Artwork for podcast Own Your Calendar: Aligning Your Business & Life Goals
Are You Focusing On The Wrong Solution?
Episode 62 • 30th May 2024 • Own Your Calendar: Aligning Your Business & Life Goals • Stephen Box
00:00:00 00:13:27

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Sometimes the behaviors we focus on changing aren't the real problem. Discover how identifying and addressing the real underlying issues can lead to more effective and lasting solutions.

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Have you ever found yourself trying to make a change that you knew

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could have a bigger impact on you?

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Say, for example, cutting back on soda, or getting to bed a little

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earlier, or being cognizant about the way that you react to things.

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But despite knowing what you need to do, you find it very hard to actually do it.

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And I want to throw something out for you.

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What if the reason you're struggling It's because you're actually

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focusing on the wrong thing.

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That's what today's episode is going to be about.

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Welcome to Unshakeable Habits.

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I am your host, board certified health and wellness coach and

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habit implementation specialist.

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And this is the podcast dedicated to helping you discover how to build simple,

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sustainable habits that boost your energy and productivity so that you can start

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to show up in five key areas of life.

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Health, relationships, mindset, faith, and professional and personal growth.

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Time to take your habits from unsustainable to unshakable.

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So guys, like I said, today we're going to be talking about Are you maybe, just

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possibly, focusing on the wrong thing?

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Do you think that you need to change something?

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It isn't really the problem and this came from a conversation I

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had with someone the other day.

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They were saying how They know that their habit they need to work on is drinking

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less soda And you guys may have heard me say this before but here is the reality

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of the situation Every behavior exists for one or two purposes Number one is an

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expression of who we are and I don't think anybody's drinking soda as an expression

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of who they are You And the other one is that it's an attempt to solve a problem.

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And it doesn't matter if it's the best solution or not, it's what we do.

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Now, when you think about soda, what is the main thing the

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soda is going to solve for you?

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And this person even acknowledged, yes, it is an energy issue.

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I drink soda because it gives me energy.

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And the more we started talking, The more it was well, the reason I

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don't have energy is because maybe I'm not sleeping as well as I could.

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I'm not eating very much when I'm at work because I'm so busy and so a lot of

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times I'm just grabbing something really quick and so I really need the energy.

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So the problem for them wasn't really that they needed to drink less soda.

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It was an energy issue so maybe they need to get more consistent with exercise.

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And start kind of building up their energy that way.

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Maybe they need to focus on getting more sleep.

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Maybe they need to focus on getting higher quality nutrients into their day.

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Or maybe they just need to be able to plan to have food more readily

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available that they can eat at work.

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That's going to give them that energy throughout the day.

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So that way they're not reaching for those sodas.

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And the thing is I don't know specifically all of their details.

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This wasn't a client.

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This was just somebody I was having a conversation with.

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So I don't know all the details.

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I don't know specifically which one of those things they might need to work on.

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But I'm just kind of sharing this story because I want you guys to see

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that a lot of times we get so focused on trying to fix a certain thing.

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And we're struggling to fix it, and we don't understand the why.

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And the why here is actually quite simple.

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Because if your behavior is solving a problem for you, and you're trying to

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take away the solution to the problem, your brain is going to fight you

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every single step of the way, right?

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Because your brain's like, hey, we have a problem.

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We need a solution for it, we have a solution, just because you don't like it,

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right, just because it's causing you to put on a few extra pounds, just because

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it's maybe creating some other issues for you is irrelevant, because it's keeping

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us going, right, because that's what your brain cares about, your brain cares

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about keeping you alive, which means you need to be alert, unless it's time to

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go to bed, and so, Your brain, in this instance of using the energy example,

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is going, Hey, we need that caffeine.

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We need that sugar rush in order to stay active and stay alert.

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So, without fixing the underlying energy issue, this person is never

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going to be able to give up that soda.

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Right?

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I mean, they could maybe force themselves to do it, but then

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they're just going to be tired.

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And then what's going to happen?

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They'll either go back to the soda, or they'll find another coping mechanism

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that may be just as bad as the soda potentially and so that's really the

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crux of this idea is that we have to come up with a solution right we have to

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understand the problem that our behavior actually solves for us and then we have

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to understand what are the other ways I can solve that problem right because if

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you do not take care of that aspect of it You're going to continue to have issues.

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I mean, we can look at this in a lot of different ways.

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So, for example, and by the way, just really quick to share this.

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This is why I always talk about the idea of synergy, right?

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This is why I talk about synergistic.

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Self improvement.

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Because if you are only looking at things one aspect at a time, and

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you're missing the impact that multiple areas have on one another, you will

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completely miss this whole idea.

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Right?

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Because like I said, with the energy thing, it could be sleep, it could be

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nutrition, it could be exercise, it could be that they're exercising too much, it

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could be that they're not eating enough of the right foods, it could be that they're

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eating too much of the wrong foods.

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Right?

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It could be that they're eating foods at the wrong time and

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it's disrupting their sleep.

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They're exercising at the wrong time and it's disrupting their sleep.

