Stop Ending Your Day Feeling Like You Got Nothing Done

Speaker A: Do you find yourself, uh, dwelling on negative thoughts? Do you want more natural confidence? And also sometimes at the end of a busy day, do you get home and think, my gosh, what did I even do all day? Well, this is because of how your brain is wired. And what we have here in today's episode is a short 5 to 10 minute daily exercise where you can reverse all that wiring to think and act more positively, to have more confidence, and also to own all the amazing things you do every single day.

Speaker B: Welcome to leadership mindset 2.0. Um, practical neuroscience and psychology. To transform you from a tactical doer into a strategic leader. Here is your host, former social entrepreneur of the year and coach to some of the world's top executives. R, uh, Michael Anderson.

Speaker C: A lot of leaders that are new to roles, with expanding teams, scaling companies almost naturally, that brings stress and anxiety. Our ego likes things to be the same. However, as leaders especially, we have to deal with change. We have to manage change, we have to lead change. And the more change there is, the m more there is a potential for us to shift from our authentic self into our ego. Now, if you are in leadership and you do get promoted and you do get into a new role, even if you are great at your old job, you have a lot of confidence that can bring up thoughts of imposter syndrome, thoughts of self doubt, thoughts of can I do this? And so what I'm going to share with you today is a thing that I teach very often, I just taught it last week. That can bring more calmness, more confidence and just get you in a better mindset because you got promoted or you got this new role because you've done a lot of things right in your career. Normally screw ups don't get promoted. Sometimes they do, but most of the time it is because you did a good job. So if you are in that new role, you've had success in the past. So we can leverage off that and really bring that into your consciousness so that you can reach these new levels with positivity. Driven by positivity, not fear that you're going to screw up, instead shift you into this positive creative energy. So what I'm going to teach you today, it's called the GAF Journal. G A F journal. I know, horrible name, but let me go through it in each step. But what you do is you want to get a notebook and you can do this online, like on Word or whatever. But uh, there's something special I think about doing it in a notebook. I like to buy nice pens for Myself, I'm really addicted to these pens. I like one of these gel rollers, energel gel rollers. So I have them lying all over my office. My wife always steals them, but that's all right most of the time. And so get a nice notebook, Get a nice pen. This is best to do in the evening before you go to bed. If you relax a little bit before bed, before you're super tired, this is a great way, or maybe you do it right when you get done from work to make sure that you decompress properly. And actually, what I'm doing is I'm working on a more specific, structured way to, uh, start your day as well. And I might do a little course on that in a couple weeks. But in the meantime, here's the gaff journal. And this is something you can. It takes you five, 10 minutes in, preferably in the evening. You do in the morning as well. And let me go through it. So you want to divide your notebook into three columns, or you can use three different notebooks, whatever you want to do. And the first one is gratitude. I didn't come up with gratitude journals. That's been done before, and a lot of people know about them. And maybe you know about them, maybe you've done them before. But gratitude journals are really powerful.

Speaker D: The reason a lot of people have

Speaker C: heard of them is because they work, because our brain is wired for negativity. However, there's a lot of reasons for that. Uh, I go over some of it in the book. Our brain is wired to protect us. So it's wired for negativity. It's wired for problems. The issue is that we don't have the same problems as we did a hundred, two hundred, five hundred years ago because we're safe. We're in a modern world. So we really need to update our wiring of our brain. And what the gratitude journal does is that wires our brain for good things instead of bad things. And you can rewire your brain. So what you want to do in the gratitude column is you want to write down, um, specific things. Now, here's the key. What people don't get in the gratitude or appreciation. You want to appreciate or say thanks for specific things. So what that means is I don't want to write down my wife, because that's so vague. It's like, I really appreciate the kiss she gave me on the way out the door for work this morning. I really appreciate how yesterday when she was, uh, stroking my leg as we were watching tv, I really appreciate that white dress she Wears because she looks so good in it. Because what happens is we want your brain to start picking out the specific things that are good. And so just by saying I have gratitude for my car, that doesn't really mean anything. I have gratitude because I love the pickup of my car. It's fast. I love yesterday when I was just changing lanes and going faster. I love how when I lay back, the seat's so comfortable. Just write down as many things as you want. Five or 10 things, 20 things, it doesn't matter. Now let me tell you how this affected me. I was in Los Angeles when I was doing my gratitude journal, and I was sitting. If you know anything about Los Angeles, a lot of traffic jams. So I was stuck in traffic. It was like 2pm in the afternoon, hot out. I had the AC cranking. Here I am, I'm stuck in gridlock traffic, sitting back in my seat, not moving. And all I thought was, that air conditioning feels so good on my skin. For a couple of seconds there, I was just like, uh, it's so nice. Now think about this. I'm in gridlock traffic. I'm like, I don't know when I'm going to get out of it. The sun is beating down. But I wasn't focused on any of that. I was focused on how good the air conditioning felt on my skin. And I was just appreciating that moment. I had gratitude for that air conditioning in that moment. So imagine if you can make that shift, and this is how you make that shift. Because once you commit to this gratitude journal and do it for a week, two weeks, you'll start to, uh. Instead of picking out all the problems, you'll be like, oh, that's good, that's good, that's good. Now don't worry as you shift to this more positive, optimistic person, because some people are like, oh, uh, this negativity drives me. Well, you can be driven by negativity, but people think that if you're not driven by, you're going to lose your edge. You're not going to be as driven. You will be more driven because you have more energy and also with positivity. So by doing the gratitude journal, that will really give you this positivity. And so you want to write down specifics. And what I've been doing, I've just been getting back into this. Actually, what I've been doing is I wrote down, I have gratitude for my wife and then all the things I'd graduate. I think she's beautiful.

