Offensive Vs. Defensive Thinking

Offensive Vs. Defensive Thinking | Mindset Daily Podcast

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Transcript

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If you want to gain more control of your life, you have to start by looking at the way it's set up. And what I mean by that. Is. You have to look deep and say is a majority of my life spent reacting or is a majority of my life spent being proactive. And that's the difference between. Offensive versus defensive thinking. So when you feel like if you've ever felt like your, your life is out of control or you don't have control over what's happening to you, it's actually a reason. And the reason is because subconsciously you've set up. A life that's more reactive. Which is well, I don't really know what. My boss is going to say to me today, or he may say something and now I have to change. Course I have to react to that. I don't know what my spouse is going to say to me today. So I have to react to that. I don't know what my friends are going to ask me to do. So I have to react to that. And. Being reactive to things is it's actually just a state of mind. It's a way of just giving up. Your power. And it's a way of not, it comes from not setting clear boundaries, which is, you know what, I don't value myself enough. Two. Actually set standards and set boundaries and set a plan for what it is that I actually want to do. So subconsciously you'll set yourself up. To be at the whim of everyone else. Bosses friends, relationships, spouses, whoever it is, there's a certain, there's a certain level where it's I don't want to rock the boat, or I don't want to come across as disagreeable, or I don't want to come across as hard to get along with. Instead, you just find yourself reacting to what everyone else does around you. And this is what leads to. Your life becoming out of control. There's no sense of, there's no sense of your own identity and there's no sense of your set of boundaries. And so everybody else just starts to walk all over them, right? Not even realizing that they do, but humans are funny in this way because. They will subconsciously since a person's boundaries, which is, this is okay. This isn't okay with them. You learn that with people, right? It's it's something you develop, the more you get to know somebody, but. It's your responsibility to make sure those are set because you'll have people in your life who realize he says yes to everything, or she says yes to everything, or she'll always drop what she's doing, or he'll always drop what he's doing. Whenever I need him to do something. Right or you'll stop your own work to do that. And they pick up on that and they realize that's your boundary that's okay. And then they start to do it more. And the more this happens. The more you set yourself up for a defensive posturing in life. Meaning. I'm just reacting. I'm just reacting to what everybody else around me is throwing my way. But the problem with that is then you never get ahead. You never. Start to accomplish the things that you want to do. You don't even have the time to do it because every day, and you can ask yourself this question, honestly, it's do I have, do I feel like I'm just, I'm a slave to the day I'm reacting. To everything around me. My day is constant reactions. Versus that's why it's important to have an identity and to have goals set for yourself and to not just have the goals, but have boundaries around those goals. So that way. Your life is set up in a more proactive way. You're playing offens instead of playing defense, you yourself are. Setting time in your day. You're blocking out times in your day to get the things done that you need to get on, to work on your goals, to work on your projects. To pursue your dreams. That set that's non-negotiable right. And that's part of having more of an offensive mindset, which is, my day is set doing the things that I know that I want to do, and I'm not just simply going to become. A slave to everybody else, I'm not going to become a slave to everything else around me. And this is the challenge that people have, like with goal setting, with building things with. With, like starting businesses or losing weight or creating any type of meaningful change. The reason it's a problem. Is because. Their day or your day, if you've ever been through this feels like it's just a series of interruptions, right? So people will say I don't have time. It's a really common one. Like starting. Starting a business or losing weight. Really common. I don't have the time to do it. And then you look deeper and you say why don't you have the time. To do it. I don't have the time to lose weight because my friends are always asking me to. Go out and have beers at the bar and then I'm hung over the next day. And then I can't go to the gym cause I don't feel good. And it's really hard to eat healthy because my friends want to eat this. They want to go this, they want to go here and it's impossible to be healthy. So I just don't, It's too hard for me. I don't have the time. That's a really common scenario, which is well, It's not that you don't want to accomplish your goals, but instead you'll assign blame to something outside of. Out, you'll put yourself in situations or blame situations that once in them, you don't have the control, but you have full control. To say no to begin with. That's one of the most powerful words that successful people use is to say no and to say no, Unapologetically to things, which is there's things I need to get done. I need to say no. And that's a skill set that's a skill set that I've had to develop. Over the years. Which is, if you don't learn to say no and you don't learn to be. Unapologetic about guarding your time. Then life and everything else around you is going to pull you away from your mission. Because if it's impossible to say no. And you're saying yes to everything you run out of time for everything, right? You, yourself, your dreams, your goals. The things that you want to accomplish in life, always take a back seat to everyone else. So you have to put yourself in. You have to put yourself in a position to succeed and in order to reclaim time, Part of that process of going back and reclaiming the time and having time to do things is to shift your thinking. Around being offensive versus being defensive, which is I can't. I can't live my life every day. Just waiting to react to something that happens. Just waiting for things, waiting for someone. To, interrupt my day. And if you're honest with yourself and you go back and you look and you go back through. Even just go back through the last month. How many times have you allowed someone to interrupt your day? Because. You couldn't say no. So it was just now I'm going to say yes, that takes a chunk of my time. And now everything else that I wanted to accomplish is completely on the backseat, it takes a back seat to. What. Everybody else or the direction that everybody else wants to pull you in. So that's a learned way of thinking, right? Being reactive and being. Defensive and your thinking is it's learned habitual, right? We do it. And we start to think this is my life. Like my life, because I hear people say this all the time. It's really hard because I'm always getting interrupted by my family always wants me to do this. My friends always want me to do that. And so I don't have the time for myself. You have to learn in that case to say no. You have to learn to. Prioritize yourself. You have to learn to be able to say you know what? I don't have time to do this today. My goal is to lose a bunch of weight. I can't go to the bar all night until five in the morning. With my friends, drink beer all night. Be hung out. Be