Nicsmas 2021 - 1. DALA and Why It Matters
'“Most people think they are not most people”
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Nicsmas is a ridiculous concept with an even more ridiculous name. But, I did it anyway. You can read more about Nicsmas here.1
Nicsmas 2021 keep coming up and, I’m told, that people have re-watched all sixteen hours of it multiple times. The Theme of Nicsmas 2021? DALA
DALA:
“Directions for Acting Like and Adult” or “Don’t Act Like an Asshole” - whichever you prefer.
First, “acting like asshole” is doing things that get you further away from what you want or complaining about things that you do to yourself. If you want to spend more time with your kids but keep making decisions that get you further away from that, that behavior is acting like an A-hole. I don’t care what you want out of life, just that you stop doing things that prevent you from getting it.
Second, understand that this whole thing is really just to hold up a mirror. The point is not to call you an asshole repeatedly, it’s so you can recognize when you are getting in your own way. There is no judgement, there is no positionality or morality - just helping you see things for what they are.
What you decide to do (or not) is up to you.
If you haven’t read by book, Bumpers2, start there. It will lay the foundation for DALA.
Nicsmas Structure:
The live Nicsmas 2021 followed a very loose structure. Sharing it with you here, will help contextualize what follows:
Quote of the day. For the purposes of this format, I’m making it quote of the month. I believe you will get the most out of this by sitting with each part for at least a month.
The 6WU. The 6 word-update3 is a tool to help us learn new things at a deeper level and crowdsource perspective. It was first introduced to me by Randy massengale in the CCA program.
No Email Support. Nicsmas had no email support because 1) it was free and 2) many times people go to comments, email, etc to try and close loops - to get an answer that gives them permission to stop thinking about something they are wrestling it. I don’t want to stop you from thinking. This was designed to keep the loops open, not close them.
Multiple Dimensions of Receptivity. You are encouraged to process everything from Nicsmas on multiple dimensions. If you learn how to influence someone to get them to buy something, great. You can also learn:
How you are being influenced to buy
How to prevent yourself from being influenced to buy
How to use the same principles to influence others to do other things
How to recognize when you’re being influenced in other domains
This is taking the same lesson, stripping it of its context, and applying to other areas in your life it might useful to you. Something presented in the context of business development can likely be used in all areas of your life.
There are a few things to keep in mind throughout the journey:
First, I will do my best not to sound preachy. Most of these conversations are conversations I have with myself. If it sounds harsh, that’s just my internal dialogue. It’s not aimed at you.
Second, I am not going to put something in you that is not already there. There are three things that can happen that are beneficial to you:
You are shown something that you haven’t been able to see on your own. It’s hard to read the label from inside the bottle.
You are reminded of something that you have forgotten.
Something is awakened inside of you.
In any of the scenarios above, you are the only person that deserves credit for the benefits. Someone else, in this case me, may hold up the mirror, drop a helpful reminder or awaken what is dormant - but I didn’t give you anything you didn’t already have. Nobody can, and I don’t believe anyone should take credit for your greatness.
The things you are reminded of will help you make better decisions.
The things that are awakened within in you represent a new, unknown potential.
Unknown Potential
I spend a few hours a week with Dr. Jeff Spencer.
We’re going on four or five years of weekly deep dives.
Sometimes he helps me. Sometimes I help him. We just show up and do the work - whatever needs to be done.
He is preparing for his Ted Talk - which will be a brain melter. Dr. Jeff has coached over 41 Olympic Medalists and world champions. He is an Olympic medalist himself. He’s a master of helping people reach their full potential.
He’s a a boots-on-the-ground kinda guy. Until faced with this Ted Talk, he never had to explain how full potential is found and harnessed.
After peeling back layer after layer, this is what he found.
There are three potentials.
Known Potential: This is what can be observed, tested and measured. Height, weight, speed, IQ, etc. Reaching your known potential can be done with hard work and a little bit of focus.
Unknown Potential: Unknown potential is an emergent property. You won’t be able to tap into it with more work or longer hours. It is something that is already inside of you, dormant. Unknown potential is awakened through exposure, proximity and receptivity:
Exposure to people, places and things that tease it out of you
Proximity to those people, places and things.
