Uplifting Others

With yesterday’s topic of “focusing on yourself,” I felt it appropriate to discuss the importance of encouraging others and specifically how I have changed to consciously do this.

I have been very goal oriented for the last couple of years but I have mainly kept to myself with how I accomplish, or fail, these goals. The more I have read “spiritual” or “self-help” books the more comfortable I have become with my personal missions, while also learning how to help others decide for themselves they want to improve. A key quote that still stands out to me comes from The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz stating, “If others change, it’s because they want to change, not because you can change them.” This quote still stands out to me because I read it on the exact day I needed to. The day I read it, I was struggling with trying to help someone change for the better. The quote helped me take a deep breath and realize I needed to take a step back. At the same time I was digesting this quote, I was also further understanding the power of support systems and how people are more inclined to act when they do not want to let someone down. The book Atomic Habits credits making goals public, or working with others, as ways to help make habits stick. I unequivocally view support systems as positive and credit a large part of where I am today to having a great group of people in my corner.

From my post on January 2nd, Read That Book, you will understand how passionate I am about reading and learning. From my future posts, you will see my ability to see the bigger picture and get better on an incremental basis. This mindset applies to working out, practicing skills, and even this newsletter! I will once again emphasize I am not perfect. Nor am I where I want to be. However, I am very understanding of feedback and know how to improve processes so I can continue to get better over a long-term time horizon.

With this in mind, I began to be more inclusive and welcoming to bring those around me to places I believed they could go. The first example of this started when Nick Bare and Bare Performance Nutrition (BPN) started their “100 for 100” challenge. This was a challenge where participants would do 100 push-ups every day, for 100 days. I shot a message to a group chat of friends to see who was interested. In the first set of 100 days we had 5 total participants and 3 of us finished. At the “end” of the challenge, I sent another message to the group chat to see if we had any newcomers wanting to participate. We now have 7 members and are on day 56 of the second set of 100. I fully anticipate at the end of these 100 days, we will continue with another reset and start again. I would also bet that on the third set, we will have even more finishers than either of the first 2 sets.

My personal opinion on this challenge is I do not need to do 100 push-ups every day as a “workout.” I go to the gym and run for my workouts. 100 push-ups a day means that I will not let the others involved down. No matter what is on my plate, no matter how tired I am, I will take the collective 5-10 minutes (or less) to do them. I almost never do all 100 in one sitting. I will do 30 here, 40 there, and ultimately finish. The purpose to me is every day, I am deliberate in making sure the job gets done. At the same time, I want everyone in my group to have this sort of mentality and realize it takes slight physical effort to accomplish. What it takes is daily commitment to improvement. Over this period I have found immense joy in seeing my friends go through individual changes and seeing “switches” go off in their minds and outlooks on life. The 100 for 100 challenge has been much larger than just 100 push-ups a day.

The second example is something new, and something officially started 4 days ago. I sent a message, to the same group chat, to gauge interest on a book club. The goal is to read 12 books in 2023, 1 per month. We will also have 1-2 discussions per book to discuss everyone’s opinions and insights. 12 books seem very daunting if in 2022 you read 1 or 0 books. The goal seems much less daunting if you say, “Read 10 pages a day, for 30 days, and you have read 300 pages. Most books are less than that. If you do any extra effort, you will easily accomplish this.” At the same time, there is no strict requirement to read all 12. Life happens, and this is ultimately a choice. It is set up to be a low-stress book club. I cannot make my friends read, they must individually make the choice. I absolutely believe in everyone involved and hope they all read 12 books, but I am not going to be mad if they do not. At the end of the day, 9 books, or 6, or even 3 read in 2023 is probably more books than they read in 2022. Progress is progress. I am extremely excited about this adventure and am very happy I have changed to recognize areas where I can present others with the ability to make choices to personally improve.

Aside from these groups I have organized, far and away the most impactful moments I have experienced through becoming more extroverted with my goals occur when my friends reach out to me individually with their stated lifestyle changes or goals they want to accomplish. When people reach out to me saying I helped them change their minds or helped them reach to go that much further it moves me. Since the start of 2023, I have had 4 friends independently reach out to me with goal planning and open discussions on how to attack them. Having people close to me come to me for advice and encouragement gives firm feedback that making a change to include others, on their time, has been the right thing to do. A large part of my 2023 will be involved with helping others personally improve. I no longer have only myself to improve.