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Beyond Quick Wins: Building a Lifestyle for Sustainable Success

Overview

This blog post is inspired by James Clear’s May 25, 2023, 3-2-1 newsletter, which emphasizes that lasting achievements are a result of a lifestyle rather than isolated efforts. I share a few of my personal experiences to highlight the power of consistent, dedicated actions over time. Examples include a history of distance running, adopting an early adopter mindset toward technology, a five-year planking challenge, daily reading of stoic meditations, and joining a writing platform. These habits have been integrated into my life, and I hope these demonstrate how showing up and working every day can lead to significant improvements and fulfillment over time.

Featured image: 3L’s of Self-Directed Learning visual credit to Tanmay Vora at qaspire.com

Full Blog Post

I have previously written that a favorite part of my reading process is James Clear’s 3-2-1 newsletter he publishes weekly on Thursday. When reading his thoughts for May 25, 2023, I was stopped by a thought that was short yet undeniably true.

James was making the point that daily efforts are not going to result in noticeable improvements. However, consistent effort daily WILL bring improvement over the long haul of life. His thought shared:

“Just because improvements aren’t visible doesn’t mean they aren’t happening.

You’re not going to see the number change each time you step on the scale. You’re not going to finish a chapter each time you sit down to write.

Early wins come easy. Lasting wins require a lifestyle.”

3-2-1: One of the most valuable skills in life, and starting before you feel ready

Don and I have shared superpowers throughout life and have been disciplined in showing up, over and over, through the long run of YEARS. Small, dedicated, consistent efforts, repeated as a fabric of your lifestyle, will be rewarding. Period. Every athlete or person focused on personal development understands the compounding effects of the drip, drip, drip, showing up and doing some work every day. In our lives, examples of activities that are part of our lifestyle fabric include:

  1. High school, college, and post-college years of competitive distance running. Our dedication to preparation and being our best to compete paid off for running, and the process changed our perspective on how we approach everything important in our lives. The rewards of our distance running careers were gratifying, yet the lifetime gift of understanding the value of relentless consistent preparation was unimaginable.
  2. Adoption of an early adopter mindset throughout our careers. We were, and are, curious about technology tools (what an incredible time for a business career!) and how to leverage the tools in our work. Repeatedly, we would select the “road less traveled” and could be found playing around with tech tools while our peers were out having fun on a Saturday night (for example) or late into the evening after the traditional workday had ended. Investing in ourselves, with our time and personal resources, was a lifestyle that “walked after us.”
  3. March 25, 2018 – we started a 30-day planking challenge, and the commitment stuck. Today, on May 26, 2023, we have completed over five consecutive years of planking (almost 1,900 days). Low-back muscle spasm problems have vastly improved thanks to the daily, do-not-miss habit that is now a lifestyle for us. “I have to do a plank” has evolved to “I GET to do a plank.”
  4. On January 1, 2020, I began a journey of reading The Daily Stoic Meditations each morning. I am now in my fourth year of reading the book – one meditation a day for each day of the year. In addition, I have added additional books for meditation to my morning reading routine. I currently read seven different books of daily meditations, which have become a non-negotiable 30 to 45-minute start to each day. I am an improved person for investing this time in myself every morning.
  5. June 8, 2020 – Terri and I joined an Akimbo Writing in Community platform – a six-month session – and have joined every subsequent session. We are now on a similar platform, Brainstorm Road, and have exceeded one thousand days of consecutive writing. The process, and the wonderful, generous, and talented people we have met, have enhanced our lives. The “lens through which we view life” has become more sharpened and appreciative.

The above list are examples and is not all-inclusive. We create habits in our lives around our highest priorities. These habits are a lifestyle.

What is a priority in your life that would benefit from your showing up and doing the work every day?

Bill Tomoff with The Daily Stoic book and Companion Reflection Journal
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Dawn of Awareness: A Journey of Self-Discovery through Morning Meditations

Executive Summary

In my full post below, I emphasize the importance of a dedicated morning routine spent reading and reflecting on a variety of daily meditation books. Beginning the day with 30 to 45 minutes of reading without electronic distractions has become integral to my lifestyle.

My morning reading includes:

  1. The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations,
  2. The Daily Laws,
  3. The Book of Awakening,
  4. The Daily Dad,
  5. The Course in Miracles Experiment,
  6. A Calendar of Wisdom, and
  7. Thriving as an Empath.

I also include Seth Godin’s daily blog and James Clear’s weekly newsletter. These readings provide a rich source of perspective and encouragement, aiding self-awareness and regularly challenging my preconceived thoughts. Although some concepts are difficult for me to embrace, the overall value derived from each book is life-enhancing. I encourage you to consider developing your own morning reading routine. Invest in yourself!

