Pick up a copy of The Mental Strength Playbook.

Do you ever set a goal you genuinely cared about — get healthier, write the book, finally save Money — and two weeks later you can’t make yourself take any action? Even when you have motivation and a good plan, sometimes, the action doesn’t happen.

Closing the gap between what you intend to do and what you actually do has far less to do with trying harder than you’d expect, and far more to do with a smarter approach.

My guest today is Chris Bailey, a productivity expert and the bestselling author of Intentional. He draws on years of research — and conversations with Buddhist monks — to explain what actually moves us from intention to action, and why forcing yourself is the least effective tool you have.

Some of the things we discuss are:

• The reason your goal keeps turning into disappointment and the one word Chris uses to describe what a goal actually is
• The simple subtraction problem happening in your brain every time you choose the couch over the goal
• How to conduct an “aversion audit”
• The five things that make a task feel impossible to start and why naming them is half the battle
• Why the early-rising, tea-drinking version of you in your head is sabotaging you and what the research says about whether 5am people are actually more successful
• The 12 values and how to instantly tell if a goal is even yours
• What it means when you can’t connect a goal to anything you value — and the uncomfortable truth about whose goal it might be
• Why guilt isn’t the enemy and what it’s actually trying to tell you
• My three favorite strategies that will help you start to get more intentional today

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• ⁠104 — What Your Sentimental Keepsakes Reveal About Your Self-Worth⁠

• ⁠40 — The Minimalists: Why You Should Declutter Your Life with Joshua Fields Millburn⁠

Links & Resources

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Take the Values Test

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Amy Morin Therapist, Bestselling Author, Host of the Mentally Stronger Podcast

Amy Morin is a psychotherapist, international bestselling author and the host of the Mentally Stronger podcast. Her books on mental strength, including 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don’t Do, have sold more than 1 million copies and been translated into more than 40 languages.

She’s practiced therapy for over 20 years and she’s a sought after speaker whose TEDx talk, The Secret of Becoming Mentally Strong, has become one of the most popular talks of all time with more than 22 million views.

Amy lives on a sailboat in the Florida Keys.