Forget Motivation and Discipline, Here's What Actually Works

[00:02] we had a strong trend towards motivation. I think you remember a guy called Igor Vaitenko. I started watching his videos myself, then immediately started doing push-ups and going to the gym. And in fact, it played, well, a

[00:15] my childhood specifically, yes, that kind of formation and transition from the mindset parents buy you something, they don’t buy you something, it doesn’t matter at all what you

[00:27] person who must achieve something, accomplish something, that's all the rest. Then the motivation trend started to die down a bit, and it all started to be replaced by some kind of discipline, right? That is, many began to say that

[00:42] motivation doesn’t work, you have to be disciplined. And partly this is also, well, a working system, so to speak, yes, but for the time being. Actually, today I'll tell you about a third, so to speak, similar direction, yes, which is

[00:56] unlike motivation, which is short-term, yes, while you have a burning desire, you do it, unlike discipline, when despite not wanting to, despite all the problems, you force yourself to do it, do

[01:08] it, but still, after some time, you give up. I'll tell you about a system that really works, that has helped me, well, in all my affairs. I will also most often give examples through my own prism, yes, from my

[01:20] lived experience, and, in fact, tell stories. But let's do it this way, so as not to keep up too much suspense, I'll explain right away what I mean. It's a topic like, well, in English there is the word obsession, yes, in Russian, how do you

[01:33] Here I used a translator. In Russian this would be called obsession. Something just flew out of my head. And, actually, what is this anyway? obsession. What is this feeling? This is not about when you are forced to accept some idea that you need to, I

[01:46] don’t know, study, play sports, work, achieve some goals, KPIs, or something else like that. And you, ah, there through I do n’t want to, through, there, I don’t know, some kind of laziness, ah, you go, you do it, because you have to, because that’s how it’s

[02:00] accepted in society. No, obsession is not about this state at all. Obsession is when you feel absolutely terrible without doing some, well, I don’t know, hobby, activity, something that you’re actually obsessed with. I'll

[02:16] just give you my own example: yes, I started skiing as a child, and I third or fourth year of skiing. By the way, this is also a very interesting point regarding, uh, the period when you will receive this obsession.

[02:29] in the third, fourth year of skating, I liked this whole thing so much , the fact that when I came home, it’s understandable that you skate there twice a year at

[02:41] most, when you come home, you just feel so bad, you see skating, you see some kind of withdrawal from the fact that you’re not doing it. Although

[02:55] two years before that, when for the most part you were just, well, taught to and you somehow treated it like: “Damn, it’s difficult, I don’t like it, I do n’t need it.” I had the same thing with the gym. I started forcing myself to

[03:10] go to the gym. A week passed, two or three, and somewhere towards the end, I don’t know, the second month, you start to get some results. Let's say you had a 60 kg bench press, then 70-80, you already want to quickly

[03:24] 70-80, you already want to quickly bench your first hundred, and you no longer care that , I don't know, you pulled your back somewhere , or something like that. You no longer care about any, well, really critical factors, even in terms of health. You

[03:38] still go to the gym despite any obstacles , you go do that bench press, you go do that deadlift, something else like that , but you put on more weight, you seem to feel bad, you do, oh, well, and your health gets worse, something else like that, a

[03:52] bunch of factors, yes, and it seems, oh, well, this is like a gym, usually people are too lazy to go to the gym, but you catch this state of so-called obsession, the fact that you just feel bad from sitting at home, you see, again

[04:06] , oh, it’s very cool here, by the way, how Instagram works, here are the results, this media content, because it constantly reminds you, so to speak, that someone with the same obsession right now is doing, oh, well,

[04:20] gym or just some other sport. It could be like, I don't know, a trip. Here is any sphere, it can have this effect of

[04:32] possession. Unfortunately, obsession can go both in a positive direction, yes, again, I gave examples of sports, but it can also go in the opposite direction. That is, if we take my distant childhood, yes, deep, I don’t know how to

[04:45] say it correctly, when I was 12-13 years old, I was just as obsessed with computer games. Only this is not called an obsession, yes, when it is negative, but more often it is called an addiction. In essence, it’s the same state, when