hung over, eat garbage food. And then wake up the next day and be completely incapacitated and hung over because of the decisions that I made. It's an easy decision to say no. And you can't be afraid. To I think a lot of the reason why we fall into this defensive mindset of just reacting to everything. Is because we're afraid. Of how the person is going to respond. We don't like conflict, right? Some people are really wired to avoid conflict. So they don't say no to anything because. They there's an irrational fear of the conflict that will follow the know. If you say no to somebody, you feel like. Now there's going to be a back and forth over it, or you're afraid of what they might think of. You. And. In order to move. And ironically, in order to start to train yourself to be more proactive and in order to start to train yourself, To have a more. Offensive mindset and thinking. And being proactive for yourself is to distinguish the difference. Between being respected and being liked. And there's a difference between the two and this is where. This type of thinking goes hand in hand where a lot of times, if you find yourself living a very reactive life, it's because you are wanting to be liked right there. There's a part of you that wants to be liked. And so when friends and family and. People are asking you. To do things you're afraid to say no, because you're afraid that well, if I say no, They're not going to like me anymore. So then you fall into that. I got to react. To these people. And I got to make sure I'm keeping them happy because if I don't or I disagree with them or I rock the boat or I say, no, there's going to be a conflict and they're not going to like me anymore. But your goal in life is not to be liked your goal. Is not to live life, at the whim of other people and looking for approval and looking to be liked. Instead. What you want is to be respected. And that's one of the key distinctions, which is yeah. If you say yes to people all the time, They're going to like you, because guess what you're basically just saying yes to them. You're answering it there when you're doing everything that they want to do. So of course, they're going to, like you. But when you start to say, no, people will start to respect you'll gain the respect of people. And this is the shift that has to happen. When in your own mindset and from your own point of view, Is that understand instead of telling yourself I'm afraid. Of being, I'm afraid of saying no, because I don't want conflict instead of thinking. About thinking of a no in a negative way of I'm afraid to say no, because I don't want to create conflict or disagreements instead linked yourself every time I say no, I gained the respect of the person a little more in the form of. Boundary being set. And. You want people in your life that respect your boundaries and respect you. And every single time you learn to say no to something. Because you are proactively working on. Your own goals, dreams, missions, whatever that is. The people you say no to are going to start to respect you more. They're going to start to understand. That this is your boundary. This is the boundary that you adhere to. And they start to understand this is acceptable with this person and this is not right. So they gain. It's like you start to become respected. And their eyes. And this is the difference to think about isn't NS yourself, right? Because. A lot of time too, people will say to themselves, They think they want to be liked, but actually what they really want is the respect of person, the respect of the person, but they go about it in the wrong way because they confuse respect with being liked. And so because you confuse respect with being liked, you say yes instead of no, which is a big distinction. The more you say yes, the less time you have for yourself, the more you say no. The more time you pull back for yourself and you can set your clear goals and your clear boundaries. So taking that time. Becoming more offensive in your mindset is. A very powerful tool to actually reaching your goals. And that's the importance of having these things defined, because if you're moving through life without goals, you're moving through life without direction. You're moving through life from let me just let life happen to me. Or, let me just go with the flow or let me just, let someone else dictate whatever it is I'm going to do. You that's why having your own identity is important. That's why. Taking the time. To define what you want. As simple as it sounds, having a goal, having a direction, having a purpose, having a mission in life, all of these things. Allow you to shift. Your thinking from defensive to offensive, right? You go from being reactive to proactive. When you have things you want to work on. And if you don't have them by default, you're just going to. You're going to. Just act you'll live life in accordance to what everybody else around you decides that you should be doing. Which is why it's important to have goals. If you yourself, don't distinguish what you want in life. Society will tell you what you want in life, right? So you have to take the time. To go and say to yourself, I'm not going to live my life being reactive. I'm not going to have a defensive mindset. Because. That there is a dream killer, more than anything else, being reactive and having a defensive mindset to everything means that you don't really have anything to find for yourself. And you don't have a schedule that. Our time blocked out for you to get what you need to get done. And that's. That's a topic for another show. But the key to success is time management. If you want to, if you want to accomplish anything great. You have to learn to manage your time. You have to value your time. Enough. So that you can. Actually have it to put in the work to accomplish what you want. And part of that part of reclaiming your time is to have that mind having an offensive mindset and a proactive mindset, which comes with not being afraid to say no. And understanding the difference between being liked and being respected and realize that you want respect and not to be liked. And in order to gain the respect and to have a proactive mindset and accomplish your dreams and accomplish your goals and your own vision, you have to be afraid to say no to the people and things that come up. That don't align with your priorities and what you need to do in order for you to live your life. So that's the show today as always, if you've liked it, take some time to tag me in a story on Instagram and share it with me. Let me know what you learned, how you applied it. And. Again, for all of you, new listeners. This show is got, I've been going through the data on this show and it's got a, It's jumped substantially over the last couple of weeks. I don't know why. Other than the fact that I look at the numbers and it's gotten larger, but a big part of it is because you guys are sharing it. You guys are taking the time to. No, get it out there and leave reviews. All of those things are really helpful. Again, thank you for that. And if you're a new listener, Do go back and listen to the older episodes of the show. Make sure you listen to everything. It's all designed to be evergreen. It all applies that way you can catch up to everything that we've talked about. On this podcast and on this show. And get yourself up to speed. All right. So that's all I've got for you on today's show again, if you're enjoying it, take some time to leave review, take some time to share it with somebody who you think would like it. Someone who you think would benefit from it would greatly appreciate that. That is what's helping this show to grow. So have a good rest of your day and I'll talk to you soon.