Ants On A Log

Brought to you by:

“That’s not an Olympic-sized swimming pool.”

What a disappointment.

I was new to this gym, and in my mind I had imagined doing 50 yard sprints end-to-end pretending I’m Michael Phelps. But it was a measly 25 yard pool.

What difference does it make? So I make a few extra kick-turns, I can still do the underwater dolphin move like Michael Phelps to gain extra momentum before popping my head up. I can swim the same distance in either pool. Who cares?

The difference was aspirational. 

It affected my mentality about how important the thing I was doing (swimming laps, the human’s wet version of a hamster wheel). I wanted to feel cool about it. I wanted bragging rights, that I swim laps in an Olympic Sized Pool (even if I was just bragging to myself).

It’s the same reason you can’t ask a preschooler if they want celery, raisins, and peanut butter for a snack. I guarantee that your answer will be “hard pass” (or the 4 year old’s equivalent phrase, probably just “NO”).

But when you put the peanut butter in the channel of the celery, and line up the raisins in a row on top, then reframe those exact same ingredients as “Ants On A Log” – suddenly it’s that kid’s favorite snack of all time. First ballot hall-of-famer. Same kid, same food.

It’s important to keep ourselves motivated, and sometimes just a quick rebrand can help.

For example…

It’s not “saving for retirement” (boooorrrrrring), it’s “Financial Independence” (cool and suave). Same goal, same tasks, new name, new you.

What can you rebrand and reframe this week to change your mindset?

P.S. – Get the awesome new financial independence GPT from us! Take a quick survey to help us make the newsletter better, and get instant access: