Habits That'll Help You Not Waste Another Year Of Your Life w/ James Clear EP 1372

https://lewishowes.com/mindset - Order a copy of my new book The Greatness Mindset today! James Clear is a writer and speaker focused on habits, decision making, and continuous improvement. He is the author of the New York Times bestseller, Atomic Habits. Clear is a regular speaker at Fortune 500 companies and his work has been featured in places like Time magazine, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and on CBS This Morning. His popular "3-2-1" email newsletter is sent out each week to more than 2 million subscribers. In this episode you will learn,This thing you have to do before you ask for something of value. Reasons why you shouldn’t set your goals based on an outcome. How to set habits that reinforce the identity of who you want to becomeAnd much more! For more, go to lewishowes.com/1372Do THIS To Destroy Laziness [SOLO]: https://link.chtbl.com/1365-podMel Robbins’ The High 5 Habit & The Secret To Motivation: https://link.chtbl.com/1170-podAndrew Huberman On Eliminating Brain Fog, Increasing Your Focus & Controlling Your Motivation: https://link.chtbl.com/1204-pod Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:02Lewis Howes?

  If you feel like you're not living your most authentic life, not leaning into your purpose and not living the life that your future self would be extremely proud of, I've written a new book called The Greatness Mindset, and I think you're gonna love this. Through powerful stories, science-backed strategies, and step-by-step guidance, The Greatness Mindset will help you overcome all the different challenges in your life to design the life of your dreams and then turn it into your reality. Make sure to click the link in the description to get your copy today.

• 0:30James Clear?

  It's true that luck and randomness and misfortune, it's true that all that stuff is gonna happen to you and you can't control everything, every card that's dealt to you in life. But it's also true that you influence the situation.

• 0:43Lewis Howes?

  Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, a former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week, we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

• 1:07Lewis Howes?

  When it comes to setting goals and accomplishing goals, and a lot of people are thinking about goal-setting at the end and beginning of a year. When it comes to setting and accomplishing them, what do you think is the difference between successful and unsuccessful people on broad terms?

• 1:25James Clear?

  Broadly speaking, you know, obviously, every situation's different, so it's hard to say for sure. But I do think there are some patterns or some useful things that you can kind of keep in mind. So, one of the framings that I talk about in Atomic Habits is a lot of the time, everybody starts this conversation with, "What results do I want?" So, people set New Year's resolutions and they're like, "I wanna be the kind of person who loses a certain amount of weight," or "I wanna be the type of person who makes, you know, a certain amount of money next year," or whatever. And so, they set this outcome that they want, and they think, "Okay, if I'm gonna lose 40 pounds, then I need to come up with a plan, so I'm gonna follow this diet, and I'm gonna go to the gym four days a week." And so, we have the result that we want, and we got the plan for achieving it. And most of the time, the conversation stops there. We just sort of assume,

• 2:11James Clear?

  "Hey, if I do this thing and follow through on this plan, then I'll be the person I wanna be," is kind of the implicit assumption, like, "I'll be more like who I hope I will be." And my argument is let's flip that on its head and start by asking ourselves not what do I want to achieve? But rather, who do I wish to become? You know, who is the type of person I want to be? How do I want to be spending my days? What's the kind of identity I want to have? And then you can ask yourself, what habits reinforce that identity? So maybe rather than saying, I want to lose 40 pounds and I'll go to the gym four days a week. You say, I want to become the type of person who doesn't miss workouts. And you can see how that gives you a different frame or a different lens, you know?

• 2:55James Clear?

  Suddenly it becomes a little bit less about what you do in the gym on any particular day. And it's a little bit more about just showing up and being that kind of person and being consistent. And you give yourself permission to still feel good, even if you only have five minutes to work out that day. Because you're reinforcing that identity rather than, you know? A lot of the time we do this weird thing with goals, which is we say, I want to lose 40 pounds in the next six months. And then six months passes and you've only lost 17 pounds. And so you feel like a failure because you didn't hit this arbitrary target that you set in the beginning. But in fact, you should be feeling great because you're making progress, you know? Like you should be feeling really good about the fact that you're in a better position now than you were six months ago.

• 3:40James Clear?

  And so goals kind of like play with our minds in that way. And that's why I think it can be helpful to focus on who's the type of person I want to be? What kind of identity do I want to reinforce and are my habits supporting that?

• 3:50Lewis Howes?

  I think identity is so key and it's a lot of, you know, a lot of people say they want something, but their actions don't enforce the identity behind who they want to become. What is the part of your identity that you're most proud of in the last couple of years? Since, since launching the book and since now, you know, being a father of two young kids? What is the identity that you've had to shift going into? I'm a successful writer. I do this every day. I've written this bestselling book that is a phenomenon. Now I'm becoming a father and how do you balance both of those identities, I guess?

• 4:30James Clear?

  That's a really good question. You know, you see this a lot in different areas of life. So in, in my case, I've had a couple of different identity shifts. You probably had this too, given your athletic career. For a long time, I was an athlete. I was a baseball player. And so when I my career ended, I was like, what am I now? You know, like I I this thing was a huge part of my life for, you know, seventeen years, and then all of a sudden, I'm not doing that anymore. So it's felt like this loss of identity. I probably had a two or three year period where to call it a mourning is probably overstating it. But there was if something felt like It feels like a mourning, though. Yeah, it kind of is. Something felt lost, you know, it was like, man, I feel like a part of me is gone now. So you hear that happen from a lot of people in the military as well. You know, they'll

• 5:13James Clear?

  be like their identity is I'm a soldier. And then they leave the military and they become the civilian. And it's kind of like, well, who am I now? They sort of feel like they lost their footing. And the way that I describe it at this point is, I'd like to think about life as a series of seasons. And so one question I ask myself is, what season am I in right now? And so before I had kids and before the book came out, I was in this really career heavy season. And my identity was tied up in like, I'm a very hard worker. I try to always provide the maximum amount of value to my audience. I'm not going to let the number of hours that needs to be done to achieve this or accomplish this outcome like block me from trying, you know, like, I'm

• 5:53James Clear?

  just going to work my way through it. And then I had the shift in seasons. And you know, now, like, a big part of my identity is being a dad. And you lose a lot of hours, working hours that are now focused on family. And I love that, right? I love that part of it. I love the family part of it. But I still feel like I lost this other part of being the hardworking entrepreneur. So for sure, I'm still working through that right now. I mean, my kids are young, but but it's just a it's a signal is a shift in seasons. And usually when your seasons shift, your habits often need to shift with it. And I found myself kind of trying to force fit some of my old habits into my new lifestyle, and they weren't like serving me anymore. Which habits?

• 6:37James Clear?

