theboot90

#11 redefine what you must do – the specialist vs the generalist

In the past you would die if you were not a generalist, and that lead to a millennia of people being generalists. Why would you die? Well, if you lived and couldn’t provide for your family and community completely, as a general husband, spouse, and beacon for the community like a hunter or a farmer, you could reason that your life was incomplete. However, now where so much of that auxiliary work can and is accomplished by far fewer people, in a managed and logical process-driven society. You have the opportunity to be a specialist like at no other time in history.

The fact of getting or achieving wealth, respect or fame.
Miriam-Webster Dictionary

To break it down there are three things you must accomplish to become a revered specialist.

Choose specialty. Special is a definition worth looking at being distinguished in some unusual quality. If someone says they are a painter you may assume that it is a specialty, is your specialty in painting, or an alcoholic that is oil-painting on canvas of mountainside landscapes in northern Italy from June to August in the golden hour? Sometimes life does not give you a chance to be anything but a generalist and to an extent you must be, to live, but in other cases people have their surroundings so well suited for their specialty, so build your environment to work for you, even when you are asleep.
I can’t relate. You will constantly be bombarded with what other people think that you should be doing so that you fit the image of you they have in their mind. It is a dangerous game, and one that will undoubtedly lead you away from the path of specialist. If you are confronted with individuals or groups telling you that they do things this way or that way, you can’t relate, they don’t write your biography.
Focus. The world is becoming more and more attention grabbing like standing in the middle of times square. Focus on your craft, your art, and you will get there. There isn’t a doubt in my mind.

Your CDN brother.

#10 three steps to learn anything

It is that easy. You will learn here how to understand your human limitations before making a demonstration of knowledge.

I am grateful for coffee. Boring I know.

Get help. As much as we’d like to think we are unique butterflies, we are not, everything you want to learn has been studied at length in the past. Your success depends on finding the people who have been in your position in the past and learn everything you can from them. (in general as much as you can export your mundane tasks, see tomorrows).
Start at the beginning. So much of what you see is designed to make it look easy. Whatever it is, it is not easy. Whatever you are learning or want to learn is probably simple, linear and logical, however it is not easy. You didn’t spend the first decade of your life learning calculus, no, first you learned what set of symbols represent numbers and grew your knowledge from there. As is the case for anything else, especially if your background in the subject is several decades old.
Definite, persistent effort. You might discover along your learning that you are relatively really good at something. Do not fool yourself, your knack for a thing does not reflect your abilities, the dedicated pursuit of the thing, for hours, months and years will ensure your success.

You can learn anything,

Your CDN Bro.

#09 little habits

Imagine as a child, you crawled, you learned to walk and then run, why do we stop there?

They let me see, share vision and more. Too often we fail to reach our destination because we fail to plan the route properly. It may sound stupid but it’s true in other aspects of our lives as well. Our habits are more pernicious than we know. Just like our habits form our thoughts and actions our habits we can forget them and live on cruise control for years, by doing things the way we’ve always done them. Going to work at the same place, going to get groceries, banking and cut at the barber shop all as routine as can be. Countless lives have gone by living in the habit, of life.

Start at 0. Your habits and routines are more ingrained than you are conscious of, the first step is not one it’s zero. You have to understand your habits and see if they’re serving you or not. When you understand your habits and routines you can begin to make amendments, one step at a time to alter your life course.
Tweak, don’t change. Too much, too soon, like too much rain can cause unintended landslides but in your life. The more ingrained a habit, the greater the number of tweaks required for a course correction.
Accomplish. Guess what, I set a goal today, a little one to drink a cup of water and it is done, while this feat isn’t usually a part of my day, I’ve done it. Add these tweaks to your list of accomplishments and watch it grow.

I know that you can put one foot in front of another and walk, now walk faster.

Your Canadian Bro.

#08 personal ownership at the time of a global pandemic

I am grateful for my health.

So much of our brainspace is being consumed by illness. We continue to be inundated with illness and everyone is looking outwards for a solution, they are looking at what the leaders are doing about it, what are you doing about it? It is our responsibility to keep ourselves healthy and safe as well as our wives and children and loved ones. They say never waste a crisis, so here are three things to do to take charge of it and own the crisis.

1. Enterprise. I remember that at the onset of this global illness there was a massive shortage in pretty much everything and it hasn’t gone to “normal” maybe it never will. Take the opportunity and step into the supply chain, do you see a demand gap? Figure out a way to make yourself part of the chain.

2. Improve. The world continues to turn as much as some aspects have ensured some factors are more difficult it is time to work on yourself. Whether that be getting as fit as fuck or learning a new skill or getting that degree you’ve been putting off, there has never been a better time to improve for alls sake, read a book.

3. Rest. We haven’t seen the impact of a pandemic on a mental health scale yet, we have surely experienced itself in ourselves by staring at other blank masked faces staring back at us, blankly. Take time and rest, develop the habits and routines that make you wake up daily ready to tackle 1. And 2.

Your Canadian brother.

#07 three step goal setting (not SMART) but PPP

I set goals and achieving them is fundamental to us, however we’re often out of our scope when it comes to preparing goals other than get up from the couch to the fridge and stuff your face, that is a goal I struggle to say no to maybe you’ve got other goals.

Goal setting equation. G = a(x)
Me, yesterday.

So to enable your ‘a’ (activities or.. ass) to be a function of ‘x’lets go through three steps on how you can reach your goals.

SMART goals are great, I have nothing against them and they have helped people at least a couple decades to make achievements. But just because it is called a SMART goal does not give it the right to say its the best, its just a SMART acronym, shit. Anyway, PPP is the way you need to look at your goals, not as something you have to achieve but something that you’ve already accomplished.

