I've been loving this question for the last 3 or 4 weeks. It comes from a wonderful story (found in the book Essentialism) of a high school Rugby coach who propelled his team to victory after victory with his "Win" philosophy.

That philosophy? An acronym for living and dying by the question "What's Important Now?"

There are three reasons that this philosophy is so powerful:

1. It pulls you out of your brain and into the moment
2. It crystalizes focus on just one thing
3. It forces you to prioritize -- and act

Together, they completely change your state of mind & trajectory.

Even as I was getting a massage, I found my brain chattering and obsessing... I asked myself "What's important now?" Having the opportunity to relax, rejuvenate and take a break from my brain. And suddenly, things got quieter.

Other times I realize that I don't know what is important now, so I know that sitting down and prioritizing is exactly what I need to do.

And finally, I feel really good when I put myself at the top of that list, when me, or one of my goals, is what's important now. It amplifies the gratitude that I feel and my commitment to it.

All in all, use this question liberally. It's gold.

If you look at your semi-close group of friends and don't feel some deep, internal pull to step up, to best yourself, to see what more you can do... you probably don't have the right group of friends. It's the kind of peer pressure you should seek. The positive peer pressure that raises your own expectations about yourself.

It's one of the easiest ways to manipulate yourself to be more.

And, yes, it is the root of the idiom "you are the average of the five people closest to you"

The most common problem is that you don't know what the RIGHT things to do are. Your to-do list may be a million miles long... but you aren't confident that, even if they all go well, that it will be a success.

You want to feel in control and relaxed, knowing that you're moving in the right direction and that everything that needs to get done, is getting done.

BUT, no matter how hard you work, or what processes you put into place or even how many people you hire, the problem is still going to be there.

That challenge is getting a clear and potent strategy. There's no substitution for it.

Years ago, I read a book by Benjamin Zander, the famous Boston Philharmonic conductor. It's an easy read. I breezed through it on the beach. But, boy has it stayed with me. One of Ben's primary assertions is that the best response to almost any outcome is curiosity: ask, what can I learn from this situation.

It went amazingly well! I wonder why? Oh my god, I bombed. I wonder why? So and so let me down... I wonder why?

He goes so far as to have his players say -- "How fascinating!" -- as a way to immediately tap into curiosity without all of the fear and negative emotions that dampen creativity.

And that is the purpose of curiosity.

Curiosity is the mindset in which we invite creativity in to play. It invites us to imagine something new, something different, something better.

Creativity can't exist without curiosity.

One of the most important tenants of our reality is my not-so-secret formula for success.

Event + Reaction = Outcome

Even though we can't always impact events, we can always change our reaction. This puts us in the driver's seat of our outcomes.

Let's be real: it can be intimidating to take responsibility for our outcomes.

But whether you decide to take ownership or not, the truth remains the same: you are responsible for your outcomes, and for the reality that they create. And while, yes, you can experience dramatic upside or downside based on events, life is long enough that it evens out in the end.

The secret is that when you decide to take responsibility, your ability to create the outcomes you desire increases dramatically.

I'm currently traveling and, while the purpose of the trip has been successful, it's done a number on my core habits and, in turn, on my stable base. It's been hard to read. Hard to keep a sleep schedule. Hard to rejuvenate well.

When I go home tomorrow, it will be easy to keep slipping. Really easy.

But this is a case of the nearly's.

I (nearly) always read a lot. I (nearly) always sleep consistently. I (nearly) always put effort into rejuvenation.

The hard part is sticking to nearly and not letting a week of blown habits & travel cause me to fall all the way off the wagon.

You have two options when the low hanging fruit is gone. You can play a new game or you can strive to become THE best.

If you play a new game, its possible to combine skills to become world class (think funny writer + good artist = amazing cartoonist). Or, you become a jack of all trades, master of none.

If you strive to become the best, you know that the best reap disproportionate awards. But, you're playing a very hard, very competitive game. You may lose.

There isn't a right answer. Just a right path for you, right now.

One of the best management tools that I have is the Urgent / Important grid, by Steven Covey.

For the first few years in my career, I used this framework to make my to-do list everyday. At that point, I was working 80% or more in box one. My job title may as well have been corporate fire fighter.

Today, I use the framework to help my team focus their energy and to prevent them from becoming firefighters themselves.

I set goals with them around the amount of time spent in each quadrant and help them deal with requests that fall in groups 3 & 4.

Here's how it goes:

Quadrant One - Do it! Then ask, why did it get into Q1 in the first place? What can we do to prevent it from becoming urgent next time?

Quadrant Two - Spend as much time here as possible. This is high value, strategic work.

Quadrant Three - These are interruptions, limit them as much as possible! If there is an interdepartmental challenge (important to another group but not to you), prioritize as is appropriate or escalate.