  Main thing that I struggled with were creative habits. So it was all around writing and reading. And usually I was spending a lot of hours each day working on that. And now it's like, hey, instead of having four hours a day to do this, now you have four hours a week. So how do you figure out? Like, one of the questions I had for myself, especially during that first year, was Okay, I know how to perform at a high level under the previous number of hours, but I don't have that anymore. So it's kind of like a lifestyle that doesn't work for me. So now how do I perform at a high level under a completely new set of constraints? And um, I'm still figuring that out to some degree, but like one thing I did was I restructured the newsletter. So

• 7:17James Clear?

  for the first three years of my career, the habit that kind of launched my career was I wrote a new article every Monday and Thursday. And those were usually like about 2,000 words. And I would spend somewhere between the shortest amount of time I ever spent was like eight hours on an article. Most of the time it was somewhere between like 15 and 20. Um, and the really long ones would be like 30 or 40, but that was rare. It's amazing. So it was basically like that kind of was my full time job was I, you know, I do 15 hours on an article on Monday and then I do 15 hours for the Thursday article. And then the rest of the time throughout the week, it would be, you know, the rest of the the stuff to run the business.

• 7:56James Clear?

  And I did that for the first three years, but then I had to work on the book. So I kind of changed it while I was working on the book, but I had the same number of writing hours. And then the book comes out and then I have kids and now I don't have any of that time anymore. Though I restructured the newsletter so that I could do it in a couple hours to usually about two hours. So now I can just do it on one day. I just need one morning and I can do it in those two hours and it's done. And um, rather than writing these long form articles, now I do, I call it three, two, one, but it's three short ideas for me. Two quotes from other people and then one question to think about for the week. And this is another thing I try to do just as an entrepreneur in general, but also for my my overall life. I like to play this little game, this little like thought experiment where

• 8:40James Clear?

  if I have constraints that I have to stick to, like in this case, I have so much less time than before. It's easy to fall into this story and telling yourself like, well, this isn't fair. Like, I don't have as much time as the people I'm competing with. I don't have as much time as other people. So I guess I just can't do that anymore. Or the strategies that other people talk about, they won't work for me. And I try to avoid that kind of mindset whenever I can. And instead I flip it around and try to ask myself, okay, out of all the universe of options out there, of all the different ways that you could write a newsletter, is there a way that I can do this so that it only takes me two hours a week? Cause that's all the time that I have.

• 9:22James Clear?

  But the result for the audience is not equal to what I was doing before. It's actually better. Can I actually use this this constraint and create something that's even better than what I was making previously? And I usually, maybe I'm just too optimistic. I don't know. But usually I'm like, yeah, if you think about like, it's hard to imagine all the possible options out there. You're like, yeah, there probably is something out there that is better for them and only takes me two hours rather than taking me 30. And so it took me probably like nine months of brainstorming and trying to come up with ideas before I eventually settled on the structure of three, two, one. But the newsletter is way bigger than it was before. There are way more subscribers.

• 10:03James Clear?

  Now, that's not the only measure of whether it's providing value to people, but people seem to really like it, and it definitely is performing well. And, you know, it takes me one fifteenth of the time. So I think that can be a powerful sort of little thought experiment to play with yourself if you're facing some constraints. And just encourage yourself to try to think a little more carefully about it. There's usually, there's usually a path for figuring out a better solution, even if you have constraints.

• 10:32Lewis Howes?

  You were mentioning this earlier. It sounds like what what people are doing. Life is going to happen. Things are going to stack on our plate. Seasons are going to change. There's going to be adversities. It's natural. And what I'm hearing you say is that even if that doesn't happen and you're just, you know, have a kid and things just need to change for you and everything's still okay. It sounds like one of the most important habits is to ask better questions. Is is to ask, is this supporting me? Is there a better way? Is there a more effective way? Who could I become that I'll be more proud of? It sounds like there's, you had to ask a different question, a better question to give you a bigger result in less time.

• 11:17Lewis Howes?

  And bigger result for you and the audience.

• 11:20James Clear?

  I think questions are crucial. You know, it's kind of funny because I spent a lot of time writing about these ideas and trying to share what I learned, but you know, with habits and improvement, decision-making, productivity and all that. And I think it's easy for that stuff to kind of come across as like advice. But I'm not really trying to give people advice. I'm just trying to like lay out a toolkit and say, hey, here are all the strategy, here's all the tools, let's lay them on the table. And then you can choose which one's the best fit for you. Like I don't really have much interest in telling people what to do. I'm more just trying to like share all the strategies. But the other problem with advice is that it's kind of brittle in the sense that it's very dependent on context. You know, like people, someone can give you actually very good advice. They can give you like an idea that genuinely worked for them.

• 12:02James Clear?

  But if your context is different, if the timing or the situation is different, or you have different resources, different strengths, it still might not be a good fit for you. Questions, however, are the opposite. Questions, whereas advice is brittle and context-dependent, questions are flexible and adaptable and they shift, they can naturally transform based on the context. So for example, one question you could ask yourself, like somebody could give you really good advice, so to speak, on what workout program to follow. Or you could just have a question and you ask yourself, what would a healthy person do? And if you keep walking around life, asking yourself, what would a healthy person do? You start to notice all sorts of things based on your current situation that maybe you could do.

• 12:46James Clear?

  And it's much more flexible and adaptable than just trying to follow one strict workout program, which may not work if you have a knee injury or if you don't have enough time that day or for any number of reasons.

• 12:57Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 12:58James Clear?

  So I do, I do really like questions and you're right that I had to ask myself better questions to get better answers. I had to ask myself better questions to kind of get myself in a better mindset. And there are a few questions that I really like that I keep coming back to. And I think maybe, you know, maybe anybody listening to this will find it useful as well. So the first question is, what am I optimizing for? And you know, people optimize for different things. Sometimes we optimize for money. Sometimes we optimize for free time or family time. Sometimes you optimize for creative output or having like the ability to choose the creative projects you work on. It can be any number of things, but you need to decide what it is for you.

• 13:39James Clear?

  And I think a lot of the time we sort of fall into this rut where we're just kind of optimizing for what we think we're supposed to be doing, or what other people are encouraging us to do. And we're not actually optimizing or working on what we actually want to optimize for. So the other challenge with that question is it shifts over time. You know, like what I'm optimizing for today is different than what I wanted 10 years ago or five years ago. So you need to keep revisiting that question and asking yourself, what am I optimizing for? Now, the second question that I like is can my current habits carry me to my desired future? So once you know what you're optimizing for, are you on a trajectory that can get you there or do your habits need to change?

• 14:23James Clear?

  Cause if you're on, if you're on the wrong trajectory, if you, if you know you want to optimize for one thing, but your habits are leading you somewhere else. Obviously something needs to change. The other way to kind of frame this, if you want to like flip it around and frame it maybe from a, that's like maybe a little bit more of a positive angle. If you want to frame it for more of a negative angle, what you could ask yourself is, how am I contributing to the situation that I say I don't want? Or how am I contributing to the conditions that I say I don't want? And if you look at your current habits, you'll almost always notice that there are a few things that you're doing that are influencing the situation. You know, like most of life is not, it's not entirely under your control, but it's also not entirely out of your control. Right.

• 15:07James Clear?

