Stop Trying! (Do this instead)

Summary:
I challenge you to make a slight tweak in your vocabulary: Use the word “do” instead of “try.”

I used to tell my wife that I would “try” to do tasks that need to happen throughout the day, and she would respond with confusion – “what does that mean?” she would ask. “Can I depend on you?”

I had commitment issues – I didn’t want to end up not following through on the task and ultimately disappointing my wife. So, instead of telling her I would complete the task, I would tell her I would try. Eventually, after this caused some issues, I decided to stop using the word “try” and replace it with the word “do.” This actually helped me to follow through even more on the task than I would have if I used the word “try.”

Using the word “do” adjusts our mindset around the tasks we are completing. It helps us to keep persisting and persevering. Make commitments to yourself – this will change your identity. Saying you’re going to do something and actually doing it gives you a type of power. Once you make the commitment, the odds of completing that commitment are much, much greater. Try it (or should I say, do it!).

-Coach Steve Arnold

Full Transcript:

Hey, what’s up, guys? Steve Arnold here with Best Life Global. And today I want to talk about a slight tweak in your vocabulary that I think will help you out a lot.

The idea is that you replace the word “try” with “do.” Now I used to have a, I think it’s more of a commitment issue, and I used to drive my wife crazy. She’d be like, “oh, can
you do this, this, this?” And I’d be like, “oh yeah, I’ll try.” And she would just be like, “what does that mean? Can I depend on you? Are you gonna do it?”

And really it was just the whole, like, I didn’t want to commit to it, I didn’t want to let her down, I felt some anxiety around making that commitment. So I decided, like, you know what? I’m just gonna stop doing ’em. So like yeah, I’ll do it, I’ll do it. And I’ll follow through because I want to be a dependable, consistent person ’cause that’s a very high priority for me as part of my identity. So I just simply just replaced it. It’s helped a lot.

Just putting it in your mindset that you’re going to do it and you’re gonna keep going and going and going and keep persisting and keep persevering. I think that’ll help you out to actually go that extra mile. To not have that fallback saying, “Well, I just said I would try, I didn’t say I would actually do it for sure.” I think that’s really just a wimpy thing to do. Kind of a wimpy thing to fall back on. And if you really want to follow through on, really the most important is like, like commitments to yourself.

Like that’s how you change your identity. You make commitments to yourself. You say you will do something and then you go and you do it and that just gives you a ton of power. Saying, “I’ll try to get in like my exercise three days a week,” it’s just not good enough.
If you really want to do it, say you will do it. And then once you make that real, real, real firm commitment to yourself, the odds of you doing it are much, much, much, much, much greater.