Quadrant Four - Don't waste your time here.

I focus on spending more and more time in Quadrant two. For myself, today, I aim for 80% or more there.

The best way to learn is to ask great questions. It doesn't matter if you are talking with an expert, reading a book or brainstorming alone -- focusing your effort by asking great questions is key.

Great questions focus your energy. They help you determine what is (and isn't) important and retain the information that matters.

Here are some great questions that work in all kinds of situations?

1. What information do you need to make the decision?
2. WHY are we (insert what you're doing)?
3. What are the biggest assumptions that drive this option / person / view?
4. What are the primary influences on this opinion / person / view?
5. Why does this matter?
6. What am I trying to convey? (message & feeling)
7. Who are the stakeholders? Who does this impact?
8. Who is protecting the status quo?
9. How has this changed over the last (year / decade / month)?
10. What is best for five years from now? (and change the time horizon)
11. What's important NOW?
12. Where have I seen these patterns before?
13. What are the potential downsides? upsides? Most likely outcome?
14. What is out of my control about this situation? What is in my control?
15. What would help?

I have a voice that tells me that I'm unworthy. Sometimes it whispers... sometimes it shouts. It makes me want to hunker down, get small and invisible... or lash out and pretend I'm giant.

But this weekend, I found a new pathway with that voice.

I say yes, I am unworthy. How freakin' awesome is that?

I am unworthy so how lucky am I that I, my unworthy, tiny self, get to be here and get to experience this?!?

Unworthiness can be a path to gratitude and awe. And that feels wonderful.

If you had suggested this to me even two years ago, I would have scoffed at the idea. My ambitions had short time horizons. I tried (often in vain) to push myself through some sort of self-constructed urgency.

But the thing is, the best stuff takes time. By definition it has to. We aren't proud of things that come easily to us, we're proud of the things that were hard, the things that we fought for.

Fighting takes time.

Simple, but not easy, takes time. (Here's proof.)

Don't minimize the value of today, but recognize that while we often overestimate what we can accomplish in a day, or even a year... we severely underestimate what we can accomplish in a decade.

Here's the thing, reading this blog is abnormal. Top performer's are abnormal. CEO's are abnormal. Entrepreneurs are abnormal. Olympians are abnormal. Trying to be better is, sadly, abnormal.

You can make the truth less apparent by changing your group of peers, and I highly suggest that you do, but the truth remains.

The fact that you want to do more, to do better and to be excellent is extra-ordinary.

It may sound odd, but accepting the fact that I am different helps me make the inevitable compromises in pursuit of excellence.

You're different. You get to make different choices. This makes you abnormal. And, yes, this is what makes you extra-ordinary.

When I sat down to write this post, my site was down.

It was an easy excuse to slack.

I can’t post — my site is down! There was a chorus in my head — Hey, you don’t have to write! You’re off scot-free!

But the crazy thing is that I wanted to write. I was looking forward to it.

Yet, at the slightest opportunity, the resistance in my mind started singing and doing a tap dance at the opportunity to get out of it. Even if it is an easy, lame excuse.

The way I think about it, easy excuses are big opportunities in disguise. It’s a chance to overcome your resistance when the odds and logic are in your favor. In other words, its a pretty easy battle, a confidence builder.

Don’t succumb to the easy excuse. Just do it.

Psst - If you do give in, don’t despair, we’ve all done it. You’re in good company.

Reading is one of the most important things that I do. I read 100+ books a year. I read 30+ smart articles a day.

That's about 12 million words a year of learning focused reading.

The way I see it, my #1 priority is to go to bed smarter than when I woke up. This is a gem of a phrase that I stole from Charlie Munger and think about everyday.

Learning is a system that I trust. I've seen it pay off in spades -- in my career, in my relationships and in my self-awareness. Big, huge wins.

I know it's my priority. But, just because its clear, doesn't mean it's effortless.

I make the time to read with these five key strategies:

1. I always, always have a book with me.
2. I treat my well edited Feedly (where I get 90% of my articles from) as my guilty pleasure
3. I binge read. Mostly on the weekends.
4. 99% of the time, I don't do TV, social media or "news".
5. I always have at least 2 books going, so I can pick based on which one I feel like reading.

These may or may not be the right strategies for you. But, I assure you, there are strategies that will help you make time.

The best strategies are simple, but they're probably not easy.

Sit down and identify what you need to do to make time. Then do it.

It's my birthday today, so it's only natural that I am thinking about wishes. Take a minute, close your eyes, imagine a birthday candle.

Make a wish.

But, let's be clear, NOW, it's time for the wish-making. Take 10 minutes and write down 10 ideas that could get you a step closer to your wish. Commit to taking one of those steps tomorrow. I have.

