Happy Thanksgiving and Some Notes for the Holidays

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! What a great year it has been. You know it has been a good year when the beginning of the year feels like it was 5-10 years ago. It feels like the things we were doing in January were occurring in a different generation. This is a good sign of progress and we’re thrilled about the progress in 2019. The second biggest thing to be thankful for is health. No issues in 2019 and that’s a huge positive. As we’ve said many times in the past, being healthy is certainly more important than being wealthy (can’t enjoy money if your health is a mess).

Get Ready to Run Hard: This post is directed to the future winners in society. If you’re a future winner, you know that the holiday season is one of busiest times for you. While everyone else is purchasing… You’re the one selling those products. While everyone else is out drinking and watching football on TV, you’re in a room getting set for the 2020 plan. Long story short, you’re not alone in these decisions processes and we want to thank you for your hard work. Whatever product you’re making we hope it sells well as you’re a productive member of society and deserve every penny that goes your way.

As a good rule of thumb, an easy way to get work done during the holidays (if you’re forced to go to a few events) is to step out when “entertainment begins”. Generally speaking, whenever the entertainment portion is occurring, no one will mind if you’re missing. In fact, most won’t even notice as they are busy watching the game or show. This will give you several hours of dead time and you can do one of the following even remotely: 1) catch up on reading – documents/contracts/a specific book you need to understand a problem, 2) create a plan for 2020 in terms of what your focus items will be and 3) schedule out all of your travel for the start of the year – always incredibly busy.

The other benefit we want to highlight is that you’re free to turn off all of your electronics. You don’t need to be responsive to your cell phone. Surprisingly this even includes customers. That’s one huge benefit. During the holiday season you can think clearer since your reaction time does not need to be on point. Of course… This does not include particular product launches or sale days (customers expect quick responses), we’re referring to the speed of your replies during the expected down times (Thanksgiving, Christmas week, New Years etc.)

Best Time to Increase Fitness: Unsurprisingly, the gym is near empty during the holidays. If you’re looking to improve your fitness, now is the time to strike (January is a terrible time to start as the gym is incredibly crowded). It’s strange but we’ve actually adapted to this and January 1 generally marks peak fitness followed by what we’d call “stable fitness” levels. It is not possible to maintain peak fitness levels year round (anyone with sports training knows this), and November-December is the ideal time to strike. No one is around, all equipment is available and you have significantly lower amounts of “social responsibility”.

Surprisingly, you can actually eat healthy during the holidays as well. This is shocking to most as the average person gains a significant amount of weight. Even if you go to family gatherings with large amounts of food, you can simply decide to eat the vegetables and meat (avoiding all of the pies and unhealthy items). For some reason, sugary foods are considering “uplifting foods” even though they make you feel groggy within 24 hours. If you eat the healthy food, you’ll be in a better mood the next day and during the events you plan on attending as well.

Topics to Avoid: If you’ve been through enough holiday seasons, you know the same old stuff occurs. Arguments about politics, sports and internal family items (so and so who dislikes so and so). The best way to avoid all of it is to simply never talk about it. Off limit items include: 1) work, 2) politics and 3) your latest success. You’d think that success would be celebrated at holiday events but there is always someone within earshot who will be upset that you’re doing well (don’t ask us why it just happens). Instead focus on things that everyone will agree on: how good XYZ food is that is being served, how happy you are for (insert older person who is officially done working) and if possible anything related to the weather if you’re in a warm climate for the gathering.

The general idea from the above is that you want to bring up topics that make people look like monsters if they disagree. If someone is retiring (above 60) it’s practically impossible to say they are undeserving. If you focus on food, at minimum the other people are forced to be polite and if it’s related to weather this is a commodity everyone gets to enjoy and you’re not “standing out from the crowd”. In normal settings, when you’re trying to build yourself up, commanding attention is the name of the game. Simply reverse this game and focus on anything positive that is inclusive (everyone in the room is getting the benefits). And…. Remember to leave those fancy clothing items at home… No name brands.

Things We’re Thankful For: Luckily this isn’t a family gathering so we’ll go ahead and list the things that many of you are likely thankful for as well.

• Extremely good health. This has been a blessing. You cannot change genetics and being born with good genetics + a healthy diet is practically equal to winning the lottery. At minimum everyone can have a great diet. On that note, one area where we lean liberal? We think healthy food should be subsidized while unhealthy food is taxed heavily to help improve the well being of the population. But. That’s a topic for another day
• Good Economy. 2008 was absolutely awful. Anyone who graduated after 2010 or so does not know what it is like to see a recession (2009 saw some of this as it was hard to find job openings). We’re throwing every cent into cash and crypto as mentioned before and it has been a good decision as our stress levels have come down dramatically
• Software. The industry continues to get better and it is becoming lifesaving. If anyone has a new cool software tool that is helping them save money or save time… Feel free to leave it in the comments. Being able to reduce mundane tasks to practically nothing is a miracle
• Avoiding bad weather. This is actually an important aspect when it comes to quality of life. While underrated when you’re young and living a rough life (long hours, cramped apartments), good weather causes your mood to be higher at all times (negative degree weather is practically never fun)
• High quality friends. This is extremely rare in a society that is now all about hooking up and taking a lot of drugs. If you have five people you can really trust you’re extremely rich from a social perspective. In this regard, being rich is yet another miracle
• Advances in Healthcare Technology. The entire idea of aging naturally is now dead, by the time you’re in your late 30s jumping onto hormone replacement therapy is a smart move. You can also get basic dysport/botox injections to improve your skin as well. Beyond this, your parents/grandparents also enjoy a much high quality of life due to improved healthcare systems and improved monitoring in case something terrible happens (faster response time). Overall, we’re unsure which one of these may apply to you. But. They are incredibly valuable
• Low Survival Stress. We can only describe this one. There is are various types of stress. The good type of stress includes: 1) deadlines, 2) high pressure performance situations and 3) effort in the gym. The bad types of stress include: 1) worrying about losing your job/career because it could financially ruin you, 2) being constantly micromanaged by a high intensity manager and 3) any time you are physically sick/ill. The second category is under what we call “survivor stress” and the sooner you can get rid of it the better off you’ll be. Rich people don’t seem to age largely because they have lower levels of stress. We will never prove this. But. We believe stress is the #1 killer in the United States. It is simply not healthy.
• The Internet. While competition continues to go up rapidly, the internet has been a great equalizer. Without it, opportunities would be limited. With the internet, assuming you’re talented in at least one activity, there is a way for you to get rich if you are willing to try and fail numerous times in a row.

On that note we’ll go ahead and get back to writing our next product. Generally speaking we won’t release anything for a couple of years as this continues to be a hobby. But. It has been fun so far and we hope everyone who reads this gets a chance to hit the gym hard this month! Best time of the year to get ahead from a physical perspective.