[04:58] you’re, say, sitting somewhere in school, and you’re constantly thinking about how to quickly leave these lessons, sit down there and launch your Counter- playing. And so, actually, you wait, wait, wait, you already want it, you’re

[05:12] already going through some kind of withdrawal, if you, I don’t know, your parents turn off this computer, yes, because you, well, you’re already playing too much, obviously, everyone can see it from the outside, you’re already just feeling bad, you’re already feeling just

[05:25] terrible. And just the same, well, it’s the same feeling of this obsession, this dependence. And here’s what’s most interesting, that this obsession, yes, this dependence can be used, well,

[05:40] purposefully to achieve some of your goals. Actually, that's what we'll talk about now. How, in fact, to direct this feeling, how to create it in general right thing. Well, the key idea that I simply didn’t voice is that

[05:54] you can direct this obsession towards something that will bring you some kind of result, right? That is, it’s also, I don’t know, some kind of result in terms of health, and in terms of finances, and in terms of, I don’t know, some other factors. And, actually,

[06:08] how to get this obsession, because it doesn’t just appear out of thin air. Again, my example. When I was skiing, they started n't like it at all. Well, I felt disgusted. I didn’t want to, I wanted to

[06:21] quickly go home from all these winter resorts. It's also cold for you there . And the same thing with the gym. Yeah, you go to the gym, first of all, uh, you feel super uncomfortable, there are all these

[06:34] skinny guy, embarrass yourself there, you can't do it, well, adequate there, I don't know, dumbbells, ah, lift, there, do bench presses and everything else. And at the beginning you seem to feel very uncomfortable, right? That is, it’s not something that you just want from birth, well,

[06:48] some don’t. That is, it is something acquired. Not what you receive right away at birth, but what you cultivate within yourself. And if we can cultivate in ourselves this dependence on a task that will

[07:02] bring us some good, positive result, then, in fact, it will be extremely simple for us to achieve this result , because, firstly, it will be easy for us to devote time to it, because we ourselves will want

[07:15] it. You know, when you do what you love, what you really interested in it, you don't even notice how time flies. When you, on the contrary, are bored, yes, you are sitting there at some, I don’t know, boring lecture,

[07:28] then on the contrary, this time, well, it’s as if extreme sports multiply. And besides the fact fly by as quickly as possible, you won’t get too tired from what you were doing, and also this activity, yes, you

[07:41] will complete these tasks with a certain inspiration, yes, that is, you won’t do it just for the sake of doing it. You will do it more creatively, which means better than others. That is, you will be, uh, well, if we take a

[07:55] he was told, and take you, who is simply obsessed, yes, with this, uh, process, well, well, actually, with implementing something, then you will have a much better and higher-quality result, which will give much more,

[08:09] so to speak, some kind of profit, yes, that is, well, not in terms of profit, but in terms of some kind of impact. And, actually, what is the strategy, yes, to get this obsession with some task that you want to do, so that you don’t

[08:22] give up along the way, so that you enjoy it. Let's take, for example, I do n't know, the process of, well, learning English, right? That is, for many, this is probably one of the most popular tasks. And this is how

[08:35] it usually happens with us: yes, a person signs up for a tutor, the person starts, I don’t know, downloads some kind of lingo or just starts learning some kind of, I don’t know, present simple, present continuous, these perfect

[08:48] simple, present continuous, these perfect tenses, all this fuss, he sees that it’s somehow difficult, incomprehensible, he makes some attempts, he doesn’t succeed, he tries to pronounce some words somehow, his

[09:01] know how else, they scold him or say that he’s doing it wrong, and he just has nothing left after this process except some negativity. He has this whole associative chain, that learning English is something

[09:15] difficult, negative. Here we need to change the entire strategy. You should enjoy the process itself. You shouldn't wait for some final result and hope to get this result as soon as possible.

