Category: Personal

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People Usually Respond with Anger When their Dishonesty is Called Out

This is a pretty random thought I had today and it seems kind of intuitive and obvious and perhaps there is plenty of written material about it already, but… People generally respond with anger when their dishonesty is called out.

I was thinking in my head of a hypothetical situation. Let’s say something incredibly unlikely happened, especially as it pertains to human behavior.

Or better yet, I have a real example.

I was in a club in Paris a handful of years back with my friends. On this trip, I had been regularly using an over-the-top French accent based largely on Lumiere from Beauty and the Beast.

I was chatting with a French girl at the bar (in English), asking her for a drink recommendation. After one question I asked her, she responded with,

“I’m sorry, I can’t understand you. Your British accent is too strong.”

Now, this by itself is pretty funny. I’m not sure where she learned English that my accent is “too British” for her. Given that I’m from middle America.

Unfazed, I instead repeated my original question, but this time using my ridiculous French accent.

It worked!

She understood me immediately and didn’t seem to notice that I had done anything unusual.

Now, it’s kind of a strange story and there’s a lot you could unpack here. But back to my original point, I’ve told this story before and people have questioned its veracity.

I did not feel even a speck of anger at that response. I understand why people would question whether it really happened, but I know 100% that it happened exactly like that, so I have the confidence to withstand such skepticism.

And in my experience, people telling the truth virtually never respond to skepticism with anger.

Obviously, if their true story is intended to determine a course of action and people are resistant because they don’t believe it, that could be frustrating and they may get angry.

But especially in low-stakes situations, an honest person should never really be angry.

People who are lying, however, seem to get angry all the time. I assume it’s because such a strong emotional response is likely to quell any criticism. People are unlikely to press the issue seeing the response they are getting.

But like with most situations, the most emotional and heated person is probably not right.

I see a lot of videos and other content of weight lifters being questioned about whether they are “Natural” or not. Many of them respond immediately with anger when questioned about it.

Especially the ones who are obviously not natural.

But to a truly natural lifter to have people questioning, it’s actually a compliment. It means they’ve gotten so big and strong without steroids that people literally cannot believe they did it naturally.

They have the confidence that they are 100% right, and it doesn’t bother them that people question it.

I think that in general, anger or emotional reactions that seem inappropriate for the situation are extremely strong warning signs that something else is going on. Perhaps that person is lying, maybe they are hiding something, or maybe they have some other emotional issue at stake that you are unaware of.

Or I suppose they could just be really unstable, too. But I generally try to avoid those types of people!

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We Have A Sense That if Something Was Important, We’d Know About It: But It’s False

I think just about everyone (myself included) seems to have this innate sense that they already know the most important things for them to know. And it’s 100% false.

I see it in others all the time, but much more pointedly in myself. Sometimes I’ll learn some new thing in my field or wherever, and it sounds like something that would matter a lot to me.

But my first instinct is usually to discredit it or downplay its significance. It’s difficult for me to believe that there could be something so relevant and important to me that I didn’t yet know about.

I think it might be a bit of a defense mechanism. You’re protecting your fragile ego. Because otherwise, how could you justify being ignorant about something so important?

You want to believe that you are incredibly knowledgeable about the world, particularly in certain areas. And when you find out that you have this gap in your knowledge or understanding, it feels like a personal failing.

But just think about how limiting that is.

If you believe that you already know everything that’s important, or if you refuse to seek out new knowledge for fear of it making you feel dumb, then you won’t learn anything.

I think it’s important to note that we will always have gaps in our knowledge and there will always be things we don’t know that could help us tremendously. We need to accept that and, more importantly, seek those things out.

Otherwise we’ll just continue missing out on important opportunities without knowing it, and stagnate where we are.

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BNI Made me Complacent

Perhaps I’m not accepting enough responsibility on this topic given the title, but I feel that I became fairly complacent with my business in BNI.

There was this sense that I could simply be in BNI and that my business would grow. And it sort of felt like that was actually the case for many years.

Granted, I was fairly active in the chapter and more or less did the things I was supposed to do.

But I was still coasting. I didn’t really do anything else in my business at all. I just went to BNI, got clients, and did the client work.

