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I like to think of myself as a very motivated and high energy individual… but that actually has nothing to do with the fact that I feel lazy sometimes. Today I talk about how I overcome those moments when I don’t feel like doing what I should be doing.

Recently, I came across the Five Second Rule by Mel Robbins and it has absolutely changed my life. In those split second moments where I’m trying to figure out how to make the right decision – I now use the five second rule.

Mel Robbins is the first to admin how simple and stupid this whole thing sounds. Count down 5 seconds and then go? And all my procrastination problems are over?

Look — I wouldn’t be posting about this if I didn’t try it myself. Give it a go the next time you’re hesitating to take action for something you know you should be doing.

Here at Unstoppable, we’re all about teaching you how to live a more proactive life. We talk about how becoming unstoppable requires you to do two things: have belief in yourself, and have discipline in your execution. Without discipline, and without actual execution, you will not get anywhere. Try this 5-second rule so that you can truly start moving forward.

The Five Second Rule by Mel Robbins (book): https://amzn.to/2N2jG2Z

Mel Robbins on Impact Theory: https://bit.ly/2BAzQvg

And remember… everyone needs a strategy for their life; YOURS NEEDS TO BE UNSTOPPABLE!

I think in life we’re told three HUGE lies… The three biggest lies we’re told in our lives are:

• That life is fair
• That we’ll eventually get to a point in our life where ALL our problems will be gone…
• …and that there’s such a thing as “perfect”

Life is not fair. There are ALWAYS road bumps small or large. And there’s just no thing as perfect. The ironic thing is that’s what makes life special!

It’s the imperfections that make things interesting. It’s the road bumps that teach us lessons to grow. And it’s the unfairness that highlights opportunities for us to win.

And as you embrace these truths… The one thing that you can count on in your life happening — is ADVERSITY.

I’ve had my fair share of adversities in my life. From businesses almost dying, to divorce, to family members getting sick.

In fact, it’s through getting through some of the craziest adversities in my life did I come up with the idea of “Unstoppable” — the idea that no matter what the road bumps – there’s always a way forward…

When you subscribe to the lies that life is perfect, and life is fair, and problems shouldn’t exist, we tend to get blindsided by adversity.

But when you start to stare adversity in the face and treat it as a familiar face — only then do you start to figure out how to deal with life’s adversities in a proactive way.

By now, I’ve gone through so much crazy adversity in my life, I’ve actually developed a framework for dealing with crisis and adversity.

The framework basically works in three parts. When you’re facing a tough situation, you want to map out three broad-based scenarios:

1. Figure out the absolute worst case scenario. The nightmare scenario. The OMG — this is horrible scenario. The crazy creative scenarios you dream up while you’re laying in bed because you’re stressed out and can’t sleep.
2. Figure out the most likely scenario.. This is what is likely going to happen if you go talk to a few experts who have gone through a similar situation before and you get them to play out where this situation is headed
3. Figure out your upside. This is the scenario where you actually come out stronger. Where things work out better. Where this adversity actually turns out to be one of the best things that happened to you. Where you basically make lemonade out of the lemons you were just dealt.

Your JOB now is to:

• Manage for the worst case scenario. Human beings are incredibly adaptable and so are you. So figure out what you’d do. The worst has just happened. How do you rebuild?
• Get comfortable with the likely scenario, because that is what is most likely to happen so get PROACTIVE about dealing with it
• And now that you’ve mapped out the worst case, prepared for the likely case, DO EVERYTHING YOU CAN to get to the UPSIDE scenario

I’ve learned that escapism is the greatest friend of adversity. Only when I learned to stare at adversity straight in the face… Recognize that I’m in a crappy situation… And then apply the tools at my disposal to solve the problem, was I able to get to a healthy relationship with adversity in my life.

My question to you is this: When things don’t go accordingly to plan… When you get that terrible phone call… When you stay up at night thinking about the things that can go wrong… You’re dealing with adversity…

The question is… are you using the right framework to deal with it? Use this three step framework to figure out how you can better deal with the road bumps we’re now facing in our life. Be sure to share your thoughts in the comments below.

And remember… everyone needs a strategy for their life; YOURS NEEDS TO BE UNSTOPPABLE!

We’ve all been there. At the blink of an eye January becomes August, and the years quickly passes us by. Where did the time go?

The thing is that unless we are PROACTIVE about setting an agenda for ourselves to go after what we want in life, others set the agenda for us.