Passion. It does not matter what you are doing, whatever the goal is, if you do not chase it with unconstrained enthusiasm then why is it on your list of goals, drop it and make better use of your time, chase it with enthusiasm.
Persistence. Second, enthusiasm or motivation or whatever you want to call your passion will curve, you’ll get so sick of it you wont want to proceed and will find excuses to get yourself out your goals. What is important is that you continue to build and develop towards your goal, keep building the channels that are parallel to where you want the water so that the lake can flow freely towards that new low area (where you want to be).
Patience. Reflective of both of the above you must have patience with yourself and with the process. Artists never get to reap the rewards of their art because it only becomes extremely valuable when they pass, your patience must be generational, like a stone. If you lose your patience when things don’t go your way for a year, or three, but continue to use passion and persistence you don’t have a reason to be impatient you body will leave the earth but it is up to you to make your work last for eternity.

The Ottawa airport CYOW pretending its the holidays.

Day 3 of Week 1 – STR 2, Pullups was not managed six sets of eight good reps and then to failure on three more sets. 10 minutes total. Single KB Press w 25lbs weight, steady through the 10 minutes with a burn out break at 1min 20sec left.

#06 multicultural leading

I am grateful for my Country.

Tomorrows leader will not deal in one culture, especially in countries like Canada. Here is a three pointer on how to lead a multi cultural group.

Your experience is not the same experience as anyone else around you. Whether it be immigrant, first generation or multi-generational Canadian, your experience varies, and there is no warning. For instance my parents found a better life here (I am a first generation Canadian) and nobody taught them and they did not take the time to learn about retirement planning, so far too late they were required to scramble for their retirement finances – not exactly where you want to be when you step into retirement.
There is no, no. In my experience if you want to work, no matter what job nobody will tell you to slow down or stop. You will be judged and characterized and grouped but the only thing slowing you down will be you. What I often see is that people compare themselves to the lowest common performer with the justification “if this persons doing something (or not), I am going to do that thing (or not)”. It’s a pathetic excuse not to reach your potential, so stop, and re-evaluate.
Define success for you. To some, a good harvest is a success, for others a culmination of their lives means earning a million dollars, and others have unattainable goals like winning the lottery (goals will be tomorrows topic). But for you, a desire to unabashedly chase your goal like a dog chasing it’s tail is required. It is simple, if your goal is G and your activities do not equal G but require you to subtract, you are doing it wrong. G = a(x) Goals must equal activities(x) that x marks the spot, defining what your G is means you can fill out the rest of the equation on your own.

Your CDN Bro.

Little dude holding onto my rucksack for dear life, It’ll be a trip boiiiiii.

#05 three steps to fitness

Welcome back to work. That is if you’re a productive human and have a job. From all the farmers out there who were up far before my lazy ass or the lawyers who were tearing it up all weekend.

I’m pretty much an expert in fitness and I’ve seen such a massive decline in people’s fitness it’s sick, not a good sick. So read these and follow.

Movement is what will keep you alive.
You’re not doing enough movement at regular intervals through the day, even the most fit people on earth train their temples for four hours a day. And the percent of that will vary. Guess what you don’t and you need to move more.
Move at every opportunity. You’re an office worker which means you’re not moving heavy shit for your job, you’re sitting there, reading this, maybe envious of the people lifting heavy shit or walking around. Move when you can pushup, situp, walk.. If people have something to say about it, reconsider where you work.

3mi walk

Your CDN bro.

#04 the millennial 3-step recipe for success

I am grateful for my experience.

There are certain things that as millennials we have that generations of the past have not had, much of that is simply due to the head down work hard nature of the past. Now with our heads up we can see that our work or what we spend our money on has an impact around the world. Fortunately there is a world at your fingers.

Focus on what you can change. The world is a big place and your effect will not be on all planes. If you’re focused on one thing make sure it is worthwhile to you, then you will not need to look up and see what everyone else is doing you will have your path.
Fuck the no. Whenever you start being exceptional and build yourself so large you start making others uncomfortable, stop, if you want to fit in, otherwise Fuck the no.
Forget about it. You’re not the same person you were yesterday and if you are then you should reconsider your path, you won’t remember yesterday in a month or a year and that means nobody else will either, drive on and level up.

Your CDN bro.

#03 make the most out of your new year

I am grateful for my education.

Part of leadership is knowledge, knowing what you are, what you are good at, need improvement in and where you absolutely need a partner. In my career I have had situations where that teammate or fire team partner has saved my ass even without me asking. These people, your followers, will catch you when you fall, but also hold you to the highest esteem. They will turn their head to you to see what your reaction to a situation is, or follow your lead with the actions you routinely take. The saying lead follow or get out of the way is also applicable to leaders, at those moments when you are in freefall and your subordinates take up the slack, you are relying on them to lead, and you must be stubborn with yourself to allow them to lead in this moment. Your greatest effect as a leader is to generate leadership within your subordinates, it will be challenging to see them step into roles you previously filled, however this grants you the space to operate at the next level, or “level up” that is so commonly said.

Your Cdn bro.

30.39km bike 146bpm, 4.85km run 144bpm.

#02 Old year

I’m grateful for my home.

Good evening and happy new year if you are reading this in 2022. As I get more organized this site will look a little better, how about that logo, bro. I have been reading and listening to a lot about human psychology which is hugely interesting to me, I’m currently reading Influence by doc Caldini. I highly recommend it. It provides real insight into why humans do the things that they do. One particular takeaway is that you can bet your ass that you are being sold to at every opportunity. If you see something that was designed for your consumption it has been crafted in some way (sometimes more obvious than others i.e. car dealerships) to extract a reaction from you, and then click, whir, you’ve been had. Did I do that in this post yet, why yes, yes I have.

*Coming soon* I will have a workout page where I will post sick new shots and workout related content.