Category: Ideology

Posted on by

Identify Small Moments

Identify small moments. Throughout our life, there’s always just small moments that count. It’s the little things that matter. It’s the small, little note that you put out for your wife or your husband, telling them to have a beautiful day and that you love them. It’s the little flowers you send, it’s the little chocolates. It’s the little small thank yous or when you see somebody having a bad day, walk over there, you tell them, “How are you doing? What’s wrong?” It’s the small things that matter.

When practicing the FYMM Framework, we want to always remember the small things. I was mostly just spurting out some things, but let’s give some better examples, like some massive examples of how identifying the small things matter. Let’s talk about Walmart with Sam Walton. Sam Walton used to fly to every single one of his competitors’ stores and spend time, he was even quoted saying that he thinks he spends more time in his competitors’ stores than his own. Why was he doing that? By trying to identify small things. Small moments, small things that other stores are doing that he’s not doing.

Another example. I think it was American Airlines one of the flight attendants noticed that all the customers were taking the little black olives off the salad. No one was eating them. She made that discovery, and she went up the proper chain of command and told her superiors. That small little thing, her general manager, realized that The Airlines were being charged by the ingredient. It’s like when you’re ordering a pizza. You get charged on how many items you put. You just get a cheese pizza, it’s completely different from an all-you-can-eat meat-lover’s pizza, right? Cheese in-expensive, Meat lover’s expensive.  So if all the customers were not eating the olives, then there’s no point in adding them.  They realized that taking off some of the ingredients, (the ingredients that the people did not want to eat anyways,) they saved thousands, probably over the years, millions of dollars. Finding that small, little thing, identifying small moments in time. Innovation comes from solving problems, I kind of almost say laziness. So identify something small, something that you don’t like, something in your life, you’re like, “Man, you know what? I think I could do this better.”

Remember, everything starts with a thought, so start from there. Identify different things. Identify with your kids, If your kid’s not doing something a hundred percent how you want it done, instead of automatically jumping the gun, take the time, slow down, maybe there’s a reason. Maybe the kid’s telling you something that you’re not paying attention to. Maybe they can’t vocalize or they can’t explain how they want to explain it, so they’re trying to communicate in a different way. One of the greatest tragedies of life is to try to turn an artist into a conformist and a conformist into an artist. 

Same thing with a dog, you trained yourself to notice when the dog goes to the door, let it out. It has to go to the bathroom. But if you weren’t raised around animals, you wouldn’t really know that. I mean, it’s kind of obvious, but it’s obvious to people who owned animals. My aunt told me when I was younger, she said, “All you need in this world is common sense.” She didn’t tell me that things don’t become common sense until it’s already knowledge that you know. It’s common knowledge, right? So, it’s common sense to let a dog out when it needs to go to the bathroom if you’ve had a dog before. If you’ve never had a dog before, that’s not common sense. It’s really not. But by being attuned and being aware, you would notice, as you can identify that small moment, whether you’ve had a dog in your life or not, is becoming aware of your surroundings, being attuned to what’s going on.

Another example, David Gold. He owned a liquor store and he noticed that every time he put 99 cents on something, that it would be out the door. He noticed this over and over and over again, and he was like, “Well, what is this?” Then, he started realizing, he started finding products he could make a profit off of 99 cents. What he did is he identified that small moment, and then went on to open up a 99 cent store with 149 different stores by selling products that are only 99 cents. He identified something small and then boom, changed, adapted, created. So, that’s what I’m asking you guys to do. Go around your house, really, honestly, go around your house and then identify the small things that you didn’t notice before, and just write it down. Take a notepad and identify every little thing that you didn’t notice before. If you live by yourself, it’s going to be a little bit easier because the majority of the things that you put into the house, you put in. But if you have other people in your house, identify the small moments. Go look around and go notice everything that you’ve never even noticed before. Take the time to slow down. Then through that, you’re going to start noticing things you never thought that you would notice. Whether it’s with your finances, whether it’s with your love life. 

This is like the number one thing with a girl. They get their nails done, pay attention and say, “I like your nails.” Or if they’re changed their hair and you don’t notice, oh man, you made a big mistake. Right? It’s identified in those small moments, and especially when it comes to a female, as in telling a female. I could be wrong, but from my experience, growing up with a lot of sisters, it’s the smallest, little, itty bitty things that they change about themselves. If you notice it, you get extra points. Right?. 

Think of the small, little things and you’ll be amazed on how that changes your life and gives you more opportunity. If you’re trying to lose weight, take time and imagine. Start looking at the weight, start looking at everything that you put in into your system. I guarantee. You’re going to be like, “Wow Are you serious?” Identify the small little things. If you’re trying to lose weight, or if you’re diabetic and you can’t eat a lot of sugar, and you smoke cigarettes, do you know what they put in cigarettes? They put a little sugar in the filter because they know addictive sugar is, and sugar will give a better tasting cigarette. Identify the small little moments. 

Posted on by

Small Rewards

Small rewards. Now, whether you’re trying to train yourself, a dog, an employee, your kid, whatever it is, we all like getting gifts, we all like being rewarded for our actions. Now the problem with that is you have to give the right reward for the action. Dr. W. Edwards Deming, studied  “a large gift kills people’s intrinsic motivation to do a good job. People want to be proud of their work. They want to attaboy. But if you just give them money or you bestow them with large gifts every time, okay, that might work once. But then towards the end, it decreases the value of it. And in the end it could actually send the inverse message that you want.”

You could be trying to motivate somebody but by giving them big rewards and big things, it’s actually demotivating them. So that brings us to the perfect reward for the person or for the problem. So the gift or reward should be appropriate with the goal. So don’t give chocolate to somebody who’s diabetic or having health problems. That doesn’t make sense. Maybe give a health book or take them out to lunch at a healthy place. I don’t really go out to lunch pretty often, I have a garden and then in the summertime, so I just eat out of the garden. But do something nice like give them some seeds. There you go. Give them a nice gift that fits the accomplishment.

Understand who you’re dealing with because some gifts people don’t like. And some things that I’m thinking, “Well, this would be an amazing gift.” I give to people and they look at me like I’m crazy. Like what is this, Erik? What is this? This isn’t a gift. This is work, to me, I’m like, “Wow, this is great. Look, look what you can do with this.” Understand who you’re giving the gift to if you give the wrong kind of gift, then it’s not a gift. Or it’s not showing someone’s accomplishments. You could be sending the wrong message.

