AI transcript
0:00:11 that I’ve been particularly compelled by because so many people that listen to this podcast
0:00:15 struggle with the idea of confidence. And there’s a big industry out there, as you’ve said, that says,
0:00:18 you know, look in the mirror, tell yourself you’re a millionaire, say it three times,
0:00:24 write it in your journal. But then as I reflected, and as I’ve written in my book, the thing that,
0:00:29 and it relates to what Alex Hamosy said, is the thing that I’ve learned is it’s all evidence for
0:00:33 better or for worse. Stack of undeniable proof. And it goes the other way, that evidence that you
0:00:37 got at seven years old, when you went up and tried to do a public speech and everyone laughed at you,
0:00:43 is more it’s a thicker layer than one layer of evidence to say that you’re capable. It’s a harder
0:00:50 layer to sort of strip. If there is someone listening now, and they want to maybe orientate
0:00:54 their drive to the fulfilling pursuits that you talk about, but also they want to build their
0:00:59 confidence, what advice would you give them? I imagine that’s 80% of the listener base here.
0:01:06 Act first. Okay. You have to lead with action. Because if you are someone that deals with a
0:01:15 crippling sense of insufficiency, your ability to discount any good thoughts you have in your mind
0:01:22 is going to be so strong. If you try and lead with positivity first, I need to think it, wish it,
0:01:27 believe it, and I will achieve it. Your set point of negativity is going to just crush
0:01:32 that into the ground. I’m speaking from personal experience, right? As the guy that was chronically
0:01:40 unconfident and still has the imposter syndrome that does creep in. You have to start with action.
0:01:45 It needs to be, okay, what would have had to have happened in a week’s time for me to look back on
0:01:52 that week and find pride in myself. Pride is seen as something that you should be ashamed of,
0:01:57 even one of the seven deadly sins. But David Goggins, I did an episode with him a couple of
0:02:03 months ago. We could put it in the show notes if people are interested. He said, “Pride is something
0:02:09 that everybody misses, that having pride in your name, your performance, the way that you show up
0:02:14 for other people is something that you can do, but you need to do something that is worthy of
0:02:17 being prideful about, right? What would have had to have happened in a week
0:02:24 for you to look back on that week with pride?” Okay, maybe stop breaking promises to yourself.
0:02:30 When you say, “I’m going to wake up tomorrow at 7am,” and when the option comes to hit the
0:02:37 snooze button, don’t do it. There’s one win that you’ve got for the day. That’s action, right?
0:02:40 And it is just, you know, it’s tried to say the Peterson clean your room thing, but the reason
0:02:44 that that works is that you start with the smallest ever step and you expand out from that.
0:02:49 You want to become a writer. You want to leave your job and become a writer. Okay,
0:02:54 can you commit to writing one blog post on substack per week for the next three weeks?
0:03:02 That would make you feel like less of a loser if you did that. Action has to come first if you’re
0:03:07 the sort of person who is chronically unconfident because you will drag your sense of identity
0:03:12 behind you. Mark Manson says that identity lags behind our status by about one to two years.
0:03:18 So, for both me and you, in two years’ time, we’ll go, “Oh, I understand why I was in LA
0:03:26 that day,” and look back. Start with action and make small promises to yourself that you don’t
0:03:31 break. If you had a friend and every single time that you and your friend decided that you were
0:03:35 going to go out for dinner, that friend either showed up two hours late or didn’t show up at all,
0:03:39 you would stop trusting that person. That is the relationship that you have with yourself.
0:03:45 You need to be able to trust your own word, and a lot of us don’t because life is very convenient
0:03:53 and it is easy for people to not stick to the promises that they set themselves because our
0:03:58 ability to be idealistic is always going to outstrip reality’s ability to deliver that to us.
0:04:03 As soon as you posit an ideal, you then begin to compare yourself to that ideal, and true hell
0:04:05 is when the person that you are meets the person that you could have been.