They do it in subtle ways and in ways we don’t even realize. Our inboxes are others setting the agenda for us — and yet we check it first thing in the morning.

Our calendars filled with meeting invites on back to back days are curated mindlessly by others we work with. It’s not their fault. They’re setting the agenda for their own day and taking you along with them!

This is one of the BIG reasons I started Unstoppable Sundays. On Sundays, I sit down, reflect on my goals, and get proactive about my week. I look at how I’m spending my time over the coming 7 days and I ask myself: if I do all of these things that I’m planning to do — will I be closer to achieving my goals 7 days from now? Will I look back next Sunday and say — wow! what an amazing week! Will I look back a year from now and say, geez, I CRUSHED my goals!

On this episode of Unstoppable Sunday, I walk you through three very actionable things you can do TODAY to start to get more proactive about your life.

#1 Have a morning ritual

Every single self help and personal development guru will tell you this. And yet such a small percentage of the population actually practices it. It drives me nuts! A recent study shows 61% of smartphone users check their phone within 5 minutes of waking up in the morning.

What happens when we check our smartphone? Why is this even bad? Well, almost immediately, within 5 minutes of starting your day, you’re immediately giving over control of what you think about, what you work on, what you REACT to right over to others.

It is the exact opposite of living a proactive life.

How do you offset this? Start a morning ritual. When I wake up in the morning, I like to meditate, I like to pray, I like to shower and get dressed. I then like to see what I have in the docket and what others are asking of me — whether it is in my email inbox, or my social media, or my calendar.

You don’t have to take huge leaps here, or take on crazy new habits. Just start with this one simple thing: Don’t check your phone until you’ve gotten dressed for work. Leave that time to yourself and your own thoughts, and your goals, and reign in positivity and gratitude into those moments.

#2 Ask for 25 minute and 50 minute meetings.

We’ve all been there. You have an entire day of back to back 30 and 60 minute meetings. As you get home completely and utterly exhausted, you wonder two things to yourself: 1) Where did the time go? 2) Crap, when do I actually do my actual work?!

Unfortunately this is the status quo for a lot of corporate culture. Even if you’re not in a large corporation, I’m sure you’ve constantly wondered about why you’re even in a certain meeting as you think about all the work you actually need to be doing.

My trick for this? I ask for 25 or 50 minute meetings. I then use that extra 5 to 10 minutes that I save to catch up on my work, take a break, scan my emails, and even jot down action items from the meeting. This simple exercise actually allows me a moment to breathe so I don’t get sucked into reactive mode and can actually think about where I am and what’s ahead in my day.

Pro Tip: I also use this time to look ahead of meetings in the day and see if there are useless meetings I can avoid or ask to cancel because it’s just not necessary.

#3 Schedule in ME time throughout your week where you’re meeting yourself

I tried an experiment early in my career. If I booked meetings spread out across the week with my imaginary friend, would it wreak havoc with my schedule and my co-workers?

It didn’t.

And so I make it a point to book 25-minute or 50-minute meetings across the week with my friend Charlie. It’s ME time. It’s a meeting, it’s a meeting with ME, and it’s a time when I get actual work done.

No one gets hurt, people work around it anyway, and in the end, everyones better for it.

Best of all, I get to regain my proactive posture as I use up these times to get caught up on my own work — instead of constantly reacting to things coming my way.

In Conclusion…

Remember, everyone needs a strategy. Yours needs to be unstoppable. If you want help switching to living a more proactive life, be sure to download our FREE Life Planning Guide.

SO… I’ve had this one TV in my living room that I’ve owned for nearly 10 years.

From living in Stamford, CT, to Greenwich, to the Upper West Side, to two apartments in San Francisco, this one TV has gone with me everywhere.

I never felt the urge to buy a newer TV. But I know over the past 10 years, I’ve clocked thousands of hours on it (estimating but I’m probably not wildly off). From my favorite shows that defined a lot of my mental model of life including Star Trek TNG, Madmen, Breaking Bad, Billions, and of course Game of Thrones was watched on this TV.

And yet, a couple of weeks ago, I dismantled the TV and stuck it in a closet. I was done. Why?

In my continued quest to get more proactive in my life, and while I was writing out my thoughts in my Unstoppable Sunday pause and reflect session — I realized that the TV was sticking out a sore thumb of time suck in my life and I needed to get rid of it.

In it’s place, I put in a dedicated iPad so I can listen to music, and in the giant white wall that was now exposed with the absence of my beloved TV — I put up an Inspiration Wall.

