Matt Willard

Do Hard Things

The four pillars: 1. ditch the facade, embrace reality

A. accept what you’re capable of
performance = actual demands / expected demands
-we need to embrace the reality of where we are and what we have to do, managing our expectations accordingly
-tougher people see stressful situations as managable challenges instead of threats
-“Our appraisal of a situation as a threat or as a challenge depends on the perceived demands of that stressor versus our perceived abilities to handle
them. Do we have the resources to handle the demands?”
-Embrace reality. Accurate appraisal of demands + accurate appraisal of our abilities.
-set appropriate and authentic goals with a focus on process

B. Confidence is a filter, tinting how we see the challenges before us and our ability to handle them. See the good and bad in all situations and our strengths/weaknesses\

  • Create confidence:
    -lower the bar and raise the floor; IE, seek consistent performance and set a standard just outside of that realm to gradually raise this base standard
    -be more vulnerable, embrace who you are and what you’re capable of; true confidence has an understanding of weaknesses and an acceptance of who we truly are
    -trust yourself ands your training; practice over and over to put in the work and gain that baseline
    -develop a quiet ego; be secure in who you are with self-awareness and reflection, but know the need for confidence and be aware of our strengths and weaknesses\

C. Know when to hold them and when to fold them.

  • Our level of control changes how we respond to stress. When we have a sense of control, our alarm is quieter and easier to shut off.
  • When we don’t have control, we lose the capacity to cope. It’s when we have a choice that toughness is trained.
  • Here’s how to create more control in tough situations
    -reduce things to the smallest item you can control for the problem, get a foothold, then move up gradually from small to large
    -give yourself choices to exert control, to have a choice and train toughness
    -flip the script, notice what nudges you towards fear and avoidance and be open about it and take away its power with permission to do what we think is negative
    -using rituals can help create a sense of control for behaviors, especially for tasks with high uncertainty and low control

For leaders:
-let go; let your guys have gradual control over time and loosen the reins while checking in every so often
-you can also set constraints on what to do, then let them do it their own way to be independent and under control, to unlock more responsibility
-let them fail, reflect on mistakes, and improve; give control in small bites that grows and give them room to fail and improve

2. listen to your body

A. Feelings and emotions have valuable messages and indicators for making better decisions and being cued into insights. Ignore them at your peril.

Two skills:
1. awareness of feelings and sensations
2. interpretation and contextualization of feelings and emotions\

Here’s how to get understanding:

  • Get specific and go into the feelings and sensations: experience without judging.\
  • Name it: describe the feeling deeply, give it a label. Seperate the feelings from the physical sensations.
  • Reappraise the signal as information - what message is this emotion conveying? See if it’s worth listening to, or to let float on.

B. Own the voice in your head. We have a variety of inner voices that vie for control to make the best possible decisions. We have control of how we react to them nd how to respond to this internal debate.

  • Here’s how we can do it:
    -externalize that voice by talking out loud, or letting it pass by, to help process and verbalize coping
    -you won’t be fooled by overly positive self-talk: be realistic, but work on having less negative self-talk. Be fair and balanced
    -create psychological distance: switch to second or third person in your self-talk (“you” or “Matt” VS. “I”) to defuse more easily and make better choices and regain control

3. respond instead of react

A. Create the mental space to have a calm conversation and respond simply to reality, without spiraling towards it. Create a pause and respond. Think, reset, redirect. Accept, reappraise.
-> Respond to reality. For most of us, we are not only responding to the actual stress but the reverberations of it. Tough individuals learn to match perception with reality so that they marshal the appropriate response instead of an exaggerated one.

  • Create the ability for a calm conversation:
    -create space by spending time alone in your head: cultivate this with sitting meditation, then doing concentration meditation during activities, then also practice with sensory imagery
    -practice discomfort and experiencing the sensations as nonreactive information, feeling your urges/feelings and watching them to decouple the feeling and the response
    -do something challenging and let yourself spiral, experience it - then use the strategies you’ve learned to label, reframe, adjust your goal, and observe

B. Respond to the downward spiral, the potential bad response, by using coping strategies
-these emotional regulation strategies can involve dampening or amplifying an emotional response and should be used based on the situation; there’s cognitive narrowing for focus, and then widening outwards to being broadly aware
=> creativity often requires zooming out for better problem solving
=> intense narrowing can be problematic and leads to rumination: the downward spiral often leads to this extreme top-down narrow processing

How to work on processing ration for broad VS. narrow:
-zoom into an object to get as many details as possible, then soften your gaze, nearly blurry, to pick up peripheral details: great for getting out of initial spiral of discomfort
-broaden your cognitive thinking to aid creativity and innovation
-use broad or narrow actions to cultivate the according thinking
-think about the future, temporally zoom out to get perspective
-zoom out to 2nd/3rd person for inner dialogue and writing to process emotions
-in environment: use it accordingly, such as a tucked away office to narrow and focus, or broad nature to expand perspective to get creative and shift your feelings and perspective

There isn’t a one-size-fits-all strategy - rather, it’s best to be FLEXIBLE AND ADAPTIVE with coping strategies depending on the situation.
=> Low-level, low-intensity issues can be distracted or supressed, but stronger shit often needs the ability to tune into and accept to what we’re feeling, and to work through and embrace it.

4. transcend discomfort

A. Inner drive and control can help us keep going and stay tough - AKA, our WHY, how it aligns with us
-It allows us to readjust wisely and re-engage
-The three basic psychological needs: autonomy, competence, relatedness
“When we satisfy our needs, we are allowed to fulfill our potential. Satisfying our basic needs is the fuel that allows us to put to work all of the tools we’ve developed to be tough.”

People must:
-be supported and have input, voice, choice: ability to take risks and voice opinions without fear
-have the ability to make progress and goal: need a clear path for progress and growth and improvement
-feel connected like you belong: need a challenging but supportive environment

B. fulfillment can come from creating, experiencing, and extracting meaning from suffering
-purpose is the fuel that allows you to be tough; by sorting through and exploring discomfort, they emerge with greater growth and meaning
“When we explore instead of avoid, we are able to integrate the experience into our story. We’re able to make meaning out of struggle, out of suffering. Meaning is the glue that holds our mind together, allowing us to both respond and recover.”