0:04:11 Sometimes I ponder how – you’ve probably seen this in your own life, I’m sure you have – where
0:04:14 you’ll have a friend in your life. I’ve got a couple of friends back home who
0:04:20 I’ve tried to help in some way, maybe give some advice when they’re struggling in their hardest
0:04:24 times, and the advice has been ineffective. And then you’ve got another friend who will just need
0:04:29 one idea. They’ll be listening to your podcast, and one idea will be the seed that changes their
0:04:33 life. I often think that I overestimate the power of words, because everything you’ve said
0:04:39 there makes perfect sense. But we both know that 95% – maybe more of people that have just received
0:04:46 that – it will not convert into any kind of behaviour. Habits are hard to break, man, and the habit of
0:04:53 not doing things is unbelievably difficult to get past. It’s one of the problems with
0:05:01 anyone that listens to your show or my show. You will love being cerebral, right? You will love
0:05:08 the idea that I can use cognitive horsepower to just get myself out of problems. And there is a
0:05:16 case of learning as masturbation, right? And believing that learning about something is the
0:05:23 same as enacting it, and it’s not. That’s why it has to be action first. A quote from one of my
0:05:28 friends that he uses when he’s thinking about a concept is, “Does this grow corn? Basically,
0:05:34 is it useful? Tell me how I can use this in my life. Does it grow fucking corn?” Right?
0:05:43 This beautiful sounding, concept, cognitive bias that helps me understand the way that my brain
0:05:48 works and my relationship with everybody else. How do I use that in my life? Give me something to
0:05:55 apply it to. And that’s why, with the confidence thing, choose promises that you will never break
0:06:00 to yourself. “I’m going to get up on time for the next month. I’m not going to hit the snooze
0:06:05 button.” If you do that and you look back in a month and you go, “Oh my god, that’s the first time
0:06:13 I’ve done that in forever, maybe.” That’s a big win. And you can do the James Clear thing. We’ll
0:06:18 write it on a board. We’ll track it. What gets measured, et cetera, et cetera. But the main thing
0:06:24 is just keep promises to yourself. And that is a good way to go from, “Here is an insight I learned
0:06:29 about I want to do breath work, cold plunge, go to the gym, fast until 12 midday, get up on time,
0:06:35 sunlight in the eyes,” and then whatever it is that you want to do, turn it into a promise.
0:06:36 Don’t break the promise.
0:06:42 One of the really important things you said there was about the size of that first step. I was
0:06:47 reflecting there on the way that video games are designed to make sure that every subsequent level
0:06:55 is not too intimidating that you lose motivation, but it’s not too small that you lose motivation
0:06:58 as well. You can lose motivation on both ways. And so it’s the same with crosswords and video games.
0:07:04 They get incrementally more challenging to keep you engaged. The size of that first step is, I
0:07:08 think, a central point there. Because when people listen to podcasts with people like me and you
0:07:13 or Andrew Huberman, and they hear that they’ve got to maybe get up at this time, go outside, gaze,
0:07:19 earth, like put their feet on the ground, cold plunge, etc. And I go, “I’m going to do that.”
0:07:26 And I set that as my first step. I’m set up for failure. How important do you think the size and
0:07:31 the subjective size of that small, that first step you take to build trust with yourself
0:07:39 is? And to start that discipline? The goal isn’t to have the perfect daily routine tomorrow.
0:07:45 The goal is to still be winning your daily routine in 50 years time. If you expand your time horizon
0:07:51 sufficiently, you will realize that very, very tiny steps can compound. Look at the graph of mine
0:07:56 or your followers on Spotify, especially mine, right? Because I was doing my show for so long,
0:08:01 and it’s just nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, everything. Well, why? Well, it’s because it’s
0:08:06 latent leverage. It takes so many layers of paint to get there. So yes, the first step has to be
0:08:12 incredibly small. Do that. Make it so small that you can’t say no to it. And then what’s next?
0:08:21 And then what’s next? So when I decided that I was going to try and become a more virtuous
0:08:26 version of me, I was going to start telling the truth. I was going to have a morning routine.
0:08:29 I was going to develop a meditation habit. I was going to read all of these things that I
0:08:33 wanted to do, none of which I did, right? Well, the end of my 20s, none of which I did. All of
0:08:38 which are now the foundation of my life. I don’t know, 1500 meditation sessions and all of the
0:08:45 authors on the podcast and etc, etc. I had to do that one step at a time. I didn’t have a stable
0:08:50 sleep and wake pattern until COVID ever in my adult life. I’d never gone to bed and woken up
0:08:55 at the same time for seven days in a row until COVID because I was running nightlife events, right?