[09:28] process itself, because the final result won’t give you much emotion. The path itself will give you emotions. This applies to both studying English, and, I don’t know, sports, and, I don’t know,

[09:42] providing for your own life, traveling, and everything else you have. Well, if we take some reasonable goals, not according to Smart GS, yes, business goals, but just such human goals, yes, to learn English,

[09:57] start traveling, start, I don’t know, somehow provide for myself, so as not to depend on the boss, on everything else. These goals have no end. That point will you learn English? Well, when you start to even

[10:11] speak somehow, well, you won’t be able to talk to everyone. That is, you ceiling here. You can always grow, grow, grow. And this is, well, in any sphere, essentially the same situation. It's the same with you in sports. You have

[10:24] no ceiling. And it is precisely this that needs to be done to formulate your entire process. Well, let's continue with the English example . And the whole learning process is done in such a way that, firstly, you enjoy what you

[10:37] do. Oh, and the second point is that you should receive some small rewards, yes, for the fact that you, you have some minimal some minimal achievements, because you study, you study

[10:50] there, you work, you try something, you train, and if you simply, well, throughout the year there are no results, it’s clear that, well, anyone will simply think: “Well, what’s the point?” Like, well, there's zero

[11:02] effect. And it’s clear that, say, in a month you won’t have a hyper-result, but you can get a result already in the second week, in the third week, but just some minimal one . In English, for example, you

[11:15] can just, I don’t know, if you’re a complete zero, you can learn to , and you, in fact, have this result, yes, that is, in front of you, yes, cool, I set a micro-goal there and achieved it, like, well, what’s next? You

[11:28] need this result to be somehow reinforced by something that, well, what you, so to speak, I don’t know, like, that will motivate you to do more. Let English language as an example, it's like, I do n't know, you went somewhere abroad and before that

[11:44] you were constantly picking up your phone and , I don't know, like some five-cantrap, you were clicking away, like, ah, cut it, like, I need this, and you were already able to formulate it with mistakes, incorrectly, with incorrectly constructed speech, something like that

[11:57] , but you were already able to formulate what you wanted to say, and you were able to understand the other person's answer. Only when you get this micro-result, only when this micro-victory

[12:09] works for you, you will understand: “That’s it, I didn’t do all this in vain, you, well, will already feel great.” And right here you can immediately tie in another life hack, which is that you can, uh, directly tie the whole process of this learning

[12:25] to what you like , what you like, yeah, it could be, uh, communication with other people, yeah, if you live abroad, then it's generally, well, imba, just go to the gym and just start

[12:37] practicing with, well, if you're learning some local language, then just with the locals. If it's some English, then yes, then also just in English. try speaking the language and as soon as you, well, at first it will be, yes, cringe,

[12:49] , meet someone, something like that some, well, discuss some topics , something like that, you’ll leave training, you’ll think, well, or from some event, it

[13:01] doesn’t matter at all, just at training, everything else will do this, you’ll already awesome. I’m like, well, I just talked to this guy about something. I, well, found out that he was doing this and that or , I don’t know, talked to some friend

[13:14] , we exchanged numbers, something like that . That’s not the point at all. The most important thing is that after you’ve reinforced your, well which you’ve been acquiring, acquiring, working on, and you It was simply reinforced by the fact

[13:28] that something happened that you liked, yes, you, well, after, say, the first such situation, you will already have a huge inspiration to continue teaching, teaching. The same thing in sports, yes, as soon as you start to

[13:41] show some minimal results, say, taking it to the gym, well, so that in a month you already have , I don’t know, huge biceps, squats, everything else, of course, it’s an impossible goal. But if you, say,

[13:54] start doing, I don’t know, squats or bench presses or something like that, yes, where it’s fun to measure some results, yes, there is some, uh, like, perhaps a hundred, yes, some such conditional criteria, and you

[14:08] start simply trying to achieve them, achieve them, then even there, say, you won’t see any results on your body, yes, but you will already understand that in the last workout you barely You pressed 60 there five times, and then the next time you

[14:22] came, did you press 65 there six times? And you will also get so much pleasure from this that literally two or three times you will reinforce this theme, yes, with such a release of dopamine, seretonin, I'm not really an expert there,

[14:35] just a release of such emotions, you will continue. And, interesting thing for most of those who watch this channel, how to apply this to work, yes, because, oh, okay, in the audience there it is clear how to measure results, but a