Speaker A: She.

Speaker C: She is so sweet. She takes care of me, she helps others. And then I wrote down my son, and then I wrote down all the cool things I really appreciate about him. So actually, in a way, I go the opposite. I bring down one larger thing and then I work on the specific. So do whatever works for you, just be specific. That's your takeaway there. All right, now the middle column is the effect column. At one point I own three companies running two of them and I would work a 10 or 12 hour day and I would get back and I was like, did I even get anything done today? So I got busted in my butt all day. I'm exhausted, I'm beat, I'm worn out and it's like I can't even think of one thing that I completed property today. So what I did is I took out a note paper and I went through the day. At the end of the day, I went through it mentally. I looked at my calendar, I looked at all the completed tasks and I looked at all the sent emails and I wrote down everything that I affected that day. I had a great call with this prospect. I helped out this project manager on this client, I talked to the hr, I got this sorted out, I got this, I did this. And I would write down all the things that I positively affected that day. And the list was huge. I was busy all day and I kicked butt and it was just, it was really eye opening to me of how effective I was. Not only things I affected positively. So it's as simple as that. You want to do the same. You want to mentally go through your day, oh, I had this meeting, I had this meeting. User. Look at your calendar, look at all the emails that you sent, look at all the tasks that you completed. If you use tasks, maybe look at your chat messages and then write down all the things that you positively affected that day. Now what's going to happen is after three, four or five days, you're going to just leaf back through the journal. You're going to be like, holy cow, I kick butt in my job. Look at all the things I've done in the last three, four, five days. That's going to give you a lot of inner confidence. And the calmness that comes from leadership is not that you have all the answers, but you have the capabilities to solve whatever comes up. It's this confidence that, look, you got it, your team's got it, you'll figure it out and you're going to realize, hey, I might be stressed about this right now, but look at all the things that I did in the last three or five days, I did a million things. So I'm not even stressed about this because look, here's the evidence of how effective I am. So it's great for confidence, it's great for calmness. Now the third part of this, and this is going to be your shortest list is, well, let me tell you this. I something like I would have like bad luck and I would think, oh my gosh, the universe works against me. How many of us think this sometimes? Yeah, I do. It's like nothing ever works out for me. The universe has always given me these bad things. So what I did is the third column here is Fortune. And what I tell people is just think about your last day, your last 24 hours. When did the universe smile upon you? When did you have good fortune or good luck? Maybe you were busy and you got that one rock star parking place right in front of wherever you were going, so you made it on time. Maybe you were looking for the answer for something and somebody just happened to pop in your office and give you the answer. Just think about one place where you got fortunate, you got lucky, things came together for you. And I would get like one or two of these pretty much every day. And that's all you need. And then I realized that the universe is on my side. Yeah, occasionally I have bad luck. Once a week, something crappy will happen. But look, one or two things happen every day that really support me. I get the right candidate in, I sign this person up. You know, this came out of nowhere. And it really makes me realize that the universe is a giving place, not a taking away place. And it's got my back in its own way. So there you go. That is the old gaff journal gratitude effect. Fortune. Really simple. So this is going to be on a normal day if you have 5, 10, 15 minutes to do this. This is going to be 5, 10 things effect. Could be really long depending on your job. Just look back and put all them. Maybe there are only three or four or five things, depending. Maybe you're a high level salesperson or something. But a lot of us in leadership, we deal with a lot of different things. So it might be really long. Doesn't matter. Don't worry about the length. Just do it until you really review your day and you feel like you got everything. And fortune might only do one or two things a day and then just go over that and then be in the habit. Maybe you want to do this in the morning, maybe you want to review in the morning. What you wrote the night before. Maybe you want to do this in the morning. I think this is more of an evening post work thing. But again, uh, with all these journals and things, do what works for you. Experiment with it. Do it this way, do it this way. Figure out where is it after work, is it right before bed, is it after dinner, et cetera. It's a great reflection tool that will really make you more powerful, more calm, and really step into your leadership potential.

Speaker A: Your challenge for this session, dear Leader, is simple. Do one session of the Gaff Journal. Take out a piece of paper, divide it into three columns.

Speaker C: First is gratitude.

Speaker A: Be very specific over the last 24 hours of what you have gratitude for, a great kiss from your spouse, a nice, hot, warm shower, an amazing cup of coffee. All those things are things you should, uh, have gratitude and appreciation for. Second thing is effectively, what did you positively affect? Go through what I used to do again, as I used to go through my tasks and my calendars and my emails, and I would make a quick note and I'd realize how amazing that is.

Speaker C: Third is fortune. Where was.

Speaker A: Where were you fortunate then? In this last 24 hours, where has the universe smiled upon you? And maybe you only have one thing. Maybe every other day you have one or two things here. That's okay. But just remember, the universe is a giving place. Do a pass of the Gaff Journal. It will start rewiring you immediately. This is a practice that, when I started committing to it daily after a couple weeks, it made a significant change in my mindset, my attitude, my wiring, and it can do the same for you.

Speaker D: That's it for today's episode, but I have one more question for you. Do you have an upcoming event that could benefit from a Leadership Mindset 2.0 Keynote or Facilitation? One of my favorite things to do is speak and work with groups at events and leadership meetings. If you want to learn more about my speaking, go to rmichaelanderson.com speaking where you can see me on stage and inquire about bringing me in for your event. Then we can both meet in person and your team can get empowered with the latest mindset, tools and strategies.