Alright, New Year! Woo hoo! So what are you going to do with this new year since last year was such an off-year? It wasn’t bad so much as it was just not anything anybody was expecting. Since many people have lived this year in fear. Some have raged and there were do many victim cards throwing around. You couldn’t count them all.
There is a saying
Hard times make strong men. Strong men Make good times, Good times make weak men. Weak men make hard times.
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With that knowledge, you see that we have had too many people choose the easy life. So much Netflix and soft couches that we as men have started to get a bit soft. We have made good times and the weak man has no struggle in his life. Without that struggle, a man looks for strife to overtake. Men are built for challenges. Without having a challenge in one’s life you have a hard time finding the meaning or purpose
There is a choice to be made
You have two paths you can take. You can either take the easy road and stay in the land of mediocrity or you can add some challenge in your life and find out what you are truly capable of accomplishing.
Are you going to take it easy or are you going hard? Are you going to stick to your old tired ways and keep wondering why the wife doesn’t want to fool around? Are you going to just sit around the television and watch the game or are you going to be man enough to start taking your son out on a hiking trip that will challenge you both? You could stay stuck in the same old job or maybe you find out that after experiencing the 3-day effect you find a solution to a problem people have been having, and you start a business.
Life is full of choices and you have one for this year. Make life better by doing something that is hard and uncomfortable something that is out of the ordinary.
Programs to try this year
There are several challenge programs out there that you can try that will push you to learn more about who you are and what you are fully capable of.
75 Hard
Andy Frisella has a program that does one thing and one thing only it challenges your mental toughness. Many people think this is a diet program or a health program. That is the farthest from the point. Yeah, there is a health element to it but the 75 Hard Challenge is so much more and the changes that happen to you are so much more impactful. I have tried this several times this year and I have yet to make it to 75 days. I know I need to do this one again. I will conquer the 75Hard
There are a few rules to the challenge
- You have to find a diet and stick to it. The biggest part of this is there are no cheat days. You are to stick to your diet for those 75 days
- Drink a gallon of water every day.
- You have to do 2, 45 minutes workouts each day, and one of them has to be outside.
- No alcohol
- Find a diet and stick to that diet for the stretch of the program. No cheat days are allowed
- Read 10 pages from a nonfiction book
- Take s progress selfie every day.
- If you fail to accomplish each of these things that day you start all the way over at day 1
Many people try to bash this program as a health program or a diet. And that isn’t the case at all. The #75Hard program is a mental toughness challenge. That is why one of the exercises has to be outdoors. You are more likely to want to not do that 45-minute exercise. This is tough but the rewards are amazing. You become better and stronger. You are also going to be mentally resilient and understand you are far more capable of anything you set your mind to if you can complete this challenge.
If you want to hear Andy himself explain the 75 hard challenge he talks about it on his podcast RealAF episode 14
The Live Hard Program
Now Andy has a program that takes what you learn about yourself and adds to it. As if it wasn’t hard enough He takes all the 75 hard and adds phases to it. This includes elements of 5 minute cold showers and visualizing and Doing something nice to the hardest thing which I gotta start doing is talking to strangers.
The Live Hard Challenge takes all the challenges to make you mentally tough and adds personal improvement to the mix. So if you breezed through the 75 Hard Challenge then add a few days to the mix and do the live hard challenge.
Andy talks about all the details on his show Real AF episode 80
Try a 30-day challenge each month
Now, maybe going 75 days punching through a list of tasks that you find way too hard to do not your thing. Well, that is cool too. You can also build up yourself by committing to a few 30-day challenges The Law of Attraction website has a list of 30 different challenges ranging from easy to challenging. So you can start easy and make yourself relaxed once a day. Then crank up the difficulty and not complain for 30 days.
Some of these are sadly easy while others do have the element of helping you get over an obstacle that getting in your way.
The Brotherhood Of Men
The final way you can challenge yourself and become the man you had in your mind when you were younger is to join a men’s group and for many, this is the toughest challenge you could face. The fact that you will be held accountable for your lack of action will be pressed just as much as they celebrate your actions that lead to your success.
The men’s group I have is the Brotherhood of Men. We are dedicated to helping each man become the man of their dreams. We all thought of who we wanted to be. Many men had their dreams suppressed because we were told it was too hard or you wouldn’t make a living following your dream. When in reality that dream is probably closer to your calling and what fulfills you than you ever thought.
If you want to get out of your comfort zone and stretch your possibilities then a men’s group like the Brotherhood of Men is just the thing. Join up if you have any questions please Ask Me A Question and I will provide an answer.
Whether you try any of these challenges or you come up with your own challenges do something. Heck, do anything that will draw you out of your comfort zone. You can’t grow unless you are stretched and willing to get awkward and fail a few times. That discomfort is where the learning happens and when you learn you become better. Try it, do something new, and share what you are going to do in the comments below.
