Shadowing Practice: How to Change Your Life in 30 Days - Learn English Speaking with Video
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This is how to change your life in 30 days.
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Step one, cut the crap.
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It's time, as the kids say, to lock the in.
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Most people's whole year is multitasking to get nothing done.
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Have you ever seen the person that goes like, hey, count to one, two, three, four, five, six, then do A, B, C, D, E, F, G, and how long it takes them to do that?
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If they do it quick, it might take like 15 seconds.
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If they go A1, B2, C3, and onward, it can take them over a minute and a half.
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So you're forcing your brain to context switch because you have too many things going on.
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Pick one, let's get a win.
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First off, we have to write one primary outcome for the next 30 days.
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What is the one thing that if you just got done, it would change your energy around your life?
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The second is we have to choose two habits that are gonna drive that forward.
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The way we do that is we habit stack.
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So if the thing is to get in a better shape, then you might go work out every day and eat better food.
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Last, we have to say no to anything that doesn't feed that one goal.
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Learn to say no. If it's not a hell yes aligned to that goal, it should be a heck no. Pick one f*ing goal.
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Add two simple habits that feed it.
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Ignore the rest.
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So once you cut the crap and the overload is gone, you have to focus.
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So now's the time to adapt to the next 30 days.
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Step two, when things are easy, go hard.
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I learned this from my coach and he calls it separation season.
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There's two times a year where everybody else can coast.
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Everybody else goes on vacation.
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Everybody else slows down.
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Think about summertime and Christmas time.
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Take those two times a year and create separation from everybody else.
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It's kind of like being on a highway at night.
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And when you look around, there's no traffic, there's no distractions, and you in your car of life can floor it.
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You build that gap on your competition and that's what separates you from everybody else.
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So here's how you separate yourself.
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First, that first 90 minutes, that is what I consider the deep work.
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That is where you separate yourself from everybody else.
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That is where you get focused on your number one priority.
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Whatever problem is in your life, maybe you don't feel fit or you don't have love or you wanna make more money, that has to be the first 90 minutes of that day.
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You have to give yourself the gift of being intentional and focus on you getting that reward.
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Next, we have to skip the party.
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Don't lose your early morning productivity because you stay up later than you should when you should have been recovering
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because now is the time to actually go hard in the paint.
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And finally, pick one weekend day to double your key habit.
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I consider the weekdays when I get done, the weekend when I get better so I can have more leverage to get more things done.
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Weekends is when you actually double down.
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For me, it's Saturdays.
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I practice my prompt engineering.
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I use it to improve my skills.
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I work on the skills that make me more valuable so that I can be more valuable to people in my life.
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And if you do these three things, you will create separation from everybody else.
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So now that you've created that separation, it's time to set your daily rituals.
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Step number three, set daily non-negotiables.
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Non-negotiable means you do it every day.
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So when I mentor other founders, I have these five daily non-negotiables, but I wanna keep this really simple and easy for you.
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So I'm gonna teach three of them, but essentially there's zero days off.
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If the day ends with D-A-Y, they do these because I want to create a rhythm of success.
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When you can live your life in momentum, you wanna fight to stay in it because things are exponentially and geometrically more powerful.
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It's like putting your clothes on.
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You don't debate it, you just do it.
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The way I think about it, it's kind of like when I created my elite program.
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I wanted to design these five daily non-negotiables in a way that it would make it impossible for them not to win.
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And for what it's worth, if you're a business owner and you're looking to scale past seven figures
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and you feel stuck and you're interested in working with me, just click the link below or scan the QR code and we'll see if it's a fit.
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It's what I do every day with my eyes closed to help people win in life.
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So these are the three daily non-negotiables anybody can apply to
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accelerate their wins the first is your body what are the one
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or two habits
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that feed your body is it movement is your eating habits
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is it your vitamins is it your stretching for me lately
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i'm 45 stretching has become a big component in my life
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but i've learned
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that a body emotion stays emotion number two is your mind what's one to two daily habits
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that could feed your mind for me i have to read
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i have to read at least 10 pages i look at
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it like i'm mining for something i can give back to
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the world i want to be learning i want to be meditating those are things
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that help me create awareness of this life i'm living in
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so that i can be better for the people around me the third is business think of the one
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or two habits
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that you could add in your business to move it forward
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think about the marketing activities the daily outreach the sales calls
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for example one of the the things I make every one of my clients do is post three stories a day.
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Three times a day, I want them to pull out their phone, talk to their phone.
