“Garbage in, garbage out.”
That’s a common saying you’ve probably heard multiple times in your life. It represents my current situation perfectly. These last days, I’ve been consuming way too much garbage, and that’s affecting my ability to create content. The biggest example of that was the last 3 days, when I simply couldn’t write a single word down.
It was scary and painful, I admit. But I survived, and today I want to find a way to never go through this again.
First of all, I need to find out what the main cause was. For that, we need to go back a few days in the past to analyze the context:
I’ve been spending way more time on social media than in previous weeks; I’ve been going to sleep past midnight, and consequently, I’ve been waking up way past 7 am.
From my POV, these two are the main causes by far.
And one is a consequence of the other, to be honest.
That reminds me of this quote from Alex Hormozi:
That’s very true. I’m experiencing that firsthand.
I lost count of how much time I’ve been wasting on Instagram and X doing absolutely nothing but doom scrolling.
Imagine how productive this wasted time could’ve been if it weren’t for this unnecessary waste on these platforms… I’m sure I’d have been able to AT LEAST start to make some money out of my business or expertise (or both).
This whole situation drives me crazy.
I’m sick and tired of wasting time this way. I want to write, I want to create, and I want to make money from it. Only then will I be able to help my parents and, of course, myself.
But let’s go back to the main point of this issue.
For me, being distracted means one thing: I’m not managing my time correctly.
If I was, I wouldn’t have been going to sleep past midnight and doom scrolling after waking up, during the day, and in bed, before sleeping. All of this just means that I actually lack discipline, unfortunately.
Believe it or not, discipline plays a very decisive part in this whole drama.
It’s the base of consistency and success. If you’re lacking discipline, it’s almost impossible to have any meaningful progress. That’s exactly my case.
“So… Are you saying that lack of discipline is the true cause behind the whole thing?”
Yes.
That’s exactly what I’m saying, Sherlock.
And that’s exactly what I need to fix in the next few days.
One of the best ways to do it is by simply deleting all social media from my phone, and blocking them on my computer too.
By blocking them you won’t automatically become David Goggins. The secret is to make the access to it many times harder, so you have time to think twice before opening it.
In my case, it’s especially powerful. Why? Because by blocking them, I’ll intentionally leave all valuable platforms like Skool, Substack, and Kindle available.
This way, when I get bored or try to procrastinate by accessing some social media platform, I’ll be able to think twice and change my decision to enter Kindle, scroll a bit on Substack, or simply access an amazing community I’m part of on Skool.
This whole plan follows a very interesting axiom I keep for life:
“If I made good choices, it was because I made the wrong ones way harder to make.”
I want to make being disciplined easier than being chaotic.
I want to make studying be easier than wasting time doom scrolling.
I want to make investing time in my business easier than wasting time on social media.
That’s how I’m going to fix my problem.
If I replace the garbage with valuable content, naturally I’ll stop suffering from “garbage out” and start to create nice things.
Daniel Costa