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There's so many different things that can have an impact on those and

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they're all interrelated to each other.

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So that's why it's so important to be able to take this holistic approach.

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In Viewpoint, when we're trying to solve these problems, as opposed

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to just focusing on one single thing, Oh, I want to lose weight.

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I need to cut calories.

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Soda has calories.

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Let me cut that out, right?

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Because that's not really going to solve the problem.

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It might help with, with weight loss, if you can actually manage to do it.

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There's other ways to lose weight other than just cutting out soda, right?

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So that's really kind of where I wanted to point this out.

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So to give you some other examples of where this might come.

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I had a client once who, every time he would get off work,

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had like a two hour drive home.

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And he'd get home, and the minute he walked in the door, his wife who's been

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with the kids all day about to lose her freaking mind, just so desperately wants

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to have a conversation with another adult.

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that she just bombards him with everything that's going on that day.

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And his kids, who have been, you know, bouncing all over the

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place, are so excited to see dad.

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that they run up to him and they want to talk to him.

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They want to tell him everything.

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So this, this guy who just got through this two hour car drive, stress

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levels are like to the max, is now walking into the house and suddenly,

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suddenly being bombarded by everybody.

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And his thought process was, I just need to tell my family.

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I need to be able to have that conversation.

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This is what he came to me and said.

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He goes, I need you to help me figure out how to have this conversation.

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With my wife and kids and let them know that I just need a little bit of time,

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like not much, if I could just have even two or three minutes, honestly,

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would be enough for me to be able to just kind of unwind and just kind of,

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you know, just get home, get settled in.

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And I told her, I said, listen, I'm going to be honest with you here, man.

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I don't think there's a way you can have this conversation

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with your wife or your kids.

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And then not be a problem, right?

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So we started looking at it.

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We said, okay, what are what's the underlying problem?

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What is this behavior that you're exhibiting, right?

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This, this frustration that you're having this desire to lash out because I, I

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might've left that part out, but that's what usually would end up happening

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is he would kind of lash out out of frustration that he wasn't getting that

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time and that no one, no one seemed to respect the fact he had been at

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work all day and just drove two hours.

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And I said, what, what is this behavior that you're exhibiting

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accomplishing for you, right?

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You feel like it's setting a boundary.

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That's, that's what he said.

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And the reality is, the real problem it was solving was, it was a stress reliever.

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You had a lot of stress.

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That eruption.

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was just your body's way of getting rid of that stress.

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I said, so if we can find a way to get you some stress relief

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beforehand, maybe we can remove that.

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So we came up with a very, very simple game plan, guys.

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When I tell you this, you're gonna be like, wow, that is ridiculously simple.

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He had a place he could pull in, uh, down the street from his house before

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he got, before he actually got home.

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Just, it was like maybe, you know, two, three minutes from the house.

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Pulled over and he just put on a song that he really enjoyed and took a couple

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deep breaths and really just got into the song and allowed that stress to melt away.

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And then he got, you know, started the car back up, drove home, or I guess he

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left the car running, and drove home.

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And when he walked in the door, he didn't have that stress buildup anymore.

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It was gone because he had already released it.

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And so the moment he walked in the door, he was able to have the

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joy of his kids running to him.

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He was able to be present and hear his wife talking to him.

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And it just was a better situation for everyone involved, where he thought

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he needed to set boundaries and have these difficult conversations.

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All he really needed to do was take two or three minutes out to listen

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to some music and take a couple of breaths before going all the way home.

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And he could have probably stopped in the driveway and

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did it if he wanted to, right?

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But that's the point, is that a lot of times we get so focused on the one thing

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that we think we have to do, the thing that we think is going to be the solution.

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But it's not the real solution because what we're doing is

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we're solving the wrong problem.

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Hope you guys found a lot of great value in that today.

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If you did, I would really appreciate if you could leave us a review and

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I'll drop a link in the show notes for all the places you could go do that

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on Spotify, on Apple, on Podchaser.

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That would really mean a lot to me if you guys could do that for me.

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And of course, if you have any questions or you just want some help

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with creating these Unshakable Habits in your life so that you can take

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back control of your schedule, you can head over to UnshakableHabits.

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com and schedule a free roadmap call today.

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And I will be glad to walk you through the process and show you

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how we can help you to do that.

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So next week, we are going to be changing the format just a little bit.

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And you're going to be seeing more short episodes like this.

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The plan is to do them daily, Monday through Friday.

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And I'm excited to share with you that next week we're

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going to have a special guest.

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And we're going to be talking all about what to do if you find yourself always

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busy, always doing all the things, yet.

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Also finding yourself always feeling behind, always feeling

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like you just can't get caught up.

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I'm going to have a special guest, Christine Jewell, the author of Drop

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the Armor, is going to be with us all week long talking about that.

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So make sure you guys are following and subscribed to the podcast.

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It is 100 percent free to do that, and that way you do not miss an episode.

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So guys, until next time, I want to remind you, as always, That while

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none of us are born unshakable, we can all become unshakable.

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