Stop Cheating Yourself, Top 5 Marriage Musts, & The Amrap Mentality #ThoughtsFromTerry

Jun 23, 2017

Happy Friday!

For what it's worth, Tuesday was the Summer Solstice in the Northern Hemisphere. That means it was the longest day of the year - but, there are so many more interesting tidbits about the Summer Solstice. If you want some random new information to add to your small talk library, just Google Summer Solstice and get lost on a few websites.

The Sun
(NASA/Goddard/SDO AIA Team)

Stop Cheating Yourself

Last week while working out solo, I noticed my form was lacking, and I was cheating with my workout. When I workout with my workout partner, Ryan, he won't let this happen, but he was lollygagging around Yellowstone National Park and not around to keep me in line. The weight was heavy, the workout was hard, and without thinking, I adjusted my form and naturally shifted to the path of least resistance. I was cheating!

What hit me immediately was the natural instinct in me to modify my motion, position, and form to find the easiest path forward. Our bodies and minds are programmed to conserve energy and to be naturally efficient. It’s a brilliant part of our biology. This plays out when our body naturally and automatically attempts to engage all muscle groups to help lift the weight. This problem happens when you work out a particular muscle group, but you don't want other muscle groups involved; you want to only target a single muscle group. For this to happen, you have to work hard to isolate each muscle. It takes a lot of focus and energy to do this, ultimately going against your natural wiring. To fully maximize your workout, you have to go completely against your core biological makeup.

Are you following me? Humans are hardwired to take the path of least resistance. It’s how we are designed and how our brains work. You can see in the gym example how this hardwiring will work against you, but it doesn't stop in the gym. Think about this in a broader sense in your life. Where are you not leaning in? Where are you resisting because of the challenge or the perceived pain of a situation? How does this even affect our view of God and our walk with Christ? Are we seeing the hard decisions and more challenging decisions as ‘not God’s Will?’ Ouch!

Reading Paul’s words in the book of Acts this morning challenges and pushes me out of my comfort zone. Paul wrote:

"After preaching the Good News in Derbe and making many disciples, Paul and Barnabas returned to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch of Pisidia, where they strengthened the believers. They encouraged them to continue in the faith, reminding them that we must suffer many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God." Acts 14:21-22

To continue in the faith…we must suffer many hardships. Yeah, this does not look like the path of least resistance! Paul knew they needed to be strengthened. They needed a shot in the arm of faith and encouragement. Hardships come, and suffering is a part of life, but please understand that this doesn’t mean every decision in life has to be the tough one. The path of least resistance shouldn’t be our default basis for making decisions.

Humans are hardwired to take the path of least resistance, but we can be “rewired.” This path does not have to be the automatic path, and our mindset can be adjusted with self-awareness, intentionality and switching on our brain.

Marriage List

In our Monday small group, we are discussing the current Life.Church message series The Vow. It's produced great discussion, and this week we shared our ‘Top 5 Marriage Musts.’ We were challenged to create and share our top 5 things you would recommend to a couple getting married. In typical Terry fashion, I had my five locked and loaded in about 32 seconds and shared the Google Doc with Robin. After some thinking and processing, Robin added her thoughts, we collaborated, and the list changed and got much better! Here they are.

Storch Top 5 Marriage Musts

Keep Christ first. Model it individually and daily.
Work hard, then work harder to communicate - it's not easy.
Your mindset is critical. What you look for in your spouse you will find - good or bad.
Have sex regularly. Intimacy is important. If your schedules get nuts, we recommend you schedule it!
Spend time together, even when kids come along, your spouse is your top earthly priority.

Podcasts & Music

Tim Ferriss Show - Podcast #246 Interview: Jason Khalipa

I enjoy the Tim Ferriss Show podcast. Tim always interviews interesting people from all walks of life. It’s a great way for me to continue my learning, and I love gleaning new concepts and tidbits from him and his guests. This week's interview was with Jason Khalipa, an 8-time CrossFit Games competitor, business entrepreneur and solid family man. I highly recommend listening to the interview.

I loved hearing Jason describe the Amrap Mentality.

Amrap Mentality - To wholeheartedly focus on the present without fear of reevaluation.

So much for me to improve on in this area! The interview was solid. Listen now.

Attending the Bethel Worship event in OKC last week drove me to this album. Man, it's solid and having the context and experience from the live event...it's nearly on repeat. If you are into worship music, I highly recommend this album.

Interesting Products & Services

(click reply with your suggestions)

Rachio Smart Sprinkler System

One of my favorite pieces of technology is my sprinkler system. Yea, sounds boring, but it's not. The Rachio is a smart sprinkler system that makes watering your yard simple, smart, and fun. When I installed our full sprinkler system we started with the Rachio unit, so I am not sure how easy it is to just replace your current master unit...but I imagine it wouldn't be to hard. You can learn all about it here, and see the weather aware, intelligent zones, and how simple and powerful the iOS and Android app are.

The All New Things (From Kyle Kutter)

I am a “to do-aholic, ” and I love Things. Seriously, after using a to-do app for nearly ten years, it becomes ingrained into the DNA of how this activator Gets. Crap. Done! So when Culture Code, German-based dev shop, launches the all new Things 3 this June it becomes like my birthday, Christmas, anniversary all in one month.

What I LOVE about this app, and it’s now 11 person team, is how with every update they live out their declared passions of productive, simplicity and beautiful design. It is most evident with the latest release of Things 3 as they re-imagined what a task management app should feel and function like on every unique Apple device. (That’s right, Things only exists for macOS, iOS, and watchOS. Sorry to the Android readers.)

But no matter what OS, app, journal or sticky note you find yourself leveraging to craft your to-do list apply these lessons from one of my all-time favorite books, Making Ideas Happen, when writing them down:

1. Start it with a verb. (Trigger your brain to take action not just think about it.)

2. Keep it short. (At a glance you should know what to do.)

3. Capture everywhere. (Be able to write it down when the idea or thought hits you.)

If you find yourself wanting to check out this app be sure to take advantage of their free trial of the Mac OS app. Trust me, after checking it out you will understand why they again received the Apple Design Award in 2017.

Reminder: click reply and submit your product or service you love and recommend.

Thoughts From Terry

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