I’m in the middle of yet another move so I’m not happy with this one. But I’m sending it anyway. Hope you enjoy it.

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Seven days.

That’s how long it takes to turn your life around.

It doesn’t matter whether you’re going through a specific challenge like a breakup or business failure.

Or whether you’re just feeling stuck and know that your life can be bigger and bolder than the groundhog day you’re settling for.

With the right strategy––you can turn everything around.

And you can turn it around a helluva lot faster than you think.

Here’s how:

The 1-in-60 Rule

In aviation “The 1-in-60 Rule” states that:

For every one degree a plane veers off course, it will drift 1-mile off target for every 60-miles flown.

Meaning that on a long distance flight, going off course by just one degree could mean missing the entire continent.

This same principle applies in your life.

Very rarely do we wake up and decide to burn our lives to the ground.

Instead:

We get off course by a few degrees.

We fail to course correct.

Then we wake up one day, overweight, divorced, working a job we hate and wondering what in-the-silicone-tits happened.

We fail to realize that small decisions––compounded over a long enough journey––have drastic consequences.

Consider the example of your body.

Consuming just 150 extra calories per day––one can of coke, one beer, a serving of Cheez-Its––doesn’t seem like a big deal.

And it isn’t.

At least, not in isolation.

But over the course of a year, those 150 calories add up to nearly twenty pounds of extra lovin’.

You only veered off course by one degree.

But that one degree lands you in a shitty destination you never wanted to visit.

Getting Back on Course with “One Degree Decisions”

Here’s the good news:

The 1-in-60 rule cuts both ways.

“One degree decisions” can land your life in a truck stop crapper.

Or, they can help you turn everything around and create a life that is unrecognizable from the one you’re living today.

The key?

Selecting the right decisions.

Specifically, identifying decisions that are EASY to do and have a HIGH IMPACT on your quality of life.

The problem for most guys––especially ambitious high achievers––is that they spend most of their time in the “High Effort / High Impact” quadrant.

They don’t have the patience to stick to the “easy but impactful” habits that compound over time.

They want to change everything and they want to change it yesterday.

So they go scorched earth overnight.

• Hitting the gym for 90-minutes a day
• Waking up at 5AM
• Working 16 hours a day

And inevitably, they burn out in a matter of days or weeks. But the most predictable way to turn things around is to focus 90% of your energy on cultivating habits and making decisions that are low effort / high impact.

‍(I’ll talk about how to find these specific habits for yourself in just a minute) And the good news?

It doesn’t take years or even months to experience the positive consequences of these decisions.

For most people it takes less than a week.

A Real Life Example

If you read my last few emails, you probably know that my 2024 was a shitstorm of “bigfoot-on-steroids” proportions. And I’d be lying if I said that it didn’t have an impact on my performance, mindset, and well being.

For weeks after the hurricane, my life felt chaotic and out of control.

I wasn’t sleeping. I was drinking to cope with the stress. I’d “numb out” at the end of the day with Netflix binges and video game marathons.

And after a few weeks, I fell into consistent patterns of anxiety and hopelessness. I was off course. But as soon as I recognized this? I decided to hit the reset button and get back on track.

‍For just one week I made five simple commitments.

1. Wake up at 6:30AM
2. Spend 10-30-minutes each morning “priming” myself (reviewing my goals, shouting incantations, or meditation)
3. Exercise for 30-minutes
4. 2 hours of Deep Work (typically writing or building new courses)
5. Reviewing the day and planning the following day

By the end of that week?

‍It felt like I had a new lease on life.

‍I was waking up excited, motivated, and focused.

I made more progress on my business in a week than I had in the previous month.

And the best part?

I’ve stayed on course since that week (in a way that feels almost effortless).

Building Your Reset Protocol

The five habits I just shared work for me. They’re high impact and easy to do. But what’s easy for one person isn’t easy for everyone.

‍And depending on your background, this protocol could be too intense, or too simple.

‍That’s fine. The point isn’t to follow my protocol.

It’s to use it as a model to build your own. So my invitation is to focus on the principles, not the practices.

‍The two most important principles?

1. Make it easy: As in "this is too easy to make a difference." It shouldn't feel hard––and that's the point.
2. Focus on key areas: Health, mindset, clarity, productivity, relationships, etc

To find your specific habits, ask these three questions:

1. What habits have I followed in the past that had significant positive effects?
2. What habits have I consistently failed to follow through on and what would it look like if I cut the commitment by 50% (e.g. instead of going to the gym for an hour a day, commit to going for a 30-minute walk)
3. What can I do in under 20-minutes that will have a positive impact on my entire day? (e.g. eating a high protein breakfast, planning your day, journaling, etc.)

Aim for 80%

Here’s something I left out.

That first week I implemented this protocol?

I missed three of my commitments.

I skipped a workout because of a demanding work day.

We had dinner plans on Friday and I ran out of time to do my planning.

And I skipped my priming routine one morning to get straight to work.

‍But it was still one of the best weeks of my life.

‍80% is good enough.

More importantly?

By proactively giving yourself grace and planning for a few “off” days, you’re less likely to get off course after a single mistake or crazy day.

You don’t need to be perfect to make progress. You only need to shift your course by a few degrees.