======

Before we start:

If you're a writer, creator, or entrepreneur and want to discover the skill to gain 1,000+ followers, 500+ email subscribers, and sign clients every month, this is a great opportunity for you.

I'm having an early celebration of reaching 20,000 followers on X (I’m hitting it on Monday).

So I'm opening 2 slots for my 1-on-1 mentorship.

I won't promote this again until one of the slots is open again. More than 1,300+ people are reading this. So to be fair, slots are given on a first-come, first-served basis.

Click here to see exactly what you're getting.

=====

For as long as I can remember, I have always felt bad whenever I wasted my time.

It felt like there was someone watching my every move. Even when I was alone.

It was the future version of myself seeing me waste my time and effort, knowing that I can do so much more — that I'm meant to do something great, but I'm wasting it.

Maybe you can relate.

You know what you need to do, but you don't do it. You know something is important, but you choose to ignore it. You know you're supposed to do something, but you don't have the energy to do it and can't bring yourself to even start.

If you can relate, then you'll also relate to this thought that I've had since I was a kid:

I've been put on this earth to do something great.

But every time I made the decision to do something challenging, something new — I'd do it for 2 weeks, but once the excitement faded away, I quit.

I was never consistent, disciplined, or focused — relying on excitement, motivation, and stress to get things done (mostly stress).

But then in 2023, I started going to the gym.

That was the first time I tasted what obsession feels like. There's nothing I would rather do than just hit the gym.

I wanted to hit the gym so badly that I was going twice a day, knowing that I was "killing my gains", but I didn't care.

Months went by, and that excitement never left. If anything, it grew.

I've been going to the gym now for 29 months, and for the past 20 months, not a week has gone by and I didn't hit the gym at least three times a week.

The same thing then happened when I started writing online. I stopped caring so much about my degree and spent most of my time writing and building my creator business.

Turns out, you don't lack discipline. You just haven't found something that you'd do for the sake of doing it.

Your entire life, you were doing things that you thought you should be doing.

Going to school. Getting a job. Be obedient. Ask no questions. Be a robot. And at the end of every month get handed a lousy paycheck that barely gets you by every month.

That's what you've been taught since you were a kid, you didn't question it, and I don't blame you. You were a kid who didn't know any better, so you listened to your parents, teachers, and society.

You see, the gym, running, and writing are things that I do for the sake of doing them. Not for any external benefit — sure, getting in shape and the idea of making money were what got me started in the first place, but results were delayed. If your mind is not set on the long-term — mastery — then there's no way you'd be doing it for years. You'll quit as soon as things get hard or results take too long to come.

But when you do something because you enjoy it, you don't care if it takes a week, a month, a year, or a decade to see results. Because you're doing it for the sake of doing it. You're "working" because you love it.

You choose to work. That's the key here.

The Law Of The Universe

Entropy.

In simple terms, entropy means chaos.

If you don't attempt to maintain order by putting energy and effort, then things will spiral into chaos.

If you don't put effort towards your goals, you'll never achieve them.

If you don't put effort into going to the gym, you'll lose progress, get out of shape, gain more fat, and feel disgusted with yourself.

That's how most people feel.

They're disgusted with themselves.

Most people choose to do nothing because they're scared of change. They want things to stay the same.

But life doesn't work that way.

Choosing to do nothing is choosing to dig yourself into a deeper hole without trying.

The life you want demands consistent effort toward your own goals.

When people say "You've changed" that's a good thing. It means all the tiny decisions you've made for the past month, year, and 10 years have shaped and transcended you and put you closer to the life that you've always wanted.

My friend, Change is a good. It means you're growing. It means you're making your life better. What's bad is not changing.

You don't want to be a 60-year-old with the mental maturity of a 16-year-old.

If you're not actively putting effort into your life to get what you want (whether you're doing it consciously or unconsciously), you're sabotaging yourself.

You're not disciplined because you're distracted.

You're distracted because you live in an environment that allows for distractions to happen.

You're distracted because you forgot what you're meant to do. You forgot what you want to become. You forgot the impact you want to have in the world.

When you're distracted, that's where chaos comes in.

Chaos comes from complacency, from being too comfortable with where you're at, from not wanting to improve.

Discipline and focus come from a constant state of being unsatisfied with where you're at and knowing that there's a higher level that you can reach.