[14:50] person, well, let's take the topic of traffic, starts, oh, uploading some videos to YouTube, there to TikTok, somewhere else, wants to transfer his traffic to Telegram, makes five videos there, they don't go

[15:05] anywhere, there are no views, nothing. There, they get 200 views for a video and that's it, he already gets some kind of dismorality Or he makes 100 videos, something like that, but he hasn't made any money from it , of course. And he's already so

[15:20] upset that it's not working, everything there is, well, like, well, apparently, it's not made for me. But if at first you just don't focus on the numbers, and, say, the ones that brought in that kind of money, but focus

[15:34] on some micro-things, yes, that is, say, if you record some video yourself, yes, then you stop stumbling there. You remember, five videos ago, you were constantly stumbling, you couldn't formulate your

[15:46] speech adequately, but here you are perfectly, well, not exactly perfect, but you can already pronounce everything clearly , you know, express all your thoughts . As you can see, I have n't even been able to do this very well for a year, but that's already different. And you already get

[15:59] some micro-joy, yes, now something is going well. Then you can just Track, I don't know, the first comment, the first like, yeah. It comments on a video, or five likes, or 100 views? But if

[16:12] you think about it, well, let's say, if you take YouTube views, those are really cool metrics. It's cool. 100 people watched you, and even if the average viewership time is 2-3 minutes, you still have, well, over the course of 200-300

[16:26] minutes, someone watched, well, some group of people. So, we're just used to, you know, not paying attention to these micro-achievements. to these micro-achievements. So, we have this thing where, like, yesterday

[16:38] I came to the idea that I need to earn money, and tomorrow I should be driving a Rolls-Royce. If I don't drive a Rolls-Royce tomorrow, that's it, everything's sad for me, yeah. Well, I'm exaggerating, yeah, but that's it. More or less, people have this

[16:50] but that's it. More or less, people have this idea. Oh, well, I mean, even wrote to me, guys who, yeah, I started there, worked for two months, and only earned $200. The guy doesn't understand that he took his first step of

[17:03] $200, right? I mean, he just sees what he, well, that's how it's perceived. He worked for two months, and it only gave him $200. But in reality, he actually got to the point where he took a bunch of steps, got to the point where he already got

[17:16] his first money. And here you shouldn't think in some kind of scale that some guys are earning $10,000, and I only got $200, so everything is bad. No, but you should, on the contrary, use these $200

[17:30] not as something sad, yeah, that I earned two kopecks there, but as It worked out, I got some initial results, everything is going well for me, I need to continue, continue, continue. Personally, when I first started

[17:45] working in the traffic sphere, that's where I got the most, so to speak, results, but at first I was just, like, well, somehow, I was just doing, doing, well, like, there was something, you know, somehow without any kind of

[17:58] involvement or anything like that. I was just driving traffic. Well, my partner and I were working there, and I didn't even know what was going on with this traffic. I was just driving and, you know, I had no motivation at all , I was just doing it because,

[18:10] well, we have an agreement there, I do this , he does this. But as soon as my partner comes to me and says: "So, like, we made 600 bucks last week." I think: "Oh, come on, that can't be." And after that, I

[18:24] can't be." And after that, I just sat at the computer for 14-15 hours. No joke, Without any involvement. I'd go to bed at 4:00 a.m., wake up at 9:00 a.m., maybe have a snack, maybe not, that's it. I'd just sit at the computer the whole day.

[18:37] This was '24. I was in Warsaw for 2 or 3 months then. Oh, well, I was doing all this for exactly 2-3 months . I couldn't get distracted by anything at all, because, well, you're starting to see results. And after that,

[18:49] this hyper-work, it gave me a huge boost. If I'd just continued with the same discipline, oh, okay, it works, I repeat all these actions, okay, like, well, without this, oh, obsession, it's good that I wrote it down, I don't

[19:03] disrepute, I would have just continued working somehow super results. But then, in 2 months, well, that is, already in the second, third month, we managed to reach 10k plus, and then We moved to Dubai, and

[19:17] something like that. So, it all stems from this feeling of obsession. It stems from the fact that at first, I simply, without looking at any numbers or indicators, just had a path, yes, it was set, I followed it

