Amigos and amigas...

Check out the storm from last night...

Don't worry, I made it through.

In other news...

The big 3 newsletter is here!

1 mental health tip

1 social skills tip

1 personal reflection

Let's dive straight into this week's mental health tip...

1.) Productivity debt

I'm going to assume you're a productive person.

You like getting things done and speeding into the day to tick off all the tasks on your to-do list.

If that's correct, then you'll know exactly what 'productivity debt' is.

- That feeling of going into the day already at a minus score and hoping to pay off this debt come the evening by getting as much done as possible.

- But instead of feeling accomplished while you do so, you just feel continuously guilty and aware of all the things you "still haven't got done yet."

In my experience, going into the day with a productivity debt is the easiest way to fall into a rut.

Here's the cycle I've observed in myself...

So what's the solution productivity debt?

Keep a done list.

In a small note pad or on a piece of paper, keep note of all the things you've already done throughout the day so as to remind yourself;

- "Oh, you know what? I'm not a useless sack of potatoes who is always one task behind. Here! Look at this list, I've already done so much today!"

By keeping a done list, you don't view your day as a way to pay off your debt put as an opportunity to fill your list.

In the words of Oliver Burkeman who coined the term...

- "A done list isn't merely a way to feel better about yourself. If you can give up the impossible quest to pay off your productivity debt, and instead start thinking of each day as an opportunity to move a small-but-meaningful set of items over to your done list, you'll find yourself making better choices about what to focus on. And you’ll make more progress on them, too, because you’ll waste less time and energy being distracted by stress about all the other stuff you're (unavoidably) neglecting."

And here's the cool thing...

No one has to see your done list.

If you're really in a rut and every task seems too overwhelming, no one has to know you wrote down "brushed my teeth" or "took a shower".

But by noting down even small tasks like that my hope is you'll spark some positive emotion towards yourself; all of which is vital fuel for spiralling upwards out of a rut.

‍

Personal note...

While typing this I've realised I've been keeping a "life done list" for the past 3 years.

In there I try to capture anything good that happens; as a gratitude journal and a capture journal.

*Takes a break from typing to flick through the pages...

Oh god, here's a quick example from 3 years ago on page 1...

"Saying to the girls at the bar "I like your tattoos" which sparked a conversation."

Lewis 3 years ago what were you up to?!?! 😭

The infamous list (don't zoom in)...

Go deeper...

- If you'd like to learn more about challenges to the "toxic productivity" culture, check out Oliver Burkeman's books; 4 thousand weeks and meditations for mortals (the latter is where I got the idea of a 'done list' from.)

Now let's cover this week's social skills tip...

2.) Social anxiety

How could we describe the feeling of social anxiety in one word?

Overwhelming.

(To say the least).

Whether you're at a party, event, meeting someone for the first time or just walking down the street, social anxiety can be one of the most debilitating and frightening experiences.

Every social cue is bombarding you at once and all you want is for the world to swallow you up.

But there's something I've found incredibly useful to cut through the noise of the overwhelm and settle the anxiety...

Setting intentions.

The bottom line...

You feel overwhelmed when socially anxious because everything you perceive becomes important:

- People's body language; "oh, he's frowning, is he mad at me?"

- Their tone of voice; "they're mocking me, oh no, everyone can see how stupid I look."

- The words they use (or don't use); "no one is speaking to me, oh god that means everyone is going to think I'm a loser!"

What you might have noticed in all three of these examples is an internal focus.

In other words;

"How am I coming across? How are people perceiving me?"

So the solution to overcoming social anxiety is you need something that's going to shift your attention from internal to external, and this is where intentions come in.

Just like a darts player would keep their eyes focused on the point of the dartboard they want to hit and ignore everything else, think of intentions as targets you set for yourself.

Some social intentions could include:

- Making one person feel as comfortable as possible.

- Finding out 1 interesting fact about someone new.

- Holding eye contact with 1 person for longer than 5 seconds.

- Having 1 interesting conversation with someone about something they're interested in.

- Smiling at 1 new person.

- Walking into the venue and staying there for 30 seconds.

- Looking at the venue from the outside.

You can set your intention as big or small as you want. Much like no one has to know what you write in your 'done list', no one has to know what your social intentions are. So don't worry if they seem silly.

Also, you can set them before you socialise or while you're socialising.

Personal note:

- 2 years ago when I was living with my cousin Brandon in Bristol, we used to head out into the town of an evening with the intention of "we just want to have some interesting conversations with people."

- Each time we set this intention we made new friends and had a great night without fail.  

But why does setting intentions work?

We humans are goal setting creatures.

In fact, the positive emotions we feel in life are largely the result of the progress we feel towards goal pursuit.

- Making progress towards a goal = positive emotion.

- Not making progress towards a goal = negative emotion.

But most importantly, setting goals helps us focus.

By setting intentions (which are a type of goal), a part of your brain called you reticular-activating-system helps you lock in on achieving that goal whilst ignoring everything else.

Better yet, when you achieve a goal you feel a flood of feel good chemicals; dopamine, serotonin, endorphins.

So by setting a social intention and achieving it, you set yourself up for what I call; abundance socialising.

Whereby; you feel accomplished after achieving your intention, so now any socialising you do after that will be a bonus. Not to mention you'll now be carrying yourself with fresh confidence after having achieved your aim.

Lastly, here's something I tweeted this week whilst thinking about social skills;

- There is no crowd, there is no audience, there is no one to perform for, no one has a gun to your head, there's no one to convince, there's no role you need to play. Just let it all go.

Now let's finalise with this week's personal realisation...

3.) Heavy lifts vs slow burns

Today was tough.

I had a video to film, edit and upload plus a whole newsletter to write.

So after finally uploading the video, I went on a bike ride through the woods before writing this newsletter and I realised...

One thing I've struggled with over the last few months has been falling into ruts.

And the pattern has been; I'm super productive over the course of a few days, but then one day I randomly wake up and don't want to do anything.

But then I realised; the days I don't want to do anything are the days after I've uploaded a big video.

So perhaps me falling into a rut is a natural response to feeling tired after a big accomplishment?

In other words; a heavy lift.

Then I thought...

I don't want to keep living like this 🤣; where it's a few days of extreme productivity followed by a few days of revenge procrastination.

So I've settled on the solution of; more discipline (but not how you'd expect).

I actually need to start enacting the discipline to stop working even when work is going well.

I can do so by...

- Setting maximums for myself ("I'm only going to work on this video for 3 hours max today.")

- Stopping writing when things are going well (as Hemmingway said; leave sentences half finished so you can return to them the next day.)

You can also apply this to the gym to prevent inconsistency after heavy workouts:

- "I'm only going to workout for a maximum of 30 minutes."

Anyway, the saying always rings true; never set a pace you can't keep.

And; the consistent plan you follow is better than the perfect plan you abandon.

So my questions to you are...

- The last few times you've fallen into a rut, was it after you'd done a heavy lift?

- If so, is there a pattern here?

- How could you lighten the load of your heavy lifts so you can break this pattern?

That's all for this week,

Thanks for reading,

Lew

P.s. We've got 2 really fun videos upcoming that you can participate in. I'm going to do a community post within the next few weeks asking you guys for your best mental health and social skills hacks, then I'm going to rate them in a video to find the best ones 🤣. We'll do 2 separate ones for mental health and social skills.

Titles; "I ranked your best and worst social skills/mental health hacks."

Hopefully it'll be a funny video, so good and bad answers will be encouraged. Get them cookin'! Stay tuned.

Quote of the week:

‍