That’s basically it.

I’m really not blaming BNI here because it wasn’t really their fault. In fact, it was the early success of that system that made me feel like I could just coast.

And coast I did, for quite a while. Granted, things did generally improve year-over-year. I started with nothing and grew slowly to where I was making a real living. I bought a house, paid off my debts, and slowly started transitioning to where I am now where I can travel the world, go wherever I want, and hopefully retire early.

But there’s so much more that I could and should have been doing.

What’s most frustrating to me now is that I didn’t even notice when BNI stopped working for me. It had probably been at least 3 solid years with virtually no new outside business. And it’s a huge time commitment.

I was a part of a lesser group for a short time (which will remain nameless), but at least in that one, I realized that I wasn’t actually getting any business and it was demanding a lot from me, so I quit.

Why didn’t I do that with BNI?

I guess it’s because it had been such a crucial part of my business for so long and can be credited with the early growth of my company. For the longest time, it would be sacrilege to suggest that I leave.

So much like some of my romantic relationships, I just didn’t question it and it went on far too long.

And actually, just like my relationships, things have become so much clearer after leaving.

Even up to the moment I quit, I was still second-guessing myself. I didn’t know if I was making the right choice.

But it didn’t take long after I left before I was much more confident in my decision. Having my Tuesday mornings free and not having to worry about all of the duties that come along with being in a chapter were immediately liberating.

And it didn’t affect my business coming in at all, since there really hadn’t been any for a long time.

I’m not sure every post really needs to have a lesson, but I guess in this case, I just think it’s important to take a step back from things and really analyze whether they are benefiting me.

That could apply to literally anything. Relationships, memberships, service offerings, hobbies, and more.

Just because I’ve been doing something a long time doesn’t mean they serve my interests anymore.

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Intelligence Has Way Less to do with Success Than Other Factors

I wrote a post with basically the same title and premise back in January 2019 and, funny enough, I just read it as part of my regular review of old posts.

Today I’m going to present a bit of a different perspective, though it’s the same at heart.

I don’t want to give away enough details to identify this person, but I recently was thinking about how hard it is to work with someone in my life. And I put some thought into why that is.

This person isn’t dumb and isn’t unfriendly, but they are incredibly ineffective in a lot of ways. The primary reasons seem to be:

  • Lack of accountability
  • Lack of a system to organize tasks that need to be done
  • Inability to think critically and develop novel solutions
  • A sense that things outside their normal scope of care are either unimportant or outside of their control
  • General lack of initiative
  • Total lack of follow-through

These are all things that most people struggle with at some point or another. And none of them really have anything to do with intelligence (though it can help a bit).

But in the case of this person, I would say that these are the reasons they are difficult to work with and also are likely causes for any failures or lack of success they’ve had elsewhere, as well.

It could be totally different for everyone, but these are the main things I’ve seen with this person.

Everyone starts out with tons of weaknesses. Some affect them more than others. Intelligence might help solve some of those problems or improve those weaknesses, but by itself, it won’t accomplish anything.

I’m thinking now that the single most-important traits (or group of traits) is probably the ability to accurately reflect on one’s own weaknesses and to effectively improve or compensate for them.

Essentially, it’s the ability to accurately answer the question, “what’s holding me back?”

And then, of course, to figure out a way to overcome whatever the answer is.

More broadly, this could really be described as having a “growth mindset,” though I generally think of a growth mindset as being entirely internal, whereas external factors could also be holding you back and you still need to be able to overcome them.

A related trait that may be just as important is the ability to effectively identify and take advantage of the right opportunities. Sometimes there may not be anything holding you back, but you still need to be able to figure out which opportunities to pursue, and how to stick with them and pursue them effectively.

That last part is where I feel I’m weakest right now and where I really need to push forward. I’ve identified some excellent opportunities and feel I have everything in place to go after them.

I just need to do it.

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I Feel Silly Writing About Things that Later Seem Obvious

Much of what I write here in this blog seems pretty obvious after I’ve written it. To the point where I often feel silly even saying it. I imagine others reading it and thinking, “how could you not have already realized that?”

