Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
anti-CONVENIENCE
304 Plays9 months ago
anti-CONVENIENCE is a mindset we have been intentionally implementing the past few years in fitness and in life. We discuss what it is, why it is more important now than ever before to embrace and express this mindset, and how it is much more than just "doing what you don't want to do." anti-CONVENIENCE is a mindset that has the potential to forever change how you see yourself and your actions, empowering you to be stronger mentally and physically.
Recommended
Transcript
Greetings and The Truman Show Weather
00:00:01
billbte
Good morning. Hello. How's it going? It's good. Monday morning. It is Monday morning. It is Monday. Another sunny day. I feel kind of like this week has been, it's like the Truman Show. You know what I mean? What do you mean? Remember the Truman Show? yeah I mean the last week. We're like every day, it's like sunny, perfect weather. Are you complaining about that? No. It almost feels unreal. OK.
Introducing Anti-Convenience Concept
00:00:32
billbte
But one minor rainy day sprinkled in. So. Good to know. Here we are. Yeah, here we are. We're going to talk about a concept that we've been more intentionally working with for, I mean, a few years, a couple of years, I would say. And.
00:00:56
billbte
For me, I think like for me personally, it's been a game changer. And I don't like that term because I feel like everything kind of is a game changer. Game changer. Yeah. But it's been profoundly impactful in a positive way, in a very honest way, in a difficult way, but not a single negative way. Okay.
00:01:24
billbte
what
00:01:26
billbte
is that the suspense is killing everybody. It is anti
Passive Inconvenience vs. Active Anti-Convenience
00:01:31
billbte
-convenience. Anti-convenience. Is that the opposite? is it What's the difference between anti-convenience and inconvenience? Or are they the same? Well, anti-convenience to me is
00:01:56
billbte
is benefiting from doing the inconvenient thing.
00:02:03
billbte
Something can be inconvenient, but without the ah doing something that's inconvenient doesn't necessarily mean it's going to help you.
00:02:15
billbte
Yeah, I think in in the context of this concept and like what we're talking about, inconvenient feels more like a passive thing. Like, oh, that was really inconvenient. Like this person was late and it threw me off my schedule. That was inconvenient or whatever.
00:02:30
billbte
anti-convenience
Convenience's Negative Impact on Health
00:02:31
billbte
is like you're taking a stand and actively saying like, I'm going to opt for not doing just the convenient thing. Is that so it feels a little more like you're involved and there's agency and like you're turning away from the just kind of convenient thing to say like, I'm taking a stand against this. Yeah, it's almost yes, because
00:02:56
billbte
Convenience kills people. Convenience erodes agency capability. It really is a destructive force. And when you look around, you look at how everything is so fucking convenient. You don't have to leave your house.
00:03:16
billbte
Well, I mean, and just to pause on that, because I think this is like a huge part of what we're trying to buffer against. When we look at where health has, let's just take health, just in general, people's health in this country, we'll talk about this country.
00:03:34
billbte
it is 100%, maybe not 100%. Mostly that has become due to everything being convenient. I mean, you go back not that long where like you couldn't get every single, you had to actually make a meal. You had to maybe walk to get somewhere.
The Paradox of Convenience and Stress
00:03:51
billbte
You couldn't just order something to your house. Like all these things that has have really accelerated in the last even 10 years, but even 20 years, have made it so there's not a single inconvenient anti-chemy. Everything is just without even trying, doing anything. And in that, it's really become the demise of people's health. yeah Totally. How can you argue otherwise that
00:04:20
billbte
the most convenient way of taking in calories has has helped. I mean, I'm probably blind to it, but I don't see the argument for how convenience has been beneficial. Yeah. And really it's taking away, not that we would say it's like, we wouldn't classify going to the store as being active.
00:04:49
billbte
But when you have all these little things
Convenience as a Mindset
00:04:51
billbte
like, oh, I have to go to the store. I have to do these things with your body. And really, you could just sit at home and do nothing and just push a button and everything kind of be given to you. like So there's an element of just physical movement that gets taken out. Maybe it's not back in the freaking prairie days where you're having to walk across the yeah plains.
