How to Talk to Anyone (Junior Talker #4) by DeYtH Banger (top business books of all time TXT) 📖

Chapter 4 - Secrets

 10x Life: How to Pinpoint and prioritize your goals

 

 

 

Let me be frank: this article will be the most fun you could have with your underpants on.

You’ll discover:

The EXACT questions that reveal your true desires. A simple process to map out your entire life, including your dreams, goals, and bottlenecks. A free tool you can use right away to keep yourself accountable.

Ready to roll? Then let’s start with…

Why you MUST write down your goals

Fifteen years ago, I’d (barely) graduated from college, and went to Yosemite for the summer to work as a cook—and to figure out what the hell to do with my life.

You see, I’d “invested” four glorious, debaucherous years in college and had no idea what to do next. Sure, I had an idea about what I wanted to do, but that didn’t fit in with the whole “Purpose in Life” thing.

Oddly, though, the answer was waiting for me. Filed away. In my dad’s closet.

Here’s what happened: After my summer gig in Yosemite, I returned home, and my dad asked me to help him move.

And if there’s one universal truism, it’s this: When you have a massive hangover, someone will ask you to help them move. I have no idea why, but it’s true.

So, naturally, I woke up that morning with a hangover the size of Texas. A temple-throbbing, gut-wrenching, oh-I-wish-the-lord-would-take-me-now hangover.

I didn’t want to help him move. But I’m a good son (even if I’m a crappy mover). So there I was, helping my dad move piles of storage boxes into his new apartment.

While shuffling through stuff in his closet, I saw it: the box that contained all my worldly possessions. After school, I had sold, burned, or thrown away everything I owned except for a few choice items; I dumped these items, haphazardly, into a medium-sized cardboard box, sealed it shut, and promptly forgot all about it for the past four months.

In that box was the usual memorabilia: postcards from friends, newspaper clippings, essays I’d written, etc.

But one item stood out: a single sheet of paper, featuring a drawing with three long, spindly trees.

The trees were labeled: personal, financial, and travel. Each tree had several branches, and each branch listed something I wanted to do, like, “Hike in Nepal,” “Become a cook,” and “Live in Yosemite.”

Here’s the astonishing thing: I wrote that list four years ago, and—even though I’d completely forgotten about it—I’d done nearly everything on that list.

In the words of Keanu Reeves: Whoa.

So what the hell happened? How did I—a guy who can barely remember where he put his underpants—manage to retain this information, and act on it, over several years? What sort of devilry was at work here?

The answer is obvious.

By writing down my goals, I:

consciously defined what I wanted to do, and sub-consciously acted in accordance with them.

You see, it’s all about…

The science behind goal setting

Here are two scientifically proven reasons to set your goals.

First, setting goals increases motivation. A 1967 study published in the Journal of Applied Psychology found that having a specific goal—rather than just being told to “try your best”—increases your motivation. (Next time you see a parent tell their kid to try their best, you can snicker quietly to yourself—because that kid ain’t gonna do shit.)

Second, setting goals increases achievement by up to 30%. You are more likely to achieve your goals just by writing them down. Sounds crazy, right? A team of researchers thought so, too. So they asked struggling students to complete an online goal-setting program. As reported in the American Psychological Association: after a four-month period, students in the goal-setting program enjoyed an average 30% increase in academic performance over the control group.

 

Key point: write your goals down. If you don’t, both your motivation and achievement will deflate into a limp-wristed sissy pants. 

 

Answer these 10 questions to discover EXACTLY what you want in life

OK, time to get real. An unaimed arrow never misses its target—but an unaimed life misses every time.

So let’s take aim first…

The following ten questions will reveal exactly what you want from life:

What do I want to do? What do I want to be? What do I want to see? Where do I want to go? What do I want to have? Who do I want to spend more time with? What would be the most fun thing to do? What activity do I want to stop doing? What is missing in my life? What’s stopping me from achieving everything in this list?

(Note: I’ve also included these—along with boatloads of other bonuses—at www.10xtoday.com/life-resources.)

Answer the above questions as honestly as you can. Dream your dream, not someone else’s. Go absolutely buck-wild, and write down as many ideas as you can. And most importantly, make your goals BIG, BOLD, and BALLSY.

Need a little help? Here are my answers:

What do I want to do? (Hike the Appalachian Trail, run a 50-mile ultramarathon, learn to surf, etc.) What do I want to be? (Kind, smart, loving, helpful, respected, etc.) What do I want to see? (Sunset over the Sahara, a dolphin in the wild, two monkeys playing pool, etc.) Where do I want to go? (Tibet, Antarctica, space, etc.) What do I want to have? ($100K in monthly passive income, a bestselling book on Amazon, my own restaurant, etc.) Who do I want to spend more time with? (Parents, Jim Rogers, Fabio, etc.) What would be the most fun thing to do? (Take a hot air balloon to the upper atmosphere, run with the bulls in Pamplona, ski naked, etc.) What activity do I want to stop doing? (Answering emails, wallowing in self-doubt, giving in to others’ demands when I know I shouldn’t, etc.) What is missing in my life? (Time with friends, my own cats, a super-sweet 30-inch computer monitor with standing desk, etc.) What’s stopping me from achieving everything in this list? (Note: be specific. Say “$1,337 to buy a plane ticket to Spain” instead of, “money.”)

