Episode 14 Final
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[00:00:00] Welcome to the Extraordinary Life Podcast from the creator of the Extraordinary Life Tribe, Crystal Obregon, the self-development podcast propelling you forward toward your goals. Using science backed high performance habits. Reach the next level in your physical and mental health. See new Heights in your relationships.
[00:00:18] Gain clarity on your purpose and live your extraordinary life. Welcome your host writers, speaker and coach Crystal Obregon. Hi there. This is Crystal from Crystal Obregon coaching with episode number 14 of the Extraordinary Life Podcast. This past month and a half, we've been talking about habits. And the last few weeks we've been talking about the high-performance habits.
[00:00:51] And so today I am talking about the third of the high performance habits, which is raising necessity. [00:01:00] As Brendon Burchard says in his book, high-performance habits, necessity is the emotional drive that makes great performance a must instead of a preference. So what I mean by that is that you need to be aware of why it's necessary for you to do well at whatever is important to you because honestly, You need to want to be excellent at what you do or really have a reason for wanting to achieve your goals or when the going gets tough, you might not continue.
[00:01:40] So another way to explain it would be that you need to ask yourself what internal or external pressures feed into your desire to do. And I know some people don't like the idea of pressure, but at some point that pressure is what will drive [00:02:00] you to succeed. Even when things might feel too hard, or you could just as easily go down an easier path that might not get you where you really want to be, but would put you in an okay place.
[00:02:16] Find a different word for it, if you want to, but get the general idea that it's really a positive pressure, even though you might not use that word pressure. So I'll start with the internal forces that make it necessary for you to do well. The first correlates with being clear on who you are and who you want to become and linking being good with your identity.
[00:02:45] I talked about this a few weeks ago in the podcast episode on seeking clarity. Being clear on who you are is the key to really understanding the step because so [00:03:00] called high-performers do hold themselves to a high standard and they care about doing well, especially in anything they associate as being important to their identity.
[00:03:12] And this is true, whether they care about. The particular thing that they have to do to live into their identity or not. For example, I might identify as being a great mom and when my kids were younger, I might have spent. A lot of time in the morning, making them a great, fresh lunch to take to school. And at the time it felt like it was being part of my identity as a great mom to do this.
[00:03:47] So that even if I felt lazy in the morning about making their lunch, I would do it anyway because it felt like part of my identity. And I'm not saying that it's a requirement for every mom to [00:04:00] make this great lunch in the morning. I'm far beyond comparing parenting styles or who does what and being a great mom.
[00:04:09] Now, my mean being available when my son or my daughter wants to talk about something or keeping my son at the dinner table while I finish eating since. A slow poke because I might learn something about what's going on in his life that I wouldn't otherwise, or it might mean picking him up at nine or 10 o'clock at night, from a friend's house when I would just assume be in bed at that time.
[00:04:39] And then on the other hand, I am perfectly happy to hand him some money to get the burrito that he really wants for lunch these days. Another example would be in the past year. I've purposely tried to shift my identity back to being a mountain biker for the [00:05:00] fitness. And also because my husband and I met mountain biking.
[00:05:05] And as we're starting to approach in four years being empty nesters, I want to make sure. That I get that connection back with him. In that case, it will be necessary for me to get out on my mountain bike a few days a week, at least so that I have the fitness to be able to ride with him and have fun with it.
[00:05:32] And then another example is one of my coaching client. It's part of her identity as a professional musician to perform with excellence. So her daily practice is really non-negotiable. She may not always love practicing a particular part of a piece of music, but she does it anyway. The second step for maintaining necessity [00:06:00] is to really go deep and allow obsession on.
[00:06:05] Important to you. So using my musician client as an example, again, that could be for her continuing with lessons, even though she's already very accomplished and learning new pieces of music to challenge herself. And for me, it's being immersed in personal development books, trainings, or audios, and I can look back over my life and see that.
[00:06:33] Pattern of interest or that passion in personal growth. And in the past probably seven or eight years, I've really allowed myself to go deep in the subject. And so you could come to my home and see the stacks of books that I'm currently reading either in my office or my living room or by my bedside table.
[00:06:58] I'm always [00:07:00] thinking, not only about how to be better myself, but also how to help my clients and also how to bring this to more people outside of my primary sphere of influence. And then the third way to use the internal forces are in big picture planning. I spend time about once a year, envisioning how I want my life to be 10 years from now.
[00:07:32] Down to the smallest detail. And then from there, I consolidate my vision into 10 goals for 10 years from now. This is what we do in my design, your decade workshop. And I've made it into an online program now. Anyone can do it on their own time. Then I write down this 10 dreams for 10 years from now every morning, along with the five things I'm grateful [00:08:00] for.
[00:08:00] And when short-term goal I'm working on. I have a vague plan for reaching my tenure goals, things that I need to do often daily or monthly. And I don't really get too hung up on the, how it's going to happen as we never really know what's in store for the future, but I have a rough plan and I know that it's going to change, but it puts me on a path or a direction.
[00:08:31] And it's a rough plan because I know I certainly wasn't expecting when I did this work at the beginning of 2020, a global pandemic, but I'm still planning on reaching these goals. They have changed slightly connection and health. They gear much bigger into my goals and I don't think I'm the only one that values connection with others and health more than.