00:05:11
billbte
um But I think what's really interesting is people are still filling their time. It's not like things became more convenient, and now people are just so much more chill and relaxed and hanging out. like So the productivity productivity and busyness is still there, if not higher. But the things that are kind of like helpful for our health, we've kind of like put to the convenient piece. And so we're just filling our cup with more of the,
00:05:39
billbte
work and things that are arguably maybe creating more stress, which is less beneficial for health. So it kind of has like a double negative impact. I agree. And, in and so that's where convenient, look, everybody, if you're, a you know, I think there's like some framing that's required too. Cause if you're, if you're alive in 2024, you're going to benefit from things being more convenient. And so it's like, okay, obviously we're not talking about like,
00:06:09
billbte
Yeah, we're not making our own paper. You know what I mean? Like there's obvious things that are, yes, we benefit from convenience. Convenience as a mindset. Convenience as a psychology is what I'm talking about. Convenience almost as an ideology. People worship convenience. And so it's not just a behavior of going to the gym, doing this, doing that. People worship convenience, even at the gym. Okay, well, I only have to do this 30-minute workout and that'll be better. I only have to do this, you know, there's this study that, you know, all of these studies and and and and the commoditization of research now, which is a whole separate topic, but like, well, maybe you only have to do
00:06:53
billbte
eight 30 second bouts of high intensity. And that's enough. Like the hack. Yeah. really you're talking And it's like, Oh, wow. That's really convenient. So now all I have to do is four and a half minutes. Um, and I'll be good. And it's like, yeah, good luck with that. Good. Good luck with that.
Anti-Convenience in Daily Actions
00:07:11
billbte
or the walking treadmill. Not that there's anything wrong with, it's not that this so eight 30-minute, 30-second bouts, there's something wrong with that, nor is there anything wrong with having a walking treadmill under your desk. But it's when that becomes the convenient solution to instead of carving out 45 minutes where you're maybe going to go walk outside, well, I'll just walk under my desk because it's super convenient and I'm like being effective. So I think there is like a mindset of like hack that goes along with this with like people that kind of buy into like the hack, the shortcut, it's kind of like a taking the shortcut versus, and and ironically, like sometimes when you go out of your way to try to take a shortcut, it ends up being yeah longer, it just like, you know, we're trying to avoid the traffic, right? And then it ends up being a much more arduous task. It's like if you just sat in the traffic and were patient. So I think that's, um
00:08:07
billbte
Yeah, the convenient way is like, Ooh, how can I get this done with the least amount of effort, ah discomfort? Yeah, for sure. And that's what I'm saying. It's a mindset. It's a psychology, it's an ideology now. And so anti-convenience is about actively being aware of when am I drifting into the very attractive pull of convenience and not not only not doing that, but in place of doing the convenient thing, I'm going to do the anti-convenient thing of
00:08:47
billbte
but you know not like always It's not necessarily always the opposite. But yeah, I'm going to put the effort in. So go through some examples. Because I think some of this stuff is like people, myself included, are like, yes, yes, I get that. Here's a perfect example. And this is going to be a silly one. But here's a perfect example. We went to the grocery store yesterday, Sunday, to do our shopping. Obviously, the cart doesn't get left in the parking spot, right? i' not I mean, some people do. I'm talking about us. I'm talking about us. If you see me, if anybody out there sees me leave the parking spot, I give you permission to hit me with your vehicle at whatever speed of your choosing. So, so we do the thing, we unload the groceries, the little house for the shopping carts. Yeah. The cart tent. The cart tent. Yeah. It was like 15 feet over.
00:09:46
billbte
Right. It was spilling. It's conveniently located in a centralized ish spot in the parking lot. But the home, the place where all of the carts eventually go was 50 feet back towards the direction of travel that we came from, which was the front door. Now, mind you, we're talking about feet here. We're not talking about miles yeah miles or anything like that.
00:10:15
billbte
it would have been convenient to just put the cart back in the little tent.
Personal Responsibility and Convenience
00:10:23
billbte
But then somebody else is gonna then have to take that thing and put it back where it ultimately is going. So I was like, you know what? I'm gonna like put it back where it belongs. And I'm not a hero for doing that. I'm not gonna win like the Nobel Peace Prize. You know what I mean? I don't think I'm anything better than anyone Nor do I think that people putting it in the little cart tent are bad either or anything like that. It's just for me, it was like, no, it would be more convenient just to do it, just to do a little, that just to do the least amount possible. right It would be easier for me. It would, and then it's like, but what would it disrupt? It's Sunday afternoon. We already had a full morning worked out, walked the dogs, did all this stuff.
00:11:07
billbte
So am I really saying I don't have seven seconds to walk the cart back? It's a mindset to your point because it's not really about the activity. Nobody would say like, no, I can't walk those extra 20 feet. It's just a psychology of just being conditioned to like,
00:11:24
billbte
it not occur to you to walk it back there. It's just like, well, just put in the car thing, that's easier. It's just sort of an automated thing. That's easier. That's easier. It takes less effort and it saves you time. And it's like, but but for what? you know in and Well, here's another example. This is going to turn into like, we're not going to turn this into a rant. But these are like, I think these are important because they're these common things.
