Where they're making me any happier, absolutely not. Actually quite the opposite because I'd have to draw through, you know, draw after draw to find my favorite hoodie. And I found my probably only wardest aim to hoodies all the time, the two I kept, so to rest they're gone. So it's that journey towards essential living. And that means you're starting to question stuff that you're bringing into your life. You know, do you need new cycling kit? Do you need a new bike? Do you need new wheels? If the answer is yes, there's absolutely no problem. It's essential. You're bringing it into your life. It's bringing you happiness. It's bringing you joy. It's essential. But if you're just getting it to consume because it's not necessary, I guarantee it'll be a fleeting happiness. And that fleeting happiness, once it dissipates, all it's gonna leave is a hole in your bank account and it's gonna sit in the closet, gather and dust. So, but you're starting to make those deliberate decisions. We take back control. It starts in the wardrobe, it extends to life. We take back control, we take back control of our choices. You know, so many of our choices are we don't make them deliberately, we make them on autopilot, we make them by a mission, by failure to make a choice. You know, think about the typical career trajectory that we take out from school. You get certain points in your leaving cert, so you go down at a certain track. You know, for me it was into law. Coming out the fire, saw it a law, you're expected to get a job. out the first time I started a job you're expected to find someone to settle down. After that you're expected to have kids, expected to have a family. And that's all fine if you're deliberately choosing that, that's the deliberate life you're making for yourself. But if you're not choosing that and you're letting someone else choose it for you, society's determined in the past that you're gone. And the problem is, it's, there's always happiness is always just down the line. Happiness is always, once I graduate I'll be happy. Once I meet someone that I love I'll be happy. Once I get that job, I'll be happy. Once I get promotion, I'll be happy. Happiness is like, it's a carrot on the end of a stick and you can never quite get that carrot because no matter where you get happiness is always down the line. So this idea of essentialism, it's taken back control of that and saying, you know what, I have everything right now I need to be happy. Happiness isn't a someday pursuit for me. Happiness is something that's attainable and achievable right now with the tools I have with the place I am in my life right now I don't need anything else to be happy I don't need anything else to validate me I don't need the new car so my neighbor I'll think I'm super successful right now I have all the tools at my disposal I need to be happy it's all good it was deep it's all good it was deep so who knew starting to throw out some of your stuff in the wardrobe was actually a journey towards you know taking back control your life and just stop being a passenger or a prisoner or ever way you want to phrase it in your journey through life. I heard it was a Joe Rogan podcast I was listening to and Joe Rogan had a great analogy. One of the best pieces of advice I heard, I know some people hate non Joe Rogan because he's become so popular in the last 12 months but Joe Rogan has some nuggets. One of the ones he was saying is you should live your life like you're the hero in your own movie. So starting right now, you're writing this movie, you're the director. This movie can go any direction you want. Start it, start writing this movie, start scripting the hero's journey. So right now, you're the hero. Where do you want to go? What's the hero? What adventures is the hero gonna have? What crazy exploits is the hero gonna live true. And at the end of your life, if you can look back on this movie and proudly say, you know, I was badass. That was some fucking enjoyable stuff. That was a great life. I made contribution. I had meaning. I had connections and I had fun along the way. You know, that's a movie you weren't watching. If you have a look when you get to the end of the road and you look at this movie and you're embarrassed and you're apologetic and you're like, that was a boring ass movie.
I sat at home the same thing for 30 years. no adventure outside of work, I know meaningful connections with family because it's destructive, it's stupid shit like social media. You know it's not gonna be a movie you're gonna enjoy, it's gonna be a box office flop. So start now, script them and create your box office sensation movie. I think there's a Helen Keller quote where she said, life is either a daring adventure or noting it all. And I think that's a great mantra to I know we're at the point in the new year, what are we, January 22 or 24 or something. And I think it's January 19 or 20. It's typically the day when most people break their new year resolutions. So we're just past that. But what an amazing mantra to take into the new year. Take into the real part of the new year because it's a bullshit part of the new year to be in and because everybody's like, yo, I'll never go to gym seven days a week and I'm gonna have a six pack by February. You know, those ambitions, they're trivial, they're transient. So now we can start getting into meaningful stuff from the people who actually are serious about making change, control their hands up and say, yeah, I'm gonna start making change now. So this is the championship quarter. It's where we're gonna make meaningful change. It's starting around now. It's not the early periods of January. Imagine you took that mantra and you lived on it for the rest of the year. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all. What sort of mad stuff could you do? Like we're living in a true and unprecedented era with the internet, with the ability to work remotely, with the ability to just dream whatever you want into reality, any career you want into reality. You know, I have a talk show, I have a talk show on the radio and you're listening to it right now. How absolutely crazy is that? Like if I had a set to my career guidance counselor, yeah, my job is gonna be, I'm gonna sit down and I'm gonna talk Torf to a load of lads on the internet and this is how I'm gonna make my money, I'm gonna squander away my law degree. he would have said, get the bow here and locked up. This is a ridiculous thing to do. But you know what, I love talking to her, I love talking cycling and I thank you for listening and making that possible. So here's a really cool exercise I want you to try. So if you're in the car, you have my permission to pause this and pull over, try and take out an old-scale pen and paper. They don't do this on your phone. I don't know, there's something cool and there's something nice about the tactile nature of pen and paper, writing something to smell of it or something or the way you can touch the paper. I don't know. I want you to write on one side of the page your Sunday list. So, Sunday you would, you know, I'm gonna try and run the stuff that would be just cool to do. Someday I would like to live on my own terms. So, get up whenever I want, got a bed whenever I want to not have anyone telling me where I have to be at what times all day. Someday I would like to live in your own. Someday I would like to own an RV and travel the world in a someday. I would like to lose 10 kilograms someday. I would like to do gravel races in Europe someday. I would like to have a deeper more meaningful connection with my partner someday I would like to listen to my dad's all stories. So these are a lot of some day things common, some of them I and some of them are just common things I hear people saying that some day they'd love to do. Now on the backside of that paper, let's get you out everything you've done today. So you got up, you had breakfast that probably wasn't too healthy for you, you jumped into the car, stuck in traffic, went to work, took shit orders from someone you didn't like listen to, scrolled mindlessly through social media, stuck in the car again, more traffic, frustration, got home, ate some bad food, told yourself you'd exercise but didn't watch some mindless Netflix went to bed again scrolling on your phone while half heartily engaged in conversation with your partner. So that's your Someday list versus your today list.