[00:08:59] And [00:09:00] I'll send no, that just that daily discipline is required to keep working towards those goals and staying connected to them by writing them every day. And then even having those daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, and yearly goals associated with my big picture plan helps too. And even if I, that. Meet those deadlines that I set for myself as quickly as I like, and I might need to course correct.
[00:09:29] Sometimes at least I'm working towards them and I have that direction. So the next three steps are really considered external forces or pressure coming a little bit more from outside. And I would say that I think that the first three, the internal forces are the most important, but using these external forces as well can be helpful.
[00:09:56] The fourth step is to know your consequences, [00:10:00] big or small of not performing with excellence or not taking those daily steps to work towards your goals or to be active. So, for example, what will happen if you don't show up what will happen if you don't exercise or you don't eat well, what will happen if you don't practice your instrument?
[00:10:25] What happens if I don't write this blog or post or record this podcast? So if I don't exercise, I might experience more stress, not sleep well at night, not be as inspired if I don't eat well, many of the same things, I won't have the energy to do the things that I want to do in the future. I might not have that energy to be with my older kids or someday my grandkids.
[00:10:57] There are lots of different [00:11:00] consequences. Could happen. If I don't take care of myself, for example, I've realized lately that I really need to tap into that necessity again, in the consequences. When it comes to my yoga practice, we're 18 months into doing classes online and it's become a lot harder for me to show up in person.
[00:11:24] I knew that once I left the house or step foot into the class, I would do it. I wouldn't walk out in the middle or I wouldn't turn around once I was outside of the house. Doing an online class. I get caught up in other things around the home, but then later in the day, if I haven't gone to my class online, I inevitably feel achy or stiff and I regret it.
[00:11:50] My consequence is not feeling as good in my body. And I could also go back to my identity, more of an internal [00:12:00] focus of my identity as someone who's consistent with my yoga practice and shows up at least twice a week. And then if I use the example of my musician client, if she doesn't practice. She won't feel as confident in her technique being flawless when she performs.
[00:12:21] And so it keeps her practicing every day. And that might seem a little bit like a negative feedback, but there's a consequence to it. In addition to just having it be part of her identity as a professional musician, instead of an amateur musician, even if maybe her audience wouldn't notice her mistakes, she would write.
[00:12:45] So that's a little external and internal. A lot of these can go both ways. And then the fifth is being of service to others. Sometimes it really helps you to push [00:13:00] through if your actions are what you do affect more than just you. If they're really bigger than yourself. So for example, one of the questions that I answer in my high-performance planner each morning is who needs me on my, a game.
[00:13:19] And the answer to this question can vary. Sometimes it's a big, broad women trying to get past obstacles in their life to live an extraordinary life. Or sometimes it's a family member or a friend who's having a hard time, or just maybe even needs me to set an example of not giving up. It can vary. So where do your goals or mission intersect with helping others?
[00:13:48] Does your art or music make people happy? Do you foster kittens to keep them out of shelters? They're really so many ways that. Getting up in [00:14:00] the morning and striving to do the best at what you do can impact others. And the key is to think about it and name it so that you can tap into it when being disciplined just for yourself, isn't doing the trick.
[00:14:19] All right. I really love this last one. Socializing your goals and your journey. And this one can take courage. As my mentor, Brendan says people aren't afraid of starting small. They're afraid of being seen starting small. So announcing your goals in relatively safe company. I don't necessarily mean just to the cheerleaders in your life, but to the people in your life that won't put you down or slow you down.
[00:14:50] Share what you're working on and your journey to getting there. It really, it gives you accountability. If you know that people are going to ask you how it's [00:15:00] going, then you're more likely to continue on. For example, when I decided to start this podcast, I announced it in several of my networking groups and to some of my friends and my family, anyone I could, while the excitement was high.
[00:15:18] And then as I went along, I shared how I put the pieces all together. And is it perfect? Is the journey perfect? No, but what did is started it's out there in the world. I'll get better as I go along. But if I hadn't announced it, it could have gone by the wayside when life got busy or when I was working on other things.
[00:15:42] So it was necessary for me to keep moving because I said I was going to all right, so this is a good start on necessity. It can be a little bit nuanced, but once you start thinking about these different pieces, you'll see where [00:16:00] they fit for you. So to recap, the six steps, first of all, link becoming good with your identity.
[00:16:08] The second was going deep and allowing obsession with what you're passionate about. The third is envisioning your big picture goals and having a rough plan of what you need to get. The fourth is knowing the consequences of not being excellent at what you do or not following through with your plan.
[00:16:32] Number five, figuring out who needs you to do what you're doing, and then six socializing your goals and your. So, if you want more help with any of these steps, you can always get started with a design, your decade online mini program that you can do anytime on your own. And if you're ready to be part of the community of women pursuing an extraordinary life.[00:17:00]
[00:17:00] My next cohort of the extraordinary life tribes starts soon and I'll have links to information for both in my show notes. Until next week. Be extraordinary. Bye for now. Thank you for listening to the extraordinary life podcast with Writer and coach Crystal Obregon. We'd love to connect with you outside of the podcast, too, to find more helpful insights, show notes and more about Crystal.
[00:17:27] Go to CrystalObregon.com that's O B R E G O N, where you will also find info for the Design Your Decade workshop. This workshop will help you to stop drifting and start creating until next time be extraordinary.