Action is what makes the wish. Not the flicker of an idea.

The truth about shortcuts is a lot like the fallacy of effortlessness. They don't exist -- at least, not in the way that they are advertised.

Short cuts absolutely exist, in terms that there are shorter & longer ways to get from point A to point B, but the fast lane to beat all of your competition easily & quickly, there's no such thing.

Shortcuts come from people who have discipline to zoom out and evaluate their market strategically and execute their vision exquisitely. Most people skip this vague and challenging task.

"Overnight successes" are almost always people who have valuable adjacent skills that they developed over the long term. These advantages are often invisible from the outside, but are the basis of quick success.

The seeming unbeatable leadership position came not from any single shortcut or action, but rather through hundreds or thousands of consistent decisions.

All in all, shortcuts come down to three skills

1. Evaluating the system for ways to do things differently and better
2. Evaluating yourself to identify adjacent value that you can offer
3. Executing with discipline and excellence

Rather then search for the shortcut, hone these three skills, and you'll come out ahead -- in the short & long term.

Short term changes and long term changes require different things from you. Short term changes do great with pushes: will power, carrots & sticks and even deliberate setups (like removing all junk food from your house).

Pushing is how we see 99% of resolutions and diets setup.

We will it. We push it. We hope that once we get momentum, it'll keep going.

And it works. For the minute.

Pushing is exhausting. Even if you manage to push yourself for a month or a year or even a decade, you aren't going to feel good about your progress and you'll constantly be on guard, fearful of not pushing enough.

If you want long term change that feels good (reflecting over years or decades), it requires something totally different.

Long term change requires a reframe. A totally new way of thinking about the situation and the choices. A way doesn't require you to push.

Perhaps you look at writing as a cathartic expression of your ideas rather than a necessary marketing evil... or you look at exercise as your opportunity to have some alone time with yourself, rather than a daily dose of self-hatred. You get the idea.

Reframes don't make it easy everyday. You may still get resistance, but its a friendlier conversation with yourself, focused on your core wants rather than your fears or hatred.

But perhaps the funniest thing about reframes is that, although they don't seem to move you towards your destination as quickly (because they're less goal centric and more holistic), it's most certainly a case of the tortoise beating the hare.

I fall into the trap just as much as everyone else...I want to think my way out of confusion and uncertainty.

But, by the time you get to the point that you realize that you are confused, thinking isn't going to cut it. It's time for action.

All you need to do to figure it out is the MINIMUM required to move forward (or sideways, or heck, even backwards!)

It might be a good time to ask my question for making hard decisions.

Action looks like a lot of things. It might be calling a trusted advisor or finding a YouTube tutorial or doing a small test... or saying screw it, let's go big, now! What your action looks like isn't important.

Action begets clarity, all you need to do is start moving.

There are many reasons why you might be bad at something. One of them is that the thing is a weakness. You're just destined to suck at it. But, we are way too quick to label something that didn't go well as a weakness.

There is a huge gulf between weakness and lack of skill development. Unless you've put in the hours, you have no idea if the thing is a weakness or simply a lack of practice.

Another gulf exists between the thing itself and all of the adjacent skills that complicate it. It's rare that we get to test any single skill on its own merit.

Maybe you're a great artist, but have a weakness in sales... leading you not to make sales (even though you really are good at art!)

Or maybe, you're a great artist, but haven't developed your sales skills yet... (also not making sales, also good at art... and with the potential to make lots of sales, with some hard work!)

Just because you don't knock the first ball out of the park hardly means that you have a weakness. Don't let a lack of skill development or the adjacent skills, which often invisible, cloud your judgement of yourself.

What you label yourself counts for a lot.

For most of my life, I've focused exclusively on outcome goals. Win the race. Lose 20 pounds Break 6-figures.

This year, I'm focusing almost exclusively on action goals.

Post (nearly) everyday. Move my body (nearly) everyday. Meditate (nearly) everyday.

I'm very curious to see what the outcomes are, when the goals themselves aren't focused on them, or even predict them. Internally, it feels like a breath of fresh air.

I like the fact that it deeply reduces my desire to steal from the future, to hit my goal more quickly. Whether that is by skimping on sleep, stacking my "gym days" for the end of the week (because I procrastinated) or getting into yo-yo eating habits. Action goals help me mitigate and minimize these patterns that are destructive in the long term.

Scott Adams (of Dilbert fame) calls action goals systems, rather than goals. While you might not be certain what the system is going to produce, they "move you from a game with low odds to a game with better odds." In other words, rather than getting hooked on losing 20 pounds and failing when you only hit 19... or failing when you lose 25 pounds of fat, but gain 10 pounds of muscle, the system enables you to focus on and maintain gains, in whatever form they arrive.