0:09:02 So if, no matter how difficult the setback is, even if you’re a shift worker, you’re a nurse,
0:09:08 you’re a parent, whatever your challenge is, just make the promise to yourself sufficiently small
0:09:15 that even with that challenge in front of you, you can make it work.
“Tôi sẽ dậy đúng giờ trong tháng tới. Tôi sẽ không nhấn nút báo lại.” Nếu bạn làm như vậy và nhìn lại sau một tháng và bạn nói, “Ôi trời, đó là lần đầu tiên tôi làm điều đó sau một thời gian dài, có thể.” Đó là một chiến thắng lớn. Và bạn có thể làm theo cách của James Clear. Chúng ta sẽ viết nó lên một bảng. Chúng ta sẽ theo dõi nó. Những gì được đo đạc, v.v… Nhưng điều quan trọng nhất là hãy giữ lời hứa với bản thân. Và đó là một cách tốt để biến “Đây là một kiến thức mà tôi học được về việc muốn thực hiện liệu pháp thở, ngâm nước lạnh, đi tập gym, nhịn ăn đến 12 giờ trưa, dậy đúng giờ, ánh sáng mặt trời chiếu vào mắt,” và sau đó biến bất kỳ điều gì bạn muốn làm thành một lời hứa. Đừng phá vỡ lời hứa đó.
Một trong những điều thực sự quan trọng mà bạn đã nói ở đó là về kích thước của bước đầu tiên đó. Tôi đang suy ngẫm về cách mà trò chơi video được thiết kế để đảm bảo rằng mỗi cấp độ tiếp theo không quá đáng sợ khiến bạn mất động lực, nhưng cũng không quá nhỏ để bạn vẫn giữ được động lực. Bạn có thể mất động lực theo cả hai cách. Và điều đó cũng giống với ô chữ và trò chơi video. Chúng ngày càng trở nên khó hơn để giữ cho bạn tham gia. Kích thước của bước đầu tiên đó là, tôi nghĩ, một điểm chính ở đó. Bởi vì khi mọi người nghe podcast với những người như tôi và bạn hoặc Andrew Huberman, và họ nghe họ phải có thể dậy vào thời gian này, ra ngoài, nhìn thiên nhiên, đặt chân lên đất, ngâm nước lạnh, v.v. Và tôi nói, “Tôi sẽ làm điều đó.” Và tôi đặt đó là bước đầu tiên của mình. Tôi đã tự đặt mình vào thế thất bại. Bạn nghĩ điều quan trọng của kích thước và cảm nhận chủ quan về bước đầu tiên nhỏ bé đó là bao nhiêu để xây dựng lòng tin với bản thân và để bắt đầu kỷ luật? Mục tiêu không phải là có một thói quen hoàn hảo ngay lập tức vào ngày mai. Mục tiêu là vẫn tiếp tục chiến thắng thói quen hàng ngày của bạn sau 50 năm nữa. Nếu bạn mở rộng tầm nhìn thời gian của mình đủ rộng, bạn sẽ nhận ra rằng những bước rất nhỏ có thể tích lũy. Nhìn vào đồ thị người theo dõi của tôi hoặc bạn trên Spotify, đặc biệt là của tôi, đúng không? Bởi vì tôi đã làm chương trình của mình trong một thời gian dài, và chỉ có không, không, không, không, mọi thứ. Tại sao? Bởi vì đó là sức mạnh tiềm ẩn. Phải mất rất nhiều lớp sơn để đến được đó. Vì vậy, đúng là, bước đầu tiên phải cực kỳ nhỏ. Làm điều đó. Hãy làm cho nó thật nhỏ đến mức bạn không thể từ chối nó. Và sau đó, bước tiếp theo là gì? Và bước tiếp theo là gì? Vì vậy, khi tôi quyết định rằng tôi sẽ cố gắng trở thành một phiên bản tốt đẹp hơn của bản thân, tôi sẽ bắt đầu nói sự thật. Tôi sẽ có một thói quen buổi sáng. Tôi sẽ phát triển một thói quen thiền. Tôi sẽ đọc tất cả những điều mà tôi muốn làm, không có điều nào trong số đó mà tôi đã làm, đúng không? Vào cuối tuổi 20 của tôi, không có điều nào trong số đó. Tất cả những điều đó giờ đã trở thành nền tảng của cuộc sống tôi. Tôi không biết, 1500 buổi thiền và tất cả các tác giả trong podcast và v.v… Tôi phải thực hiện từng bước một. Tôi đã không có một mô hình ngủ và thức dậy ổn định nào cho đến khi COVID đến lần đầu tiên trong cuộc sống trưởng thành của tôi. Tôi chưa bao giờ đi ngủ và tỉnh dậy vào cùng một giờ trong bảy ngày liên tiếp cho đến khi COVID đến vì tôi đã tổ chức các sự kiện đời sống về đêm, đúng không? Vì vậy, không quan trọng khó khăn của sự trở ngại là gì, ngay cả khi bạn là một người làm ca, một y tá, một bậc phụ huynh, bất kỳ thách thức nào mà bạn đang đối mặt, chỉ cần giữ lời hứa với bản thân đủ nhỏ để ngay cả khi có thách thức đó ở trước mặt bạn, bạn vẫn có thể làm được.
