Reject Mediocrity #8: Lets make this happen!!!
Hello 👋 and welcome 🙏 to the 8th edition of this newsletter, which we are now calling “Reject Mediocrity.” Why not get as specific as we can with the name, right?
I swear I won’t change the name again, or rather not so soon 😜.
Also, I missed last week. Again. And I am late this week too.
Some unavoidable things happened. But no excuses. I will keep trying to be better than this.
With that said, let’s get started 🚀🚀🚀:
To jog your memories, in the 7th edition, I revealed the secret to how we can fight the war on mediocrity in our daily lives in a way that aligns with our biology and does not make it so damn hard.
In short, when dopamine levels are sustainably elevated, we tend to focus our attention on outward goals — the things we want — and we feel motivated to pursue them.
And the secret sauce to it is self-regulating dopamine and the pleasure-pain balance system in our brains.
We want to start doing more of the things that may seem painful or hard - to optimize for dopamine that comes from some form of “pursuit.” And we want to adopt behaviors that make it hard to seek cheap dopamine (like distractions, pleasure without pursuit, etc.)
If done long enough, the more we get our dopamine from hard things, the less our need for cheap dopamine becomes.
I applied these guidelines to craft a system to help me be the best version of myself. Some of these I was already doing, while I introduced and fine-tuned others.
So today, I will cover the following:
How I operationalized the Dopamine Pain-Pleasure Balance in my daily life
The transformational benefits that I am starting to see
Before we continue, a word:
If you have been struggling to find your drive or motivation, and feel that the things mentioned below are just too difficult for you, hit reply and let me know.
I will help you audit your current habits and craft a system that is suited to your life and goals (for FREE). And I will help you stick to them.
Transformational Benefits of Self-regulating Dopamine
Let's start with the benefits first. Trust me, I did not expect benefits so fast 🤯.
Also, I am hoping that these might excite you enough to give you the motivation to try some of the activities I describe in the next section.
Alright, let's get to it:
Pain seeking as the default mode - This makes everything else sustainable.
As I complete a new challenge every day (e.g., advancing from cold showers to cold plunges to increasing the plunge time from 1 min to 8 mins), I am building a “pain” or challenge-seeking muscle.
As I experience the sustained dopamine high from pursuit, I now seek bigger challenges to tackle. Whenever I face a difficult situation - mentally or physically - my first thought is, “New challenge - yay 🥳.”
I keep looking for ways to push myself more every time.
No more low days.
I am not kidding. I never thought cutting out things could add so much to the quality of my life.
Insane motivation levels.
I can go through long work days without any dip in motivation or energy levels.
Gone are the days when I felt like being in an endless rut.
Improved sleep, energy levels, cognition, fitness, and peace.
At the end of the day, all the habits I am adopting are inherently good for my overall health, both physical and mental.
And this is just the start.
Operationalizing Dopamine Self-regulation
I broke this down into 2 distinct parts,
1) The driving force
2) The activities/behaviors for dopamine regulation
Caution: They may seem herculean at first glance. Don't get discouraged.
Adopting these was easier once I realized I needed this and decided I am doing it.
1) The Driving Force - Vision 🎯 and Anti-Vision ❌
This was the key. I would have miserably failed in my attempt without this step.
You see, Dopamine is subjective. Our brain does not know whether an external event is good or bad - we define that.
So, I needed to define at a high level - what the “pleasure” of success and the “pain” of failure means for me. And I need to visualize this in detail so it feels real.
I sat down to craft a Vision of my future - writing down, in vivid detail, the future I want to build for myself. That helped me have a goal post. 🎯
Imagining what SUCCESS 🤩 looks like is a huge stimulator for dopamine release. That is what gave me the initial drive to adopt these new behaviors.
Incidentally, this is how positive reinforcements really work 🧐 - When we repeat to ourselves something like “I am the luckiest guy on the planet 🤞” and feel good about it, our brain will release dopamine.
Next, I crafted an Anti-Vision of my future - writing down, in vivid detail, what I don’t want my life to become. What regrets do I want to avoid? From experience and observing others, we know exactly what we don’t want.
Imagining what FAILURE 😫 looks like keeps pushing me not to give up.
The Vision sets a direction, and the Anti-vision generates a negative emotion that I will do anything to avoid.
Both are powerful action inducers.
2) Foundational behaviors for Healthy Dopamine levels:
With the driving forces in place, these activities/habits are the foundation that allows me to maintain healthy levels of baseline dopamine, which sustains my day-to-day motivation.
I have divided it into 2 types (along with the reasons why they work):
Pleasure-inducing or Neutral
Sunlight in the eyes within 30-60 minutes of waking up (preferably on a walk)
Why? Done consistently, this is known to up-regulate the baseline dopamine and improve sleep quality (circadian rhythm regulation).
Drink water immediately after waking up (with salt, lemon, and honey)
Why? To kickstart our metabolism and wake up the body. Salt also activates the neurons faster, which is good for dopamine circulation.
Black Coffee (before 2pm)
Why? Caffeine in moderate amounts improves dopamine circulation in the body. Yay 🥳
Protein-heavy meals
Why? Protein makes us feel satiated, releasing dopamine over a longer period, plus you will eat less dopamine-spiking-and-crashing simple carbs. Additionally, protein (mainly the amino acids Tyrosine and Phenylalanine) is a building block of dopamine.
Pain-seeking
No devices for at least 60 minutes after waking up (not even in the washroom)
Why? Our bodies will always choose the highest reward for the least effort. So, restricting access to cheap dopamine on waking up makes it easier to do all of the things that require some work or “pursuit” for dopamine.
Work out early morning while fasting (I alternate between heavy resistance workouts twice a week and aerobic/light workouts remaining 5 days)
Why? Regular Physical activity (especially resistance workouts) remodels our reward system, leading to higher baseline dopamine over a longer period. If you had to do just one thing of all of these, THIS IS IT.
Cold plunge (in ice cold water) for 4-8 minutes in the morning
Why? Cold showers and plunges increase baseline dopamine by up to 250% for hours. That is huge. Do this, and you will forget low days forever.
Intermittent fasting (first meal after 11 am and last meal before 7 pm. Just 2 meals most days)
Why? We seek food for pleasure and a distraction more often than just for nutrition. Intermittent fasting forces us to deal with the “pain” of not having food as a distraction - which is huge for dopamine regulation, providing sustained motivation (and less lethargy) to pursue our goals. The timing is important here - mainly, the not eating after 7 pm.
No light exposure after 10 pm - That means dimmed lights and no cell phones. Why? Light exposure after 10 pm drastically reduces our circulating dopamine.
Meditation for 15-30 minutes
Why? This is a Pain-seeking behavior because boredom is our biggest “pain.” Entire industries, from social media to streaming to gaming, exist because we cannot sit and be bored.
And meditation requires us to sit still and intentionally get bored (which is also the source of all its benefits).
And that’s a wrap!
Time's Up⌚
That's my slightly more than 5 minutes with you this week.
See you next week. 👋
Thanks again 🙏, and please share this with a few friends if you like it. That is the only way I am growing right now.