This isn't to say you should never rest and enjoy what you have. By all means, enjoy it. You've worked hard for it. But don't get too comfortable and lose focus on what truly matters, your life, otherwise you'll become a victim of entropy. You will have to go through trial-and-error to know how much you can push and rest.

You'll burnout, multiple times, but that's normal. Life goes in cycles. There's a cycle of intense focus and effort, and there's a period of rest. Burnout is rest.

Chaos happens in your life when you don't have a clear path of what you want to do next.

Focus comes from having absolute focus on what to do.

How To Get Your Sh*t Together

Discipline is just the conscious decision to avoid long-term pain.

Self-discipline is choosing your long-term goals over the short-term pleasure of life.

To do that, first you need to…

Figure Out What You Don't Want

The reason why I started writing online was after I finished my first internship with the biggest developer in Dubai.

I realized that the 9-5 life was not for me. Working a 9-5 was the bane of my existence. I knew if I decided to work for them, or any other firm, that I would be living, in my definition, hell.

Wake up at 6. Stare at the ceiling for 10 minutes, asking myself, "Is this what my life is supposed to be?". Get stuck in traffic, drive 1.5 hours to work. Finish 8 hours of unfulfilling work. Make millions for the company every week. Get stuck in traffic, again. Get back home at 6. Feel too exhausted after work that the only thing I have energy to is sit on my couch, watch Netflix, and sleep. And at the end of every month get paid peanuts in comparison to what I make for my employer.

It was suffering.

Here's the thing: everyone has to suffer.

But this doesn't mean you need to suffer doing something you don't want.

Working a job you hate for the next 40 years of your life because that's what everyone told you to do since you were a kid and now you're "too far deep" and can't do anything about it because you've built a whole life around it and it hurts to know that you've been going down the wrong path for all your life.

But what hurts even more is staying there and not doing something about it.

You're not a fool for getting into that situation, but you are one if you choose to keep going down that path when you know it's not the right fit for you.

Now I'm not saying that you need to quit your job tomorrow, leave town, and start from scratch.

That's not realistic.

But what is realistic is you realizing that you've gone down the wrong path and slowly undo the mental programming that you've been fed and change your life.

You only have one shot at this life, make it worth it.

Life doesn't have to be miserable. You can choose what to do, you can have meaningful suffering.

Me, writing every day, "working" for 6-8 hours building a product, writing weekly letters, writing my thesis, getting my degrees, and helping people live a better is meaningful suffering for me.

I choose to do this.

The same goes for you.

But you won't know what is worth suffering for until you know what you want to do.

The easiest way to know what to do is by knowing what not to do.

I didn't start writing immediately after finishing my internship. I started by learning how to run a social media marketing agency. That turned into crypto (still waiting for Dogecoin to hit $1).

The first step of getting your life together is having absolute clarity on what you want to do and achieve in life.

If you don't know what you want, figure out what you don't want.

Some people call it "hell", others call it "anti-vision".

The name doesn't matter, they're all the same.

To find it:

1) Observe society — Make a habit of paying close attention to the people around you in any situation. What are they doing? What do they talk about? What do they think about? What food are they eating? Where is it leading them to? Is what they're doing something you want to do in the future?

It could be something as simple as seeing how their YouTube algorithm is and realizing that that is what they're choosing to feed their minds with.

2) Your past experiences — What are experiences you never want to have again? What were the lowest lows of your life? What have you done to prevent them from happening again?

3) Keep a running list of what you don't want — Pull out a notebook and be specific with your writing.

You'll feel uncomfortable. That's how it's supposed to feel, because living your "hell" isn't supposed to be comfortable.

4) Realize where you'll be if you keep doing the same thing — You are your habits, the content you consume, the people you surround yourself with.

How will your life look after 10 years if you keep doing the same things? Are you going to be where you want to be? Are you actively feeding your mind with information that helps you get closer to living the life you want?

And don't come to me with the "I'm manifesting it. What's meant for me will come for me" bullsh*t.

Manifestation requires action — whether you're doing it consciously or unconsciously.

Nothing happens out of nowhere.

For something to move, there must be a force to move it.

If you want the life you want, you have to do something about it.

My friend, nothing will be handed to you. Everyone is too busy with themselves to look to their side and help you.