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It's really awkward and post those on their stories on Instagram, on Facebook, on TikTok.
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I actually don't care where because it's the process of doing it.
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It helps their business.
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It helps them grow.
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It helps them overcome their fear of learning to communicate or creating content.
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And that pushes them outside their comfort zone.
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For most people, it's improving their business relationships.
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For other people, It could be marketing, trying to figure out how do you get your message about what you do in the right places.
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Could be just shaking more hands.
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You know, the more hands you shake, the more money you make.
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I don't know what it is for you, but think about the two habits in your business that can move it forward.
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One or two habits for your mind, your body, and your business.
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Anybody can do this.
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With your habits locked in, it's time to eliminate every single biggest thing holding you back from your goals.
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Number four, stop making excuses.
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Excuses are just lies that keep you comfortable.
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You know, I don't have the money.
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I don't have the relationships.
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Those are just things you tell yourself to make it okay for not doing something.
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I get that laying in a warm bed and warm blankets feels really good, but you know what feels great?
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Living a life of your dreams.
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And please don't say, I'll start on Monday.
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That used to be my move.
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I would be like Saturday, ate like a pig.
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All right, I'm gonna start my diet on Monday.
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Guess what?
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You can start a diet halfway through a bag of chips.
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For me, what happened is Monday became next week.
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And then eventually next month.
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And then eventually next year, because I never got to it.
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I kept pushing it off.
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So here are my favorite ways to eliminate excuses to make the last month the most productive of the year.
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First, we have to say our excuse out loud.
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Give it a name, like actually talk to it.
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You can actually write it down and say, oh, this is my excuse.
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It's got a name.
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Let's call it Bob.
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Bob, why are you in my life?
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I really would like for you to f* it off.
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Having that conversation might sound wonky, but when we name things, we then have the ability to change things.
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Second, we have to ask, does this serve me?
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Challenge it.
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What would it mean if I didn't have this in my life?
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I like to ask questions like, where did this come from?
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Who taught it to me?
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Why do I continuously allow myself to enable this behavior because it's in my life?
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When you put a spotlight on it, it starts to dissolve.
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There's this great quote that says, sunlight sanitizes, sunlight, putting attention on it will dissolve it, we'll clean it up, we'll get rid of it.
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And lastly, if you can't dissolve it, ignore it.
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It sounds crazy, but I tell people all the time.
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Feel the feelings, have the excuse, fly the plane.
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See, when people talk about like being courageous or taking action in spite of fear, that's what courage requires.
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Courage isn't, I did it.
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Courage is, I'm scared shitless right now and I'm gonna do it anyway.
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If you do that, I can guarantee
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that you're on your way to make this last month of the year the best month of the year.
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So now that your excuses are gone, there's one more thing holding you back.
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Step five, cut your time assassins.
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Being successful isn't about what you do, it's actually more about what you don't do.
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When I think about like the ultimate personal development plan, it's waking up in the morning, asking yourself, scan the previous day and go out of everything I did yesterday,
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is there something I wish I didn't do?
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But if I then knew what that was
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and I make a commitment for today to do the thing
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that I didn't do or to stop doing the thing that I knew I shouldn't have done, then today will be a better day.
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That's why in my book, Buy Back Your Time, I have a whole chapter dedicated to time assassins
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because I realized it doesn't even require money to buy back your time.
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It requires you to stop stealing your time by having these time assassins show up and literally take from you.
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And if I were to bet, one of your time assassins lives in one of these five categories.
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The first one is notifications.
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Turn them off.
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I don't have notifications on my phone.
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Look, I literally pull up my phone, no notifications.
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Don't need them.
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Why?
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If somebody needs to call me, I'll go check my missed calls.
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If somebody needs to get ahold of me, I'll go check whatever I need to check.
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So just turn off the notifications.
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Your focus and attention is worth way more to you than other people's need to distract you.
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Second are the vices.
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Remove them from your life.
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And the vices aren't just alcohol, drugs.
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It could be video games.
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It could be anything you feel guilty for doing the next day because it took away from you.
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That's what a vice is.
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Third is energy vampires.
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And this one, I can't tell you how powerful it is if you add it to your life.
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To essentially do a friendventory, look at the people in your life and curate out the ones that take your energy.
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When I interact with somebody, I ask myself a simple question.
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Was that easy, light, fun?
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Did I learn something?
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If the answer is no, I say no in the future so I can create the space to say yes to somebody I may not even know.
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Fourth is late nights.
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I care more about getting up early and having that time to myself than I do staying up late at night.