[19:32] , followed it, and as soon as I started getting some results, yes, that is, as soon as results, some cool numbers, that's it, you immediately pick up the one or two results you need, yes, conditionally, ah, in any field. And

[19:48] accelerating, accelerating, accelerating, and develop this addiction, right? That is, you need a higher dosage, so to speak, you put in more effort. And so, to summarize, I've

[20:02] talked a lot here, but so, to summarize, to make it clear, the main idea is that you simply have to choose for yourself what you get this obsession to achieve

[20:16] some goals. And just for the first, say, a month or two, just don't care about any numbers, indicators, any results, money, I don't know, knowledge, anything like that , just do, do, do, and try to achieve, firstly,

[20:30] that you, uh, somehow like what you're doing, somehow come up with something, yeah, that is, say, well, watch YouTube in English, yeah, if you like it, if you want to learn English. If you start

[20:44] say, the first result [music] will simply be the first positive comment, something like, "Oh, cool video," or something like that. as soon as you start seeing some micro-results, you'll immediately become

[20:57] Yeah, not even, well, not motivation, again, that Inspiration, you'll have this obsession. So the main task is simply to outline a path, and try to set it up in a way that's interesting enough for you. If it doesn't

[21:11] work out, it's still simple, well, outline a path and just do it with discipline, take some actions to achieve some result. And don't go out and immediately set yourself a goal, some kind of bar, well, just

[21:25] inadequate, yes, for example, if it's English, then to pass the C1 test or if it's earning money, then immediately earn $10,000 by the second month . Set a minimum goal, which may seem ridiculous, yes, in the

[21:37] context there, well, let's say, earning the first 20 bucks or something, and just learn to say, uh, like hi, my name is so-and-so, I'm from English or if it's a gym, then just learn the correct bench press technique

[21:51] , something like that. Just set microgoals and enjoy these goals, as if you've achieved them. That's almost exactly what I wanted. Only in this format, when you start forcing this dependence on yourself, to lie, well,

[22:04] that is, to see some results, yes, and each time try to beat them, beat them, then you will, in fact, develop this obsession along the way . I hope I gave you an explanation, because in reality, it's

[22:18] just start doing, doing, doing. It's the same thing with the gym, which always works for me. You don't go for six months, then for the first month you force yourself to go, and for the second month, that's it, you'll develop an obsession with it

[22:31] . So don't get caught up in some kind of motivation, yes, you watched a video, that's it, you went to do something, it's unclear why you didn't succeed, yes, after two weeks you just quit, or in some kind of hyper-discipline, where you

[22:44] just feel bad because you, uh, do the same thing over and over again, and you don't get the results you want, which you've planned for yourself, and you just give in, try to hit this obsession, so that you just, well,

[22:57] discipline, then some micro-results that you practically just set for yourself, yes, some, well, minimum standards, say, the first subscriber, the first first poured application there, and, there, the

[23:12] first 10 words learned in English, the first [music] pressed, I don't know, 50 kg in the gym, something like that. That is, you set absurdly small goals, but, well, enjoy them, as if it's really something cool. And then,

[23:25] thanks to this, you will want more and more. And also, by the way, from such cool things, this is around what you like, you can build your own also such an interesting point that came to me, say, and when I was

[23:41] cycling, I had the same obsession. All my content, all my results, were exclusively about skiing and cycling, because I really liked those two areas

[23:53] . When I started working on traffic, I was exclusively subscribed to Teplov, who were, well, like Alex Slovobozhenka and all that kind of stuff. And the only people I watched in terms of podcasts and interviews were

[24:06] traffic. I wasn't distracted by anything else , and I wanted to consume more of this kind of content. And by consuming this content, I wanted to you can also build an environment around yourself , a dedicated environment, an

[24:21] environment of people who are also into the topic you want to work on. That's basically it. The video came out a bit hazy, as you can see. I'm not very structured yet, but I don't

[24:33] know if after 5-10 videos it will start to click for me. Some kind of result, I'll start improving, improving, and, actually, I 'll also catch an obsession. I just forget the word. I have "obsession" in English. It's [ __ ]

[24:46] in English. It's [ __ ] hard for me to remember "obsession." Anyway, that's it.