Focus Your Attention On One Thing

You don't need more time, you need focus.

You don't need more motivation, you need clarity.

You don't need more discipline, you need something that you can obsess over all day long without getting bored.

The gym, business, personal projects that you can pour all your heart, effort, and focus into will solve most of your problems and get you closer to getting what you want out of life.

The reason you're distracted is because you don't have a reason to focus. Nothing bad happens if you don't show up at your best. Your work doesn't demand you to be at your best. You can shut your brain off, do the bare minimum and still reach your quarterly goals.

You need something that demands you to be at your best. You need something that is so important to you that you wouldn't want to do anything other than work on it and bring your vision to life.

A bodybuilder eats healthy and doesn't miss a workout because it's aligned with his goals.

A creator learns new skills and builds projects because that's the only way to bring their vision to life.

You don't need to tell them what to do, they do it because they know that's the only way to get what they want.

There's nothing more enjoyable and fulfilling than knowing that you're working on something that's meaningful. Something that will improve your life.

Remove, Replace, Restructure

You don't lack motivation, discipline, or willpower.

You're distracted.

You're distracted because your environment makes it easy for to get distracted.

The secret is to change your environment.

Remove apps, bad habits, friends, and sometimes family who are holding you back in life.

Replace apps with learning.

Replace toxic friends with books and writing.

Replace doom scrolling with lifting weights and running.

Replacing binge-watching Netflix with podcasts and courses.

They're the same thing, just a better version.

Structure your morning to do that one thing that will move you closer towards your goal.

Why the morning?

Because that's when your energy is the highest. That's when the world doesn't demand your attention. That's before all your responsibilities start to pile up.

Start your day by focusing on yourself, not on your boss.

Reprogram Your Mind

Your thoughts influence your actions.

Your actions influence your character.

Your character determines your life.

If the thoughts you're having are low-quality and shallow, it will reflect on your life.

Most people fill their minds with low-quality inputs, scrolling for hours, watching brain rot content, numbing their minds with any cheap pleasure they can get their hands on. This is why they feel lost, anxious, and miserable.

If you don't want to be like most people, you can't run on the same mental programming as everyone else.

You need to install a new program.

How?

By changing your inputs.

Curate a new environment that supports your vision. Feed your mind with new knowledge and experiences.

Learn a skill. Start a creator business even if you don't have any experience. Build a product, launch it, even if it fails — the experiences and lessons you gain are worth more than any money you'd make in a traditional 9-5.

Read books, letters, listen to people, and podcasts that challenge your beliefs.

Why?

It expands your perspective. It changes the way you think and view the world. You don't become narrow-minded.

When you're vision is narrow, you miss out on the bigger picture. You can't think, you don't make the right decisions, you become stuck in life. You miss out on life-changing pieces of advice.

You achieve your goal in your mind first, then it happens in reality.

You must become the person who can achieve the goals before actually achieving them.

A champion sees himself as a champion before getting his belt.

If you want to build a successful creator business, you must see yourself as a successful creator first. You can't build a successful business with a mindset of waiting for someone to tell you what to do and thinking you're a failure.

You can't be happy if all your thoughts are negative.

A negative mind can never create a positive life.

The Identity Principle

Discipline and focus are easy once you understand this:

They come from identity. Not willpower.

Every time you train, you become an athlete.

Every time you write, you become a writer.

Every time you run, you become a runner.

Every time you read, you become a reader.

Every time you create, you become a creator.

Your identity isn't what you say. It's what you do.

Your identity comes from your actions—from what you do. In your action, you become that person.

If you say you're disciplined but you never do the things that need to be done, then you're not disciplined.

If you say you care about your health but you're at 30% body fat, 70 lbs overweight, never work out, and always eat junk food, then you're not someone who cares about their health.

Every day, you have to make the conscious effort to keep moving the needle forward.

The goal isn't to read a book. The goal is to become someone who reads every day.

The goal isn't to write a book. The goal is to become someone who writes every day.

The goal isn't to build a successful creator business. The goal is to create new things every day.

The goal isn't to get in shape. The goal is to become someone who makes exercise part of their daily routine.

Every day, you make a choice — keep what you have or lose it.

That's all for today. Thank you for reading, and enjoy the rest of your day.

- Hussain