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My favorite thing my mother-in-law always says is nothing great happens after 9 p.m anyway, so go to sleep.
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So here's a pro tip.
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Set an alarm for when you go to bed.
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Try figuring out your go-to-bed routine, not a wake-up routine.
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Number five is saying yes.
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Most people need to learn to say no. People have to say no to other folks
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that are asking them to do things that aren't aligned with their goals.
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Say no to the distractions.
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Say no to these long conversations that don't go anywhere.
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Just say no. And no is a full sentence and it ends with a period.
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So now that we've freed up your time, it's time to make some progress.
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Step number six, stack the small wins.
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Most people don't celebrate the little tiny wins.
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See, what you do when you celebrate those small wins is you build belief and belief builds identity.
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And it's actually the identity that drives the actions.
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When I'm driving home after work, I don't have to convince myself not to stop to buy a pack of cigarettes.
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Why?
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I don't smoke.
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identity makes it easy for me.
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It's like when I go to the gym, tracking my lifts, even if I don't get stronger, still makes the win there because I track the lift.
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So here's how you track your wins to make this month the month where you start to build your identity.
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Number one, we have to track your progress.
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Every little thing you have to measure.
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Peter Drucker always says, what you measure will get managed.
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If you measure things, then you will start to make better decisions.
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So measure your steps per day, measure the marketing you're doing, measure your weight, measure your revenue, measure what matters to your goal and track it.
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I like to put things in a spreadsheet.
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Every Friday, I track myself across seven different dimensions, okay?
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It's the last bonus chapter in my book.
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And these are just my life scores around things like love and hobbies and money and spirituality.
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And because of that, I have a chance every Friday to reflect on my week, to measure myself.
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And then I choose my two lowest scores and I do one thing, action for each to make it better the following week.
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Number two is identify the win.
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Most people just coast through life.
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Things happen to them and they don't even notice the progress.
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They don't even stop to like celebrate.
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My creative director hit 2 million on YouTube.
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It's our project, but he's the one that's spearheading it and creating it.
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He wasn't even gonna celebrate it.
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It's just like onto the next thing.
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Don't be that person.
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See, when you celebrate the little, the big ones come to life.
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If you don't appreciate what you have, God's not gonna give you more to deal with.
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And number three, share it with the world.
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See, a lot of people don't wanna share their progress they don't wanna be considered braggadocious.
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Here's what I've learned.
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The more you share your wins, the more consistent you'll be because you've now just been public about what you just won at.
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So if you went and lost a bunch of weight and you shared on social media, well, guess what?
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When people see you next time, they go, oh my God, how are you doing?
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Are you keeping it off?
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And you're gonna be like, yep.
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Cause you don't wanna be the person that says no. You don't wanna win in private so that nobody holds you accountable.
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But the best part is you will 100% inspire them.
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Isn't that the coolest thing?
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I consider the three H's.
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We go through the world and we unfortunately have to hurt.
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Then if we're mature enough and we learn these things I'm sharing with you, we heal from those things.
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And then the last part, which is why you should share with the world is that you can help other people by sharing your story of winning,
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of transformation, of the setback and the struggles and how you overcame it.
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By sharing this video with people, if this video helps you, then share with other people so that you can help them with your story, with your journey.
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I think it's the most powerful idea in the world.
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And if you do that, you'll start stacking wins that will build your belief, that will eventually shape your identity to make it not even a habit, just who you are.
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Now that you've got momentum, this last message is to you.
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Step number seven, start today.
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Imperfect action today beats a perfect plan for tomorrow.
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Whatever it is, you've got 30 days this month to actually turn it into reality.
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Here's why.
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Like a plane, taking off, the first few minutes take the most fuel.
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So you just got to get that motion going.
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Get the plane off the runway.
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Once you're in the air, it's actually easier to keep momentum.
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But the reason I'm so passionate about this is because I believe that life isn't about just being happy.
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Life is about fulfillment.
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And to feel fulfilled, we have to do two things.
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And this is like my core message to everybody.
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If we ever have a chance to sit down and have coffee, this is what I would tell you.
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Number one, we want to wake up every day to strive to become the best version of ourselves.
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What I like to call our 10.0 self your best moments of your life all into one day, and you live that day every day, that is the 10.0 version of yourself.
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So we gotta wake up every day to become that person.
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And then the second part to this, to feel true fulfillment, is to share yourself with the world.
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Share your wins, share your process, share your progress.
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See, that's what we're here to do.
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We're here not just to make our lives better, we're here to use our example to help other people.