00:11:47
billbte
that we people do that doesn't even have to do with fitness. Like, but that is like practicing getting reps in in your everyday life. We frequent live breath. Oh my God, you're gonna, you're gonna fucking launch me off the deep end on this. Which is a bakery in Melbourne. Really awesome place. Anyway,
00:12:13
billbte
There are a few spots in the like on the street in front of LiveBreds. But typically, they're full. And then there's an enormous parking lot across the street, which is sometimes full. But if you just go through the light, there's always a couple more spots. We have never not found a spot. And sometimes we sit outside. And there's a spot that's not really a spot. It's a space with like yellow lines indicating don't park here. But every time we're there,
00:12:42
billbte
What's fascinating to me is there's many people that order takeout from live breads, and they have to go pick it up. like Let's just say there's 100 people in a day. If all 100 people thought that they could pull up there, like that would be a problem. It's not like a pickup. it's not a But like some people think that instead of going and parking, now mind you, to go consume whatever amount of calories, they're going to buy baked goods. They're not going to do some physical activity.
00:13:13
billbte
And they like just pull up and leave their car there. And it's sort of like,
Strengthening the Mind through Inconvenience
00:13:21
billbte
there's that trade off, you know, if I'm gonna go buy $200 worth of baked goods, and like do that, maybe I can just maybe the trade off in that and enjoying those pastries, not that it's like that, but like maybe there could be that little stretch to have to park and walk across the street.
00:13:39
billbte
But it is a very like, and this is on a weekend. We're usually there on a weekend. you know And it just becomes that psychology of like the quickest, fastest. Well, there's space there. So I'll just pull up and do the most convenient thing. you know And that's just like, I think it does trend into when your convenience then starts to spill over into other people's world. like That is spilling over into other people's environment because someone yesterday was trying to do it, backing into people trying to cross the crosswalk. like
00:14:12
billbte
So there's sort of like a responsibility almost to it. Um, I think to yourself, but, so there's all these like little daily tasks. I think that we can, you kind of have to steer your mind away from it though. That's anti-convenience. That's the mindset. And that's where it will, it, it,
00:14:29
billbte
It's not masochism. It's not, you know, Goggins and Goggins-ing everything. It's not being of being a faux hard ass. It's not every time you put the cart back, then you have to do 20 burpees before you get back to the cart. It's not contrived like that because it's not about the thing you do. It's about how you view yourself in the world. It's about how you view effort.
00:14:55
billbte
And if you were under the if you're under spell of more effort is
Balancing Effort and Convenience
00:15:01
billbte
bad, okay which is what a convenient mindset is, more effort is bad. Let me reduce and minimize all possible effort, all discomfort. um Let me have everything be easy, as easy as possible, right? If you're under that spell, you better believe it. You're looking at everything.
00:15:21
billbte
you're the person who's going to park in the clearly marked no parking situation who can't walk across what we'll say maybe at most 500 feet, at most 500 feet. Look, my back went out whenever that was six months ago. If there was ever a time to park in that spot, it would have been that because like it took five minutes to walk 500 feet. And again, I'm no hero for this. it's And it's not about me doing something, it's just about the anti-convenient mindset
00:15:59
billbte
is good for your brain. It's good for your mind. It it strengthens your mind because your relationship to effort, to discomfort is completely changed. yeah So now, and and this is where the anti-convenience, when you do something, when you do the inconvenient thing on purpose and for the purpose of strengthening your mind, and that creates a whole separate feedback loop right to now where effort looks like way more effort looks way more doable. Yeah. And you've expanded how you view your capability, which allows you to be more capable because you're going to do it and you're going to, you know, you're going to pursue it. Well, the barriers less, you're kind of lowering that barrier. Cause now when you're doing that becomes more normal, that
00:16:51
billbte
making that leap into something that requires a little more effort, it's becoming more, normal you know, you're normalizing it. And it's like, Oh, that's not so bad. Yeah, I do think there is an application, of course, in fitness. Oh, totally. Jim. And yeah that's a great way to train it. Yeah. um How would you say, how do you see that application? it It always starts with you have to be honest with yourself. All of this stuff is based upon honesty.
00:17:18
billbte
And what I love about that is we don't have the answer. What's inconvenient yesterday. We'll keep going with that. So week one of the vector project, there's a rock workout. There's a run workout and there's a strength conditioning workout. It was Sunday afternoon or it was Sunday rather. And I had not done the interval workout, the run, the run workout, which is intervals. It was four by eight hundreds.