  You know, it's the majority of life is like, kind of like a tennis match, you know? You don't control what the other player does. You don't control their shots or their strategy. But you do influence it with your shots and your strategy. And so it's true that luck and randomness and misfortune, it's true that all that stuff is going to happen to you. And you can't control everything, every card that's dealt to you in life. But it's also true that you influence the situation. And so the only reasonable approach is to focus on the elements that are within your control. And to try to influence it, to try to shape the conditions to the best way possible. And I think questions like, are my current habits carrying me to my desired future? Or how am I contributing to the conditions I say I don't want?

• 15:52James Clear?

  Those questions are are kind of helping shape that or helping reveal different steps that you could take. By the way, that how am I contributing to conditions question? I think that's from Jerry Colonna, a great like business coach and entrepreneur. So, uh, so those are a couple that I like. The other question that I asked myself, which I mentioned previously, what season am I in right now? You know, that kind of helps encourage you to get in the right mindset and think, hey, you know, sometimes habits can be good for you, but they just have outlived their usefulness. Like they were, they were good for a previous season. And so, that doesn't mean that, you know, the habit was bad. It doesn't mean that you should feel bad about doing it. It just means that maybe it outlived its usefulness.

• 16:33James Clear?

  So those are just a few of the things I like to kind of prime myself with to try to spark thoughts on what should I really be focused on right now?

• 16:41Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, when you're playing baseball and, you know, in the batting cage for an hour a day, that habit served you then. It doesn't serve you now to swing a baseball bat for an hour a day. So you just got to know what season you're in. I'm curious, you know, you ask a question in your newsletter every week.

• 16:56James Clear?

  Yeah.

• 16:56Lewis Howes?

  What was the most powerful question for you of 2022?

• 17:02James Clear?

  All right. I actually, I actually have a couple that I like here. So I, I, um, I have a big spreadsheet where I keep all the, the questions and, ideas and stuff from each week and I go through them every now and then and kind of mark some of my favorites. But so these, these are just a few that I liked from this year. So one is, do I need to spend more time searching for better information? Or do I need to spend more time acting on the information that I already have? So is the bottleneck strategy or is it execution?

• 17:29Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 17:32James Clear?

  Another one that I like, this is kind of the, trying to encourage me to try big things or attempt big things is the question to ask yourself is not, will I succeed? The question is, what should I attempt? You know, if we get so caught up in trying to succeed, then I think maybe you can talk yourself out of trying things that are worth attempting, even if they don't ultimately pan out the way that you hope they will.

• 17:56Lewis Howes?

  How does someone know what they should be attempting in life?

• 18:00James Clear?

  It's a great question. I mean, I, you know, I don't know the answer. I'm not, I'm not the person that, you know, that has the answer to, to that kind of stuff. But I think that

• 18:10James Clear?

  people often talk themselves out of things before they should. So we're almost always our own bottleneck before the world is actually the bottleneck. If you, if you think about it, you know, if you just try to step outside and above yourself for a second and think about the things that you've tried or the projects you've worked on, it's almost never the case that you hit a true hard stop that like the, the world is just like, hey, sorry, there's nothing else you can do. There's nobody else to contact. There's no small action to take. There's no alternate path of attack or line of questioning. There's nothing else you can do. There's almost always something else you could try if you want to give it another attempt. But we talk ourselves out of it way earlier than the world like

• 18:52James Clear?

  puts a true hard stop in front of us. And so as best as possible, I try to not be my own bottleneck. I try to not be the, I try to let the world tell me no before I tell myself no. And that I don't think, I, I feel like sometimes if people want to push back on something like that, they'll talk about how it's like overly positive or it can get delusional or something like that. And I, you know, certainly I would prefer to not be too negative or too positive. I'd prefer to strike a perfect balance. But that's not possible. And if I'm going to err in one direction, I'd rather err on being too positive rather than too negative. I'd rather err on attempting too many things rather than

• 19:34James Clear?

  talking myself out of them. But even though you're trying to be positive and trying to attempt difficult things, that doesn't mean you can ignore reality. You know, like another question I like, so this is, this is actually another one that I marked on the sheet, which is without altering the facts of the situation I'm facing, and without ignoring the reality of what must be done, what's the most useful and empowering story that I can tell myself about what's happening and what I need to do next? And there's this little exercise I heard about one time. So all you need, you need to get two sheets of paper or open up two doc, two Google Docs or whatever.

• 20:14James Clear?

  On the first one, you're gonna, you can pick whatever timeframe you want for this. Just for this example, let's say it's the, the last 10 years of your life. Okay. But you could do the last six months or whatever. All right. So on the first sheet of paper, you're going to write down the last 10 years of your life. You're going to tell the story of the last 10 years, but the only rule of this game is that you can't tell any lies. Okay. Everything has to be true.

• 20:39James Clear?

  The first version, you're going to write the least favorable version of your last 10 years. It's gotta be true, but it's the least favorable framing. The second version, you're going to write the last 10 years, but it's going to be the most favorable. Now, what's interesting, I feel like you look at those two sheets of paper, there are no lies on either one of these, you know, both, both sheets of paper are true. And I just have a hard time seeing what telling yourself that first version, that first piece of paper, what that gets you. You know, like if you're, if you're not ignoring reality, if you're sticking with the facts of the situation and you're still going to deal with uncomfortable conversations that need to be had, or the difficult steps that need to be taken. You might as well tell yourself the most empowering and useful version of that story.

• 21:22James Clear?

  Um, that's the story that's going to make you feel best. It's going to get you motivated. It's going to get you moving. So I don't think you should be delusional about it. And it doesn't mean that there aren't going to be hard times or that you're not going to have to have difficult conversations. Like all of that is still part of life, but you're just trying to not be your own bottleneck.

• 21:40Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. Three framing the story of your life. And when we can frame why we are doing things on a daily basis in a more empowering way as opposed to a disempowering way. It starts to feel like there's a lot more flow, fun, fulfillment, joy in life rather than a drag holding us back. So I love that.

• 21:58James Clear?

  Um, all right. I just, I love these questions. Let me just give you one more. Um, so sometimes I like to do this thing with asking myself a question where, um,

• 22:09James Clear?

  Both answers can be true, opposites can be true. And the question is not whether it's right or wrong. The question is, what do you need right now? So, for example, this is one that I had in an issue that went out in June. Sometimes we're too hard on ourselves, criticize our mistakes to an unhelpful degree. Other times, we're too easy on ourselves and let excuses run our lives. So which way are you leaning right now? Do you need to be harder with yourself? Do you need to be firmer and more disciplined? Or do you need to be easier on yourself, more forgiving? And how can you pull yourself back to center? And, you know, yeah, sometimes like you need to be tough with yourself and disciplined. And sometimes you need to be forgiving and chill out a little bit. And the question is not whether one person is right or wrong. The question is, which one do you need right now?

• 22:54James Clear?

  You know, which one serves you best? And so many things are like that, you know? It's not, the question is not, do you need to rest? Or do you need to train? The question is, which one do you need right now? You know, the question is not, do you need to read and research? Or do you need to write and produce? The question is, which one do you need right now? And so opposites can both be true. It's just a matter of timing. And I like to think about balance in general. We talk a lot about work-life balance or balance in life. And I think it's easy for it to kind of get squished into this like average mode, where you're just like, well, let me just do a little bit of each. But actually, you can still be really intense if the timing is right. You can, it's like turning it on and turning it off. You know, the, the question is, let me rest fully. Or the, the approach is, let me rest fully and let me rest fully.