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That's what it's always been about.
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That's why the worst thing that's ever happened to you is actually your purpose if you're willing to look there.
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And that's why for me, this month, the last month, setting you up to build
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that momentum into the new year is one of the most
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important times of the year for you to finally get on the train of feeling fulfilled.
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So on that note, I need you to do two things.
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Number one, write down your 30-day goal right now.
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If it's lose 20 pounds in the next 30 days, that's aggressive, but write it down.
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And number two is commit.
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Post that goal on social media right now and tag me for accountability.
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At Dan Martell, 2Ls and Martell on all platforms.
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That's what I need you to do right now.
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If you start this process, that life you've been dreaming of, it's not that far away.
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You got this.
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Just fucking do it.
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Now, as a reminder, if you're a business owner
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and your goal is to pass seven figures in 2026 without sucking your life away, just scan the QR code or click the first link in the description below and I'll see if I can help.
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And if you wanna learn the 40 brutal truths that took me from broke at 24 to a millionaire at 27, click here and I'll see you on the other side.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This video has 274 sentences and 3293 words to shadow. The speech runs for 15:35. The speaker talks fast, about 211 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 88% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is easy to follow.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| habit noun | /ˈhæb.ɪt/ | An action performed on a regular basis. |
| separation noun | /ˌsɛp.əˈɹeɪ.ʃən/ | The act of disuniting two or more things, or the condition of being separated. |
| momentum noun | /ˌmə(ʊ)ˈmɛntəm/ | Of a body in motion: the tendency of a body to maintain its inertial motion; the product of its mass and velocity, or the vector sum of the products of its… |
| notification noun | /ˌnoʊtɪfɪˈkeɪʃn̩/ | The act of notifying. |
| assassin noun | /əˈsæsɪn/ | Someone who intentionally kills a person, especially a professional who kills a public or political figure. |
| belief noun | /bɪˈliːf/ | Mental acceptance of a claim as true. |
| courage noun | /ˈkʌ.ɹɪd͡ʒ/ | The quality of being confident, not afraid or easily intimidated, but without being incautious or inconsiderate. |
| scan verb | /skæn/ | To examine sequentially, carefully, or critically; to scrutinize; to behold closely. |
| stack noun | /stæk/ | A large pile of hay, grain, straw, or the like, larger at the bottom than the top, sometimes covered with thatch. |
| ignore verb | /ɪɡˈnɔː/ | To deliberately not listen or pay attention to. |
| essentially adverb | /ɪˈsɛnʃəli/ | In essence: by nature. |
| routine noun | /ɹuˈtin/ | A course of action to be followed regularly; a standard procedure. |
| stretch verb | /stɹɛt͡ʃ/ | To lengthen by pulling. |
| shake verb | /ˈʃeɪk/ | To cause (something) to move rapidly in opposite directions alternatingly. |
| overcome verb | /ˌəʊ.vəˈkʌm/ | To surmount (a physical or abstract obstacle); to prevail over, to get the better of. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| wake up verb | /ˌweɪk ˈʌp/ | To stop sleeping; to awake. |
| buy back verb | To purchase (something already sold, misplaced, destroyed, or given away). | |
| figure out verb | To come to understand; to discover or find a solution; to deduce. | |
| stay up verb | To remain awake; to not go to bed. | |
| double down verb | To double one's wager, particularly, the name of a specific doubling bet allowed in blackjack. | |
| get up verb | To move in an upward direction; to ascend or climb. | |
| go through verb | To travel from one end of something to the other. | |
| look around verb | To inspect a building or area. |
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Conditional sentences if + clause, will/would + verb — a condition and its result | if you just got done, it would change · If somebody needs to call me, I'll go · If you measure things, then you will start |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | Have you ever seen · you've created · has become |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | aren't aligned · be considered |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 98 contractions and reduced forms, such as don't, I'm, you're. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: separation /ˌsɛp.əˈɹeɪ.ʃən/, notification /ˌnoʊtɪfɪˈkeɪʃn̩/, essentially /ɪˈsɛnʃəli/, shake /ˈʃeɪk/, emotion /ɪˈməʊ.ʃən/
- Long words — get the stress right: separation /ˌsɛp.əˈɹeɪ.ʃən/, momentum /ˌmə(ʊ)ˈmɛntəm/, notification /ˌnoʊtɪfɪˈkeɪʃn̩/, essentially /ɪˈsɛnʃəli/, eliminate /ɪˈlɪm.ɪ.neɪt/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like habit, separation, momentum.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.