I do this quite often. Like I said, I’m not very good at giving gifts. I tend to give people gifts that are educational or to better themselves and sometimes people just want a gift. They don’t want to have to think and educate themselves all day long, just some of the days. Have you ever heard the expression, it’s the thought that counts? Well in this situation it is. It’s the thought that counts. So yeah, you can give people Gucci and Prada and Ferrari, but what message are you sending? You can also take the time, especially if you have the money and all you know how to do is just give gifts of money. Well in the beginning, that’s cool but in the end that can get old. Because you’re not telling that person that you care about by doing this. It’s like having your assistant buy your kid a Christmas gift. If you were to take the time and make something that takes you 10 minutes? If you take the time and you give a small gift, it was free for you to do, but it was personalized and it’s something from the heart. That has a much more effective effect on somebody, and longer lasting. Have you ever got something from a little kid they can’t afford, extravagant gifts. they don’t have an income. Well some of them do, but we’re not talking about them. It’s almost the reason they invented magnets for your refrigerator, to put small drawings, pictures, crafts your kids make.

When they want to express love, they make something out of the tools they have and they give it to you and then your heart melts. Now that’s all pretty and everything, because it’s something that was heartfelt and it was something that they took time and they put into it. So it’s the same thing, if you want to do something nice or have a gift for your wife, instead of buying her a diamond, maybe take the kids out and give her some time to herself. Ask her what she wants. Not as in what do you want materialistically, do you want a new Ferrari or this or that? No. Like what do you want? What would give you peace? And then try to do that.

Or if it’s an employee, my buddy, he was so happy. His job acknowledged him and told him he was doing such a great job. He’s still running high off of that now, and it’s been about two weeks since the incident actually happened. And it was for free. They didn’t give him anything. They just told him he was doing a good job and gave him a pat on the back. Imagine if they gave him a big bonus or something, that would have been great, but in the end he would have been like, “All right, whatever,” everyone would move on with their day. He would have been inspired a little bit. But then look at the comradery by acknowledging my friend in a positive attitude, they brought the morale of everybody else up. If they would have passed out money it would have done the inverse and created a competitive environment opposed to a supportive environment.  like crabs in the bucket. Only doing their best to beat the next person to get the money. By not giving money and giving an attaboy, everyone’s like, “Attaboy, Erik. Good job man. Yo, I’m happy for you.” Takes the monetary value out of it and now we all can enjoy and celebrate together. So hope you got something out of that message. 

Posted on by

I feel like we’re having a real conversation no lies, If you ride with me I’ll ride with you till I die, No matter if it causes my sister to cry, Just remember I died for the cause open your eyes, And ask why

In today’s society, it is imperative for us as a people to cease from living a meaningless life. How many conversations does each of us have in a day that does not have any meaning? We as a race of people even came up with a phrase to define worthless communications we call it “small talk.” How many of us see exaggerating as being a harmless little lie that will not affect anything, but we use it to boost the story and give ourselves a false sense of pride. This quote challenges us to stop having worthless conversations and start having real meaningful conversations. Only when we as a human race stop wasting time with each other and begin to have real conversations will we begin the process of growing. It saddens me at what the world has become, no longer do we care about our future and the futures of our descendants. We are more concerned with watching television and trying to emulate people we will never become. Conversations in the past were meaningful, black people actually had conversations on how to grow as a race. We were organized and driven, to advance our society and our mental abilities. In those days we took ourselves seriously, nowadays we idolize phrases like “I made a 100K without going to college”  how ridiculous is that?  

Now we have the understanding that having a real conversation is one emulated from forgotten leaders of the past or conversations with intellectual value. Once we move past the bullshit of worthless conversations and proceed with authentic conversations it will have an unconscious effect on our psychological makeup, it will allow our brains to advance at a faster rate. It also will have a positive effect on our abilities to understand and be empathic to ourselves and others. If you ride with me I’ll ride with you till I die,  shows the extent of commitment we need to survive in the world to come. This statement could be construed to be negative or detrimental but we have already discussed what the intention of this statement is, having a “real conversation.” Imagine a society where we are not having “small talk” discussing last night’s ballgame, or how the club was last weekend, what date the next pair of Jordans come out, how “fly” our ride is, you know the typical everyday conversation. There is nothing wrong with those conversations, but in a progressive society, there is nothing progressive or productive about them either. The inverse society FYMM is creating is based on enlightenment and intelligence, having mentally stimulating conversations about; travel, history, sciences, and personal growth. A quick example: A few months ago a friend of mine was showing me pictures, one of the pictures was a picture of a lot of shoes, she showed me the picture with a sense of amazement, like having a collection of shoes was a progressive thing. A few nights ago a group of us were analyzing and strategizing our next moves. During the discussion I was asked how many properties I own, I told them I have 7. The conversation I had with my friend before about the shoes flashed in my head, and I thought I don’t collect shoes, I collect real estate. That is the difference in the thinking, one style of thinking is detrimental because it allows you to collect liabilities, FYMM thinking allows you to collect assets, things that appreciate over time. Although that is just a simple example, if you analyze the message you will see the power in it. One way of thinking is short term and based on clouding our minds with liabilities, thoughts, and actions which do not appreciate over time. While FYMM thinking forces you to expand your mind and conquer your niggerish tendencies.

Over the course of about two centuries we have been trained to have a short term thinking, and only being concerned with short term gratification. Over the last century, our intellect has decreased at a staggering rate. I fear that if we do not do something drastic to alter our thinking all of our ancestors who struggled and died will have died in vain. Please take a moment to remember all of the forgotten heroes who sacrificed themselves for our advancement. It only seems just to follow suit and give our lives to the very cause our heroes did, the advancement of our people. So as the lesson states. “Just remember I died for the cause open your eyes and ask why.”

Posted on by

Keep looking into the past You will lose your life fast Look to the future to bring the cash

Only for select things is looking into your past beneficial, on all other things, looking into your past can be very destructive.  When you analyze your past it can be very helpful when I say analyze,  I mean just that analyze without bias. We all make mistakes, we have all been in situations where we wished we made a different choice than the one we made. It is common to have a sense of pride and embarrassment about our pasts. Analyzing what works and what does not work can be ideal for your future, it allows us to make better-educated decisions to conduct our future in a positive and productive manner. When analyzing our pasts it is imperative to do so in an unbiased constructive way, for our own emotions will cloud our minds, and unconsciously rationalize and justify our destructive behavior. It is human nature to form opinions in all aspects of life so it would only make sense that our minds can form an opinion about our own individual pasts. This can be constructive at times but also and more importantly it can be destructive, our biases and opinions have the ability to create a false perception of our pasts. Whether it is in a past love, money, family, friendship, or it can also go as deep as a past social environment, city, anything that is in our past. Our minds even have the ability to allow us to create a past which we did not even live. This is why it is so important for us to only “unbiasedly” analyze our pasts for insights into our future, as opposed to living in the past.  