• 23:39James Clear?

  And let me rest fully and let me train fully. And so, in a way, balance is about timing, not intensity. You know, it's not saying, don't do intense things, just like, you know, take it easy and like, keep yourself in this average mode. It's saying, no, do like really intense things, but just shut it off every now and then, and give yourself self-space to recover and have the right timing.

• 24:00Lewis Howes?

  Hmm, love that. Something about, you know, thinking about what people need the most right now. You know, as a, a season, a year turns over for a lot of people. And really, a season of the last few years for a lot of people, hopefully turning over into the next season. Something that I love and one of your strategies and your approaches is focusing on getting 1% better, you know, every day or every time you do something, focus on the 1% improvement in getting better.

• 24:33Lewis Howes?

  If people are listening to this, watching this, thinking about how they can transform their lives and better their lives, what's something over the next seven days that they should be thinking about with their habits to to make this happen?

• 24:46James Clear?

  Yeah, great question. I don't even think it needs to be seven days. I think it'd be five minutes. You know, like you can do a lot with five good minutes, like five good minutes of exercise will reset your mood. Five good minutes of writing will make you feel totally different about your manuscript. It's like now the project's moving forward. Five good minutes of conversation will restore the relationship and, you know, get people back on on track. So five good minutes can do a lot. And I think you can scale it down that small and just ask yourself, you know, how can I live five good minutes? You know, how can I like, in a sense, each day is a small lifetime? And how can you live a good life today? That's really all you got to focus on is can I have a good day today? And then you can wake up again tomorrow and do the same thing. And this idea of getting 1%

• 25:27James Clear?

  better each day, it's really encouraging a focus on trajectory rather than position. You know, there's so much discussion about position in life. We've all these different ways of measuring our current position, like what's the number on the scale? How much money's in the bank account? What's the current stock price? We have all these different ways of analyzing what our current position is. And then usually when we get that number, whatever it is, there's kind of some sort of judgment that happens. You know, it's not where I said I wanted to be yet, or we haven't achieved what we said we wanted to achieve. And what I'm encouraging is to say, listen, measurement's fine, it can be useful, but just for a minute, let's set that to the side and stop worrying so much about our current position and focus a little bit more on our current

• 26:12James Clear?

  trajectory. You know, is the arrow pointed up and to the right? Or have we flatlined? You know, are we getting 1% better or 1% worse? Because if you're on a good trajectory, even if it's just for the next five minutes, you know, then you're on the path where all you need is time, like. Time will magnify whatever you feed it. You know, if you have good habits, time becomes your ally and that trajectory will carry you forward. And if you have bad habits, time becomes your enemy. And every day that goes by, you kind of dig the whole little bit deeper. And so getting 1% better each day, it's really a mindset. It's an approach. It's less about measuring it. Oh, is it 1% or 1.6% or whatever? Like, it's not about getting caught up in the numbers. It's about trying to focus on putting yourself on a good path and then letting those days stack up.

• 26:57Lewis Howes?

  And seeing the trajectory, I love that approach and that mindset. I'm curious, in your opinion, why do you think so many people have the habit of being hard on themselves, even when they're improving and seeing the metrics go up on whatever they're measuring?

• 27:10James Clear?

  I mean, it can probably be many different things and I, you know, I don't know all the answers. I think one thing that's common is that the results of success are widely discussed and highly visible. And the process of success is often invisible and hidden from view. You know, like, you'll never see a news story that's like, man eats chicken and salad for lunch today. It's only a story once it's like, man loses 100 pounds. You know, it's only once it's a result that people talk about it. Or like, there's never going to be a story about James Wright's 500 words today. You know, it's like, only a story once Atomic Habits is a best seller. And so because the results are the thing that gets discussed so much, and it's not, by the

• 27:52James Clear?

  way, it's not that results don't matter. Like, I consider myself pretty results oriented. It's just that I think we tend to overvalue outcomes because it's all we ever talk about. And we undervalue the process because it's just not, it's not compelling to talk about what's going on on a daily basis. So because of all that, I think it can get easy to judge yourself. You know, you could be doing the right thing on any given day. Like, I could sit down, I could write 500 words. And that's actually a really good day, you know? But if the manuscript still a mess, and I'm still a year and a half away from the book coming out, and I'm seeing somebody else launch a best seller this week, then it's, you start to judge yourself and feel like, oh, they have what I want to have, or I'm not there yet, or this is still a mess. I've been working on it for months. Like, this is never going to get finished. It's very easy to fall into

• 28:37James Clear?

  that kind of mindset. And especially if you're focused on results. So I think the shift is, partially, it just helps to know that

• 28:49James Clear?

  Working on habits day in and day out, focusing on building a better process and building a better system is how results occur. And that is very obvious to all of us as soon as you say it, but man, it's so easy to forget it on a daily basis. And so reminding yourself that most of your results in life are a lagging measure of the habits that precede them. So your bank account is a lagging measure of your financial habits. Your physical fitness is the lagging measure of your exercise habits. Your even like silly stuff like the amount of clutter in your living room is a lagging measure of your cleaning habits. So many areas of life are largely, maybe not exclusively, but largely influenced by the habits that precede them. And so if you want

• 29:33James Clear?

  better outcomes, the thing to focus on is building better habits. And for some reason, we get into this mindset where we're focused on results and we naturally start to compare. And that leads to feelings of judgment, resentment, and negativity, and so on. And if we can just shift it a little bit, and just try to focus on having five good minutes, or living a good day, or building better habits, then I think maybe you pull yourself back in the present moment. You focus a little bit more on running your own race, and maybe a little bit less on what everybody else is doing.

• 30:04Lewis Howes?

  Love that, man. Focus on your own race. You know, over 10 million copies sold of Atomic Habits. You know, if there is anyone who hasn't got this yet, you guys got to make sure you get this. But I'm curious, for those who haven't got it yet, and don't know, how long does it take to form a habit? There seems like there's all this different research. This university says this, and this scientific study says this. How long does it take to actually form a habit? And it's dependent on what habit you're trying to create. And are there also, also are there different stages of building and forming a habit?

• 30:40James Clear?

  That's interesting. The stages part's interesting. People don't usually ask that. Okay, so very popular question, how long does it take to build a habit? It does depend on the habit you're building. So there are a variety of studies that show, you know, if you pick an easy habit, you know, it might only take a couple of weeks. If you pick something really difficult, maybe it takes six or seven or eight months, like, you know, who knows? But it also depends, like, the same habit can take very different amounts of time, depending on the context. Imagine one person who's trying to build the habit of doing yoga every day, and they live with a bunch of athletes or people who go to yoga studios or whatever. And then the other person is trying to build a habit of doing yoga every day, and they live with nobody who works out, and they kind of get criticized or poked fun at if they do it in front of them.

• 31:25James Clear?

