I came home from work a little stressed out.
There is some stuff going on at my job right now that I cannot control.
Things that make my future unknown.
I was stressed out.
I started questioning the side projects I was working on.
I started getting into my head and mentally reviewing the things I write about each week that we need to do to succeed.
I was mentally failing at them all.
When you start thinking about the worst-case scenario, your discipline can falter.
Years ago, I would lose days to these states of mental funk.
As I have grown older and, I hope, more experienced, I have learned to view these as mental challenges to overcome, opportunities for self-reflection and improvement.
What should you do when you are having a bad day?
I do not have a 100% fix for how people feel.
I do know that inaction, shutting down, not facing the challenges of the day, binge-watching Netflix, or just feeling bad for yourself is not the solution.
If you do not get ahead of your thoughts, a few minutes of feeling bad will turn into hours. Hours will turn into days. Days will turn into weeks, and so on.
These are moments of lost opportunity that you will never get back, so it is important to quickly shift your mindset from being negative to positive.
Action is the solution.
Maintain your discipline and fight through it.
It does not have to be a perfect day, but even small accomplishments can be considered a win.
Even a small win can change your mindset, and you might even surprise yourself. That small win may turn into multiple small wins or a big victory.
Go for a walk.
Get moving.
Do something physical.
There is nothing like resetting your thoughts by taking a nice walk. When dealing with mental blocks, I can start to get some mental clarity if I take a 30——to 45-minute walk: no audiobooks, no music, just me and my thoughts. Walking with just your thoughts can become like a physical meditation session.
Here are three quotes I like that reinforce what I wrote about above.
All truly great thoughts are conceived by walking.
Friedrick Nietzche
Methinks that the moment my legs begin to move, my thoughts begin to flow.
Henry David Thoreau
There is nothing like a walk to get your mind working
J.K. Rowling
Walking, especially in nature, boosts creative thinking and problem-solving. One reason is that it creates a change in scenery and breaks our normal routine. Newton’s first law of motion states that an object will remain at rest or in motion unless acted upon by an external force. When we are sitting around, we sometimes get stuck or in a mental funk. Movement changes our current mental state to a new one, and once we get going, we get ourselves “unstuck,” and execution can continue.
Walking and other physical exercise help reduce stress hormones like cortisol and increase the production of endorphins, the body’s natural mood lifters. Both will help increase your energy level, lift your spirits, and combat the negative feelings you are having.
I strongly recommend that you turn walking into a daily, non-negotiable habit.
That makes it easier to use this as a failsafe tool to quickly deal with mental doubts and roadblocks.
Talk to a Trusted Group of Friends
Shoot the shit with trusted people around you.
I recently wrote an article about the importance of Building Meaningful Relationships. If you surround yourself with successful, intelligent, motivated people, you will probably push yourself to learn more, find more success, pull yourself up from the ground, and learn from your mistakes.
You can leverage this group of people to pull yourself out of temporary lapses in discipline.
They will set you straight.
They will call you bluff and push (encourage) you to quickly return to your optimal mental state.
I have a group of friends I can count on to give unfiltered feedback about what I should be doing when I feel this way.
They are friends.
They are mentors.
They are advocates.
They are also my critics who call bullshit when I am lacking in the confidence I should have.
They are my A-Team.
This week, when I was feeling down and having a problem and felt no one else could help, I called my A-Team. I know it is corny as hell, but the darn theme song and introduction to the 1980s A-Team play my head every time.
“In 1972, a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn’t commit. These men promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Los Angeles underground. Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire… The A-Team.”
Reach out to your A-Team.
They will set you straight.
Get some small wins
Lastly I believe you need to take some action.
You have to execute on your goals for the day.
You know your own state of mind best.
If you are just a little stressed out and having a mental block related to work, writing, etc. it is okay to take a mental brake from your daily routine.
These mental breaks are critical to recharging our energy.
Sometimes we need to deliberately break our routine. By deliberately breaking your system for a short period, you give yourself a mental break from the usual grind. This can reduce burnout, provide relaxation, and help you approach your tasks with renewed energy.
It is important for us to sometimes step aways so we can gain perspective. Stepping away from your routine allows you to see things from a different angle. This can lead to innovative solutions and improvements in your system that you might not have thought of otherwise.
These are two examples where taking a break makes sense.
If you need this mental break do not let my post push you into doing something you are not comfortable with.
In my example above, where I thought things were a bit dark and bleak, and my discipline to push forward for the day was being challenged, I felt it was more important to push through and get a win for the day.
In these cases, you really have to push through and try to execute.
You can aim for the minimum output for the day. That is okay. You do not have to have big wins everyday.
I went for my walk and sat back down to get what I need to do for the day. The walk alone did not work. I was still stuck.
Next, I reached out to my A-Team.
They told me how full of crap I was, reminded me of what I had been accomplishing, and help me put into perspective what I already new. Sometime you need the additional encouragement from trusted friends.
Then I went for a second walk.
It was the second walk that put things back into the right perspective for the day.
It was just enough to get my social posts and associated artwork created for the day.
The first small win.
Next I got started on my mid-week newsletter Just Start Engaging With Your Kids. I did not complete the whole thing but it was enough.
The second small win.
It was not my best day of output ever but it kept they daily streak going and I went through the process of “dealing with it.”
It ended up being a great day
Life brings us all challenges everyday. We cannot control this be we can control how we react to it.
“Life is 10% what happens to us and 90% how we react to it.”
Charles R. Swindoll
The routine above is what works for me when I am having a hard day.
Please reach out and let me know what works for you.
I did not have the day I expected but I was able to push through and turn a day of zero output into a few small wins.
This completely changed my outlook for the day.
I calmed down a bit, reflected on what I could control, got my work down for the day and turn my attention to my family.
I had a worry free, undistracted and enjoyable evening with my family and their friends at the local minor league ballpark.
Watching my boys and seeing what joy they get from running on the field and getting autographs from minor league players was amazing.
Focus on the things you can control today.
Try to have three wins each day.
Have a physical win. Go for a walk. Go for a swim. Lift weights. Run. Hike. Ruck. The sky is the limit. Just get up and move!
Have an accomplishment win. Read, write, and learn something new. This quick blog post is my mental win for the day. I was a bit stuck and wanted to focus on winning, so I decided to sit down and write.
Have a spiritual win. I often overlook this one. Pray, meditate, study, and do the things that help you grow.
Dammit! Go out and win today.