This quote challenges us to develop skills which allow us to quickly analyze any situation that has happened in the past, and unbiasedly form a healthy decision to positively impact our future, to make our next move our best move. We will see how the mentality of someone living in the past will continue to struggle in life and not understand why.  Whereas the person whose mentality is living in the future is able to constructively solve past mistakes and create a more productive future. 

It is not a zero-sum game, where you either have one type of mentality or the other, if it were that simple it would not be so hard to spot.  Each of us on a daily basis interchange mentalities subconsciously, depending on the particular subject being discussed. We already discussed an array of different topics so let’s examine those in more depth. 

Love

We all have the “one that got away” or in some cases the two or three that got away. We dwell in the past, after the initial breakup we might even go into a state of depression,p now how long we stay in that state is purely our own choice driven by our mindset. If we keep looking into the past we will convince ourselves how perfect everything was and how if we had another chance everything would be different and better. We will replay every fight and think “what if”. What if I did this and what if I did that. This disruptive state again will last as long as we allow it to last. The mentality of a person looking to the future will understand that people change and grow over time. Will look over the life of the relationship with gratitude and appreciation, because they understand how to analyze the relationship constructively and absorb the things which worked and will dismiss the negative behavior. Awaiting the next exciting relationship God has for them. 

Money

Money is just like a significant other it has the power to activate extreme amounts of emotions. It is most detrimental when the person has had money then lost it. The amount of confidence that is stripped from the person surpasses the amount of confidence one needs in life for basic functionality. The constant thought of past achievements can distract the person from accepting the reality of their immediate situation. The inability to accept one’s life can cause a person to invite uneducated risks, and further hurt the individual financially. We call this “keeping up with the Jones” when a person buys things they cannot afford in order to impress spectators or oneself. A person who focuses on the future accepts the new life they have and analyses their past behavior to dissect the problem and then makes the necessary changes for the future. The person whose mentality is about the future understands that disruptive behavior only compounds into a much larger problem.

Family

Nobody is perfect. We can all strive for perfection but in the end, none of us make the perfect decision all the time. Whether it is your mother, brother, father, or daughter no one is perfect and we all make mistakes. Holding resentments about past events is not a healthy way to deal with anyone much less a family member. I fall victim to this, I am having a hard time forgiving people’s actions from the past, by choosing to hold on to past resentments and grudges. I have not allowed myself to grow into the individual I am supposed to become. Hate is a funny thing when you hate another person or thing it also consumes you, when you think you are punishing someone else you are in turn also punishing yourself.

Friendship

This is the plethora of looking into the past, whenever we encounter a friend from our pasts the first thing we tend to do is tell stories about our pasts. “Remember when, do you remember” and any other catchy overused phrase. I don’t particularly believe in the word friendship, I believe it is overused and has lost its value. At the core friendship can be a beautiful thing, a true friend has your best interest in mind. A true friend does not allow you to wallow in the past about anything they are always encouraging you to better your future. What most of us have are acquaintances, people we have in our life to pass the time. Misery loves company and a person who continues to live in their past is miserable. They need to find like-minded individuals to continue their path of self-destruction. They are miserable because instead of focusing on solutions to their problems they are only focused on their problems and only remember the “good ol days” when life was better for them.

Past social environment 

As we get older we adapt to our new lives,  for some, that means moving to different cities or schools, it could be as large as a move to a different country and as small as moving across town.  With all these changes it is only common for us to think and remember our past lives. This can be healthy in moderation, giving us much-needed motivation, however, when we dwell in the past we forget to focus on what is more important and what is in front of us. Take a moment to think about the different conversations you have with other people and really listen to what is being said. Is the conversation progressive? If it is what are you discussing, take notes when you feel the conversation is not progressing and later review your mental notes and determine what the problem was and in turn what the solutions are. You will find that most of your conversations about the past will become boring because you now understand the conversations are not progressive in other words they are a trap. 

Looking to the past will only allow you to repeat the same mistakes, although analyzing your past to help construct your future is imperative. It will be a struggle but every day we have to challenge ourselves to be progressive, to aspire to have the future we all deserve. 

Posted on by

My past is always right behind me If I don’t look to the future I’ll get stuck B All I ask is that you follow me Just remember Fuck You Make Money

The past is a funny thing, it is equivalent to our shadow in that it continuously follows us. Every future moment will eventually become a past moment, in our distant memory. With this statement in mind it raises a great question, If every future moment will eventually be a past moment then why do we focus so hard on past events opposed to future events. It goes with this saying if you don’t like your past then change your future. Phrases like “I wish I did this”, “I never have any money”, “if I had just waited” or “I was at the wrong place at the wrong time” are indicative of a person who focuses more time on the past then on the future. To better explain this, imagine a person who always holds a grudge, what is the one thing we all wish they would do? LET IT GO!!!  When we hold onto a grudge we think we are “winning” or we have power over the situation, a person with “power and control” issues usually has hard times with letting things go. For some reason people with “power and control” issues feed off of being stubborn and difficult, in their minds letting go is the same as losing. What they don’t see or understand is that always holding that grudge and living in the past they become stagnant and miss out on great opportunities. Sometimes your worst enemy will become your best friend. 

A perfect example of how holding a grudge and being stuck in the past can and will be detrimental to any relationship.  Four years ago I met the woman of my dreams, she was perfect in every sense of the word. I made a huge mistake, a mistake that most women would have run and never looked back. I broke my goddess’ heart, she did not however run from me she did something that looking back was way worse. She held and still holds a grudge, in her mind, she has won. Everything we dreamed of doing together she did with someone else. She stopped taking pictures with me, (to this day we have no pictures together after the first time we met), she has become non-agreeable, saying no to everything I suggest. One of her dreams was to come to America, so I opened a business for us but she wanted no part of it because of her new boyfriend. I offered to put her name on some of my property so that she would own land in America, but she would not listen to any of it. I tried to show her how to make more money online but again will not listen to anything. The terribly sad thing and the reason I am explaining this is after all the no’s and years of my trying to love her she has grown a bond to me, because we have been able to grow in my perception of the world, But in her world, we are still stagnant and have never progressed. 