  Well, same habit, but very different situations. And so the environment's going to influence how much friction you're feeling associated with that. And obviously, that will influence how easy or difficult it is. So I don't really know that the timing tells you anything. You know, there's all these kind of popular myths, 21 days or 30 days or whatever, and there's not really anything to back that up. But there's also a couple of studies that say, on average, it's like 66 days or something like that. But again, the range can be quite wide, depending on the habit. So I think the true answer, the honest answer to how long does it take to build a habit, is forever. Because if it stops, if you stop doing it, it's no longer a habit, you know, like, and what I'm trying to get at with that is

• 32:07James Clear?

  habits are not a finish line to be crossed. You know, they're a lifestyle to be lived. It's something to integrate into your new normal. It's not like, hey, let me just do this for 30 days or 66 days, and then I'll be a healthy person, or then I'll be productive or whatever, you know, I won't have to think about it anymore. It's like, no, like, what we're looking for is a change that you can integrate into your new normal, something you can make part of your lifestyle. And then, once it's part of your daily life, great, you can start to look at the next habit, try to integrate that one. And it's a, it's kind of this endless process. And maybe that encourages you a little bit more to look for a non-threatening change or a sustainable change, rather than just trying to flip a switch.

• 32:46Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, and it also sounds like a habit is only a habit, and correct me if I'm wrong, if it becomes and is your identity on a consistent basis. And if it's not your identity, then, and you're not, then you're not doing it, if it's not your identity.

• 33:02James Clear?

  I don't think most researchers would define it that way, but it speaks to this question you asked about stages. And that that was kind of the first thing that I thought about when you mentioned that question. So like, let's say, for example, let's just take like a classic habit, like going to the gym and we're working out. So early on, going to the gym is kind of uncomfortable. You know, you're worried about like, are people judging me? Do I look stupid? I don't know what exercises to do. You know, like, I don't know where to put my stuff. Do they have a water fountain at this gym? Or do I need to bring a water bottle? There's like all these like stupid little questions that you're thinking about when you're getting started. And it's definitely not part of your identity. You haven't shown up enough to be comfortable there and feel like, hey, this is just part of who I am.

• 33:43James Clear?

  And so early on, the kind of the first stage, when you're practicing it, I think the number one thing you need to do is scale it down, reduce the scope and try to make it as easy and as frictionless as possible to show up each day. So that's probably like stage one is how do I make this?

• 33:57Lewis Howes?

  It's the opposite of what people try to do when they're like, I'm out of shape. I'm going to go every day for the next year and I'm not going to miss a day and I'm going to eat chicken and salad every day.

• 34:05James Clear?

  Well, and you know, what's interesting is especially for ambitious people, it's really interesting or really easy to fall into that pitfall. Because when you sit down and you think about the changes you want to make, yeah, it's easy to get excited about that. I think implicitly, you kind of, even though people don't say it, with the thing that's kind of in the back of their mind is what can I achieve on my best day? Like, how can I get to peak performance, you know? And instead, I almost think it's more useful to ask yourself, what can I achieve even on the worst days? Like, what habit could I stick to even on the bad days? Because then if you start there, now you can start to build some momentum. You can show up consistently, you can establish the habit and you know, you can keep going. So that's maybe the first stage is scale it down.

• 34:48James Clear?

  The second stage is you start to get some like other rewards associated with it. So you've been going to the gym for a few months and then maybe you start to see a little bit of a change in your body. Or maybe you start to develop some friendships there and you look forward to seeing your new buddy there. And you guys fist bump and you chat a little bit and it's just like kind of more engaging and fun to do it, to go there and you know, work out. And so these are like other benefits, things that make the habit feel good and they kind of help you show up more and more. So you're starting to get these external benefits that are coming along the way. And then ultimately, the maybe the final stage or a later stage is now it feels like it's kind of part of my identity. I go like this is where I would say, so I've been working out for a while now and it's probably like the habit that I care most about.

• 35:33James Clear?

  Like my in terms of personal habits, it's the one that feels like it centers me or it's the only time I really get for myself. And so I want to work out now. Yes, of course, I want the benefits of it and the, you know, the physical changes and all that stuff. But what I really want is I just feel good when I do it, you know, I feel like I'm being me, I'm being the kind of person I want to be. And it makes me feel like, yeah, this is the identity I want to have, this is the kind of person I want to be. And so I can get that satisfaction instantly, like as soon, as long as I'm doing one rep, I, you know, I get that feeling. And so that's a reward that comes maybe later, you got to show up a lot before you get to that place mentally. But I think ultimately that's where you're trying to get to.

• 36:17James Clear?

  Now there is, there is maybe one more stage after that, which is the tighter that you cling to your current identity, the harder it becomes to grow beyond it. And so this is kind of an endless process, you know, like you, we all can sort of think about like, uh, let's say you have a surgeon who they've been doing an operation a certain way for the last 20 years. And they have a bunch of successful patients and cases from that operation. And they just are like, yeah, you know what? I know it works well this way. And then a new technology.

• 36:48Lewis Howes?

  Been this way, yeah.

• 36:49James Clear?

  Yeah, a new technology comes along and they're like, you know, hey, you can do this with robots now, or you can do it laparoscopically or whatever. And they resist it because they're like, no, I have a lot of evidence for doing it my old way. They cling to that current identity and it's harder to grow. And five years from now, they find themselves behind the curve. Or you've got a teacher who they've been doing their lesson plan the same way for the last 10 years. And they don't want to integrate YouTube or some new learning modality or whatever. And five years from now, they find themselves behind the curve. And so the tighter you cling to your current identity, the harder it becomes to grow beyond it. And it's kind of this endless cycle in the, in the early stages. What you want is to foster the identity to like reinforce being that kind of person because it helps you show up.

• 37:34James Clear?

  But then eventually a couple of years from now. The world changes and you need to adapt. And so it's kind of like evolve or die. And you need to continually be retouching or optimizing or refining that identity in your approach. And so that's, those are, there are some various stages there, but those are kind of some of the big ones that I, that stuck out to me.

• 37:54Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. And it's like people who are stuck to whatever fax machines and then it's, you know, then from faxing to email and then email to, you know, cell phones and whatever it is. It's like our grandparents don't keep up with the technology and then we can't call them on FaceTime because they don't know how to turn it on or whatever. So that's interesting. There, it sounds like there's different stages to these habits and it sounds like when you become successful, the habits that got you here may not necessarily get you to the next stage or season of accomplishment, fulfillment, success, health. Is that right?

• 38:25James Clear?

  Yeah, it's interesting because I would say there's kind of like two categories. There are habits that are like timeless that you, the, we call those the fundamentals of whatever your domain is, you know, like in my case, reading and writing are probably always going to be habits that will serve me as an author, you know? But then there's other stuff, you know, the way that I executed the book launch for Atomic Habits. You know what? Like if I launch another book in 10 years, a lot of those strategies will probably be outdated. And so you need to upgrade and improve. You need to evolve and change. And so there's, there's both the fundamentals that you always need to stick to, and there's just this continual growth and, and learning process that you also have to be committed to.

• 39:03Lewis Howes?

  What's the habit you think you're going to need to innovate over the next one to two years in this season of life? That supported you to getting here, but won't support you to the next level?

