One Quote:

“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.” - Victor Frankl

You can’t control your circumstances, but you can control how you react to them.

(Share this on Twitter!)

One Framework:

The Two Day Rule

There are two relevant facts about me to consider:

1. I am fascinated by the art and science of personal growth.
2. I am a natural idealist forcing myself to become more of a realist.

The first fact means, as you'd expect, that I love to think and write about frameworks, tools, and strategies for creating growth.

The second fact means that my natural idealism often bleeds into the frameworks, tools, and strategies I share, making them a bit intimidating or overwhelming to the non-idealist reader.

I'm working on it—and you'll see me striking this balance of idealism and realism in these frameworks in the weeks, months, and years ahead.

Today's framework is one such example.

If you've been reading my content for a while, you'll know that one of my favorite strategies for making progress on literally anything is my 30-for-30 framework.

For the uninitiated, "30-for-30" just means you do the thing you're trying to improve at for 30 minutes per day for 30 straight days.

As I explain in the piece linked above, there are three core advantages to the approach:

1. Meaningful Commitment: 30 days of effort is meaningful enough that you can't be half-in, half-out.
2. Manageable Commitment: 30 minutes of effort is light enough that it shouldn't feel intimidating.
3. Effective Compounding: 900 minutes of accumulated effort is enough to improve meaningfully at literally anything.

The approach has worked wonders for me, but I've become aware that it's an idealist's approach, as it requires daily effort that may not be possible as "life happens" on a day-to-day basis. Furthermore, depending on your personality, the approach may create stress, as failing to hit a day (due to any number of random occurrences) can feel like a failure.

Enter the Two Day Rule—a realists approach to consistent progress that I first learned about in a video from the wonderful Matt D'Avella.

The Two Day Rule is simple: With whatever activity you are trying to make progress around, you don't allow yourself to take off more than one day in a row.

Rather than 30 straight days of Xs (as required by my 30-for-30 Approach), your Two Day Rule calendar may look something like this:

I love this strategy because it will create forward progress but allows for the vagaries of life to enter without derailing your approach and mental state.

If you've found the 30-for-30 Approach too steep a hill to climb, I highly recommend trying the Two Day Rule in November. Give it a shot and let me know what you think.

I'd love to hear about your progress with it. Tweet at me @SahilBloom and I'll do my best to get back to everyone.

One Tweet:

I often comment that the most successful people in the world achieved their success not by having all the right answers—but by asking the right questions.

This list of questions is wonderful. A few of my favorites:

• Do I really need to answer this text or email right now? Urgent is very rarely actually urgent. By constantly manufacturing urgency, we limit our progress on the important.
• Am I doing/not doing this out of fear? Fear distorts our reality. Being deliberate about deconstructing our fears is a productive exercise.
• What would this look like if it was fun? Before you quit something on the basis of it being an energy drain on your life, always ask yourself whether there are things that could be changed about the experience to make it energy creating.

I have a list of ~20 questions I ask myself regularly that have unlocked new opportunities and broken damaging patterns of behavior. These questions have truly changed my life. I've been working on collecting them into a useful resource (perhaps a free illustrated e-book) to share alongside a newsletter piece.

If you’re interested in seeing the list, tweet at me and I’ll put them in a future piece.

One Article:

​An End to Doomerism​

"The world desperately needs more optimism to make progress, so I should stop being so shy about it." - Dr. Hannah Ritchie

This is a wonderful article about the “optimism stigma” (the idea that society broadly views optimism as blind, dumb, and naive) and how to fight back as an impatient optimist.

A few insights worth calling out individually:

• The separation of optimism from blind optimism is important: Optimism is about viewing problems as challenges that require solving—not about just assuming that everything will get better in time and without dedicated effort.
• Optimism is not about inaction (the opposite, in fact): Optimism is about creating forward movement to create change and solve big problems.
• Never conflate criticism and pessimism: People who provide constructive criticism are not pessimists. Optimism requires productive criticism in order to flourish and solve big problems.

Always remember my Optimist Razor: When choosing who to spend time with, prioritize spending more time with optimists. Pessimists sound smart, optimists get rich.

One Podcast:

The Diary of a CEO: David Harewood

Brilliant and vulnerable episode with a deep discussion on the mental health struggles of award winning actor David Harewood (best known for his roles in Homeland and other hit shows).

It’s a wonderful thing that so many successful people—and men in particular—are feeling empowered to share their journeys and personal mental struggles. My hope is that these stories become a reminder that none of us are alone.

If you’re struggling—talk to someone.

If you’re not—be there for someone who is.

Listen to it on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

‍