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PNTV: The 4 Disciplines of Execution by Chris McChesney, Jim Huling, and Stephen Covey Nov 24, 2017

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I planned to read this book since Cal Newport referenced it in Deep Work. I finally did so in preparation to teach Productivity 101. It's fantastic. If you're a business leader or entrepreneur I think you'll particularly enjoy it. Big Ideas we cover include the 4DX, the whirlwind, your Wildly Important Goals, Lag vs. Lead measures, the power of keeping score, and avoiding the blackhole of the magnificently trivial.

+1 #85: 50 Pounds = A Nov 24, 2017

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Imagine this: It's your first day of art class. You signed up for an intro class on pottery. (Nice! Go you!) The teacher does something a little weird. He points to one half of the class and says, "On the last day of class I'm going to bring in a bathroom scale. You guys will get an 'A' if you produce 50 pounds of pots. A 'B' for 40 pounds. 30 pounds gets you a 'C.'" Then he points to the other half of the class and says, "You guys? You'll get an 'A' for creating an amazing pot. I just need one pot from you. Make it awesome and you get the 'A.'" Fast-forward to the end of the semester and who do you think created the best-looking pots? Answer: The group that produced the 50 pounds of stuff to get an "A." Why is that? Well, as the authors of Art & Fear put it: "It seems that while the 'quantity' group was busily churning out piles of work—and learning from their mistakes—the 'quality' group had sat theorizing about perfection, and in the end had little more to show for their efforts than grandiose theories and a pile of dead clay." So, question: How do YOU approach your creativity? Are you trying to create the "perfect pot"? Or, are you willing to lean in and produce a TON of stuff—learning from your mistakes and, eventually, getting better and better? Today's +1: Go create a bunch of pots. Remember: 50 pounds and you'll get an "A." P.S. Maslow comes to mind. He tells us: "It seems that the necessary thing to do is not to fear mistakes, to plunge in, to do the best that one can, hoping to learn enough from blunders to correct them eventually."

PNTV: The Effective Executive by Peter F. Drucker (#346) Nov 23, 2017

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Here are 5 of my favorite Big Ideas from "The Effective Executive" by Peter F. Drucker. Hope you enjoy!

Peter Drucker is considered the father of modern management. This book was originally published in 1967. It's *remarkably* well written and lucid. And, of course, packed with Big Ideas on how to optimize our effectiveness. We cover the 5 key practices/habits of the effective executive: time (first things first; second things never!), contribution (what can you contribute?), strengths (make yours productive; make weaknesses irrelevant), concentration (the secret to effectiveness), decisions (boundary conditions help).

PNTV: Peak Performance by Brad Stulberg and Steve Magness Nov 22, 2017

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Brad Stulberg is a writer focused on health and the science of human performance. (Amy Cuddy calls him her favorite health and science writer.) Steve Magness is a coach to some of the top distance runners in the world. Together, they've written a super-engaging, quick-reading book on how to pursue growth in a healthy, sustainable way—aka, without burning out. Big Ideas we explore include the secret equation of sustainable awesome (Stress + Rest = Growth), just-manageable challenges, the iPhone Effect Part 3 (aka how to decrease your productivity in one step!), the optimal work/rest ratio, and the paradoxical twist of fulfillment.

+1 #80: Time Blocks Nov 22, 2017

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Continuing our theme of making TODAY (and every day!) a Masterpiece Day, let's take a quick look at Time Blocks. Gary Keller wrote The ONE Thing. He also created the largest real estate agency in the world. In his great little book, he tells us how important it is to ruthlessly focus on what's most important—the key activities that drive the real results. He takes the 80/20 principle to the extreme and has you continue drilling down on the most important things until you get to the ONE Thing that drives the whole show. And then he has you ruthlessly focus on what you need to do TODAY to make that ONE Thing a reality—knocking over the next domino in a chain of dominoes that inevitably leads to the outcome you're looking for. Just figuring out what your ONE Thing is (over the long run and today) obviously takes a lot of Deep Work. Gary tells us we need to create "Time Blocks" during our day. He calls them the #1 "power tool" of time management. The rules? You turn off ALL distractions for a set amount of time and you focus on whatever you decided is the most important thing. Then we make a habit of doing that. Every. Single. Day. For me, my #1 creative thing is a ruthless consistency on what I call my AM1 Deep Work time block. It's the time after I get up before the family gets up that I use to do that day's most important work. In fact, I'm working on this +1 at 5:51 AM while the family sleeps. We're on a mini vacation. I can hear the ocean waves as I type away on my iPhone. I'm excited for the family to get up and have another great day—feeling complete that I've already crushed it today. (Yes, that's just another way I'm weird. I'm in good company though. In On Writing, Stephen King tells us he never misses a day of writing. Something magical about it…) I LOVE my Deep Work time blocks. You? When's your best time to go Deep? Schedule it. Shut the doors. Turn off all distractions. Make it a sacred ritual. Then aggregate and compound those tiny little gains over an extended period of time +1 style!