 In the short term holding that grudge and traveling with a different man, made her happy “she was in control” but there is always a downside to always being right and holding onto the past. After the four years the risk she has, has become much greater, if I leave and find someone else then she loses four years of friendship (because I opened my heart to her) but I, on the other hand, lose nothing, because she gave me nothing. So in the end holding on to the grudge fueled her motivation, but since she is still in my life 4 years later. She made a horrible life choice by holding on to the grudge, four years we could have built an amazing relationship and maybe become a family by now. But because of not letting go she has drained all the life out of the relationship.  This is a personal experience but think in your life about how not letting go has forced you to become stagnant like the love of my life has become in our relationship, it does not just have to be with a different person. How many times have you not forgiven yourself for a past action, by holding on to the past we only get stuck.

By no means am I perfect at this but I do always try and give chances, people might not change but situations do. 

Posted on by

You always remember what you did for a nigga But Do you remember what a nigga did for you

As there are two sides to every coin there are two sides to every story. In one of my programs, it was drilled in our heads to “seek first to understand then to be understood”. Over the course of my life, I have been in numerous situations where this quote and phrase ring true. In conflict resolution, we tend to forget to hear the entire spectrum of a situation. We allow our emotions to cloud our judgment. We as a society have been trained to approach the world differently than my programs drilled into my head at a young age. It is fascinating to see how far we have not gone from being a small child. Let me give an example: if you have observed a 2-year-old, a child just learning to talk, if they make a mistake and called upon their mistake their first response is “no I didn’t do it”. We all get a good laugh at how cute they are and carry on with our day. Well let’s look at the same 2-year-old ten years later now at age twelve the same behavior of avoiding responsibility occurs and we wonder why?  Now take an adult, for the most part when we make mistakes we always have an excuse on why we made the mistake, the same behavior that was ingrained to be ok since we were two years old. We try to be understood first then we try and understand. We are always defending ourselves even when we are not being attacked.  Quick tip, another thing that was drilled into my head was this “ if a person is able to affect your emotions in any way they now have power over you, why are you giving that person your power?” 

 You always remember what you did for a nigga

I fall victim to this as well, it is an easy thing to do, with our daily lives it is easy to become narcissistic and only think about ourselves. When we watch old gangster movies we remember the names of Al Capone, John Gotti, Lucky Luciano, even Pablo Escobar. One thing in common with all the movies about these individuals is they are most certainly the boss. They all have a demanding presence and were all ruthless at an instance. When we grow up idolizing these people and repeatedly watching movies based on that lifestyle we begin to implement that way of life to be the reality. Now if this was only on a singular term it would be different but we are talking about a massive amount of people who are watching these movies and falling in love with these movies and video games. Now we have a massive amount of people with the ruthless “dog eat dog” mentality.  

But why does this matter?

 Hollywood is not giving us the full spectrum of the situation about these people, they create the story based off of one person’s rise to power. A man on an island, so to speak. In these 2 hours of entertainment, we are manipulated to think our idols actually did it on their own, with a narcissistic attitude. So in turn we have the narcissistic attitude, where we want to rape and pillage just because we saw it in the movies and we think our idols would be proud. It is easy to forget Pablo built hospitals, Lucky helped during World War 2. The only way we can survive is if we look past our selfish and narcissistic attitudes and begin to help each other, reach higher dreams and aspirations.

  You always remember what you did for a nigga

This is such a regressive way of thinking, I am the first to say no one does anything from the kindness of their heart, we all have a sense of self-preservation, that is normal we are human. However, why people do things is what I am discussing. Do we only do things for narcissistic gratification? Here is an example you help a friend in need; it could be with money, relationship help, homework, anything. What was your purpose in helping your friend? Now since we have the understanding we don’t do anything from the kindness of our heart that only leaves us with a couple of alternatives. We helped our friend in a vindictive way (having or showing a strong or unreasoning desire for revenge) or in a benevolent way (well-meaning and kindly). One way of helping is the same as “crabs in a bucket” where we only wish to help as long as it does not allow the friend to progress more than ourselves. 

The other way of thinking, the FYMM way of thinking is to give in a benevolent way, as Pablo was when he intended to build hospitals. We first need to take the time to become empathetic to our soundings, as opposed to having the “crabs in the bucket” mentality. If we remember no great man became great off the back of his own labor, but instead became great and built massive empires off the backs of a collective group of people. Not all of us are meant to build empires, but the one common theme is they all will remember the FYMM way of thinking and always remember what a nigga did for them.  

Do you remember what a nigga did for you

Think of any great achievement you have had in your life, it might have been your achievement but you did not accomplish it alone. Learning how to crawl, walk, talk, or run. Yes, they are all your achievements but they were not accomplished without the help of others. This however is not as straightforward as one would like. We all agreed that the person we are today is a combination of different interactions with people over the course of our lives. In an unbiased way of thinking of ourselves and our past, we will begin to realize our entire personality and thought process has just been small snippets of different things we saw or encountered during our lives. This is what brings truth to the “I am a product of my environment” statement, If all you know is hell then all you have is one frame of thinking.

This past year as I have gotten older I have done just this, I looked at why I have not accomplished my life goals, I started to analyze my own interactions with different people in my life. When you do this you have to remember it is imperative to be unbiased, in that you can not use emotions. When I stopped remembering what I did for a nigga (crabs in the bucket mentality) and began thinking in a progressive FYMM manner and started remembering what a nigga did for me, it changed my outlook on many things. In one of my programs as an exercise, they would make us look our friends in the eyes and we would have to tell our friends all the ways we choose to hurt them, you would be surprised how vindictive people are. With this in mind, I was able to analyze my past encounters and formulate a solid plan to accomplish my goals and the people I want in my future.  

It is very important for us to remember what a nigga has done for us, whether positive or negative. With deeper analysis, we realize we learned a lesson either way. Our life is shaped with two variables, because of and in spite of. I became a drug dealer because of the environment I was raised in or I made it out of the hood in spite of the environment I was raised in. As we take a deeper look at both phrases, we must remember we are the masters of our own destiny. We as individuals have the conscience choice to allow others to manipulate our power or to make the choice to control our own emotions and future by having a better understanding of ourselves, and what a nigga has done for you. 

Because of

  • Society; The Black Male is feared and depicted as an ignorant beast
  • Environment; I have been another status quo and become another statistic
  • Family; I have never seen the world or tried new things 
  • Friends; I am a certain person and expected to continue to be a certain way

In Spite of

  • Society; I am intelligent and well mannered
  • Environment; I have risen above the expectations of the world and become successful
  • Family; I seen the world, met amazing new people and tried thousands of new things
  • Friends; I have learned that people grow and friends are perfect for certain times in our life like a revolving door

In order for us to have an FYMM mentality we must, first, acknowledge the “crab in the bucket” way of thinking, “I have done this for a nigga” and transition to a “what has that nigga done for me” mentality, constantly evaluating the individuals in our life, making sure we do not allow people in our lives who have a vindictive way of helping us. 

