I held a coaching call last week with the members of Physician Assistant Exam Scholars. It went really well, and I’m going to start incorporating more of those calls into the program.
During that call, we talked a little about the importance of daily habits. The guy who set me on the path of daily habits was Admiral McRaven, but during that call I couldn’t come up with it. So, I dug back through my old email record and found something I’d written as it pertains to the Admiral.
The date on this email was 4/6/2017 and it’s just as important a message today as it was then.
Here you go:
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The Navy SEALS are recognized as one of the elite fighting forces on the planet. The toughest of the tough.
They undergo the most rigorous training. They are basically tortured for weeks as part of their training. No sleep freezing cold water and let’s not forget people shooting at you.
Adm. William H. McRaven who was in charge of the SEAL team that took out Osama Bin Laden is clearly one of the best. And he have some advice to the 2014 graduating class of The University of Texas that you should be using.
He opened with this.
“If you want to change the world, start off by making your bed,”
You’ve hear me say before what’s easy to do is also easy not to do. It isn’t sexy. It isn’t exciting. It is one of the most powerful things I can share with you and it comes from one of the toughest most accomplished people on the planet.
People fail their exams. People are struggling with PA school. People don’t know where to get started with all of the material for the PANRE.
My answer is the same for everyone. Tomorrow morning make your bed. Then do it the next day and the next.
Admiral McRaven goes on in that speech to talk about how making your bed impacts the rest if your day.
I take his advice to heart and so should you. It’s those little confidence builders that change the game – not one act of bravado. It’s not slaying the dragon, but going to the gym everyday. Making your bed everyday. Studying a little everyday. Not the Herculean act of sitting in the library for 10 hours, but the consistent act of studying everyday.
30 minutes an hour whatever you do, but do it.
It’s the consistency that pays dividends.
If you’re looking for an easy way to be consistent with your studying grab a copy of The Final Step and work with it everyday. If you haven’t covered the topics yet only do one or two questions and look up the answers. That physical act of looking them up will make them stick even if you only do one or two a day.
Good luck!
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The fact that I just pulled up that email for today of all days is a bit funny. You see,
today is day 75 of the 75HARD program for me. If you haven’t heard of it, 75HARD is program created by Andy Frisella that is nothing but daily constancy. It’s the same 5 tasks repeated over and over and over, every day for 75 days. No exceptions. If you miss one, even by a smidgen, you start over on day 1.
Success comes with daily consistency. The way to win is to win every day.
The Final Step is one tool to help you do just that.
Brian Wallace