• 39:14James Clear?

  Yep. I, my biggest fear is that I, I know how to write a good book, but the way that I know how to do it doesn't work for me anymore. So I had a, I had a, a period, the last like six to nine months of writing Atomic Habits. Where it was just all that I was doing, you know, it was like I would wake up, I'd write for 12 hours a day or edit for 12 hours a day. I'd go to sleep. I'd dream about it. I'd wake up again and do it all over. And that was just like, it was this kind of, I don't know, to call it a dark period is probably too extreme, but it, you know, it was just like this very intensely focused period.

• 39:48James Clear?

  And I can't do that anymore because I have kids, I got a family and like it just, it doesn't work. So I know that if I can force myself to go through that, which by the way, like that was a difficult thing. My little mantra for that period of life was, Elaine de Batain has this quote where he says, of many books, the reader thinks this could have been truly great if only the author was willing to suffer a little bit more. And I just kept telling myself that I was like,

• 40:18Lewis Howes?

  It's kind of true though.

• 40:19James Clear?

  Yeah. I mean, so I just, that was like my little mantra was like, this can be great, but you just have to be willing to suffer a little bit more. And so I just told myself that like every day. And you know, I just,

• 40:29Lewis Howes?

  It can be true and it cannot, it's also not true. You know, it just kind of depends on how you create, you know?

• 40:35James Clear?

  For sure. I, I just can't, I can't do it that way anymore. So I have to go back to that little thought experiment that I mentioned earlier, where I've got this new constraint. And so now I have to ask myself, okay, if I can only write for one hour a day, how could I write a book that's even better than a topic than Atomic Habits? How can I write something even better than Atomic Habits if I can only write for one hour a day?

• 40:57Lewis Howes?

  Now you got a good question.

• 40:58James Clear?

  I don't know. I don't know the answer yet, but that's my little, that's, that's the, that's the thing I'm noodling on for right now. That's the better question that hopefully will,

• 41:05Lewis Howes?

  That is a, that is a great question. I mean, and again, it goes back into, maybe you didn't think it was possible with your newsletter because you had to do whatever 10, 15 hours a week on it. And now you're doing two and it's impacting people, you know, in, in a potentially a greater way with the results it's getting. So it's, I think there's a world in which you could write two hours a week and write a better book.

• 41:28James Clear?

  There's got, it's got to be possible, you know? I mean, the, the obvious answer is like, well, it'll just take longer, you know, like, but, but I also don't want to,

• 41:36Lewis Howes?

  But if you had to do it in the same time, if you had to do it in one year, I bet there's a way.

• 41:40James Clear?

  So there's, that's where the question gets really interesting. If you throw another constraint, you say, okay, you can only write for one hour a day and you only get two years. Can you write something that's better than Atomic Habits?

• 41:51Lewis Howes?

  I think you would. I, I think you would because, because again, you've got, Ten fifteen years of experience writing now, you know what works, you can do it faster, you can pull into your archives of memory better, you have all the documentation from the previous, you know, you've got this skill now that it it should flow more effortlessly if you allow it to, but.

• 42:13James Clear?

  We'll see, I appreciate your your enthusiasm and encouragement about it because I'll need it, but I I don't know, we'll see, that's that's my little task is to see if I can find an answer.

• 42:21Lewis Howes?

  I'm curious, I uh, it's another personal question for you, I um, when I when I interviewed Liz Gilbert about, you know, she did Eat, Pray, Love, which I think did ten or, I don't know, twenty million copies, whatever it's done, it's done over ten million copies, right? And I remember her talking about, you know, is my best selling work behind me?

• 42:43James Clear?

  Yeah.

• 42:44Lewis Howes?

  And kind of that, is it, you know, the fear or the worry or the, just the the thought about it? I'm curious for you, after writing the best selling book of the year and potentially the the decade, I guess, um, what is the biggest fear that you have moving forward? Is it the fear of greater success? Is it the fear of potentially not it being as successful, what you do in the future? Or just the the fear of judgment and the opinions of other people, no matter what you do?

• 43:18James Clear?

  Yeah, um, I remember hearing that Adele said something similar like that after she um, she wrote and released Someone Like You, that she was like, it's because I don't remember how old she was, but she was in her twenties, and um, you know, she was like, I'll never write a song better than that. And that's kind of a strange feeling to feel like the peak of your career is already behind you.

• 43:41James Clear?

  I am trying to not think about it like that, uh, you know, I I've had some friends who have written bestselling books as well and have gone through stuff like this and uh, you know, I've heard about the Adele example or the Liz Gilbert example.

• 43:54James Clear?

  You know what, like, I'm just trying to look at it as it was a project and it can just be a thing that went really well. You know, like, it doesn't have to be more than that. It's just, I tried really hard. I wanted to provide a great amount of value. And it seems that people like it and that's great. Like, it doesn't have to become some all-consuming thing that defines every bit of my existence. You know, it's just like, it's a project that went well. And now I'm going to move on to the next project and I'm going to try to do that one well. And I think that's, that's fine. It can just be that. It doesn't, it doesn't need to be more.

• 44:26Lewis Howes?

  How do you, how do you keep yourself there mentally and emotionally so that it doesn't, you don't feel like you have to deliver something as good or better than the last work?

• 44:37James Clear?

  So.

• 44:38Lewis Howes?

  Is it the Ohio Roots? Is it the, you know, this, you're a dad now? Like, what is the, how do you keep yourself emotionally stable in that way?

• 44:47James Clear?

  Yeah, I, I, you know, I don't know the perfect answer, but I'll just say a couple of things that are coming to mind. I, you know, so I think some of it's personality. You know, like, I'm not really the type of person that worries about very much. I've just never really been like that. So I don't know, this kind of seems how I'm wired. I'm more focused on like, what is the next thing rather than like worrying about what could happen? So having a project that excites me or that I can get invested in, I think it helps a little bit that I'm not ruminating on the last thing. And whether it's being judged appropriately or not. One interesting little side effect, and I, I just want to say before I preface this.

• 45:27James Clear?

  This is the best possible outcome, right? Like, the, the best possible thing is that the topic happens did well. So like, it comes with trade-offs. It comes with, you know, downsides or problems that maybe you didn't think about solving beforehand. But this is what I was working for, you know, like, this is, so this is like.

• 45:43Lewis Howes?

  How can I write a book that gets a hundred thousand copies sold and then it does 10 million globally? You're like, okay, it exceeded every expectation and then a thousand times.

• 45:53James Clear?