And yet I believe it’s absolutely critical that I keep going. Maybe even more so for things that may seem obvious.

If I didn’t write about it, I may not ever figure it out. And then I would be stuck not realizing or understanding something that many deem ‘obvious’.

Presumably, that’s what most people do.

And it just makes me think… How much progress and personal development are people missing out on simply because they are too afraid to confront something that they should have known?

I’ve said before that I think most people have a tendency to be far more motivated to avoid bad feelings than to seek good ones. It’s a good recipe for getting into a comfortable situation, but not one of growth.

Self-reflection can be painful, including times when you have a revelation that makes you feel guilty or ashamed for not having it earlier.

An easy way to avoid that is to not have any revelations. To simply ignore avoid serious self-reflection of any kind and build a protective wall around yourself so that you never have to be confronted with your own inadequacies.

So even if my thoughts might not seem that novel to others, or if I feel guilty or ashamed for not having figured something out sooner, that’s okay. It’s still important progress.

After all: better late than never!

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I Need to be Having Fun & Enjoying Life OR Working Hard to Maximize Income

I’ve been in the Los Cabos area of Mexico for over a week now, and a though crossed my mind as I was swimming in the ocean near where I’m staying.

I need to basically either be enjoying myself, trying new things, and taking advantage of everything my area has to offer, OR working as hard as I can to maximize my income at all times.

It doesn’t mean I have to pick one forever, just that I need to completely eliminate everything that’s not one of those two things.

Why?

This was the first time in 4 or 5 days that I actually swam in the ocean, despite it being extremely close. I’ve barely taken advantage of this place I’m in. Mostly because I’ve been working.

But I’ve wasted a lot of time, too.

When I’m working, I need to be working hard. And I need to constantly focus on how I can maximize the financial return for my time.

The reason for that is because I want to retire as soon as possible. The faster I can increase my net worth, the sooner I can retire and then it will be much easier to take advantage of everything around me.

And more to the point of this blog post: I need to eliminate things that are just a waste of time or that are just going through the motions.

I can’t be wasting time on things that aren’t important, and I can’t get complacent in my business and simply continue with the status quo.

I need to constantly be growing and expanding. I don’t want to work more hours, but I want to get way more out of the hours I do put in.

My goal is to retire by 50 but I would greatly prefer to do it much earlier, or at least be able to reduce my hours or increase flexibility before that.

Certainly I have improved in everything I’ve described here over the last several years and certainly the last decade. But I can’t get complacent with that. I need to continue improving, ideally at a more rapid pace.

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Getting the Clients I Want OR: The Law of Attraction?

The thought came to me just now that my business has continued to grow quite well, and almost all of the business that I’ve gained is for new hosting and maintenance clients, which is actually what I want.

While we still regularly have website design projects, they are becoming less and less frequent.

Now, it doesn’t feel like I’ve actively gone out of my way to avoid website design projects. My processes are all pretty much the same for website designs and I always tell people that we do it.

If I didn’t put any more thought into it, I’d simply say that it’s the Law of Attraction. You put what you want out there and it will come to you.

And I think there’s some truth to that, but if you break it down, you can see why it works. It’s not just some mystical thing that works magically.

I put a lot of thought into how to get more hosting clients. I’ve been actively tweaking my website and marketing to better reflect that we do that. I’ve been pushing hosting and maintenance services for years, while probably downplaying design.

Meanwhile, I haven’t updated my website design portfolio in quite some time, and it needs it. That just hasn’t been a priority.

I also put a lot of work into improving our hosting services and making them as good as possible. I don’t put as much thought into design.

Little by little, both the services I provide and the quality of my messaging and marketing improves. Little changes stack up over time, to where I am now getting way more of these clients.

Maybe nothing has slipped really for website design, but all of these little things add up over time in a huge way.

And this got me thinking: just imagine how all the other little things in my life can add up over time?

The power of gradual change cannot possibly be overstated.

As long as I continue progressing and putting work into the things that are important to me, they will work out.

I just need to keep going.

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Update on Fixing my Sleep Schedule – It’s Working?

I finally have some good news about my sleep schedule. I’m doing it!

