Good morning and welcome
to your morning cereal.
Okay, good morning and welcome to Friday.
You did it again, you made it.
Was there ever any doubt in your mind?
Well, you are going to
want to put on your walking
or running shoes this morning,
not because we're gonna
make a quick getaway today
or we are walking to
Calvary on this Good Friday,
but because today is walk to work day,
which sounds
fantastically healthy, right?
Unless your commute involves
highways or really bad weather.
So maybe walk down to CVS
and get some of that Easter candy today.
Now the answer to yesterday's trivia
question, monoliths.
That's the term that describes
large single standing stones, monoliths.
Well, it is now time
for the essential vitamins
in your morning cereal.
Today's quote, and it
is from birthday girl,
she's turning 44 today, Kobe Smulders,
who said this quote, "You
can't control everything,
but you can control how
you show up," end quote.
All right, your morning decode,
your life, it might be chaos,
but your attitude is still
your home court advantage.
Let go of the uncontrollable.
All right, well, let's go ahead and hear
now from the experts.
It is time to pour in some
atomic habits by James Clear.
And today we are unpacking
the intro to chapter six,
which is motivation is overrated.
Environment often
matters more, all right?
And if you've ever
blamed a lack of motivation
for not following through on something,
this chapter is about
to let you off that hook.
In the best way possible, here,
Clear argues that behavior
change is less about willpower
and it's more about the environment.
In fact, he says this quote,
"The most common form of change
is not internal, but
external," end quote.
Now, that means your surroundings
are quietly shaping your
decisions all day long,
whether you realize it or not.
So think about it.
If your phone is next
to you, you'll check it.
If snacks are visible,
you'll likely eat them.
I got a big problem with that.
Now, if your running
shoes are buried in a closet,
you're probably not gonna go for a jog.
These aren't failures of yours.
They're not failures of discipline.
They're predictable responses to cues.
Clear explains that humans
are incredibly responsive
to visual triggers.
What we see influences what we do.
That's why
environmental design is so powerful.
Instead of trying to resist temptation,
you should remove it.
Instead of relying on motivation,
you make good choices the default option.
Now, he also highlights that
habits are context dependent.
We associate behaviors
with specific locations
and situations.
That's why it's easy to
fall back on these old patterns
when you revisit familiar environments.
Your brain is simply
just following learned cues
that it already knows.
So he says this, "Stop
trying to resist temptation.
"Make it invisible."
That's one of the
most practical strategies
in this whole book.
If you don't see it, you don't crave it.
If it's not
available, you don't act on it.
So the deeper message here is feeling.
You need to become a
more disciplined person.
You need to become a better
designer of your environment
because when your
environment supports your goals,
your good habits become easier
and bad habits, they
become inconvenient for you.
All right, here it is,
your Friday takeaway.
Don't rely on motivation.
Design your
environment so the right choices
are easy choices.
All right, friends,
whether you're walking to work
or walking to get the mail today,
just keep moving forward.
It is now time for the prize
on the bottom of the cereal boxes,
the morning cereal
trivia question of the day.
What poet started one
of her most famous poems
with the line, "I'm nobody, who are you?"
End quote.
All right, hey, thanks for listening
to morning cereal today and this week.
We will see you back here on Monday
for the answer to the trivia question
and more sugar for the soul.
Have a great weekend.
Happy Easter this Sunday.
And may you find the golden Easter egg.
And until then, have a fantastic day.
Don't forget to follow and subscribe
to the morning cereal podcast
on the One Life Live It channel.
You can find more episodes and videos
by visiting our YouTube channel
and the website at
seaningless and at seaningless.com,
where you can also
follow our other podcast,
the Mr. and Mrs. English podcast
and the Life Happens podcast.
And these other podcasts will dive deeper
into everyday issues, self-improvement,
well-being, business and finance.
And we welcome special guests too.
So join us.
It'll be a good time, I promise.
Thanks again for listening.
Have a fantastic day and
we'll see you tomorrow.