The Manifestor's Manifesto

What is shadowboxing?

Shadowboxing is boxing without an opponent. Moving your hands and feet. Throwing punches. Dance like a butterfly. Sting like a bee. 

But it’s just you. You’re not fighting anyone.

You go through the motions without an opponent. And you do this to get the motions down for when you DO fight an opponent. 

Fighters shadowbox so they can train their muscle memory. When they fight a real person, they won’t have to focus their attention on their own movements, because it’s second nature. 

Instead, they can focus all of their energy and attention on their opponent.

Okay…

What does this have to do with forming new habits, though? 

When you create a new habit, reduce as much friction as possible between your current behavior and the new habit you want to create.

One way to do this is shadowboxing. Shadowboxing is acting out a fight before a real fight. When you...

Change your environment, change your habits

Change where you work if you want to form new habits.

I call this “the nomad life.” 

Change your workspace. This can mean going to a different space each day or on a regular basis. Or it can just mean picking a new regular space from where you typically work right now. 

If you work from home, start working in coffee shops. Or a bookstore. Go to the library. 

If funds are tight, just set up work in a different room of the house then you normally use. 

The key here is that you start a new habit with a new environment. 

Why?

The reason is simple. Our habits are largely driven by stimulus-response. That just means when a certain stimulus in your environment happens, you act a certain way. 

If this -> then that. 

When you first sip that coffee in the morning, you’ve trained yourself to read your emails. 

When...

Sleep better and be more productive

Some things are simple. Sleep is one of those things. 

When you get good sleep - and enough of it - then you’ll improve your ability to get things done. Not to mention you’ll also be happier and healthier too. Because who doesn’t like to sleep?

But in terms of habit hacks, sleep is an easy way to improve your habits and be more effective in reaching your goals. 

If you want to improve your sleep, play binaural beats while you’re sleeping. (I’ve already talked about the importance of avoiding blue light and screens before sleeping here). 

What are binaural beats?

A binaural beat is a tone your brain produces when you hear two different tones in each ear. 

If you hear a tone at 100 Hertz (Hz) in your left ear and a tone of 120 Hz in your right ear, then your brain will make up the difference and “produce” a tone of 10 Hz. 

Your...

Stop waiting till you feel like it

You’ve heard of the 5-minute rule. Here’s the 5-second rule.

This is the 5-second rule: if there’s something you want to do, count to five (backward) and then start. 

That’s it.

5-4-3-2-1…start.

That’s why it’s called the 5-second rule. When you want to do something, you have to act NOW.

Hold on

Wait.

What if I’m not ready?

What if I don’t know how to do it?

What if I don’t quite…feel like it yet?

Doesn’t matter.

If you want to form new habits, then you have to act now. 

It doesn’t matter if you know what you’re doing.

It doesn’t matter if you feel like it.

It doesn’t even matter if you fail.

You have to act. 

Why this works

The 5-second rule sounds dumb. 

You literally just count down and start doing...

How your identity drives your habits

I want to share with you something that has transformed my life and tons of others.

It’s called the Be - Do - Have model.

Ready to transform your life? 

Focus on who you are first and who you want to be BEFORE you start thinking about what you want and how to form habits.

You’re not going to have the success you want until you become the person that has that success. It’s all about identity. 

Identity

How does this happen? How can you shift perspective to your identity?

Sounds hard.

But it’s not. Because if you have a goal in mind - something that you want or a habit you want to form - then you already have a corresponding identity attached to it. 

You just haven’t made yourself aware of it. 

When you think about getting up every morning to work out at the gym. Hit the pool. Lift some weights. You’re already imagining that person you want to...

Change your beliefs, change your habits

Before you think about the new habits you want, think about the old beliefs you have now.

If you try to change a habit without checking your beliefs, then it will be much harder to make that change permanent. 

You might change a habit for a short time. You might get up in the morning and go to the gym for a week or two. 

You might start eating healthy for a little while, but if your underlying beliefs don’t change, then the new habit won’t last. 

Our habits always snap back into alignment with our beliefs.

Why?

That’s because our beliefs affect our habits. And our brains will always seek alignment between our beliefs and our habits.

Your subconscious will produce results in your life that are congruent with what you believe. In a weird way, it’s a way of keeping you happy, because our brains don’t like conflict.

Because your brain wants to...

Why it’s okay to operate out of other people’s comfort zone

If you want to create a new habit, stop people pleasing. You don’t have to do what other people expect you to do. 

And that’s…okay.

I thought this was an important message to send out at Christmastime, because dealing with family and friends and Christmas, while wonderful, can also be stressful. 

During Christmas we think about our lives and changes that we want to make in the new year. 

And unfortunately, being around loved ones, we sometimes feel that we’re kept in a box. Because they expect us to act a certain way.

And you have to get over that. 

The idea of people pleasing could be a long article, because it’s a big topic. So I may write about it again later. But right now I just want to talk about one specific aspect of people pleasing.

And that aspect is habits.

It’s all habits

...

How this helps increase your energy the next day

Phones are an easy target. We all know we’re addicted to them. 

But we don’t like to be reminded of that either. 

We love 'em. We hate 'em.

We know they’re bad. But we’re gonna keep using them.

But…if you can reduce your phone usage during this one crucial time, then you’ll see major improvements in your energy levels and your ability to get stuff done. 

How screen time affects you

Screen time before bed does three main things:

• It exposes you to harmful blue light
• It increases your alertness 
• It reduces your time in REM sleep

Blue light

The screens in our devices emit harmful blue light. This can damage your retinas (which is why it’s important to wear blue light blocking glasses if you look at a screen often). 

Blue light can also suppress your ability to produce melatonin. Melatonin is a...

An easy way to plan your day 

Multi-tasking does not work. If you want to be successful and accomplish your goals, then this is one myth that you need to let go of.

A lot of people think they can multitask, but that’s just a coping mechanism for our overworked, overscheduled world. But if you want to get more done, then start by accepting this truth.

That’s because concentration is one of the first rules of success. The more that you’re able to focus on and pay attention to one thing then the more you’ll be able to get the job done and do it well.

You’ve probably noticed, but this is one of the main points in a lot of habit hacks, you’re more productive when you’re able to eliminate unnecessary thoughts and emotions from the task at hand. 

Remember that your brain is an efficient machine. In order to help your brain be more productive, remove anything that drains energy or focus. 

...

3 ways to re-think repetition

When you think of habit hacks, you think of ways to get around how humans normally operate. Some insight or new way of thinking to break through convention. 

And that’s a good thing. One of the wonderful things about the modern day information age is the wealth of knowledge at your fingertips that can help you make marginal improvements on every part of your life. Never give up trying to crack the code.

But sometimes...old school works. 

And when it comes to creating a positive habit, old school repetition is one of the best ways to succeed.

Repetition

First off, why do I keep saying “old school?” 

Well, that’s because old school is cool. Everybody likes to be old school. 

When you’re old school, it means you appreciate simple wisdom. Bread and butter. Meat and potatoes. Nothing wrong with the new stuff, but don’t forget the old stuff that...