Receptivity, because it’s not going to be something taught directly to you. Sometimes it’s overhearing a conversation between two people that awakens your unknown potential - and they don’t even know you heard it. Sometimes it’s just seeing how a group of people interacts.
When you do the work to reach your known potential and get the exposure and proximity to awaken your unknown potential the result is:
Full Potential: Exponential growth, impact and progress.
Dr. Jeff will say it much better than I just did. But hopefully you get the gist of it. Here’s a top secret slide from his forthcoming Ted Talk:
My hope is that reading, watching, listening or engaging with my stuff helped awaken your unknown potential.
Dr Jeff is one of my closest friends and my weekly interactions with him shaped the Nicsmas experience and structure.
The Structure
To Dr. Jeff, preparation is everything.
“Do the homework and test is easy”
But he is not dogmatic and he has a sense for awakening the unknown potential in people. Still, it was surprising to me to hear his advice. He said:
“You are the only person I have ever said this to, but I believe it to be true… You should not prepare to present. You should pull up a chair and flow or answer questions and flow. That is, without doubt, where you deliver the most value”
So the Nicsmas experience was delivered in flow.
No preparation. I just fired up YouTube and started rolling through my bullet points.
Necessarily, the written version will be more structured.
DALA Overview
Resource Allocation and “Sitting The F*ck Down”
The concept of DALA assumes that you have an appreciation for resource allocation. It’s a strange thing to think about. But I remember my first lesson like it was yesterday…
It was ninety-six degrees and nearly 100% humidity - and I was standing in the middle of a parking lot in Tampa, Florida with about one hundred other people pacing back and forth.
I was standing in a parking lot because I was trying to go pro in strongman. To go pro in strongman, you have to qualify for a pro show at an amateur one. Amateur shows were held in parking lots.
They are six to eight hours long, they are mentally and physically exhausting.
I felt good about my chances because Vince Urbank, one of the best in the world, had agreed to help me prepare. He even showed up to support me that day.
I was pacing back and forth, cheering on my friends and watching the competition closely when I was startled by Vince’s booming voice:
“Sit the fuck down. Find some shade. Drink your fucking water”
I turned around to see a very angry, six foot eight Vince staring directly at me.
“We have six more hours of this. Let those amateurs wear themselves down. We have limited energy, you’re going to win by converting yours. If you want to waste what you have acting like these idiots, I’m going home”
So I found some shade, sat down and drank my water. Vince wasn’t done.
“The last event is a deadlift. Find somewhere to sit with some back support, you dingleberry”
So I found a chair, put in the shade and drank my water.
Going into the final event, six hours later, everyone else had been standing in the sun, pacing in circles and cheering each other on.
…and there was a tie for first place with half a point separating first and second place. That meant that if any of the top three competitors won the last event, they went on to the Orlando Europa for their shot at a pro card.
The event was simple:
Deadlift for reps.
After six hours of competing in the sun, whoever could pull 455lbs the most times in sixty seconds went on to the get tested at the next level. Fortunately, the other person tied for first went before me, so I would know what I needed to beat him.
He pulled 21 reps. I needed 22 +. After giving it everything I had left in the tank, I pulled 22 with maybe half a second to spare.
I needed every ounce of energy that I had conserved to get the thing that what most important that day.
Had I allocated any more energy to anything else, it would have cost me the reason for showing up.
If winning that day is the most important thing, everything that drives down the probability of sinning is me acting like an asshole - doing things that get me further away from the purpose of being there.
If showing up and having fun was the most important thing, sitting in the shade by myself would have been acting like an asshole. Resources allocated to one thing are not allocated to another.
If you're not intentional about how you're allocating resources, you are probably running a race against yourself.
Running a race that you lose, even if you win - and then complaining about losing - is Acting Like and Asshole.4
To get a handle on resource allocation, you have to clear on what really matters. What is the reason for showing up? What makes it worth it?
