 Have you ever followed somebody's life path or life trajectory and you see them do all of these things like five years ago they were this and four years ago they were this and three years ago this two years ago this last year they were this and this year they have a brand new project that they're working on and the whole time you're wondering how the hell do they maintain that momentum? Like how the hell do they keep growing and keep changing and keep iterating on these projects? Well in this video I want to share a concept that has really really helped me try to become that person as best I can where each year is continually better than the last year. What's up you guys? Alex Hine, author of Milk the Pigeon, a field guide for anyone lost in their 20s. Check it out on Amazon or on Audible and I've included a free link below this video which is for a free journaling worksheet that will help you figure out how to design your life and how to plan out the exact life you want. So you can check it out, the first link below this video. Now let's talk about the real big problem here. The very big problem that I tend to see is that most of us are living life on autopilot. Like when you look around in your life do you see your friends and family progressively getting better? Do you see them working on their flaws and their frustrations and that irritating dynamic with your mom or your brother or your sister? Do you see that friend who's working at that menial job at the coffee shop or who's a waiter and they say they want to change and they probably really do. But do you see them progressively getting better? Do you see that in yourself? You know I think it's challenging because for me the answer is to all of those is no. For most people I don't see progressive improvement and I don't believe for a second this idea that with age comes wisdom because if with age came wisdom then as we got older we would have less financial problems, we'd be better at managing our health, our relationships would get better, we would be better at going after our dreams and I know there's a lot of stuff going on in life. I know that shit happens, things are changing, stuff does happen to you. But practically I don't see a lot of evidence that people get better with age and so it was obvious to me as a kid that you don't automatically get better and that's important to know that you have all these corny 3am thoughts quotes on Facebook about just let it pass, just trust God a year from now things will be different but a lot of the time they really aren't if you're being honest with yourself. You know would you say to a diabetic and don't change anything a year from now it will be different? No, you might be getting your pinky toe snipped off because the circulation is impaired. So people don't naturally grow and get better. So I want to talk about the 20% rule of self growth that has helped me. The 20% rule is very simple, 20% of your time related to your life or your goals or your free time should be about getting better. And when I say getting better I just mean you should be taking on challenges that require you to grow into a new version of yourself. I'll give you an example. Before I had ever created this brand Modern Health Monk I had never been a business owner. I had no experience with business, I had no interest in business. I sucked at it, I was terrible with money, I didn't care about money. So when I decided that it was time to be a business owner because I could control the projects I worked on, guess what happened? I had to become a totally new person. I had to learn what it was like to learn how to create and write articles, to be an editor, to be a good researcher and then eventually to become a good business owner. I had to track the numbers of my business, stuff I never wanted to do. I had to answer emails and customer support inquiries and create all these new things that I never had to do and as a result I got better. Now fast forward a little bit and then I realized you know what? I want to try out this YouTube thing just for fun. So as I tried out creating a new video that was a new growth goal. I had to buy a camera and learn about cameras and videography and learn about editing and learn about YouTube and what works on YouTube. So I had to learn that and then I acquired a little bit of an experience point there. And then from there it was you know what? I want to write a book. What a massive growth goal undertaking. How the hell do I, a normal dude, write a book let alone a couple of them? So I have to learn. Okay I have to learn my writing style. How to hire editors. How to market and sell a self-published book which is probably one of the hardest things you could do. How to even create it. How to hire designers. So I get that book done and then again I acquire another experience point. And it just keeps going and going and going. You know it's the growth goal of it could be personal growth where you're just practicing not being so introverted and you're getting better at talking to strangers. It could be becoming a business owner or it could be something totally different altogether. For a lot of people that growth challenge could be moving to a new city alone and then you have to work on these aspects about yourself. Being okay being alone. Learning to make new friends and to find new routines. And being comfortable with being uncomfortable for a certain period of time. And you don't know how long that's going to be. Same as being single for a long time. But the point is that if you orchestrate some of your free time around setting new goals that deliberately force you to get better or acquire new skills, new upgrades, more experience points for the nerds among you like me. You will acquire a kind of inborn confidence that then goes with you everywhere you go. And those challenges that I used to do that seem so intimidating like even writing a book. Now we're a piece of cake. And things that are 10 times bigger than that now now seem like my new growth goals. So the more you dedicate a certain percent of your time to deliberate growth since it doesn't normally happen usually. The more you will upgrade yourself continually and the less intimidating other challenges in life will become. So try dedicating a certain period of your time to a new goal that requires new skills, new character traits, new friends, whatever it is. And you'll begin to acquire this confidence more and more and more. And the things that used to scare you will not seem so intimidating. They'll actually seem pretty attainable. And sometimes to reach those really, really, really big goals you want. That's really all it takes. Right you guys, that is the 20% rule of self growth. Again, I've got a link below this video which is for a free journal worksheet you can check out to help design your dream life. And I have two related videos on the topic right here.