+1 #75: Simplify the Battlefield Nov 20, 2017

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In our last +1 we talked about Spinny Fingers and how to quickly regain our equanimity when life spins us around. Here's another way. Mark Divine is a former Commander in the Navy SEALs. He tells us that in the chaos of war, elite SEALs are taught to "simplify the battlefield." When the fog of battle rolls in and things are nowhere near as clear as they were a moment before, it's absolutely essential that we simplify everything. Commander Divine tells us that we need to identify THE next most important target and then put ALL of our energy into successfully executing that micro-mission as we maintain what he calls "front-sight" focus. Simplify. Identify next target. Focus. Execute that micro-mission. Repeat. That's an incredibly effective way to roll. ESPECIALLY when things are most challenging. That's today's +1. How can you simplify the battlefield of your life? What's THE most important thing right now? Give it your front-sight focus. Hooyah! P.S. The last four digits of my phone number are 5320. Mark tells me that "5320" just so happens to be the call signal for a junior SEAL. It's become a fun game to sign off my text messages to the Commander with -5320. 😃

PNTV: The Art of Learning by Josh Waitzkin (#344) Nov 20, 2017

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Here are 5 of my favorite Big Ideas from "The Art of Learning" by Josh Waitzkin. Hope you enjoy!

Josh Waitzkin is an extraordinary human. Ever heard of the movie Searching for Bobby Fischer? That's the story of Josh life. Literally. After a childhood and young adulthood spent dominating chess, Josh then went on to master Tai Chi and became a World Champion. But what he REALLY became was a master of learning and peak performance. Big Ideas we explore include the two approaches to leaning, the downward spiral (what it is and how to avoid it), honoring your unique disposition, investing in loss, knowing your goal (decent, good, great, among best!), the power of stress and recovery and the ultimate secret of mastery.

+1 #70: 5-Minute Sweaty Conversations Nov 19, 2017

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You know those times when you need to initiate a tough conversation and you're kinda sorta dreading it and avoiding it? One of my old mentors once told me that you just need to move through what he called "sweaty five-minute conversations" to get to the other side of clarity and resolution. Most of us avoid the challenging conversations because we aren't willing to endure those few minutes of discomfort. I definitely used to avoid them. Now, I remember that Speed Is a Force then I WOOP it, chant "Bring it on!" + "I'm excited!" and jump in. It's become a really powerful practice for me as I've mastered it over the years. But here's the funny thing. Once upon a time, I needed to have one of those "sweaty conversations" with that mentor of mine. Guess how it turned out? It was, by far, LITERALLY, the worst conversation I've ever had in my life. HAH. Seriously. I kid you not. As Campbell said, when you dare to go after bliss, there's always the chance for a fiasco. :) Here's how Campbell puts it: "The hero journey is one of the universal patterns through which that radiance shows brightly. What I think is that a good life is one hero journey after another. Over and over again, you are called to the realm of adventure, you are called to new horizons. Each time, there is the same problem: do I dare? And then if you do dare, the dangers are there, and the help also, and the fulfillment or the fiasco. There's always the possibility of a fiasco. But there's also the possibility of bliss." So, today's mission, should you choose to accept it: The next time you find yourself avoiding a challenging conversation, see if you can recognize the fear and then get to work on it with one (or more) of our growing array of tools. Perhaps you can remember that your infinite potential exists on the other side of that fear and chant "Bring it on!!" to yourself. Maybe you can practice Active Love on the person who's currently stressing you out. I'd definitely recommend you WOOP it! Wave the wand. Create your Wish. See it going perfectly. Experience the benefits. Then anticipate the obstacles and make your plan to deal with them. Then, if you feel that now's the time, jump in and move through those few seconds/minutes of sweaty palms and make it happen. You'll win or you'll learn. :) P.S. I know for a fact that if I had that challenging conversation of a decade ago today it would have ended so much better. But I never would have gotten to where I am without the pain of that fiasco. And so it is. 😃

+1 #65: Sacrifices vs. Decisions Nov 17, 2017

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George St-Pierre is one of the greatest mixed martial artists in the world. Ever. Of course, he wasn't always one of the greatest. At one point, he was just a young guy working as a garbage man who DECIDED he was going to be the best in the world. People around him thought he was crazy. (Of course they did. Who says stuff like that? Hint: People who have a shot at making it happen.) So, when GSP decided (!) he would be the best in the world at what he wanted to do, he also decided what he WASN'T going to do. "Train instead of party. Work instead of play. Perfect practice instead of casual repetition." ALL of his energy went into achieving his goal and making his dream a reality. (You should see the consistency in his schedule. Astonishing.) In his great book The Way of the Fight, GSP makes the important distinction that all those things he was no longer going to do weren't sacrifices. They were decisions. Sacrifices vs. Decisions. There's a huge difference between the two. One comes with a little whiney voice. The other comes with the calm confidence and grounded, authentic power of a committed person. Today's +1 practical application: Who have you DECIDED to be? What decisions do you need to make to focus your energy? P.S. Remember: The Latin root of the word decide literally means "to cut off." When we make a true decision, we CUT OFF all other options and go ALL IN. Let's do that.

PNTV: Coming Alive by Phil Stutz and Barry Michels (#343) Nov 17, 2017

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I'm a HUGE fan of Phil and Barry's first book, The Tools. Coming Alive is kinda like The Tools Part 2. In this book, we get four new tools to go along with the original five tools. Big Ideas we explore include how to connect to our Life Force, defeat Part X (their name for that part of each of us that gets in the way), build our confidence and learn to see problems as gifts as we live a GREAT life.

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