  So, you know, it's, yeah, it doesn't make any sense to complain about the result that you wanted. Even if it comes with trade-offs and other, other problems that you need to deal with. I remember Charlie Munger said something like that too, where he was talking about people, once they get into their nineties. A lot of the time that all they talk about is how all their friends have passed away and how much their body aches and the next illness and all that kind of stuff. And he was like, well, isn't the best possible outcome is that you live this long? So it doesn't, doesn't make sense to complain about it. Um, so that doesn't mean that there aren't problems. And one of the interesting like little problems or unexpected things that uh that unexpected for me is

• 46:33James Clear?

  before, early in my career, I was trying to get as much feedback as possible. Like I would respond to every email that a reader sent. I would, you know, every message on Twitter I would look at or respond to. I was trying to get feedback so that I could learn. So that I could figure out what do people like? What do they not like? How can I get better? How can I improve? And now the feedback is too much. So it doesn't it like it's crippling to try to first of all, it's not possible to respond to it all. But even if it was, or you tried to make that commitment, um, I don't think it's helpful at this point. You're just kind of getting noise, you know? I mean, uh, it's at the point now where I can be pretty confident that Atomic Habits is a good book.

• 47:13James Clear?

  I'm not going to say it's the greatest book ever or anything like that. I'm sure that I could have done it better, or there are areas that can be improved. But I can be pretty confident at this point that it's good because, you know, 10 million people have bought it. And if you look at the hundreds of thousands of reviews, almost all of them are four or five stars. But there's still going to be some sliver of people who they read it at the wrong time, or it wasn't in what they were expecting, or for whatever reason, they just don't like.

• 47:39Lewis Howes?

  Speak to them. Yeah.

• 47:40James Clear?

  And that's fine, you know, but like, there's enough of them now because it has reached so many people. That if I just focused on that little segment, I could spend all day just looking at, listening to people who don't like it. And that would make it seem like it was this big problem, when in fact, it's not a problem at all, like 98% of people love it. And so there's no, there's no issue. There's nothing that needs to be solved. And so the just the amount of feedback has scaled to such a degree that weirdly you have to start insulating yourself from feedback because otherwise you spend too much time responding to noise. And that's a, that's been a hard thing to figure out a good balance for because I, I want to continue to learn.

• 48:19James Clear?

  I don't want to like wall myself off and um, and not, uh, I don't want to become ignorant or unaware of how my work is landing or what I'm saying, or how, uh, what would be most useful to people. And yet, at the same time, there's just way too much feedback to pay attention to it all. So that's been, that's been an interesting challenge. I'm not sure how I'll deal with that going forward.

• 48:40Lewis Howes?

  What was the habit? In the last decade, leading up to Atomic Habits, of thinking and feeling that was most consistent for you? The most habit thought, the most consistent thought habit and the most consistent feeling habit that you had created, developed over the decade leading up to it?

• 49:02James Clear?

  Hmm, um, for the most consistent thought, and I, I think this is just kind of my core approach to entrepreneurship. The most consistent thought was, I'll be, I'll figure it out. You know, and so like, you're always facing another thing as an entrepreneur. You don't know what, there's not really any playbook, you know, they're, they're sort of playbooks. There's things other people did to grow their business or there's strategies to use or whatever. But everybody's running their own race and everybody's in a slightly different situation, has slightly different strengths and weaknesses, slightly different resources and opportunities. And so you gotta figure that out for yourself. How do I best put all these pieces together? And you need to have that mindset if you're gonna be like, if you don't have the mindset of I can figure it out.

• 49:47James Clear?

  Well, then you're for sure not gonna do it. The, just having the mindset does not guarantee it happening, but you need to at least be in that frame of mind. So that was the most common thing that I told myself is whatever the next thing was on the horizon, like I'll, I'll figure it out. I'll figure out a way to make it work or I'll figure out a way to, you know, utilize my strengths to try to, you know, develop a new line of attack for this or whatever, but I'll, I'll figure out some solution. The most common feeling,

• 50:13James Clear?

  probably the feeling of like waiting or the feeling of delaying gratification. That, that was probably the most common thing was like, you just keep showing up and keep doing stuff, but it's not there yet. You know, you, I, especially in my case, because I focus so much, I'm building the audience first and not on monetizing. And so I didn't really make much money for the first like three to five years of this business. And I, so do something for five years and try to put your heart and soul into it every day. And then like, don't really have the payoff. It's just a lot of waiting. And so, um, you know, that, I was fine with it, like, you know, I had the personality that could work and, um, I would make money on the side doing freelance gigs, or I would, you know, occasionally have some kind of like,

• 50:56James Clear?

  I do like a seminar or webinar or something that I would sell tickets to and, you know, I'd present something to the audience. But for the most part, I was just trying to provide as much value for free. And so it was a lot of waiting. And that was probably one of the most common things that I felt.

• 51:09Lewis Howes?

  The, the feeling of delayed gratification and to give more people, learned that skill, that habit and developed it and nurtured it. They would be so much more fulfilled, happy, and there'd be so much bigger payoff for them than the instant gratification or the shortcuts and things like that.

• 51:27James Clear?

  The key part that made that work for me, the reason I could do it is because I was still making progress. So you, like, I was delaying gratification, but I could still see that things were on a good path. So the newsletter was growing quickly. I was getting good feedback from the audience.

• 51:43Lewis Howes?

  Traffic was growing on your website.

• 51:44James Clear?

  Yeah, I wasn't, traffic was growing. I wasn't feeling like I'm putting work out into a vacuum and there's no response. And so because I could see the snowball was building and rolling down the hill, it was easier to tell myself, hey, just you're on a good path. Just keep going. You know, you can keep waiting.

• 52:02Lewis Howes?

  And when you saw, I know you're very connected to a lot of the other kind of writers in our space. And you guys, you know, connect and do masterminds and stuff like that, people that I've known as well for a long, long time. When you would see other people in your industry, your friend group or peer group, writing your time bestselling books over and over again, and, you know, launching this thing and this project. And you're kind of just turning away, doing the same thing consistently for five, seven years before you launched your book. How do you not get discouraged from your peers doing the things that maybe you want to do in the future, but you haven't done yet?

• 52:38James Clear?

  Yeah, well, I mean, it's a good question. I think it's very natural to slide into that kind of feelings of comparison and stuff. But I tried to avoid that. Like, I want these people to succeed, you know? I imagine, so like, there are two scenarios. There's going to be bestselling books either way. Okay, so they're, they're still gonna, they're gonna happen either way.

• 52:54Lewis Howes?

  Every week, every week.

• 52:55James Clear?

  They're gonna, they're gonna happen. So the question is, do you know the people who are writing bestsellers or do you not? And I would much rather be friends with all the people doing it than to not be. And I was just looking to learn, you know, I'm, I'm just trying to soak up like they're, these are really smart people and they, you know, they've done the thing that I'm hoping to do. So what can I learn from them and how can I? Provide value to them or help them out or you know, at least be an ear that can listen to the things that they're struggling with. And so, um, yeah, I was looking to try to like, build relationships with those people, not to turn it into like a competition, but more turn into like a collaboration and try to be on the same team.

• 53:36Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, I think that's so wise. And I, and I think there's a lot of people that hoard their information, that compete with their peers. And I just think that's a losing battle. When you try to compete and be the best and win, that was kind of my twenties where I was like, how do I be number one and be the best at everything? And then I realized, man, this is exhausting and draining. And, and then when I launched my show 10 years ago, I was like, how can I make it about everyone else? How can I shine a light on everyone? Not make it the Lewis Howes show, but make it the School of Greatness and shine the light on others like yourself, James, and lift them up and collaborate instead of compete. And it's so much more rewarding to be in collaboration with people, to see them shine, to support

• 54:19Lewis Howes?

  their success, and be in partnership with people, you know, and working together in your own way. But then saying, how do I learn everything for myself and just, you know, keep it all for me?

