Hey everyone, I'm Jonathan Cutrell, you're listening to Developer Tea Friday Reveals. Happy Friday everybody! This is the first Friday Reveals episode of Developer Tea and you might notice things are a little bit different in this episode. Music's a little bit different, the tone is a little bit different, and that's all on purpose. Friday Reveals are a different kind of Developer Tea episode. We're going to get into that, but first I want to say, I love Fridays. I've grown up loving Fridays. Who hasn't? It marks the end of the week and marks a chance to look back on your accomplishments, but also you're able to look forward to some rest, some time to be away from your work and to recover from the week. But sometimes we love Fridays for the wrong reasons. We love Fridays because we're looking forward to and escape. And that's why we're creating Friday Reveals. The idea here is to energize you going into your weekend. We should be able to rest with energy. I know that sounds kind of like a contradiction, but hopefully it makes sense to you rest with energy. In other words, rest with intention and purpose and excitement for what the rest will bring. So what exactly will Friday Reveals look like? The point of Friday Reveals is to do a short as in three to five minutes show that is focused on advice and inspiration and doesn't have any sponsors. We're going to get straight to the point on the Friday Reveals so that you can get on with your weekend. I'm super excited about it and we're going to get started with some advice today. And the advice is very simple. Stop looking for motivation and start looking for small obstacles. Stop looking for motivation and start looking for small obstacles. This is the number one problem that people have with building good habits following through on their motivations and actually getting things done that care about doing behavioral research will show you this a hundred times over motivation is not the fuel that is needed to follow through motivation is not the fuel that is needed to fall through motivation may help you get started and we can take advantage of that. I'll tell you how in just a second motivation is not the fuel you do not need to be hyper motivated every single day. What you need every day is habits. What you need every day is behavioral attention behavioral consistency. These are the things that will help you achieve the things you care about achieving and how do we get there. I'll give you a short anecdote about my personal journey for creating this podcast and for being consistent in my daily workout region. Creating this podcast I realized that the thing that was keeping me from getting going was having my stuff set up. I want to have as close to a single button push as possible to record these episodes of this show. Because here's the reality, the smallest amount of friction, the smallest barrier that's in your way is very likely to be the reason why you don't do the thing that you want to do. There's an interesting dichotomy there. The thing that you want to do is there seems to be two use. There's one you that looks at that small obstacle and says it's easier to just not do that thing. And there's another you, the motivated you. Remember we talked about how motivation isn't the fuel. There's the motivated you that says, oh, I really do want to do that thing. So how can you make the motivated you beat the other you, the obstacle lazy you? It turns out that it's not by pumping up that motivation to overpower those obstacles. That's not at all how you can win this game. Instead, it's by making the excuses disappear. Look at the obstacles that are keeping you from doing the thing that you, the non-lazy version of you wants to do. I've set up my recording studio to be able to click about three buttons and get started recording an episode of this show. The night before I'm supposed to be working out the following morning, I set up my gym closed, sometimes I even wear my gym closed bed. I have my shoes out. I have my pre-workout supplements out on the counter. I take my shaker bottle and I make sure that it's clean and ready to go. And everything is set up. I'm ready to go. And the only excuse that I have in the morning is that I don't want to. Not that I don't have time because everything's already prepared. I've focused on those small obstacles. Using the smallest obstacles that are causing friction in the thing that the non-lazy version of you wants to do, remove the friction, remove all of the possibilities for excuses. And here's what's amazing. This is actually a strategy that doesn't just work on ourselves. It works on other people as well. One of the most important sales strategies that you can find in the negotiating books that are out there. Many of them make the argument that the most important work you can do as a salesman is to remove the objections. Rather than just simply making a case for the value of a thing, it's very likely if you already are having the conversation about this product that the value is already there. It's the objections that you should focus on. The detractions, if you can remove all of the detractions, then all that's left is action. All that's left is the yes. All that's left is following through on our motivations. And so how do you actually have the energy to do this? How can you find the energy to remove those initial distractions, all of those first things that cause us to not follow through? That's where motivation comes in. Your motivation the night before when you think about working out the next day. Don't let that motivation go to waste. Use that motivation to remove those excuses. Use the motivation to set up your gym clothes on the floor so that when you wake up, they're staring you in the face. It's easy rather than just slightly harder to say yes. Thanks so much for listening to this first Friday refill episode of Developer Tea. Have a good weekend and until next time, enjoy your tea.