Full Blog Post

My morning reading is a treasured aspect of my day. The process of intentionally reading a mediation each morning began with The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on January 1, 2020. The encouragement of the stoic philosophy has resonated with me and my journey with Stoicism has grown more extensive. I have written a full separate reflection on “Why Stoicism?“

Reading a short meditation each morning has expanded to several books and other readings I work through daily. My process is about the first 30 to 45 minutes each morning – quiet time with my coffee and no phone or other electronic devices.

My morning routine now includes the following:

  • The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have by Mark Nepo
    • Started on February 26, 2023.
    • I discovered Mark Nepo when I came upon and read his September 2022 book Surviving Storms: Finding the Strength to Meet Adversity.
    • The Book of Awakening is a New York Times bestseller – Mark Nepo has been called “one of the finest spiritual guides of our time” and “a consummate storyteller.”
  • The Course in Miracles Experiment: A Starter Kit for Rewiring Your Mind by Pam Grout
    • It started on August 2, 2021.
    • Gift from Terri Tomoff in April 2021 – two months after her uterine cancer surgery. I hold this book of meditations with special gratitude.
    • The book is a rewrite of the A Course in Miracles Workbook – Pam Grout’s book back cover describes her book’s purpose: “Pam Grout to the rescue! Her book is for all those still struggling with the Course. Grout offers a modern-day rewrite of the 365-lesson workbook – the text at the heart of the Course. Unlike the original, it’s user-friendly, accessible, and easy for everyone to understand.”
  • Seth Godin’s Daily Blog
    • Started in 2010.
    • Who is Seth Godin? (Seth inspires me daily, and he has changed my perspective on life)

My list may seem ambitious to start each day, but the meditations are short and digestible. My morning routine helps me reach a frame of mind to go out and make a difference in my day.

I have grown to love the process of reading a short meditation by many different authors. My mission is to touch and absorb perspectives and encouragement that may help my thought process about how I perceive and approach my life. Awareness is key and touching topics that challenge my established thinking. My mission is to be aware and apply the topics to my life – many meditations have me cheering, while others trigger me to think, “I cannot get myself there.” Examples – the Stoicism concepts Amor Fati and Momento Mori are important to be aware of, yet living the concepts will be nonstop work for the rest of my life. The Daily Stoic Meditations are one example – the other books present similar challenges. However, on the whole perspective, the value I gain from each book is wonderful.

My intent with these meditation books to reread each year and keep them in my “rotation.” The time commitment each morning is negligible compared to the compelling value I receive. In Ryan Holidays’ introduction to The Daily Dad, he encourages reading meditations over each year:

“My book The Daily Stoic is now well into the second half of its first decade. With more than a million copies in print in forty languages, there are people who have read it every day for years [Bill T comment – into my 4th year of reading daily]. Even though the book is the same as it was when I submitted it to the publisher in the fall of 2015, it continues to connect with and be of service to people all over the world. There’s a Stoic observation about how we never step into the same river twice, for both we and the river are in a constant state of change.”

“On a minute-by-minute basis, your kids and life put you in situations you could never have imagined on your own (and that none of the books seem to anticipate). So while there is no sudden transformation in parenting, there is still a process, a working at it, that you must take up. That’s what this book—one page per day—is built around. Not a one-time thing but a morning or an evening ritual, a checking in, a continual process.

We will fall short. We will lose our tempers, get distracted, prioritize the wrong things, even hurt ourselves and the people we love in the process. What then? Just as with the pages of this book, we must pick back up where we left off. We must accept the fact that we are flawed humans while doing our best to learn from our errors and to not make the same mistakes twice . . . or any more times than we already have.

Dust yourself off. Recommit. Do better.

That journey—The Daily Dad as a book and as an idea—is, of course, not just for men. Our daily email, which has been free at dailydad.com, is received by thousands of women each morning. It’s called The Daily Dad because I happen to be a father—of two boys—and that’s about all you need to read into the name.”

One may ask the question, “When you travel, how do you keep up with so many books?” I have a hard copy of five of the seven books, but I have the Kindle e-book of all seven books. My meditations are read via the Kindle app on my iPhone when on the road. Very convenient, and I LOVE the freedom of having the content available anytime, anywhere!

What is your morning routine? Do you read and contemplate any books of meditations on a daily basis?

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Personal Development Will Be Difficult. Embrace Adversity.

Working with my twin Don and I will be challenging. We will push you, and yes, it will be uncomfortable. We will ask you to demand more from yourself – because there IS MORE potential within all of us. The reward of personal growth – for ourselves and others – is compelling. We have experienced the benefits throughout our lives and careers, and thus why we are so committed to encouraging others.