• 54:30James Clear?

  For sure. I think, um, like I mentioned, the comparison part is natural and it kind of also, it's something that, uh, you wouldn't want to shut it off totally. Like, let's say, for example, that you want to launch a YouTube channel. Um, how do you know what a good YouTube video is? The only way that you know, is you look at a bunch of YouTube videos and you start to compare them. You start to compare and contrast and see which make, what makes, what qualities make one great and what qualities make other, others not so great. And so it's the ability to compare things that leads to what we would call taste, you know, or the, uh, the ability to make judgments. And so you need that, that muscle, that comparison

• 55:12James Clear?

  muscle for that. I think the problem is when it gets applied in unuseful ways. So I tend to think that it's really helpful to compare small things or granular things. So like, and very unhelpful to compare big things. So it's helpful to compare small things like, what's the marketing strategy for this particular book launch? Or what kind of squat form or technique is that person using in the gym? And you can look at this little small detail, deconstruct it, and you can learn something from it. Meanwhile, it's pretty unhelpful generally to compare big things. What's that person's net worth compared to mine? How happy is their marriage compared to mine? These are like really big issues and there's so many things, factors at play and it's really complicated.

• 55:55James Clear?

  And it's just kind of a losing battle to compare anything like that. It's not, it's not really helpful for anybody. But if you can scale it down, deconstruct the small stuff, then yeah, there's often a lot that you can learn. So I think comparison's fine if you keep it in the right lane. And in for big picture stuff, it's better to collaborate. And maybe for small things, it's better to deconstruct and compare and try to analyze and then you can figure out how to make it work for you.

• 56:22Lewis Howes?

  Right. I'm curious on a, speaking of scales, uh, before the book launched for you. On the scale of one to 10, let's call it the joy happiness scale. 10 being your peak happiness, peak joy, you know, consistently, maybe some minor moments here and there, but most of the time you're a joyful, happy person. Is a 10, one is you're miserable. On a scale of one to 10 before the book comes out, call it a few months before, where are you on that scale?

• 56:51James Clear?

  So, um, whenever I get a scale like this, I basically never choose one or 10 because I feel like, uh, there's seven billion people in the world. And so there's gotta be some other, um, you know, example out there that's higher than what I'm imagining or lower than what I'm imagining. So, uh, I pretty much never select those. But having said that, um, well, a couple of months before the came, book came out, I was really, I was really quite happy because I was done with the book finally. You know, and I've been working on it. If you went like maybe say a year and a half or two years before the book came out, that was a really tough period because I was in the middle of working on it.

• 57:26James Clear?

  But I generally consider myself to be a very happy, positive person. And so even years before I, even before I got the book deal, you know, like I, and I wasn't making much money, but I had this audience that was growing. I was quite happy then, you know, like I, I was even before, you know, before I had a career and I was just a regular college student. I was quite happy then, you know? Um, and so I try, I think this is actually a very important version of mental toughness, which is mental toughness often gets framed as, um, grit, stubbornness, discipline in the face of challenge. I'm going to force my way through it. But I think there's another version of mental toughness, which is flexibility,

• 58:08James Clear?

  adaptability, things like I can be happy no matter what I'm working on. I can be happy no matter who I'm hanging out with. Um, I can make this work no matter what resources I have available. And mindsets like that are actually very robust and resilient. They're very mentally tough because your mindset, your mood is not dependent on your conditions. If your, if your mood is dependent on your conditions, you're kind of like brittle. You're, you know, you're, um, you're stuck, uh, you're, you're beholden to the, the situation. And you're being held hostage by it. And so I don't want my happiness to be held hostage by the situation. Like I'm going to be happy no matter what I'm working on. I'm going to be happy no matter who I'm hanging out with. And, uh, I try to approach life like that, even though of course there will be moments of grieving

• 58:53James Clear?

  and sadness and difficulty. Everybody's life is going to have that, but I don't want to be, um, I don't want to be held hostage by my circumstances. So, um, yeah, so I would say there were periods, two years before the book came out, that period was harder. Uh, but I still tried to be happy, even though I was feeling pretty drained.

• 59:11Lewis Howes?

  What does that look like when it's hard for you and you're the, in the darkness of writing? You know, 20 hours a day, what is that? Is that a seven? Is that a two? Is that a four? What is that on the scale?

• 59:20James Clear?

  Um. Let's say my baseline is I'm usually at like a seven or an eight. And then if I have like a really great day, I'm like living in a nine. Um, and then on a hard day like that, I'm like at a four, uh, and I'm just feeling like exhausted. Um, mostly the one feeling that I don't like is feeling so busy that I can't be thoughtful. So I'm, I'm so busy working on stuff. I'm so exhausted by the amount of effort that I had to put in. I can remember this a lot from this period. I would have been working so hard on the book all day and then I'd be like six o'clock. And I'd be like, I just need to stop for a minute and go to the gym and work out. And I would go and work out, but I was kind of like a zombie going through my workout. I was just, I was so tired that I was just getting through it.

• 1:00:04James Clear?

  And I'd see people and I just, I was so busy, I was so tired that I couldn't be thoughtful and have a good conversation. I just didn't have the energy for it. But you, on a typical day, I'd be excited to walk in the gym. You know, I'd have like a bounce in my step and I'd go in there and I'd have a great workout and I'd get to chat with people and kind of cut it up a little bit and then leave. And I just didn't have the energy for that at that time. So I think that's what being maybe a four looks like compared to being a seven or an eight.

• 1:00:29Lewis Howes?

  And where are you today? 10 million copies sold, two young kids, you know,

• 1:00:34James Clear?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:35Lewis Howes?

  Living the dream.

• 1:00:37James Clear?

  As long as you're getting sleep, I feel, I feel good. You know, the kids' sleep dictates a lot of things. I would say that I'm like pretty consistently at an eight right now. The thing that's keeping me from being at a nine is wrestling with this new season that I'm in and I'm, I've got like all this time that I'm spending with the kids, which is great and I don't regret at all, but I also have this ambition, this drive to create something great, to continue to build a business, to try to like make my little mark on stuff and I don't have the time for it. So I got to figure out some answers to those questions that we were asking earlier.

• 1:01:12Lewis Howes?

  I hope today's episode inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a rundown of today's show with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me as well as ad free listening experience, make sure to subscribe to our greatness plus channel on Apple podcast. If you enjoyed this, please share it with a friend over on social media or text a friend, leave us a review over on Apple podcast and let me know what you learned over on our social media channels at Lewis Howes. I really love hearing the feedback from you and it helps us continue to make the show better. And if you want more inspiration from our world-class guests and content to learn how to improve the quality of your life,

• 1:01:53Lewis Howes?

  then make sure to sign up for the greatness newsletter and get it delivered right to your inbox over at greatness.com/newsletter. And if no one has told you today, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.