Hines Ward Or Larry The Loser?
September 11, 2009 
11 Comments
I want to share something with all of you that I think will be really interesting. Right now, I’m personally working on changing a behavior pattern I’ve had most of my life. I’m not going to tell you what it is, because it is not like I’d be admitting it to my best friend (but rather to probably around 10,000 people). I am, however, going to talk about the process I’m going through to change that behavior.
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I am actually doing an exercise I tell all my clients to do. Every week, write down how your week went. Write down your wins and your losses, and do this based upon whatever behavior pattern you want to change.
We tend to get in our heads so much about something we want to change about ourselves. We tend to beat ourselves up so much that we don’t see the gains we’ve made.
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So as part of working on this behavior I’m working on changing, last night I actually wrote down my wins and losses for the week. I had six wins and two losses. That’s a great week!
What’s so interesting is that if you don’t write down your wins and losses, then you can often miss them. Your two losses will feel like a hundred and your six wins won’t feel like any, because when you want to change something about yourself it tends to feel like an overwhelming task. It’s easy to get discouraged.
I also tell people to write down how they want their week to be. So, for example, if you want to meet women then write down where you’d like to meet them.
That way, you can always envision yourself doing these things. If you can envision yourself doing things, then you’re already feeling how it feels to be successful in the situation.
By writing down your wins and losses, you are confirming that you can actually break this behavior pattern. It takes time to really break behavior patterns. It takes work.
Wouldn’t it be great if there was a magic pill we could all take that would eliminate the things that drive us crazy about ourselves? Well, there is no such magic pill or herb or pharmaceutical drug that does that. There’s nothing but hard work, determination and perseverance to achieve that.
When you write this stuff down and look at it, it becomes far less intimidating. You actually can see yourself accomplishing it even more.
It takes thirty days to form new behaviors. That’s it, just thirty days . . . but it takes thirty days of being aware, thirty days of work, thirty days of trial and error, thirty days of wins and thirty days of setbacks.
By documenting it — writing it down and reading it on a weekly basis — you can actually trick your mind into making it easier. I even tell some people to do this on a daily basis so they can look at their daily wins and losses.
Remember that we all have losses. If you watched the football game last night, you saw a great example of this.
In that game, Hines Ward caught a great pass. His competitive nature made him fight to get to the end zone. He got the ball stripped from his hands which meant that instead of winning, the Steelers were forced into overtime.
If you look at Hines Ward on the sidelines afterwards you can see that even though he had a great night, that the fumble got to him. He was stamping his feet, pacing around and blowing off steam. When Pittsburgh got the ball in overtime, however, he was back on the field blocking and running and acting like the winner that he is.
Can you imagine if Hines Ward was trying to meet women and acted like a lot of you do? He would go into Whole Foods where a woman wouldn’t respond to him in the way he wants, so he would spend the the next three days thinking about what he should have done or said differently. No way. He’d never approach it that way.
Football players watch themselves on tape. It’s time you watched yourself. It’s time you journaled. It’s time you hold yourself accountable. It’s time to forgive yourself. It’s time to look at your wins and losses. Are you ready to play in the game of life?
Have a great Friday!
David what happend to that 30 Day challenge you mentioned ón FB. Great blog, great when you put things in context to yourself, you really live what you preach. Dating i am not ready for but no excuses for
what Else i have to work with. Most often its the process thats the true reward and
the fact we keep trying even when we face resistance, which most often is in our own heads.
Hey David. Yeh thats true, what happened to that 30-day challenge on sept 1? Great blog, strong finish. How many of us are ready to play the game of life? So many of us want to change certain behaviors, but very few of us actually go through with it. Why? Since we are our toughest critic, the hardest thing to do is to look at ourselves on tape like you put it, and walk that hard but very rewarding journey. It’s very inspiring for you to let us know that you too, are still working on your behaviors. Let us know your progress. Thx David.