Posted on by

I don’t care about what you did I care about what you’re about to do

“War stories” is what we used to call them at Aspen Achievement Academy. A “war story” is a story about your past, but not just any story; it is a story that you take pride in that does not have much value, a story where you are glori- fying negative destructive behavior. I have been through lots of different adventures in my life, some of my adventures have been dangerous, some have been detrimental, and some have been productive. The common thing has been my ability to constructively learn from my adventures, but having the ability to extract different teachable lessons takes time and practice. Learning how to analyze our pasts and extract teachable lessons is a skill all of us need to practice and strive to perfect. Whether we are using our new found lesson to teach our kids, peers, or even ourselves every ad- venture has its own particular lesson to be learned. “War sto- ries” are obviously different for each person, however i have lived many different lives, and been in hundreds of different social structures and the use of “war stories” to pass time is constant. 

How do you know if you are in the middle of a “war story”? 

Have you ever listened or told a story where the other person or you don’t know a single person in the story? A sto- ry where it is only funny to one person, but is always fol- lowed by “ I guess you had to be there”, or the best. This is really when you know you have become victim of a “war sto- ry”. When your patience has run out and you have to ask “what is the point of your story”. This gives a very broad ar- ray of examples, but we have all been in conversations just like these. As your mind transitions into having a FYMM mindset, you will begin to realize how painful it is to waste precious time with people who only are concerned with “war stories”. As we have discussed numerous times before, hav- ing a FYMM mindset is about being progressive not stagnant or regressive; being stuck in our “war stories” only keeps us in the past. A friend came to visit recently, as we were talking I asked about their plans. This is after about an hour or so of “catching up”, telling “war stories”. The answer I got was shocking and scary, my friend really did not have any plans at all for their future, it was more or less a “wing it” mentality. That is the problem today we can spend hours talking about what we did but only a few sentences about what we are about to do. 

I don’t care about what you did

Everybody has a story and everybody wants their own particular 15 minutes of fame where they are the center of attention. This could be in an argument, trying to persuade your opponent to see things your way. For the most part we all want to win the “influence game” between people. “Influence game”? Yes, if I am listening to you then you are influencing my time with your perspective and mentality, the same is true if you are listening to me. For the brief time you are listening to me, I am in control of the “influence game”. Everything begins with a thought, so if the wrong person is in control of the “influence game” then it can and will have detrimental consequences for the listening party. When you become FYMM you need to pay careful attention to the conversations around, if they are conversations about what people have done, then an alarm should go off, to proceed with caution. If the conversation is a progressive one about one’s past, what they have learned, how to avoid certain pitfalls, common sense or wisdom. Then it is ok to allow that person to control the “influence game” for a while, as we might learn something to benefit ourselves. However if the conversations are about how great someone else is or what great achievements they have accomplished, or discussing a person you do not know and will never meet then run as fast as you can as that is not the type of person we want to be influenced by.

One of the most annoying things in my life is when people talk about my past for me, this has happened more times then I can count, I will be discussing one of my future plans and out of nowhere a friend will blurt out “you know he went to Harvard” or “you know he is a millionaire”. I guess people do this to validate everything that I say, like since I went to Harvard or I am a millionaire my words carry more value or weight.

As we are discussing the “influence game” at first thought the mention of Harvard or the fact of me being a millionaire, would bring value but in actuality what happens is the person’s attention is broken and now are more concerned with what I have done opposed to what I am about to do. 

The new winner of the “influence game” is my friend who blurted out my past. The attention is still about me, but now I am no longer in control of how my life influences other people. Years ago in Pacolet, the first season so it was mostly like camping, while sitting by the fire, my cousin from my black family in California started to “war story” and he started talking about my “gangster life” past the people around the fire were listening in disbelief, they would look at me and say “Erik” my cousin started laughing and said “yall dont know shit about this nigga” when asked I just responded “telling those type of stories would not help you, so why would I tell you? I don’t need to impress you”. 

I care about what you’re about to do

I tend to be alone more than I would like, not because I like being alone, but because most people refuse to talk about the future. Past this upcoming weekend, most people don’t have much of a plan, they just exist in this world without really living. The special few who actually have goals, if you ask them what happens after they accomplish their goals then they usually give a blank stare, like after the goal is accomplished the end credits are going to roll like in the movies. 

Life is influenced by so many different variables it would be irresponsible not to plan different situations and outcomes. Again having a mentality of never settling and always striving for more is not a common trait, so it is understandable if in the beginning it would seem odd. As we all remember, I needed help to get me out of my worst case scenario lifestyle. If it was not for a select few people who never allowed me to settle then maybe I would have also been a victim of only being concerned with what I have done opposed to what I am about to do. 

Dreams are huge in life, without dreams life can become grey and stagnant. Nelson Mandela lived 20 some years in a prison camp and then became president of South Africa, if he can stay focused on what he was about to do through all the pain and struggle he had to endure then I challenge us all to follow suit. To stop worrying about what we did and focus solely on what we are about to do. 

Posted on by

Obviously, you don’t trust me I know what I’m about Fuck You Make Money!

Trust is a funny thing, it has more to do with our own personal beliefs than it does with another person. Trust has become a blanket statement, we tend to think of trust as black and white when it is grey, there are many different degrees of trust. When we say we trust someone or that we don’t trust someone is not a complete statement, every situation is different, if you say you don’t trust someone to do something one way, you are basically saying you trust a person to do the opposite of that way. Let us explore this a little more. 

If I say to my girlfriend I don’t trust you around other men because you might cheat on me, what I am actually saying is I trust you to cheat on me. They are basically saying the same thing but internally they are very different, one causes anxiety the other provides clarity. If she cheats on me she might have broken one trust but now has built a different trust. We have all heard this saying “I knew you were going to…” when we say or hear this it is a confirmation of trust, “we knew something” but most of the time we still get hurt when we already knew the outcome but why? We tend to confuse trust and hope when our instincts are telling us one thing but we still want to believe in a different outcome that is us confusing trust and hope. Our instincts trust the reality of a situation, while our emotions hope for the desired outcome. Hope is a dangerous thing, it has the ability to distort reality. Hope is only a projection of ourselves, when we hold ourselves to a certain standard then we hope others hold themselves equally to our standards. However this is rarely the case, people as individuals have their own perspectives, beliefs, standards, and stories. When we project ourselves onto other people we are setting ourselves up for failure. 

