Speaker 1: 0:06

Welcome back. Welcome back, sweet Spotters. It's Take Action Tuesday here on the Sweet Spot, and I'm Dr Derek Sweet. I'm your host. For those of you who don't know me, I'm a board-certified psychiatrist. I specialize in sports psychiatry and high performance, but what I love to do most is to work on inspiration and motivation. My whole thing is about living a life you love. How do we do that? How do we live the life we love?

Speaker 1: 0:34

Well, this week, my friends, we are looking at an invisible thread that's running through our lives. We are spending time with time. Yes, yesterday, on Making Moves Monday, we talked about time. We said that time is this invisible thread that's running through every single moment of our lives. And how wild it is that time is shaping us as human beings. How the past turns into memories that we either hold tight or we try to forget. How the future becomes these expectations that we're either running towards or kind of trying not to have come or avoiding, or how the present is something that's fleeting. It doesn't last, the present, but if we don't pay attention to it, it's gone before we know it. And so we are in the middle of time at all times. And here's the thing, even though time is sort of always there. It's a very sneaky thing. It slips away while we're busy. One day you wake up and you ask yourself where did the time go? Okay, sometimes you look in the mirror and you go what's happening to me? Where did the time go? So, my friends, I want you to spend some time with me today, on Take Action Tuesday, and let's dig into the power of time and how decisions and time are linked.

Speaker 1: 2:12

The future depends on what you do today. That's what Gandhi said. The future depends on what you do today, and when I say future, I'm referring to time. So, my friends, sweet spotters, think about that for a second. Not what you plan to do, not what you hope to do, but what you actually do today, the actions you take today on Take Action Tuesday.

Speaker 1: 2:43

Because the truth is, time is not waiting for perfect conditions. You might be, I might be, but time, it never waits for the perfect conditions. And you know what? Neither should you. Do you ever catch yourself saying I'll do it when the time is right. I'm notorious for that. Not right now, I'll do it when the time is right. I'm notorious for that. Not right now, I'll do when the time is right, I'll figure it out. That's me. But let me ask you who decides when the time is right? Because time itself it's neutral. It doesn't pause for our hesitations, it doesn't give us extra minutes If we say we need more time, it just moves. And the ones who take action, they move with time, they get it.

Speaker 1: 3:39

So it's easy to think that action follows motivation, and I work with athletes, I work with high performers, I work with a lot of folks who are in high-pressure situations and we've been conditioned to think that get motivated and then I'll take the action. But actually the science tells us otherwise. It's the opposite. Psychologists call it the action bias. The action bias when we move first, our brains create momentum. Remember that whole striatum thing? I talked to you about that part of the brain. So when we move first, our brains create momentum.

Speaker 1: 4:20

Action isn't just the result of motivation, then it's the cause of motivation. Taking an act, doing something, actually can create the motivation you're looking for. Wow, the action bias, remember it. Tony Robbins puts it this way the path to success is to take massive, determined action. Success isn't about waiting for clarity, it's about deciding and moving. I'll repeat it, tony Robbins the path to success is to take massive, determined action. What a great quote for Take Action Tuesday. In the Torah this is taught too, this concept, this concept of making your move and taking action. You see, it's one thing to make your move we did that yesterday on Making Moves Monday it's another thing to decide and take action and translate that into a real action. You got to get up and move, that's true, but then you have to take a determined action.

Speaker 1: 5:34

In the Torah it says this in Exodus, when the Israelites were standing before the Red Sea, they were trapped between the waters and Pharaoh's army. It was a coming. Pharaoh's army was on him. And what did they do? They hesitated Because, listen, they were up against the water. And what did God say to them? In the text it said God said why do you cry to me? What are you asking me for? Tell the people to move forward. That was in Exodus 14, 15. I love it. Tell the people to move forward. I'm going to translate that into today's language. Tell them to get up off there you know what? And take action. Okay, the seed didn't part before they moved. It parted because they moved. Do you get that? So that's just something to think about. Just think about that the action sometimes is what you need to do in order to get the results you're looking for, not the thought, not the thinking all the time. So okay, so, okay.

Speaker 1: 6:56

So this hesitation trap thing. So why do we hesitate? I'll tell you, as somebody who counsels individuals and provides therapy. There are three areas. One is the fear of the unknown. If you haven't heard that podcast, we did a whole week on that a couple of months ago on dealing with the unknown and the uncertain. And God knows, we're living in unknown and uncertain times right now.

