How to become powerful

Let me ask you a question. Have you ever felt powerful? And if so, when was the last time you felt truly powerful, like your steps have extra weight to them? You have a steely-eyed focus. The decisions that you make have clarity. Obviously, it's impossible to feel like this all the time. Life will throw a plethora of things that will sort of knock you off the straight and narrow path. It will make you feel powerless, or humiliated, or anxious and embarrassed, nervous, but hopefully, we're able to come back to that feeling of empowerment, that feeling of strength.

If it's been a while since you felt this feeling of internal calm and power and presence, then in this video, I want to talk about a strategy that I have for converting the situations of life, as various as they may be, into internal power. I know that sounds very woo woo, but hopefully by the end of this video, you understand where I'm coming from. So you can use it to your advantage, so that you can feel more powerful more often. You can truly be Gigachad. I'm sure Gigachad feels like this 24/7; he is the spirit of this internal benevolent power.

In order to feel this way, we need to beware of snakes and ladders. [Music] Now in life, it's no surprise that there are lots of places to go, things to see, things to do. But if we are not aware of what's a snake and what's a ladder, we'll do certain things and go certain places, and partake in particular activities that will either increase our power or decrease it. The things that increase our power are ladders and the things that decrease our power are snakes.

So how do you identify a snake and a ladder? In order to properly identify what's a snake and what's a ladder, we need to figure out a little bit more about our psychology. Now, our brain has many chemicals, chemicals that make us feel very different ways. The present-oriented chemicals include oxytocin, endorphins, serotonin, and endocannabinoids. These brain chemicals allow us to experience and savor the present moment, what we have right here and right now.

Dopamine is concerned with what we don't yet have. It makes us desire things we can attain in the immediate or distant future. It says, "You should do this thing because you will get a reward." And it's important to realize that these two types of brain chemicals work in tandem. Usually, things are some degree of satisfying and some degree of tempting, but the weird thing is some things are extremely tempting and we feel a huge urge to do these things but they're not that satisfying. This is a snake.

We live in a culture that creates activities that are lopsided in construction, front-loaded with so much dopamine, so much intrigue and temptation to do them. But the satisfaction is usually all right, and it expires quickly. Snakes make you lose power; they waste your time, energy, and attention on things that give you a net loss return on investment. Desire without satisfaction, intrigue without resolution.

The goal is to find activities that have the right balance—dopaminergic enough that there's incentive to do them, but satisfying and enjoyable enough that they give you a feeling of empowerment and fulfillment in return. You have a deep sense of feeling like it was worth it; it gave you something that you can take forward into life. Things that make you feel better about yourself and your life after having done them—these are the ladders.

So before you dive into any activity that you usually do, ask yourself: Is this a snake or is this a ladder? How can I tell? Well, how do I feel before I do it? Am I very tempted to do it? Is there this magnetic draw to do it? How do I feel while I do it? And how will I feel directly after I do it and later in the day after having done it, and maybe even a day after I do it and a week after I do it? If that is all cohesive, if that feeling is good, good, good, good, good, then you've found yourself a ladder. But if the answer is, "I find myself drawn to do it and it feels good when I do it but I feel like crap after I do it," that's a snake. That is a serpent.

Okay, pop quiz: You're absolutely famished after a hard day's work in the field—plowing, seeding, cutting the grass—and you come in the door and you smell the savory smell of Mama's nectar. I don't know what that is, but let's just say it's a meat stew. You smell the garlicky, beefy goodness as you walk in the front door, and you find yourself extremely tempted to go and gobble it down, pour it down your throat. Is that a snake or is that a ladder? Well, it's probably a ladder because you were working all day and you need a high-protein, homecooked stew that will nourish you and help you recover your muscles, and you can take that nutrition onwards in life. It's just a win-win all around.

There is both temptation and a deep sense of resolution and satisfaction and nourishment; that is a ladder. Another quiz: You're at the gym, busting out a set, and some absolute dime piece walks across your field of vision. You catch a glimpse and you say, "Wow, that is crazy, crazy." So, let's just say noticing is a moral neutral, but you're confronted with a choice: continuing to stare—is that a snake or a ladder? Well, it's obviously a snake because unless you're using the beauty of this person to motivate you to go form a genuine relationship that is mutually beneficial, that's the only situation that it would be a ladder. But 99% of people in that situation choose snake. They look for the angles; they try to bounce their vision off of 16 different mirrors to get a glimpse of the assets.

But why is that a snake? Well, what is it doing for you? It's making you want and desire with absolutely no resolution. It's telling your brain that there is value over there that I don't have, and I still don't have it, and I still don't have it, and I want it, and I want it, and I want it. Attraction is a tool just like anything else, but it's a tool to form connection, and if you're not actually doing that, then all you're doing is teasing yourself, and you're subconsciously signaling to yourself that, "Wow, there is beauty in this world and I don't have it." Do you think that is an empowering feeling?

Let me leave you with this. In Homer's Odyssey, Odysseus tied himself to the mast of the ship because he was afraid of feeling good. He was aware of the siren's call; he was aware that the temptation would have been too strong because whatever satisfaction it promised was just not going to be worth it. He was aware of the snakes, the sirens, the dopaminergic temptation. If what the sirens offered actually felt good and gave them something of value that empowered them on their journey, there would be no resistance. But the wise man knows that the siren offers unfathomable pleasure but doesn't deliver. It's a sham—quite literally, the definition of disorientation and disintegration, a distraction from the mission.

So if you look at the bigger picture, accumulating this sense of power has nothing to do with avoiding pleasure. In fact, it's quite the opposite; it's about avoiding the cheap and false proposition of pleasure. It's not falling for the sirens who make things sound very exciting and very tempting but don't actually give you something in return. If you look at life with a broader scope like this, then climbing as many ladders as you can in life actually offers you more satisfaction and enjoyment, both in the long run and often right now.

When you're doing something that you know you're supposed to be doing and you submit to it, you submit to your destiny and to your calling—that feels good here and now. You know when you're finally writing the paper that you've been procrastinating forever and you're sitting there in a flow state? That feels existentially satisfying. You just want to melt into that moment and ask yourself, "Why aren't I doing this all of the time?"

That feeling of calm and duty is power. Power is this feeling of integration. The person that we want to be is the person that we are being. Welcome to the IKEA furniture building session. Holy smokes, I look super tired with this top-down lighting. No, I'm not using any fancy lighting, so this is what I look like in real life. I look 68 years old.

I want to take a second to thank today's video sponsor, Audible, and also recommend the audiobook that I've been reading recently, which is "The Millionaire Next Door." Now, if you guys have been struggling financially, then there is no financial book that I recommend more than "The Millionaire Next Door." This book goes hand in hand with what we are talking about in this video. It helps shift your mindset from chasing the snakes in your financial life, slithering your money away on frivolous things, and helps shift your mindset towards genuine wealth building. So you can use your money to do more satisfying things.

So give it a listen using today's video sponsor, Audible. For those of you who don't know about Audible, it is by far my favorite app on my phone. Audible is the leading provider of spoken word entertainment and audiobooks all in one place. As an Audible member, every single month you receive one credit, which you can spend on any audiobook of your choice, regardless of cost, and you get to keep that audiobook forever. If you ever cancel your subscription at any point, you still keep your entire library of audiobooks, including the audiobooks that you got for free using their credit system.

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If you're lurking here and this is the thousand million billionth brazillion time that you've seen my face, consider subscribing. I don't know if it does anything, but I like to have more subscribers for the clout. Other than that, thank you so much for watching, and we'll catch you in the next video. [Music]