如果現在有位在聆聽的人,他們想要把自己的動力朝著你所談論的充實追求導向,但同時他們也想要建立自己的信心,你會給他們什麼建議?我想這大約佔據了這裡80%的聽眾群。首先行動。好吧,你必須以行動為先。因為如果你是一個面對嚴重不足感的人,你心中的任何好想法都將被你打折扣。如果你試圖先以積極的態度引領,想著、希望著、相信著,那我就會實現它。你那消極的起點會將那一切壓到地面上。我是在親身經歷的基礎上來說這些的,作為一個長期缺乏自信的人,至今仍然會有潛在的冒名頂替者綜合徵悄悄滲入。你必須從行動開始。你需要問自己,對於我來說,接下來的一週中,什麼事情發生之後,我能回顧這一周並引以為傲?驕傲被視為一種應該感到羞愧的東西,甚至是七宗罪之一。但大衛·戈金斯,我幾個月前和他做過一期節目。如果聽眾感興趣我們可以把它放在備註中。他說:“驕傲是每個人都會錯過的,對你的名字、表現,以及你為他人所呈現的方式感到自豪,這是一件值得做的事情,但你需要做一些值得驕傲的事情,對吧?什麼事情發生之後,你才能以驕傲自豪的眼光回顧那一周?”好吧,也許是停止對自己許下承諾卻不履行的行為。當你說“我明天要在早上七點起床”時,當按下貪睡鈕的選擇出現時,不要這麼做。這就是你今天獲得的第一個勝利。這就是行動,對吧?你知道,這說起來像是彼得森的清理房間的理論,但之所以奏效,是因為你從最基本的一步開始,然後再從此擴展開去。
你想成為一個作家。你想辭掉工作成為作家。好吧,你能否承諾接下來三週每週在Substack上寫一篇部落格文章?如果你做到這一點,你會感覺到自己不像一個失敗者。如果你是一個長期缺乏自信的人,行動必須放在首要位置,因為你會把你的身份感掛在身後。馬克·曼森說,身份感落後於我們的狀態大約一到兩年。所以對於我和你來說,兩年後我們會說:“哦,我明白為什麼那天我在洛杉磯。”並且回顧。從行動開始,給自己許下小承諾,不要打破它。如果你有一個朋友,每次你和朋友決定一起出去吃晚餐時,這位朋友要麼遲到兩個小時,要麼根本不見,無疑你會停止信任這個人。這正是你與自己之間的關係。你需要能夠信任自己的承諾,而我們當中有很多人做不到,因為生活非常方便,人們很容易不遵循自己所設定的承諾,因為我們理想化的能力總是會超越現實能夠給予我們的。當你一旦提出一個理想,你就開始將自己與這個理想進行比較,而真正的地獄在於你現在的自己和你本該成為的自己相遇。
有時我會思考怎麼樣 —— 你可能在自己的生活中見過這樣的事情,我相信你見過 —— 有時候你會有一位朋友。我在家鄉有幾位朋友,我曾經試圖在他們遭遇困難時提供幫助,也許給予一些建議,但那些建議卻並沒有產生效果。然後你會有另一位朋友,他只需要一個想法。他們會在聽你的播客,一個想法就能成為改變他們生活的種子。我經常認為我高估了言語的力量,因為你剛才所說的一切感覺完美無瑕。但我們都知道,95%甚至更多接受那些想法的人,不會轉化為任何行為。習慣是難以打破的,朋友,而不去做事的習慣簡直是難以克服的。這是所有聽你節目或我節目的人所面臨的問題。你將會熱愛思考,你會熱愛利用認知能力徹底解決問題的想法。還有一種學習如同手淫的想法,認為專注於學習與實踐是相同的,但事實並非如此。這就是為什麼必須以行動為先。我有一位朋友常用的一句話是:“這能長玉米嗎?基本上,它是否有用?告訴我我該如何在生活中應用它。它能長出該死的玉米嗎?”對吧?這美麗的概念、認知偏見幫我理解大腦的運作方式和我與他人之間的關係。我該如何在生活中使用它?給我點東西可以應用於此。因此,在建立信心的事情上,選擇那些你永遠不會違背的承諾給自己。
「我將在接下來的這個月準時起床。我不打算按下貪睡鍵。」如果你這樣做,然後一個月後回頭看,說「天啊,這可能是我很久以來第一次做到這樣。」那是一個很大的勝利。你也可以做詹姆斯·克里爾的方法。我們可以在黑板上寫下來,追蹤進度。什麼被測量,等等等等。但最重要的是,要對自己許下承諾。而這是一個很好的方法,從「這是我學到的關於呼吸練習、冷水浴、去健身房、中午12點前不吃東西、準時起床、讓陽光照進眼睛的見解」,然後無論你想做什麼,都要把它變成一個承諾。不要打破這個承諾。