Let me take it big picture; If you are Christian then you “trust” Jesus is your prophet, if you are Muslim then you trust Muhammed is your prophet, if you are Bahia then you trust Bahaullah is your prophet, and so on with each religion. If each of us trusts in our own beliefs, perspectives, standards, and stories in regards to religion, does that mean people who do not trust in what we trust in are wrong? I hope our minds are large enough to accept people with different beliefs, perspectives, standards, and stories. As you see I did not use the word “trust” I used the word hope. Unless I can empathize with each individual. I don’t know what their core beliefs are so I can not project my beliefs on to them. I can however trust that each person will have their own beliefs, perspectives, standards, and stories. 

We have a hard time accepting new things in life, it could be as large as a new perspective on life or as small as having a different seat in a meeting than you have been accustomed to. We find security in monotonous routines. When we see or hear a phrase like “Fuck You Make Money” it is natural to be transformed into a defensive or curious state, depending on our own beliefs. This quote realizes each individual has their own opinions in life, when you hear a phrase like” Fuck You Make Money” it is normal to not “trust” me or anything I believe in. as the saying goes “don’t judge a book by its cover” it is the same with new or different frames of mind. If we set our bias aside we will allow ourselves to absorb the message being presented. When we choose to disarm ourselves and attempt to empathize with other frames of mind, we realize the commonality of all of our core beliefs. This can only be achieved with the “seek first to understand then to be understood” mentality. This is a difficult task, we have been programmed to talk but not listen, to actually listen to people is a learned skill. When listening to another person, we must pause everything else in our worlds and indulge completely in what the other person is trying to say, when we do this and take this amount of time we are able to identify if the person is someone we want to put our trust in or not. To go a little deeper, we can pick and choose how we want to trust the person, as every situation is different the levels of trust for each person and with each situation should be different. 

I know what I’m about Fuck You Make Money 

“If you don’t stand for something then you are bound to fall for anything”. It is quick and easy to judge another but first, we must judge ourselves, What do you stand for? I understand the way I think is unique, I also understand the way I think could be construed as being controversial, but FYMM is my belief, perspective, standard, and story. Through the course of the book my mission is to appropriately display my beliefs, perspectives, standards, and stories with the intent to give inspiration, motivation, guidance, and support. As you continue to give FYMM your complete attention, I hope I am able to provide a resource for you to refer to for: 

  • Inspiration
    ○ Inspiration can come in many different forms, my hope is through my writings I inspire you to be great and aspire to accomplish amazing things. Where every day you “make the impossible possible” 
  • Motivation 

○ Through my work ethic and my endless projects, I hope I motivate the laziest couch potato. Self-motivation is extremely difficult but through my classes and my writing I hope I am able to take some of the burdens most people have of “not being motivated” 

● Guidance
○ I have gone down every wrong path imaginable, to have the ability to guide you away from the stupid things I have done in my life would be great, but providing the guidance after we have made a terrible mistake is the key. When we are still at our lowest point is where we need the most guidance but far too often that is when guidance is the hardest to find. 

● Support
○ There have been more times than I can count where I wish I had a support system, now I have had small instances or periods of time where I had support but being alone has been constant. I hope my writings help other people just like me who are alone and don’t feel like anyone in the world cares. The world can be a lonely place, my intention is to provide support to those in need. I may not be able to be present in the physical form but in the spiritual form, I hope to provide whatever is needed. 

Posted on by

Why It Works

All right, so far we’ve learned FYMM and innovation, what’s the difference. We’ve learned what FYMM is, what it’s based upon. We’ve learned the six different strategies of The FYMM Way. Now, let’s break down into why it works, before we get into the strategies.

What it does is the small steps, like we talked about in the six strategies (if you notice, all of them say small this, small that.) With the small steps of FYMM, they disarm the brain’s fear response, stimulating rational thought and creative play. Fear of change is rooted in the brain’s psychology. When fear takes hold, it can prevent creativity, change and success.

The brain has consistently evolved over the years. We have three separate brains. The challenge is to develop harmony among the different brains, so as to avoid physical and emotional illness and stress.

At the bottom of the brain, which we developed about 500 million years ago, and it’s called the reptile brain. This wakes you up in the morning time, it puts you to sleep at nighttime, and it tells your heart to beat. It’s the most animalistic, or whatever you want to call it, part of the brain.

Then we have the mid part. The mid part of the brain is about 300 million years old, and is the mammalian part of the brain. The mammal part, which makes us more into mammals. It regulates the body temperature, it houses our emotions and it governs the fight-or-flight response that keeps us alive in danger, which is very important.

So what the midbrain does, is it gets back to the fight or flight, keeping us alive in the face of danger. So back in dinosaur times or when we weren’t living in cities, or even when we’re living in cities, have you ever heard of the phrase deer stuck in the headlights? Well, that’s what it is, it’s our fight-or-flight. When we were in the Serengeti and a lion came through, we didn’t need time to analyze the situation. Our whole body needed everything to shut down and make a decision: fight or flight. We didn’t want to analyze the situation; it needed to make a split decision extremely fast.

Nowadays that gets in the way sometimes, but it also is very helpful. When we’re driving a car and someone cuts us off, we don’t want to analyze, we don’t have the time for that. We need that immediate response to kick in, the midbrain to kick in and make that decision for us, because it’s a split-second decision and it could be life or death.

Then we have a third part, about a hundred million years ago. This one creates civilization. The art, the sciences, the music, it all resides in the frontal part, the cortex. It gives us rational thought and creates impulses. So when you want to create a new project, or you’re an artist and you’re drawing a new product or you’re an artist and you’re writing a new song, or a scientist, whatever, this is the part of the brain that you tapping into, the frontal part, cortex.

So if we want to make a change or jumpstart the creative process, we need to access the cortex. What happens to most of us, or to the majority of us, or the ones that haven’t studied this and don’t know exactly what’s going on in our body or in our brain when this happens. When we face a new project or a new challenge, our midbrain usually jumps in, and blocks us. It’s called writer’s block, it’s actually blocked, right, deer in the headlights. We get stuck at the piece of paper; we don’t know what to do, and then we start getting frustrated and we end up probably not even doing it. It happens with everything in life, so it’s not just with writers. It could be with starting a new project, building the tree house that you’ve promised your kids for the last six years. They’re not even kids anymore, they don’t even want it anymore, but you’re still making that promise, that, one day, you’re going to do it. Well, what caused you to do that is, it was just such a big project. It just put you in your block, the fight-or-flight. What happens is, our fight or flight, shuts off our creativity. Then it kind of transforms us into our basic reptile, animal stage, where it’s like fight, or we get out of here. Either you’re going to fight like a lion or dance like an antelope.