Speaker 1: 7:19

So that's a reason people hesitate. They get into the hesitation trap. There's a fear of the unknown. We're naturally set up like that. I talked to you about the amygdala, I talked to you about the fear circuits of the brain, the limbic system, the hippocampus and other parts of the brain that, uh, remember things that might be scary and we naturally designed to protect ourselves. So that's one. The second one is the illusion of the right time. There's this illusionary thing where we think there's such a thing as the right time. It doesn't exist, we just create it. It's like, oh, that'll be the right time, right. So that's another thing that can make people hesitate. And then the third thing is just overthinking small choices when they could just make a quick decision. You ever been around somebody like that Just making a small choice? And they have so much trouble because they overthink and these things stop us from moving forward.

Speaker 1: 8:14

Jim Rohn said it best you cannot make progress without making decisions, and Kerry Russell reminds us sometimes it's the smallest decisions that can change your life forever. The problem we don't realize which decisions matter most until much later we, retrospectively, we look back and go oh man, I should have, I should have said this, I should have done that. But every move, my friend, every action, my friend, creates a ripple effect and you've got to understand that. You've got to take action. So how do we stop waiting and start taking action? Here's how One try the do it now rule If a decision takes less than 60 seconds.

Speaker 1: 9:06

I've said this before in previous podcasts. I'm just repeating myself If a decision takes less than 60 seconds, make it immediately. Train yourself to choose instead of hesitate. Be the kind of person that, look, this thing takes 60 seconds or less. I'm doing it now. Okay, that's it. The do it now rule.

Speaker 1: 9:29

Then the five minute jumpstart If you're struggling to get going, give yourself just five minutes of action. Chances are you won't stop. So you have to write a paper. Just say okay, I'm just going to give myself five minutes. You have to go to the gym, you don't feel like working out? Just give yourself five minutes. Anytime you give yourself five minutes, the brain, those structures in the brain, love this action and it builds on it. You'll be surprised.

Speaker 1: 10:00

Try the five minute jumpstart rule. And then the other thing is Yates said it this way make the iron hot. Don't wait for the iron to get hot. You make the iron hot by striking it. Stop waiting, wasting time, waiting for perfect conditions. Create them. You know, strike while the iron is hot. Well, you could be up there for 20 years waiting for this iron to get hot. Sometimes we ain't got that kind of time. You got to hit that iron, plug it in, do something, make it hot, and that's how you get things done.

Speaker 1: 10:36

And the last thing I'll share with you is the 24-hour rule. If something really matters, take one small action towards it within the next 24 hours. You tell yourself all right, I'm going to use a 24-hour rule here. I'm going to take one small action within the next 24 hours on this issue. So, all right, let's review. You have to do it now. Rule less than 60 seconds, make it happen. You have the five minute jump rule. Give yourself just five minutes of action. You have to make the iron hot by striking it rule Stop waiting for perfect conditions. Create them. You have the 24-hour rule. If it matters, I'm going to take one small action within 24 hours Now. You ain't got no excuse. You're ready. I'm asking you right now. Here's the challenge. Here's the challenge. Here's the take action tuesday challenge.

Speaker 1: 11:29

Think of one decision. You've been putting off just anything. Maybe it's big, maybe it's small. Step one Give yourself a time limit. Remember, action thrives when it has a deadline. And then, if you're hesitating and you're feeling like, oh my God, I don't know if I'm going to do it, what do you do? Five, four, three, two, one go.

Speaker 1: 12:03

Remember that exercise, because time it's moving. It's moving. The question is are you? Are you moving? All right, remember my friends, don't wait to strike till the iron is hot, but make it hot by striking. All right, now. That's your Take Action Tuesday message. If this spoke to you, please share it with someone, someone who may need to hear it, someone who may need to take action and I'll see you tomorrow for guess what? Win it All Wednesday, where we're going to explore how belief and time shape success. Until then, I want you to keep moving forward and I want you to keep taking action, and I want you to love yourself, believe in yourself and trust yourself. Stick with me. I'm Dr Derek Sweet. You're in the sweet spot and I'll see you tomorrow. If you'd like to check me out on YouTube, if you'd like to check me out on LinkedIn, Instagram or Threads, see you there.