你提到的一個非常重要的事情是關於第一步的大小。我在想,視頻遊戲的設計確保每一個後續的關卡不會太令人生畏,以致於使你失去動力,但也不會太小,以至於你也失去動力。你可以在這兩種情況下都失去動力。因此,填字遊戲和視頻遊戲也是如此。它們逐步變得更具挑戰性,以保持你參與的興趣。我認為,第一步的大小是一個關鍵點。因為當人們收聽像我這樣的播客,或者是安德魯·休伯曼(Andrew Huberman)等人,他們聽到他們可能需要在某個時間起床,出去,凝視、大地,像是把腳放在地上,冷水浴等。然後我說:「我會這樣做。」我把這設為我的第一步。那就註定要失敗。你認為那第一步的大小以及主觀上覺得那一步小到什麼程度,對於建立對自己的信任,以及開始建立紀律有多重要?目標並不是明天就有完美的日常例行。目標是在未來50年仍在保持日常例行的勝利。如果你充分擴展你的時間範圍,你會意識到非常非常微小的步驟是可以累積的。看看我或你在Spotify上的追隨者圖表,特別是我的,對吧?因為我做我的節目已經很久了,然後一切都是零,零,零,突然一切都有了。為什麼?因為那是潛在的槓桿。需要很多層的油漆才能到達那裡。所以,第一步必須非常小。做到這一點。讓它小到你無法拒絕它。然後是什麼?然後是什麼?所以,當我決定要努力成為一個更有美德的自己時,我打算開始說實話。我打算有一個早晨例行。我打算培養冥想的習慣。我打算閱讀所有我想做的事情,然而我都沒有做到,對吧?在我20歲末期,我沒有做到,所有這些現在都是我生活的基礎。我不知道,有1500次冥想,還有播客中的所有作家等等。我必須一個步驟一個步驟地做到。在我的成人生活中,在COVID之前,我從未有過穩定的睡眠和清醒模式。在COVID之前,我從未有過連續七天在同一時間上床睡覺和醒來,因為我當時在做夜生活活動,對吧?所以,無論挫折有多困難,即使你是一名輪班工人,一名護士,一位父母,無論你的挑戰是什麼,只需對自己許下足夠小的承諾,即使面對那個挑戰,你也能做到。
In this moment, YouTuber and podcaster Chris Williamson gives his best advice for building confidence. Chris believes that the most important step for achieving confidence is to lead with action. Acting first is more important than starting with positive thinking, as this positivity can easily be crushed by negativity. To being on the road to confidence, you should start with an incredibly small step and easy promises that you will never break. Chris says that little by little these small steps will compound until you have undeniable proof of past actions that you can feel truly proud and confident for achieving.
Listen to the full episode here –https://g2ul0.app.link/TIVYc9ZjNu
Watch the Episodes On Youtube – https://www.youtube.com/c/%20TheDiaryOfACEO/videos
Chris: https://chriswillx.com