Hi David. I really want you to answer me.I’ve got a question. How can I remember all the information and knoledge that you give me? In the last podcast you said no young people try to get better from a younger age. I’m just 18 and from Romania…way away and for about 8 month since I heard of you i’ve been listening all the podcasts reading the blogs and the interviews. But it’s kinda too much. Help? i really would be gratefull if you could answer me. This is what I discussed with my girlfriend yesterday. She knows me better than I do, she has more faith in me more than I do. What can I do to remember and fully know myself? I’ll try the writing exercise. Hope you will answer will mean a lot to me. Thanks
Just a thought -
Sometimes when there is a behavior you want to change, you can set a short time limit. Let me give you an example. I have a problem with clutter, so I set my timer for 15 minutes and clean like a demon for 15 minutes. Then, when the timer goes off, I stop. Later, I do it again. This way, I am making a change in my environment in small chunks and not getting overwhelmed.
I think you can approach a lot of these changes you want to make the same way. If you want to meet women/men, make yourself go out to the grocery store/park/coffee shop. Make a point of talking to one person to start. Don’t expect it to go anywhere. Just do it. After a while, you’ll get more comfortable talking with new people and you can extend your reach.
David your right, Hines definitely let it get to him, and once he had a chance to do something about it, you could tell he really let it go. If nothing else he was going to turn a negative thing into a positive thing. He used it as additional motivation.
This really can be a great lesson in the dating game too. Love the football comparisons to dating.
Mike-
The best thing I can say to you is to actually apply David’s advice and exercises. One at a time, make sure you master each step before going to the next one. It will take time, but you will understand the knowledge; this is not about remembering behaviors, its about learning them until they become natural so you can become a better version of you. Hope that helps.
Charles thanks I’ll do that but the actual problem is that I’m doing most of them only most excercises are about writing something about you.My ‘problem’ is that when I actually talk to somebody I don’t know(and by the way it’s kinda hard for an 18 year old because people look weird at you, in my city they do), I don’t remember all the ‘tips’ , all the do’s and don’ts, I get carried away and very excited
. For example last night at a weeding I tryed talking to a cute waitress. She was busy, but I dared her to dance and kid a little. When I went home I told her there’s a dance friday night at some location. She was very excited when?how?how much? but when I demanded the phone number she hezitated and said nnnno. Odd because she was very excited about the ideea. So you see my problem?Hope somebody answeres to this.
Mike
Thère could be a lot of reasons, when you just meet someone then you can easily get caught up in the moment and the get a bit scared. Maybe it was the Way you asked for her number. Personally i would have preferred getting the guys number indstead of giving mine. Another time if a Girl hesitate, just smile give her your number and casully say something like take your time and give mé a Call if you want to get together.
I was kinda in a hurry because the guy who had the car was presuring me to come already. The way I asked the phone number? In a demanding way like David said somewhere. I didn’t ask for it like pleasa, can you give me your number? After I made the proposition I said ok give me your number. Don’t know I’m always smiling and she had a huge smile every time I talked to her and ignored the rest of the guys who here hitting on her. And my friends told me that all night she was checking me out so I thought that the best way to close that night was with a phone number and after a few day I would text her with a joke that I ‘made fun’ of her cause she was sitting there, wanted so bad to dance but she couldn’t
Something like that but it backfired.
Another thing, I don’t have the actual money to be a member cause I only get my school allowance wich is about 12 US dolars. But I would apreciate if I just comment and sometimes I can get some help when I need it. Btw Marina leave a comment about my aproach and keep in mind, in my town it’s kinda had when people look at you very weird when you’re just trying to be friendly.
Mike_
Dont worry, almost in every town people look at you weird when you’re trying to be friendly, because most people aren’t friendly. This is why you have to keep applying the exrecises. It will get better. As far as the waitress goes, just because you didnt get the phone number, it doesnt mean it was a failure. Like Marina said, there are different reasons why she didnt give it to you, and casually giving her your number works too. Just make sure your approach is genuine and in the moment, no expectations. If you really want to join the community, David has a special going on right now for the silver membership. You can join for $1 for the first month. Check it out under the members tab. Enjoy!
I know that but as far as the payment…no credit card. Might as well get used to ‘coment section help’. If I’m not asking too much for an email or something. If not I’ll see what I can do and talk to later in other posts.
To be honest I don’t know how some people will look at me if I manage to join. 18…yeah pretty young but I think it’s a good thing I’m trying from an early age.
And Charles and Marina I really do apreciat you really answered. If at first you don’t succed, try try again right?:)