00:17:43
billbte
Which would take less than 30 minutes. Just all in. It's about a 30 minute warmup. Yeah, an 800 for me takes about a minute. Yeah, 30 minutes. I'm kidding. You missed it. I'm not entertaining your nonsense.
00:17:57
billbte
so so and And what's funny about this is I've been saying for a couple years now, like, oh man, you know I miss doing like track workouts. like i they're They're like a love hate thing. you know They're hard, they're but they're so good.
00:18:13
billbte
But you haven't done anything about that. No, I've just complained a bitched about it and said, oh, I'd like to. Oh, I'd like to. Oh, I'd like to. Oh,
Personal Anecdotes on Effort and Reward
00:18:21
billbte
I'd like to. But it's like, OK. This is not related to anti-convenience per se. But then it's like, oh, there's this training. There's this thing that we're doing. There's a program to follow to prepare you for an event and like do the training, training by itself or training as a process.
00:18:42
billbte
is about hedging against convenience. You're going to have to sacrifice and you're going to have to do things that are inconvenient.
00:18:52
billbte
so I had not done the 800s yet. This is again, something that I've been wanting to do. And it was kind of like, eh, I don't know. You know what I mean? Well, and our local track is being worked on. So like, you can't just go there and you have to figure out where you're going to do them. And yeah it was like a couple of steps to figure out like, Oh, it was maybe one step. Yeah. It was, it required one step. And yet that was, um,
00:19:21
billbte
you know, a sort of channel that I got sucked into a current of of mind that I got sucked into. And you were kind of like, um, cause I also was like, you know, feeling it, it was a week. I went pretty hard this week. Then typically I have like a rest day kind of in that third or fourth day didn't, and you were kind of like,
00:19:44
billbte
or do you need a rest day or ah are you being a pussy? You know what I mean? And like, and and it was somewhere in between that it was, but was like I'm looking for convenience. I don't want to be inconvenienced. Right. And that's, it wasn't like, and I want to make this point, it wasn't like an irresponsible, like you could be like, Oh, teetering on needing a rest day.
00:20:09
billbte
But I wouldn't put running for you in the high risk of like category of like you're kind of teeter on the rest day. And if you run, that could really like certainly not for a hundred. So it's like, come on, let's be honest. So, you know, yeah and the reward for that is like that little shift into like, you know, figuring out that little bit of schedule, finding the track, doing it, and and how that turns out. Like, who cares what your times were? It was the the win in that too, I think, was like for you and not to, but I think it was, not about like, oh, I PR'd my 800, but I kind of didn't feel like doing that. I kind of just wanted to be lazy and say like, nah.
00:20:51
billbte
I'm good. And I chose to redirect towards the will the effort that it took. Yeah. Yeah. And I think what's important to to distinguish is if everything you're doing is I did what I didn't feel like doing. Right.
00:21:11
billbte
something's not working. Then it's, i I don't think it's then an anti-convenience because the whole, the whole, it's like anti-fragility is this cool kind of thing from Nassim Taleb and talking about markets. I think he's like an economist, but basically talking about anything. Our body. So something that's fragile. When there's a stress put upon it, it'll break easier. Something that's anti-fragile. When there's a stress put upon it, it'll respond with strength.
Stress as a Mental Strengthener
00:21:41
billbte
it will kind of be the the best thing for you. Medicine kind of follows that route. Training follows that route. How do we have the same sort of process for our mind? And this is where the anti-convenience mindset is has been incredible. And it's different than I don't fucking want to do this. I'm going to do it anyway.
00:22:11
billbte
That doesn't quite, that doesn't, that's different because you still don't want to do it. Right. You're still kind of playing like you're more in like the victim like, Oh, I guess I'll do it. It's not really, that it's lacking the agency and they like the resilience. But to your point, I think if your entire life is operating from a place of never wanting to do anything and you're always having to overcome, I think that's a like stepping back and looking at your life thing.
00:22:37
billbte
It shouldn't be that the majority of the tasks in your day you're having to use anti-convenience mindset on. It's more about in the little things or having it, you know, it shows up here and there. Maybe once a week in a workout, kind of like, uh, not really convenient, but, but I think that is important that when there's just a constant need for forcing, forcing yourself and having to,
00:23:05
billbte
pull yourself up, it's like what's what's happening in your life. That's probably a bigger question than just simple times. And what likely, I think, would happen is look for where you're being convenient.