When we are in this state, our heart starts beating faster, we start getting nervous. And our other senses shut down. It shuts down your sexual desire, your thought process, your digestion, it shuts down everything. So if you had to go to the bathroom before and you get distracted, one of two things going to happen. Either you’re going to go on yourself or you’re going to forget that you had to go. This happens because you are no longer your front part of your mind. It has been replaced with fear, you are now using the amygdala. The “Let’s get out of this situation, I got to go, or, the clock’s running down and it’s the end of the game. And for the last 10 minutes, you’re exhausted. But then now it’s 1 minute to go, and somehow, you’re rejuvenated with energy. Well, it’s the same thing as the fight-or-flight. In that instance, your body decided to fight. And so everything else stops, and now you have this new energy because you’re putting every last little inch on the line and you’re fighting.

What happens when we face fear, our creativity is gone, we go into, robot mode. You see this when Michael Jordan, he’s sick He had the flu (1997 finals). Well, most of you guys might not know this; he wins the NBA Championship. His body stops being creative and becomes a robot. Muscle memory and the desire to win forces his body to choose fight or flight, and It went into fight mode. When we understand and can control the fight or flight mechanism that is an example of how powerful we can become. 

Now on the contrary, when we want our creative side and we don’t want to be a robot, we need the cortex, the very front part of the brain. That gives us the creativity. To use it in a different sense, when we have a large goal, it causes fear, and then it restricts our access to the creative part of our brain, and we tend to fail; writer’s block, getting frustrated. For example When you start something for the first time, and then without putting forth 100% energy you’re like, “This is too hard, whatever, I quit.”

So what is the solution?

By having small goals; you bypass the fear. Remember we were talking about this in the previous chapter how, when we start so small we don’t even notice it. With the picking up the pencil or the lighter or whatever, you’re doing a repetition, you’re building new habits. Small goal, fear bypassed, the cortex engaged. You’re allowed to sit there and think of more creative ways. Instead of just picking up the pencil, now you’re picking up the coffee cup. It gives us the ability to become successful. By acquiring the skill to be able to build new habits, is exactly what we are discussing.

An excerpt from “ One Small Step Can Change Your Life: The Kaizen Way” The brain is programmed to resist change, but by taking small steps, you actively rewire your nervous system so that it does the following: unsticks you from the creative block, bypasses the fight-or-flight response, creates new connections between neurons so that the brain enthusiastically takes over the process of change and you progress rapidly towards your goal.

I hope that all makes sense, because it is huge. It allows us to come up with new ideas, be able to accomplish new goals and new feats. Going to the gym, painting a whole house by yourself, writing books, and large unimaginable goals. It also builds self-confidence, before, you might need other people to do things with you, if you have fear of being alone or fear of being ridiculed. With this secret we are taking the most minute steps to complete our goals. we’re bypassing fear, in a way you don’t even notice the change until it becomes a habit.

Before you notice, you’re reading that big book that you’ve never been able to read. You’re doing those 100 pushups that, at the beginning, you couldn’t even think to do five. You’re doing 20 pull-ups. Imagine being able to accomplish the un-accomplishable. amazing right?

Stress or Fear. The modern medical name we have given for the feeling produced when approaching a new challenge or goal is called stress. However for countless generations, we called it fear. Most successful people confront fear instead of relying on terms like anxiety, stress or nervousness. Now, this is very important for us to grasp. Nowadays, I’m stressed, I don’t know what’s going to happen, or I’m anxious, I’m nervous. Instead of focusing on the root problem, I have fear, I am scared of this.

When adults typically see a Psychiatrist, they talk about their emotional pain. They choose words like stress, anxiety, depression, nervous, tense. But then if you remember, when you were a kid, or if you’re around a lot of kids, they tell you root emotions such as scared, happy, or sad. Anxiety, stress, and depression are new terms. The terms we used when we were little, were scared, sad, happy, and afraid. Right? You don’t hear a two-year-old talking about, “Oh, I’m so stressed.”or “I’m so anxious”. When they’re anxious, and they’re bouncing around and their heart’s moving fast, they tell you, “I’m scared.” They don’t go to the doctor and be like, “I’m anxious.” “Well, what are you anxious about?” If you break it all the way down, it usually has to do with fear. Children know they live in a world they can’t control. They have an understanding that fear is a part of everyday life. Everything’s bigger than they are. Even walking down the street, it can be petrifying for a little kid because just a normal adult is towering over them. You know what I mean? We walk faster than them, especially with a little guy/girl who’s more waddling than walking. They’ve got people running past them, dogs that are twice the size of them, wagging his tail, knocking them over and things. That kid knows that, life is dangerous! You never know. There’s the side of the table that you could just, bam, hit yourself, now for the next week or something, your head’s hurting. Don’t forget touching a hot surface, a kids worst nightmare. As a little kid, you’re scared. There’s a whole bunch of things that they know they cannot control; it’s a part of their daily lives. This is why we say kids are like a sponge, they have to learn fast in order to survive.

But adults, for some reason, we feel like we can control everything in our lives. And when we don’t, or can’t, we feel like there’s something wrong: “Why am I not feeling perfect? Everything Is supposed to be perfect.” As opposed to the kid that knows that he’s not supposed to be feeling good all the time. He knows that there’s something out there that’s scary. Us as adults feel that we can control everything, we know everything. So instead of admitting the fact we could actually just be scared, we come up with fancy terms and call them stress, anxiety and depression. So we run to the doctor to solve the problem, then another uncomfortable emotion arises and we run back to the doctor to save us again, never once even thinking to just solve the root of the problem.

Speaker 1:

And why do we do that? I don’t want to get too much into it. Just think for a second, pharmaceutical companies have a financial duty to make money for their shareholders, not to solve your problems. If they made it as simple as, you’re fearful, so conquer your fear. Name what you’re scared of, figure it out and then figure out how you’re going to overcome that fear. If it was that simple, then there wouldn’t be a market to sell things. For example antidepressants can cause erectile dysfunction, so when you subscribe to an antidepressant you also now have a different problem erectile dysfunction. Now you go back to the doctor to get an ED drug which is made by the same company that  made your antidepressant drug. 

To finish up, if you expect life to be ordinary and well-run, you’re setting yourself up for panic and defeat. When life gets scary and difficult, we tend to look for solutions in places where it’s easy or at least familiar to do so, and not in a dark uncomfortable place where a real solution might lie.  It’s human nature, it’s a reaction. And that’s why we call things “comfort food”, ect. Or when people get their heart broken, they say “I gained weight because I started eating.” When something in life gets difficult or when a speed bump slows us down, or we run into a wall, we tend to go back to what’s comfortable, right? Have you ever been in a long-term relationship with somebody? You know it’s not a good relationship, but the only reason you’re with that person is because it’s comfortable. Or you might even break up with that person, go try somebody new, and then before you even can know if this person’s better or worse or whatever, you’re already back to the old, because it’s comfortable.