Now, let’s discuss…

How to really win at the game of life

Did you ever play the board game “The Game of Life”? (It’s also known as simply “Life.”) The game simulates a person’s journey through life, from college to retirement, with jobs, marriage, and children along the way.

Let me tell you: I. Hate. That. Game.

Here’s why: according to the rules, “winners”—and I slather that term with sarcasm—would cruise through life, buy a car, get married, have two kids, and retire.

And the “losers”? They ended up childless philosophers.

Now, as someone who (i) studied philosophy in college, and (ii) doesn’t want kids, this doesn’t seem like a game I’d dig.

Don’t get me wrong. I hate most philosophers. I like (some) kids. I’m not attached to either label, for good or evil, and frankly, neither should you.

But what drives me to drink—among a litany of other reasons—is the notion of one-life-fits-all. As if there’s one great cosmic roadmap that works for everyone. Which—in the words of Jeff Goldblum in Jurassic Park—is “one big pile of shit.”

Look, if you want to be a big-time corporate executive, good for you.

If you want to make minimum wage doing something you enjoy, good for you.

If you want 17 children, and to spend the next few years cleaning up spit, excrement, and chicken fingers—good for you.

If you want to read my book 10x Life and leave a glowing on Amazon—good for me 

 

 

 

You see, happiness is a simple equation: Knowing what you want + Doing what you want = Happy 

 

And that’s what cheeses me off so much about “The Game of Life.” The end result is ludicrously out of touch with what we really want.

But games are fun, right?

So here’s what I propose: together, you and I’ll create our Board Game of Life, right now. And the best part is, we can decide what a winner really looks like.

Creating your “Board Game of Life” with Trello

Remember those ten questions? Did you answer them?

I hope so—because we’re gonna put them into your personal Board Game of Life.

 

 

 

 

How to Make Small Talk with Strangers: My 21-Day Happiness Experiment

 

 

 

One of the more unexpected changes I discovered upon becoming a parent is how much more you end up talking with strangers. This is in part because strangers are more likely to approach you when you have a youngster with you, and in part because kids are great icebreakers.

 

My 3-year-old son, Mason, has zero trepidation about approaching and chatting up strangers. If we didn’t stop him, he would probably happily walk off with another family.

In fact, recent social science research suggests we might all be happier if we had a toddler to break the ice with more strangers. Two Chicago behavioral scientists, Nicholas Epley and Juliana Schroeder, have found that people who talk with strangers are actually happier than those who keep to themselves.

 

The researchers approached commuters in a Chicago area train station and asked them to break the usual “rules” of communication in public places. One group of commuters was asked to talk to the stranger who sat down next to them on the train that morning. A second group was told to follow standard commuter norms, keeping to themselves. A third group received no instructions.

At the end of the train ride, the researchers asked the sets of commuters a simple question: were they happier, or less happy, when they had to chat up their seatmates?

Perhaps surprisingly, the group of commuters who talked to a stranger turned out to report greater happiness than the other groups.

The interesting discovery is how the reality was so out of sync with the commuters’ own predictions. When Epley and Schroeder asked the commuters in advance to predict how they would feel after talking to a stranger, the commuters thought they would be happier if they remained silent. The opposite proved true.

 

“Our daily lives are guided by inferences about what others think, believe, feel and want,” writes Epley in Mindwise: How We Understand What Others Think, Believe, Feel and Want. The problem is, our inferences are often wrong. And it turns out we’d all be happier if we just talked to one another. The reason? When we talk to strangers, we’re motivated to show them a happy, friendly version of ourselves. As the Art of Manliness has hit home before, the way you act changes how you feel — by acting you become! In other words, if you’re in a grumpy mood, but turn on the warmth while talking to a stranger, you’ll start actually feeling a lot better. Interacting with strangers is a great way to lift your mood. 

 

AoM has previously written about why you should talk with strangers, as well as offered a detailed guide on how to make small talk with them. I took this advice to heart, and in this post, I decided to test out the theory that talking to strangers will make you happier.

Over the course of 21 days, I made an effort to chat up strangers at every opportunity I could.

 

My 21-Day Experiment with Talking to Strangers

 

The rules of my experiment were simple: for 21 days, I would seek out opportunities to chat up strangers in public places. I didn’t roam around public parks and Greyhound bus stations accosting every stranger I met, but I determined I would try to set the stage for more interactions with new people. For example, when given the chance to sit in a public place either by myself or in shared seating, I would opt for shared seating and look for opportunities to speak to my seatmate.

 

I won’t bore you with a detailed rundown of every interaction during the 21 days, but I will share below a few examples of typical experiences during the time I served as a human guinea pig, along with my commentary/reflection on each interaction.

I also share a few things I learned from my 21-day experiment which you can use to become more proficient at talking with strangers.

Friday, May 9th, a hotel pool, Calabasas, CA. While visiting my family hometown for a wedding, I encounter a man sitting on the side of the hotel pool as I am about to go swimming with my son.