We credit our mindset of continual learning, acceptance of being wrong, and failing over and over to our background as college and competitive marathon distance runners. Today’s Daily Stoic email asks, “When Is The Last Time You Challenged Yourself?”

The fact is, we all will face adversity in our lives. Unavoidably, extreme adversity may be thrust upon us, and we have no choice but to respond with every ounce of our being. In my family, my son Ryan’s childhood cancer diagnosis on October 17, 1996, changed our lives forever. His and our family’s story is told in Terri Tomoff’s memoir The Focused Fight.

Yet, outside of fate forcing adversity upon us, there is strength in placing ourselves in positions of chosen adversity. I encourage reading the short blog post linked above and contemplating where you might most immediately apply in your life. Highlights from the post:

“It’s very easy to get comfortable. To build up your life exactly how you want it to be. Minimize inconveniences and hand off the stuff you don’t like to do. To find what you enjoy, where you enjoy it, and never leave.

A velvet rut is what it’s called. It’s nice, but the comfort tricks you into thinking that you’re not stuck.”

“…as soon as we stop growing, we start dying. Or at least, we become more vulnerable to the swings of Fate and Fortune. Seneca talked over and over again about the importance of adversity, of not only embracing the struggle life throws at us but actively seeking out that difficulty, so you can be stronger and better and more prepared. A person who has never been challenged, he said, who always gets their way, is a tragic figure. They have no idea what they are capable of. They are not even close to fulfilling their potential.

“Prioritize a few minutes to contemplate, “What personal development challenge is most interesting or impactful for me, and how can I chip away every day, embracing the difficulty, so I can be stronger, better, and more prepared?”

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Tilt The Future | Personal Development with Karena de Souza

Share your message. Stay the course. Your tribe WILL emerge. #TwinzTalk

My twin Don and I have lived our careers dedicated to developing and bringing our best potential to our careers and lives. Personal development and a willingness to invest in ourselves is a commitment we take seriously – we owe this to ourselves, those we work with, and the companies and clients we work for.

During a recent writing ✍️ retreat that Terri and I attended in the South of France (a post for another day – the experience was EPIC), I had the opportunity for an IRL meetup with Karena de Souza. I met Karena in 2020 through a writing community we participated in, and we have developed a virtual friendship over the past [almost] three years. In-person, we shared many conversations during the week. She is most definitely a kindred spirit in her encouragement and emphasis on the importance of investing in yourself and the need for continual personal development. We are delighted to have her as part of our tribe!

Don and I are inspired by Karena’s dedication to helping others grow and continually learn. Listen in as Karena, and I talk IRL about the critical importance of establishing individual priorities around learning – for ourselves, our children, and the emphasis within the family unit. She makes excellent points to reflect upon:

1:30 – Every family makes decisions about where to “park” personal development among their priorities.

2:15 – Most of us, professionally, live in an environment of short-term goals and urgency to accomplish/handle our responsibilities. Yet, how do we leave that mindset “in the office” and switch to a longer-term “30-year” mindset within our homes and families?

Karena, Don, and I live our lives to encourage people to invest in themselves and their families. Allocate resources and mental bandwidth to prioritize beyond the day-to-day “urgent” and “busyness” that can overwhelm us all if we are not thoughtful and judicious with our time and decisions. Develop in your world, and bring your talents to helping others.

Recent readings from The Daily Stoic Meditations by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman spoke compellingly to the need for us all to “start with ourselves.”

May 5 – “You are the Project“ stresses that “The raw material for the work of a good and excellent person is their own guiding reason…- Professionals don’t have to justify spending time training or practicing their work. It’s what they do, and practice is how they get good at it… the one constant is the working of those materials, the gradual improvements and proficiency.”

May 6 – “Righteousness Is Beautiful“ urges that the presence of human excellence makes a beautiful human being. Working diligently at human excellence needs to be an utmost priority. Quoting Epictetus:

“Then what makes a beautiful human being? Isn’t it the presence of human excellence? Young friend, if you wish to be beautiful, then work diligently at human excellence. And what is that? Observe those whom you praise without prejudice. The just or the unjust? The just. The even-tempered or the undisciplined? The even-tempered. The self-controlled or the uncontrolled? The self-controlled. In making yourself that kind of person, you will become beautiful—but to the extent you ignore these qualities, you’ll be ugly, even if you use every trick in the book to appear beautiful.”

—Epictetus, Discourses, 3.1.6b-9

Starting with ourselves and in our homes, we can build a foundation and lifestyle that enhances our ability to positively impact our world!