I can’t remember exactly when I most recently decided, for the nth time, to try and fix my sleep schedule, but my gut says that’s been something like 4 months, maybe more. (Update: it was September 21st, so less than 3 months ago as outlined in this post)

My main enemy is the snooze button. And in that time, I think I’ve only gone back to sleep after my alarm went off a single time, and that was because I was sick and made a conscious choice to sleep more.

I’ve been consistently getting up early, often before the alarm goes off. I’m far more productive and things are going well.

I’ve found, though, that it’s very closely related to how much I drink, which has also been much lower in that same time frame. Making sure to avoid heavy drinking days entirely seems to be fairly important to the success of this effort.

But it’s been good. In total, I’m spending way less time in bed, which gives me an extra hour or more each day to be productive.

But I also have way more energy and am just generally more productive in every way.

I’m hoping I can just keep this up and never have to go back to the way things were. I sort of feel like this has been my biggest obstacle for a long time and now I’m finally making good progress on it.

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The Eccentric Part of the Lift is Everything

Some new research has come out which has confirmed what many have been saying a long time: that the eccentric part of the lift in weight training accounts for nearly all of the hypertrophy and strength gains.

Now, it’s possible that other research will come out and show that this isn’t quite true. But what’s there seems very convincing.

If true, it means that I’ve really been doing my training wrong. I really haven’t put any effort into the concentric portion, especially for bigger lifts like bench press.

On bench, I basically just drop it on myself and put all the focus into pushing it back up.

I could be much more productive with my lifting if I put all of my effort into the eccentric portion. So for bench press, that means a very slow, controlled descent. Which is what I’ve been told to do anyway, but I’ve just ignored it for some reason.

For other lifts, like overhead press for example, I maybe don’t even need to worry that much about form going back up. I just need to be able to maximize reps coming down, and specifically the quality of them.

It’s nice to have this kind of clarity, and thinking back, I think I’ve actually really been lacking in my lifts because I haven’t been doing them this way at all.

I’m looking forward to trying this out and will post back results.

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I Need to be Mindful of What Activities I Truly Value

This thought crossed my mind and it was a bit shocking to me that I had never really considered it before.

What activities do I actually value? How do I want to spend my time?

It’s easy to just assume that you are always considering this and that the manner in which you spend your time always reflects what you value.

But the more I think about it, the more I think that’s a foolish assumption that also happens to be incorrect.

It’s easy to get stuck in the same old routine and do things simply because it’s what you have done.

Without a plan in place and some conscious effort, you’re also way more likely to simply choose easy things versus good things. You may even subconsciously justify it by convincing yourself that the easier thing is what you really wanted.

In my own life, I think there are obvious examples of things that I do that I don’t actually value that much. While I’m certainly not bad at all compared to the average American, I still spend a fair amount of time watching movies and TV shows.

And I really don’t find any of that time fulfilling. Even simply reading a book is virtually always a better use of my time. So in most cases, I feel that I should be doing that.

I’ve had the thought lately, too, that something like disc golf is actually surprisingly rewarding, and something that I value a great deal. It’s outdoors, it’s active, it’s social, it’s fun, and I really enjoy an activity that I’m always trying to improve at.

I think it’s really important to be aware of things like that and to plan accordingly.

I think it’s also important to be mindful of specifically what it is about an activity that I enjoy, so I can focus on what’s important.

For example, as a 30-something that spends time with lots of other 30-somethings, activities like going to breweries are quite common.

But what is it I value about those activities? Is it trying new beer?

No.

While that can be mildly enjoyable, what I value is spending time with my friends. That’s it.

If I keep that in mind, I think I can focus a lot more on what’s important and simply enjoy that.

But also knowing that the brewery part of things simply isn’t important to me, I can suggest other social activities that I do find more rewarding.

Going on hikes, kayaking, and doing other outdoor group activities have always been great experiences for me, and I should continue to try to emphasize those and try to plan plenty of events to do those things with my friends.

As I’m writing this, I can’t help but feel like everything I’m saying is common sense and it should always be in the back of everyone’s mind at all times.

But I’m not sure that it actually is.

In this case, I think it’s far better to state these things explicitly and make a conscious effort to determine what’s important and then focus on that.