Elon Musk is a disruptor. He created the luxury Telsa Electric Car and changed an industry. The creators of Uber revolutionized the taxi industry by changing the status quo.
A Disruptor is anyone who refuses to accept the current version of ‘normal’.
You may or may not change the world that way some like Elon Musk has, but you can certainly disrupt your own world to a significant degree.
Here’s how…
Take one personal pattern, something you have been doing a certain way for as long as you can remember, and starting today, do it differently.
Here are some examples:
- Use Stevia instead of sugar in your coffee
- Take one extra flight of stairs per day than you currently do
- If ALWAYS use a 15 pound dumbbell for a certain exercise, try the 20’s for at least the first set
- If you always stay up to watch a certain program, during the week, try recording it and going to bed ½ hour earlier (I know it sounds goofy, but I always felt like I was cheating the system when I watched ‘Sons of Anarchy’ on DVR when I had some time during the day…
- Go one week without your normal dessert
- If you drink alcohol, change the pace at which you drink to a slower one. Most people I know have been conditioned to drink at a certain pace. Slow it down…
- Grill, roast or steam one new veggie recipe. Learning a new way to fix food is a great way to shake things up
- Buy a larger water bottle or cup and keep it full of water on your desk or table
You get the point. These are not exactly earth-shaking changes. Mark Zuckerberg may not be looking over his shoulder seeing you as the ‘the next big thing’, but this is how disruptions start.
Pick one action you have NEVER done before and add it to your routine…and I chose that word carefully.
Routine can be the enemy! – “If you do as you always have, you will get what you’ve always got.” For many people, including me, this is not always good.
So what do I plan on changing up? Recently I started working out at 5:30am. Once I got in the habit, I found I got more done during the day since I did not have to worry about getting my workout done later. I also noticed I had significantly more energy throughout the day because I fired up my nervous system early.
I simply took a time of day that was otherwise unproductive and moved something important there. I completely disrupted my daily pattern and saw very positive results.
Here’s another example. We recently had some trees cut down which were posing a threat to our house as winter approached. I asked the workmen to cut the trees up into pieces small enough for me to get an ax through. The result? A great workout doing something that was fun and productive.
A little different…and a change from my regular patterns.
Speaking of my workouts, I have just started a “40 Day Full-on, Take No Prisoners, Let’s Get LEAN for Vacation” training program (my own name J). February school vacation starts on the 13th of next month. Our family is heading to Puerto Rico and I have every intention of being ‘beach ready”. Let the countdown begin!
I have decided I am setting a target of getting below 217 pounds. I have picked this goal for two reasons.
- 217 pounds was the weight I hit after my last contest at Matrix.
- It will also be the lightest I have been since I had knee surgery in 1987.
My body weight as of today is 227 pounds. I’ll let you know how it goes.
In order to get this done, I will have to disrupt some regular patterns. Number one for me is my evening red wine. I usually have 2 glasses of red wine almost every evening and a few more on the weekends. No more. I suspect this change alone will account for half my progress.
I also intend to increase the number of morning workouts I do and increase the intensity of the interval training I do.
If I stick with these three disruptions for 39 more days, I have confident I will hit the numbers I want.
What small thing can you disrupt today to improve your health?
Committed to your health,
Art