Self Improvement Daily Podcast

At the end of your day, do you ever feel like a big ball of stress?  No shame in that, because life can be pretty stressful sometimes.  But can you accurately pinpoint what causes the majority of your stress in the day?

Something that helps me evaluate my day and my current state is to perform “How Do I Feel” checks.  

The behavior is simple. Take 30 seconds at various points in your day to close your eyes and focus on your mental and physical state.  I ask myself questions like: “How is my mood”, "How anxious do I feel” and “Am I in pain?”.  I also have my moment of reflection when I get in the car before turning on the ignition.

This is helpful because if you feel stressed at the end of your day, but you can’t quite figure out what causes it, this check will help you hone in on exactly what is aggravating you. By doing that you can begin working on alleviating that situation proactively.  A good frame of mind is a requirement for a productive efficient, and fulfilling day.

So find a trigger that works for you to start doing “How Do I Feel” checks. Then, in those moments start asking yourself questions about your current state.  I’ll let you figure it out for yourself how effective these checks can be!

I want to talk about something we all do but hardly think about which is mirroring. Mirroring is the act of reciprocating the behavior or mannerisms of someone you are interacting with, and is usually most observable in body language and speaking style. By understanding this concept, you will be able to relate with people better.

Be observant of other people’s behavior and accommodate yours to match it.

By replicating someone’s non verbal signs, you come across as more similar to them, which has been proven to be a very strong factor in building rapport and relationships. Similarity is a sub-category of Dr. Robert Cialdini’s pillar of influence called “Liking”. Some of the other factors are physical attractiveness, cooperation, and conditioning.  

Mirroring creates comfortability through similarity. We all have specific neurons in our brain that are active only during action and observation, and when people seem like they have good chemistry, the activity of their mirror neurons are aligned more than normal! 

So, to give it a try, and actively think about mirroring someone else’s mannerisms or behavior in a conversation you have. What you might even notice is that you were already subconsciously mirroring them! This awareness can be used to build better relationship.

This is something that I bumped into and had to mold a little bit to make work in my life. It came as an exercise in the book, Sprint by Jake Knapp. This book is about optimizing the creative entrepreneurial process, but I quickly realized that it had applications more generally. The book talks about prioritizing potential entrepreneurial ideas and solutions on a 1-5 scale, and I liked the concept so much that I started using it when prioritizing my tasks.  

As random things come up, acknowledge them by writing them down and assigning a 1-5 priority ranking.

This quick assignment helps me hone in on exactly where I should be spending my time and has increased my productivity as well as my ability to make deadlines. It also has helped me transition quicker between tasks because I waste less time deciding what to do next, and get straight into what is next on the priority list.  

What I do is I keep a pocket notebook on me everywhere I go, and as tasks add on, I jot it down and assign a number 1-5. This way it can be kept out of my mind until I am ready to address it and I don’t let it distract me when it presents itself. When I complete the task, the action of physically crossing it out has become associated with accomplishment, so it also serves as a source of motivation.  

So, that sounds like a pretty good place to start. Keep a pen and piece of paper on you and write down all of the things you need to do, and quickly assess their importance on a 1-5 scale. Then, let it be out of sight, and out of mind until the time comes to encounter it head on!

kaya ismail, the founder of Wordify, tells us about a technique he uses in his company to create good and consistent content for his clients.

"Whether you are a personal brand or a multi-million dollar company, we all know the value of content marketing. We all need to provide content to our social media platforms. The hard part is not knowing it is doing. We all look back to our calendars and realize we just are staying consistent enough with our content marketing strategies. So what is the secrete to producing great content regularly for your audience? Producing great content is an art form. You cannot master an art form on a regular basis. Most people try to squeeze their creativity into their everyday life and work. Trust me, that is not a long-term strategy. Instead, you need to identify time slots and give your content marketing strategy you undivided attention. Not only will this help you stay focused and consistent, but it will help you stay focused on your other tasks during that day of week, because unlike everybody else, you know that your content is already taken care of".

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I imagine you have at least one friend for family member that you keep in touch with. This person supports you when your low, celebrates when you’re up, and is always there for you. As great as that support is, their role in your life still goes undervalued. There’s a reason social acceptance is in Maslow’s Hierarchy of of needs, because it is essential to our well-being!

An article in Time Magazine says that having good relationships, “protects your health as much as quitting smoking and a great deal more than exercise!”.  This has the potential to extend your life by boosting your immune system, decrease your cardiovascular activation, and reducing stress.  

The objective is to actively foster the relationships that are important to you but are no longer convenient. This means, make the time to be in touch with the people in your life and from your past. Whether that is on the phone, over Skype, or on Snap Chat, it doesn’t matter, as long as both of you know that you support each other and are committed to maintaining the relationship. That support, paired with being able to comfortably speak your mind and get things off you chest, will positively impact your health.  

So don’t overthink it. They’re your friend for a reason and would love to hear from you! Send them a text that you’d love to catch up and chat, and be sure to make it happen. 

We are going to be listening to Mark Metry about something that he does to relax during work.

"I discovered this because I was looking for a natural way to feel more calm so I can focus more on my work. Take six deep breathes. Ever since I started doing this, I became much more productive because I wasn't so busy being distracted. Taking six deep breathes has been scientifically proven to help dampen the nerve activity that governs your blood pressure and deep breathing triggers our nervous system into neutralizing stress to elicit a calming feeling. Also, when you are working and living life, you got that mental critic inside of you talking and distracting you. Taking a deep breath helps you recenter and brings you back to the present moment".

If it isn’t already, this must be incorporated into your daily routine. It demonstrates the importance of childhood chores because it sets the foundation for positive behavior.  

Make your bed every morning!

The importance of doing this was explained by Admiral William McRaven in his famous commencement speech for the University of Texas.  Although the speech was around the premise of changing the world, his first suggestion was simply to make your bed every day

The beautiful part about being a human is how seamlessly we can share our thoughts and communicate with each other. With that communication comes a complex package of expectations, etiquette, formalities, and nuances.  We are all very attentive to these subtle differences in our conversational partners and sometimes make assumptions about them based on our observations. For that reason, being a strong communicator is a very important skill to have in any setting.  

So, how can you be a strong communicator? One good thing to do is listen to understand, and not to respond.  

This is a difficult skill to have but it gets better with practice. Retaining and recalling information is hard enough as it is. Only 25% of what we hear is remembered, and when we are distracted thinking about what we should say in response, we retain even less information. To enumerate, a Princeton study shows that there is a lag time between what you hear and what you understand.  

A way to counteract this is to actively listen. This means that when someone is telling you something, you respond with a paraphrased version of what they said, then go on to elaborate with your own thoughts. This same technique can also be used when trying to remember someone’s name. This method drastically increases recall.  

So try it in a conversation you have today, and focus on actively listening and reiterating what your conversational partner says. Hopefully you notice verbal and non-verbal cues that indicate their engagement in the conversation,. You have a talk with more quality.