294. How To Be Awesome At Becoming Anti-Fragile

Today we are making a plan to become tougher and less fragile.  Because it puts us in the drivers seat. When we take full accountability for things and we resist the urge to fall into mindless scrolling or just going with whatever everyone else is doing, we’re planning for the long game.    Taking lots of small risks and trying new things and pushing yourself and getting uncomfortable - it’s all conditioning you to be tough for life.    So you are mentally and physically strong when you need to me.  So when something hard is in front of you, you haven’t created this comfortable bubble that you live in that you just fall apart.    I am on optimist to the extreme - so don’t take this as a negative - but just an honest observation - more and more people today are fragile and easily offended than ever before.   That’s not the life we are working to create here - so let’s design our plan for being completely anti-fragile.      How do we get tougher and less fragile?    First, let’s unpack, where we are at and how we got here.   Then, let’s make a plan to become anti-fragile.      I’m finishing up the the book The Coddling Of The American Mind and it’s SO interesting.   The authors explore why people are mentally weaker than they used to be and more emotionally fragile.      A few key points that the authors make…    In the last 15 years the public has become more emotionally fragile and young people in particular are less tolerant of any discomfort that comes their way.    They talk about a few explanations that they have data to support that explain this…    1. Rise in helicopter parenting The assumption that parents need to watch their kids and protect them at all costs.    2. Philosophy of safetyism  The belief that anything that can cause pain or suffering is ultimately harmful in the long run and can even be tramatic.    3. Lack of play  The past few generations of kids have been so overloaded with schoolwork and extracurricular activities trying to get into a good high school and college that they haven’t had time to be kids, and it turns out that most mental and emotional development happens when they are playing.    4. Social media  Social comparison, fear of missing out, constant connectivity and validation seeing are always that social media makes us more emotionally fragile.      JOE ROGAN says…  The hardest thing that has ever happened to you is the hardest thing that has ever happened to you.    It’s so easy to win right now because most people are special snowflakes.       Responses from social media:  Everyone expects things at their fingertips with the Internet.   Over parenting… In the 90s we got sent outside all day.   Kids never have to struggle or just figure it out. Parents are too connected to kids.    We are overstimulated with technology. Higher stimulation and emotions means faster to break down.    Think we have more awareness and options more than ever to cater to comfort.   Overprotective parenting and limiting exposure to the “hard” in life.   The media telling us that everything our parents did was wrong.   Definitely the younger generation has a difficult time managing stress and pressure.    Not as much adversity to face, we embrace differences more than different opinions.   Computers and less social interactions.    Everyone gets a trophy.    Lack of downtime in children. Too much screen time.   We know more dangers than our parents did.    I blame the Internet.   Lack of basics In kids. One thing we know for sure - we must be anti-fragile to thrive.      So knowing all this, how do we become anti-fragile?      Here’s the breakdown..    We need to do harder things!  Embrace uncomfortable too!    Book: Antifragile Author Nassim Taleb       Thoughts from this book!    Do hard things because adversities make you grow   Go through life as a flaneur Adopt an anti fragile life philosophy  Make a plan for yourself and then stick to it.  Build in redundancy and layers (no single point of failure) Resist the urge to suppress randomness Make sure that you have your soul in the game Experiment and tinker — take lots of small risks Avoid risks that, if lost, would wipe you out completely Don’t get consumed by data Keep your options open Focus more on avoiding things that don’t work than trying to find out what does work Respect the old — look for habits and rules that have been around for a long time     #1 tip! Put tough people in your ears!!    You have to be willing to look wrong/do the thing everyone else isn’t in the short term to look like a genius in the long term.    As the old adage goes, when you do what everyone else does, don’t be surprised when you get the same results everyone else does.