focus on. This is what we're going to focus on. And my brain will eventually lock in.

And what it does is it takes your peripheral vision and it actually starts to narrow it so that you're just seeing the screen. That's telling your brain, that's telling you, and you're actually watching your peripheral vision disappear. You're going, okay, I'm getting more focused. I'm getting more focused. I'm getting more focused. And I can tell that my brain is getting more focused on this. Now I know it's time to lock in. So then most people go, okay, let's say that you're a writer, for instance. And you're like, but you know, I get writer's block. Well, that's what's going to go into number five. Number five is to just start whatever task it is or acting like whatever task it is. And let me explain this is going to make more sense. Number five is just start. So most people think if they're a writer that they have

writer's block and they think writer's block is a creativity block. Writer's block in most cases is not a creativity block. It's actually a mind and body resistance to a new task. And so what you do is you've got to kind of warm up your mind and body to this new task. And you can use this for however you want to use it. If you're a painter, you can use this, but I'm going to use this as an example for someone who is a writer who has writer's block. I'm going to stare at the screen, which was number four. And number five was just start. I'm going to stare at the screen. I'm going to say, today is Thursday. I am wearing a blue shirt. It is sunny outside. It has been raining for the past six days. I live in Austin, Texas. I'm recording an episode of the

Mindset Mentor podcast, and I'm just going to type a bunch of bullshit. Doesn't matter what I type, I'm going to delete all of it. What I'm trying to do is I'm trying to get my brain and body past the resistance point, which is usually about three to five minutes in and then your brain goes. Oh, this is what we're doing now It's the same reason why we have so much resistance to actually going and working out is because it's just a new thing that our brain and body Always resist doing something new a new task switching. We're inherently lazy. It's just the way that humans are built, right? So that's why if you go into the gym, it's hard to get yourself to go in the gym. But once you're there, it's easy once your body starts moving. I'm going to start the task that I want to, and it's not creativity

block. It's just resistance towards the new task. So if you know that you need to write a talk, or let's say you need to do a PowerPoint for a talk. You got to create this PowerPoint. You're like, dude, I just hate creating PowerPoints. I'm going to stare at the screen as long as I possibly can without blinking and basically narrow my focus and tell my brain, this is what we're going to do. And then what I'm going to do after I can start to feel myself focused a little bit more is I'm going to start typing out this PowerPoint and it could just be random stuff. I could put colors down. I could put, you know, whatever it is. This is the talk I'm about to create. And I'm literally starting

my brain and my body into the task to focus on whatever it is. After a few minutes, you're going to start to notice that you're getting a little bit more into the flow. Now we get stuff done. a little bit more into the flow. Now we get stuff done. Now we start to go through it. Now we have about 22 to 20 minutes left of hardcore intense focus before we have five minutes off. That's step number five is to just start. You lock in for 25 minutes. Then what you do is you take five minutes off, do whatever it is you need to do, go to the bathroom, you know, stare at the trees, whatever you want to do. And then come back. You'll notice that when you come back, you'll already be a little bit more focused than you were before. And your focus starts to get better and better and better. And the reason why the Pomodoro technique works so well, there were studies that were done on

human focus. And what they noticed is that about 10 minutes in, human focus spikes at its highest, and then it just slowly dips off. So if I were to just work for two hours straight, it would spike one time at 10 minutes, and then it would slowly drop and drop and drop and drop for the next hour and 45 minutes, hour and 50 minutes. If I go and I do the Pomodoro technique, I get one large spike at its highest at 10 minutes, and then it'll slowly drop, and then I'm done at 25 minutes, take five minutes off. And then I get another spike at 10 minutes on the next one. And then I get another spike at the 10 minutes and the next one, I get another spike. So instead of having

one big spike where I'm at my highest productivity, and then it drops for the rest of the two hours, I'm getting four of those spikes of high productivity. And I'm using my brain and my body, knowing how it works, knowing my space, knowing my brain, knowing my body, knowing neurobiologically how all of this works. I'm using this to my advantage to focus. And I'm telling myself, Rob, all you got to do is two hours. Crank out two hours of hardcore work. And then whatever it is you got to get done outside of that, get it done. But as long as I get those two hours of hardcore focus done, I get more done in those two hours than I do for the rest of six hours, seven hours, eight hours of the day that I'm getting stuff done as well. You have to lock in for two hours.

That's all you've got to do. So those are the five steps. Number one, write out your to-do list. Number two, create a space for focus. Number three, use the Pomodoro technique. Number four, stare at your screen or stare at whatever it is that you're about to do so that you can bring intense focus to that thing. And number five, just force your brain and body to start doing something that is like the task that you're about to actually dive into. So that's what I got for you for today's episode. If you love this episode, please share it on your Instagram stories and tag me at RobDialJr, R-O-B-D-I-A-L-J-R. The only way this podcast grows is from you guys sharing it.

So I greatly appreciate it every single time that you share it. And I'm gonna leave it the same way I leave you every single episode. Make it your mission to make someone else's day better. I appreciate you. And I hope that you have an amazing day.