This is the Clarity Piece of the 3C’s
The 3C’s
Everyone wants to go fast; they want to get to where they are going faster; collapse the time to target. Before collapsing time, you need an accurate set of directions; this is Certainty about how to make decisions.
Certainty precedes collapsing time.
To have Certainty in decision making you need Clarity on where you’re at and what matters most.
Clarity precedes Certainty.
Clarity —> Certainty —> Collapsing Time.
This is a good guide to help orient yourself as you go through this, or any, content.
Allegiance Capital, Open Loops and Greased Slides
Most prefer the Certainty of Misery to the Misery of Uncertainty
-Virginia Satir
Allegiance Capital is another concept I picked up from Jeff Spencer.
Throughout Nicsmas, I do my best to let you know how you might feel - triggered, upset, confused, uncertain - before you feel it. For example, when you hear something new, the first thing you do is open google and try to find and answer.
This is called “closing a loop”.
I’m telling you right now that if you watch Nicsmas, you will have the impulse to open google and search for and answer or for confirmation. I’m telling you this so that when I tell you NOT to quickly close the loop, you know that it’s part of the process.
If I tell you AFTER the fact, it will sound and feel like I am trying to explain something away that I did not expect or account for.
Allegiance capital helps navigate people through uncertain situations by calling things out before they happen - especially things like how you will feel or what impulses you might have. I practice allegiance capital because I want to help you make better decisions in the future - without allegiance capital people are more likely to choose “the certainty of misery” - the devil they know.
If you want to influence people to do anything better for themselves that means you are influencing them to do something differently for themselves. Allegiance capital is worth practicing. It makes different more comfortable.
The other thing you might realize is that Nicsmas is not a “greased slide”. A “greased slide” is a term marketers use to suggest a journey with no friction - thus no effort required - with no-brainer offers.
When you have a journey that requires no effort and a bunch of no brainer offers, you get lazy clients with no brains.
That’s not interesting to me.
I will lose many viewers and readers because I didn’t make it effortless or mindless enough for them. No judgement toward them, but on this particular journey, I want to lose them.
Speaking of losing viewers, I didn’t end any notifications of Nicsmas starting. No email, no reminders. Why?
Abdication of Responsibility
Remember, the purpose here was not to get views or eyeballs. I just wanted to show up for the people that were willing to take responsibility for their lives.
Many people asked if they could get an email reminder or calendar invite. The answer (trigger warning):
“No. It’s at the same time, in the same place, every day for the next twelve days. If you expect me to be responsbile for making sure that you remember to even show up, then you aren’t in a place to make any meaningful changes for yourself"
Outside of Nicsmas, I would be careful as to how often you are abdicating responsibility. Delegating tasks is fine. But if something is important to you - like top priority important - don’t leave it in the hands of an outside party.
If you can’t take it up on yourself to show up to the same place, at the same time, twelve days in a row without a notification - Nicsmas was simply not for you.
…and that’s okay.
Homework and discussion.
On some days there is homework. Generally, I recommend you do the homework and then discuss it with someone important to you. The homework is generally designed to support the topic of the day or prepare you for the next day (or month)
What really matters to you? Not what do you think is supposed to matter, but what makes it all worth it, truly?
Watch the Human Mindset vs Champion’s Mind5. For the next few weeks, keep an open loop and observe yourself. Just make a mental note when you catch yourself coming from the human mindset and an effort to re-orient to the champions mind. I recommend journaling about it.
OPTIONAL: WATCH NICSMAS DAY 1 (Embedded above)
Wisdom comes from multiple perspectives:
Share your 6WU here.
Onward
Nic
PS. Want a full Nicsmas in your mailbox every month? Check out the The Letter:
At my age I find that calendar reminders are a must so I set them for myself. I am the guy at the DR's office standing there putting the next appointment in my phone while they are trying to send me off with a card that I will lose before getting home. Reminders for the day before and another allowing enough time to be on time not tardy. Do I still mess up sure usually by falling asleep, by neglecting to check AM/PM , or correct time zone. Just put 2 things in an hour ago for next week, I don't remember what they are but the phone remembers.