You get 24 Hours in the day

The greatest equalizer of all of mankind is time. We all get 24 hours in the day. You take out 8 hours for sleep, 8 hours for work, and 2 hours for family time, you’re still left with SIX hours in the day.

As high productivity as I am, even on my best weeks I was still loosing hours to my TV. And while there is something to be said about down time and entertainment — there wasn’t anything huge I was getting out of my time on TV.

This index card I used in a prior Unstoppable episode describes this dynamic perfect. We all know where those SIX hours are going. It’s TV. It’s idle time on our Facebook feeds. It’s time we could be spending for more proactive time with family or time spent improving ourselves from active learning or building our dreams.

Inspiration Wall

If you’re like most people, the TV serves as a central pivot point in your living area. Everything is oriented around it and even if you entire family is sitting in this space — its designed for them all to be oriented around the TV.

There’s something special about that, and with this giant gaping space now available with my TV being gone, I saw it as an opportunity to use that space in a more proactive way.

The first thing I did was to set up an old iPad I had as a permanent music device connected to my stereo system. This made it that there could be background noise or even active listening — whether I was alone or I had people over.

This also made it where I could be doing OTHER things even while my space was being filled with Youtube videos that are educational, music that I love or calming music for meditation.

But there was still the giant white space.

And so, I took the opportunity to turn the empty white wall into an Inspiration Wall. I bought one of the canvas art we have in our Unstoppable Store for inspiration walls. I put in a new plant. I put in some picture albums (yes I still have them) from an important part of my life.

Very quickly, the dynamics shifted. My living room went from being a place of active TV watching to a place of real conversation. To a place of self reflection, of relaxation, and most importantly to a place of conscious living – vs – passive watching of mindless entertainment.

In Conclusion

In my continued quest to lead a more proactive and unstoppable life, and in my continued quest to help others become more proactive in their lives — this small (yet huge) change to remove my TV turned into having a massive impact in my life that I felt almost immediately in the past couple of weeks.

How are you spending your SIX hours? What are the time sucks in your life? Take stock, remove them, and double down on the things that help you grow instead — whether it be an inspiration wall that constantly reminds you of your goals or a music area that helps you create a space of fun rather than idle watching.

Remember, everyone needs a strategy. Yours needs to be unstoppable. If you want help switching to living a more proactive life, be sure to download our FREE Life Planning Guide.

Happy Unstoppable Sunday! On Sundays, we ask our selves two questions: 1) Where am I? and 2) What do I do next?

This Sunday, I spent some time reflecting on my ToDo list.

I’m a HUGE fan of ToDo lists. I’ve used them since when I was like ONE year old (kind of joking).

The ONE thing I hate about ToDo lists though is that they quickly become a cluttered burden of things that you haven’t done… which leads to me feeling overwhelmed, which leads me to… well you get the picture.

That all changed when I discovered the Eisenhower Matrix.

This simple tool helped me figure out how to take a long flat ToDo list of things that I think I should be doing — to a list of things that are: Urgent + Important, Important but not Urgent, and then two other buckets of things that I think I should be doing but in reality isn’t Important nor Urgent!

Here’s how the Eisenhower Matrix works:

So the next time you’re staring at your ToDo list, ask yourself these three questions:

1. What are the most important and urgent things for me to do?
2. What are the most important things to do that I have some time to do (they’re not urgent)?
3. What are the things that I can delegate, because they’re not important but relatively urgent?
4. What are the things I really should just delete because they’re neither important nor urgent?

We all know that ruthless prioritization is the key to winning in life. It’s the key of living a PROACTIVE life. And yet it’s hard to prioritize when staring at a sea of competing priorities. This simple method consistently allows me to turn a complicated and long ToDo list that I feel uninspired by to a set of ToDos that will have the most impact and deliver those dopamine hits that I crave when crushing my ToDos.

The other thing to remember is that this doesn’t have to be a one-time exercise. I structure my ToDo list application to always have these as “sections” — for my personal ToDos, I use an application called Things, and for team projects, I use an Asana. For both of these, I set up sections for each of these buckets in the Eisenhower Matrix so I can easily group my ToDos and focus on the right things.

This simple way of prioritizing my ToDos has helped me reach unparalleled amounts of productivity in both my personal and professional life. It kills the clutter from my life and my mind, and it helps me articulate and evaluate what is important — ALL crucial steps in ensuring I am being PROACTIVE in my life.