00:23:19
billbte
And I think you know it's almost this inverse relationship kind of situation where if everything has to be, I'm going to do the inconvenient thing, there's something that you're, there's some degree of inconvenience you're avoiding in in a pretty important part of life. That could be work, that could be a relationship, that could be you know whatever it might be. um So that's where it's not just about doing a thing, because what you could do is you could do the thing and reinforce how you view convenience or inconvenience in this point. And that can further entrench you in this mindset, in this psychology of um basically, yeah, how you view effort. And I think in the gym, to get back to your question,
00:24:04
billbte
You have to be honest with yourself of when is it, when am I just looking for convenience? And sometimes that's fine. Like sometimes there's a time and a place to that. Hey, it's super convenient to sometimes come on in.
00:24:24
billbte
and do something five minutes on the bike, five rounds of push-ups and pull-ups. I think that that example, the bet, I can relate to that, that like I trend towards... I think it's interesting because you and I are on different ends of the spectrum with this. If I say I'm going to work out tomorrow, but the only way for me to work out would be to do it in our garage or something.
00:24:51
billbte
I will go like, okay, that's the most convenient thing to make this happen. Versus you might say like, well, I'm not just going to like come up with something in
Convenience in Fitness: Debate and Inquiry
00:25:01
billbte
the garage and do it. So I think there's like, you know, like, I'll find the convenient thing, but in the past, and so there's a positive to that because like, yeah, I will work out where you might say like, I'm not going to do it. And then you don't work out that day because it wasn't like all the right factors. But on the other side of that,
00:25:18
billbte
that can kind of snowball into always looking for the most convenient thing and rushing things. And now it's like, oh, I'm just fitting it into my schedule versus saying, you know what? Like today I want to really like pay attention to this workout. It's not going to be the most convenient, but I'm going to make time to go to the actual gym and do it. So I think it's just looking at that with just, it's not always the right answer, always the wrong answer, but seeing if there's like patterns coming up there. Cause then you're like, what are, what are, what are you getting out of that?
00:25:48
billbte
Yeah, I agree. And I think the challenging thing with doing, you know, there's this, there is this kind of thing where, you know, it's great to do um a workout in the garage, hey, if the schedule is whatever, I can, it's more convenient. And if that's going to make you do the thing, you know, like, yeah, wonderful, there's definitely a time and a place to that. And that's fine. That's why it's not just about convenience or never doing something convenient. It's not about that. The challenge is um doing the convenient thing, like in this case sometimes, like we'll just take the work out in the garage and let's just say it's whatever. It's fine. You moved. OK, fair enough. You didn't move the needle up or down. You just kind of stayed.
00:26:40
billbte
The challenging thing with that, especially from a gym situation and like, Oh, I didn't feel like doing it. I'm going to do it anyway. Is that sometimes that just scratches the itch and avoids you sitting with. Yeah. Maybe today was a day where because of how your life was structured, uh, you didn't prioritize.
00:27:00
billbte
the gym or a good workout or a call or whatever it might be, you know, we just kind of like scratch the itch a little bit. we We do something to temporarily. I mean, everything is temporary, but we do something to like just enough change our mind. Like just enough. Avoid the discomfort of.
00:27:24
billbte
Maybe something that's like a little bit more underlying, if that makes sense. Yeah. um And I think that's where it it's it's really between you and you for how honest you're going to be with it. Yeah. Yeah. And that's why there's not like a 10 step thing or this month you're going to do this. that It's more just observing and being honest and seeing what you can get from that. Yeah. Yeah.
00:27:59
billbte
so Pursuing something like recognizing, I think, when you're looking to do the convenient thing and and and getting curious with that and actually being, you know, not jumping right to like, okay, I'm going to do another router. I'm not going to do this. Like, no, actually being quizzitive and curious and keep your awareness open to.
00:28:23
billbte
Yeah. All right. Like, is this, is it is this all about convenience right now? Or like, if there's an issue, if there's a little friction point in your mind, I like to do this thing where I just continue to ask like, what's the problem? Uh, okay. Well, what's the problem? What's the problem? And like a lot of times, you know what, if you boil it down and distill it down, the problem was like, I just don't want to fucking do it. I just don't want to be inconvenienced. It's like, okay, now we have. Yeah. Now we have the truth. Yeah. Yeah. And you might not always immediately get the answer.
00:28:53
billbte
Yeah. Which is where it's a practice. But as a mindset, stop doing the ultimately the ultimate thing. yeah Because the world around us will force is is incredibly powerful in forcing us to be more convenient and attracted to convenience, which is repelled against effort, and you will be controlled 100%.
00:29:19
billbte
That's the significance of this and not just with actions, your mind. So this is about taking back control of your own mind. Good. Can't wait. Good. All right. That's all we got. That's all we got.