Happy Saturday, friend!

We’re back again with another edition of Productivity + Habits + Fun

😃 Fun Fact of the Week

In the Philippines, McDonalds serves spaghetti!

There it is!

🐦 Tweet of the Week

The real goal is consistent improvement.

Breaks are ok, even recommended.

And sometimes, it’s worth taking a vacation from the plan for a short time.

Distance can yield a great perspective.

💪 Featured Productivity Tip

The 5 Second Rule.

When you know there’s something you need to do, but you feel a twinge of hesitation, what do you do?

Per Mel Robbins, just give yourself a countdown “5-4-3-2-1,” and GO!

This does two really cool things:

1. You consciously interrupt that feeling of hesitation by actively focusing on your countdown

2. You give yourself a very short deadline to act

Once you begin, your mind and body will be in motion, and it will be easier to keep going.

🕰️ The Daily Routines of Famous Creatives

John Milton: slept from 9pm to 4am, 5 hours of creative work, 3 hours of exercise after lunch

Vladimir Nabokov: slept from 11:30pm to 7:30am, 7 hours of creative work, 1 hour of exercise broken into two parts (11am to 11:30am, and 6:30pm to 7pm)

Pablo Picasso: slept from 2:30am to 11am, 10.5 hours of creative work broken into two parts (3pm to 10:30pm, and 11:30pm to 2:30am), the rest of his day was food and leisure activities

As you can see, there's no one-size-fits all approach to structuring your day.

These folks found their way to get the most gains for what worked for them.

Can you say the same about your day?

If you think you can do better, but you don't know how to start, the first step is simple:

Reply to this email, and I'll see how I can help you.

✈️ Online Travel Agencies - $158B In Savings

Highlights:

• The first Online Travel Agency (OTA) appeared in 1994

• More rooms booked via OTA = more savings for consumer

• The big power of OTAs is to create choices and provide transparency

• During the height of COVID, OTAs cut jobs by about 50% and lost about the same in profits

Click the photo for the full article.

🤔 Decision-making Idea

The Just-World Hypothesis: we tend to believe that the world is fair, so if something unfair happens to someone, they must have deserved it.

Example: A coworker says something unkind about someone else’s car. On their way home from work, they hit a nail and have to replace the whole tire.

Some people may call that karma, and I’m tempted to agree with that, but…

I don’t think that’s a useful way to view the world.

The truth is: the world is a random place.

Good things happen, and bad things happen.

Given the frequency of these events, we may even say that someone has “good” or “bad” luck.

As much as possible, this is how I live my life:

• Do your best

• Learn and grow

• Help others learn and grow

• Don’t take things personally

• It’s all data - be objective so you can learn from it

Bonus: sometimes things just don’t make sense. We can’t see the pattern or the lesson. That’s ok! Let it go and move on. Good things are always coming your way. :)

🧠 Quote of the Week

What I think:

“It’s better to shoot high and miss than to aim low and kit.”

“Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.”

This is all about choosing some lofty goal that feels out of reach.

By aiming for something like this, you learn to pull more from yourself.

You stretch yourself to learn, grow, and act more than you normally would.

Even if you can’t reach the huge goal, you’ll have accomplished so much more than if you chose a small and very safe option.

What is a major goal you have?

This is mine: My purpose is to help 10M high-achieving professionals define and develop their daily habits so that they can transcend into their ideal self.

Thank you so much for spending some of you precious time with me. 🙂

I’m always looking to improve, so hit “reply” and let me know what you think!

Have an awesome week.

Sincerely,

Steven Sanders

PS - I hope to see you on Twitter and Instagram!