It’s great for you to feel comfortable, but it’s horrible if you want change. If you always go back to what’s comfortable, you never give yourself the ability to change. Change doesn’t come from being comfortable. Change comes from being uncomfortable. Does that make sense? If you’re always sitting on your couch, well, your body is going to change, but it’s just not going to be a positive change. You’re a couch potato, your body’s going to change, but it’s going to change in a way that you might not want it to change. Your body’s never going to be stagnant, it’s never the same. It’s constantly changing. So either you’re changing in a positive way or in a negative way. Negative change occurs in a comfort zone. Positive change comes from being uncomfortable. 

When you always go back to the same, there’s a definition for it, keep doing the same thing over and over and over again, and expecting a change. What do they call that? They call it the definition of insanity. But fear can cause us to unconsciously sabotage ourselves by going back into the same routine, it’s the fear of the unknown that causes us to go backwards. The FYMM approach is so great, why it works, is we’re bypassing our fear. We’re taking baby steps so small we don’t even know to be scared.

The next time you’re a deer in the headlights, or getting writer’s block, think of this perfect example. You study all night for a test. You know the test backwards and forwards. You’re dreaming about it, you know it so well. But then when it’s time for the test and you sit down, your mind goes blank. In a situation like that, take a little bit, take a deep breath and just realize what is happening is that it’s your fear. Your fear has taken over. Your cortex no longer has the ability to function because your midbrain has 100% control. So calm down, understand what’s happening, that it’s the fear that has taken over, and then adjust accordingly.

Through understanding the six strategies or six steps, however you choose to term it, by the end, you’ll hopefully be able to sit down, be in a stressful situation understand when fight or flight appears and have the ability and the knowhow to be able to assess the problem and to solve the problem quick, fast and efficiently. That’s the goal in all this, to be able to see something we don’t like about ourselves, to assess ourselves, to better understand ourselves and to give ourselves the ability to change ourselves in a positive, more efficient and more effective manner.

We have to remember this: fear is a normal and a natural sign of ambition. So it’s going to be normal that, when we go through this journey, a change in our lives, to better ourselves, it’s going to be fearful, and there are going to be times that we’re going to want to revert backwards, into the past (Go buy that pack of cigarettes; go talk to that ex-girlfriend, boyfriend; go back to the old job that you hate.) There’s always going to be self-doubt as well, that we’re just not going to be able to do it, we have to remember, that’s the normal part of this entire process, the fear.

Let’s embrace the fear and remember to be more childlike sometimes, and to understand and accept the world is a fearful place, and it’s okay to be scared. What’s not okay is to avoid our fears, because if we don’t face them, we’re never going to be able to get over our fears, we will succumb to them. Reading this book and learning the six steps, we’ll be able to accomplish what we’re trying to accomplish.

Posted on by

6 Strategies Introduction

It has been raining all day, so I am stuck in the house. I figured it was a great day to start writing about FYMM and the different ways to change. Really, there’s two different ways of changing. There’s the innovative way. and then there’s the FYMM way.

The innovative way is the shock factor, right? Let’s imagine going to the gym, and you jump in there, you haven’t been in the gym in six weeks, six years, whatever it is, some extended amount of time. You go in there, you start maxing out on everything. You go run three miles. You go max your legs on the leg press. You go on your bench press. You bench press every last little thing. You do as many pull-ups as you can. Trying to prove to the world that you’re strong, right? But what happens with innovation, is it’s very expensive for you to do, because the next day or the next three days, the next month, or however long, it depends on how old you are and how long it was since you were last exercising, you’re going to feel it, right? You’re going to pay for that innovative way of changing. 

Or trying to stop smoking cigarettes. Like, “Okay, I’m going to stop today. I’m never going to buy a cigarette, never going to smoke another one, today.” Some people have the willpower to be able to do that, but most of us don’t. Just be honest with yourself, most of us don’t. Or, it could be “I’m going to break up with this girlfriend or boyfriend.” Whatever it is in your life. I hope you understand the innovative change, a drastic change that most of the time doesn’t work and could be very expensive both physically and emotionally, if it works then it’s amazing, Great! you were able to change extremely fast and effective.

 But when it doesn’t work, it causes you to almost give up. Going to the gym and trying the innovative way and it doesn’t work and you’re sore and you’re like, “Screw this. I’m good.” You know what I’m saying? “I’m good with being a couch potato. I’ll just get used to… I’ll just buy bigger clothes.” Another example; is learning a new marketing skill spending a few thousand dollars on the class and then only spending a few hours taking the class, get frustrated, Stop watching the class halfway through it and proclaiming it to be a scam because it didn’t happen overnight.  or a common example is  when you leave an unhealthy relationship but returned to the relationship because you’re lonely. 

But what the FYMM way is the complete opposite. It teaches us to take small steps, almost so small that you don’t even notice them. You’ll hear me talk about this in future chapters; picking up a pencil every day 10 times with each hand to start working out, or maybe even marching in place for five minutes during the commercials of your favorite TV show. Or to stop smoking cigarettes, buy the rollie pack first, or buy some tobacco that you think is absolutely disgusting and some rolling papers, so every time that you want to smoke a cigarette, you start smoking those. You train your brain to stop going into the store and buying a pack of cigarettes. It sounds crazy, but little by little you’re retraining your brain to go look at the cigarettes and not even think about a cigarette, and you’re going to put yourself in a situation, when you do smoke a cigarette, as you’re not going to be used to the flavor because you’re used to something that you don’t really want. But then, slowly but surely weed yourself down. I’m not saying just replace it. I’m saying weed it down. If you’re smoking 20 cigarettes a day of regular cigarettes, then try to roll-up 20 little itty bitty cigarettes. Break down 20 cigarettes and make 40 out of them, of the little rollies so you’re still getting your nicotine fix but you’re smoking half as much. Right? That’s the FYMM way, or like I said, going to the gym, just marching in place for a little bit, getting yourself used to the moving, building a habit.

Anything that it is, the slow approach, FYMM way of accomplishing things. It’s in the name. If you want to learn how to mountain bike, or you want to climb Mount Everest, you’re obviously not going to just start from the beginning and run up the hill. You gotta do it in stages, and that’s what the FYMM approach basically is, it is doing everything in stages.

I look forward to you reading the next chapter, it gives you a little bit more understanding of what it is, and then talking about the six different strategies of this new approach and why it works.