Yo, yo, yo, welcome back to the Further Your Lifestyle Podcast Conversations on Lifestyle, Passions, and Hustles. My name's Chris. I'm your host, and I'm super excited to be back here having the conversation with you. Episode 243 today, and welcome to 2026. We're about day 25 into the year, and I'm probably guessing it's one of two things that you're feeling right now. Either the hype is fading or the pressure is rising, or maybe, maybe actually, I could be wrong, maybe there's three things. Maybe actually feel like you're in your best grief here. And the topic that I want to talk about today, and we'll get we'll get into a few other things soon, but having been away, taking some time off for myself, I took about four or five, actually, it's probably been about six weeks that I haven't actually documented and filmed and all that jazz. I was off in the Philippines. We had our second wedding ceremony over there in the Philippines, Carla and I. And yeah, it just took some time off, and it was really great to just, you know, reset and a lot of chance to plan, reflect, and think about, you know, how last year went, 2025. Now, what we're going to talk about today, we're talking about something which can be become a bit of a cliche. We're talking about not just another year, but a year of intention. And how do you go make this year your best year yeah? Now, this does not necessarily apply to, you know, 2026. It applies to any point in time in which you're resetting and starting from zero, or you're just wanting a big game change in your life. But I think coming back to you know the premise of all of this is like you're either feeling that the hype is maybe fading because we're, you know, 25 days into the year, or maybe you're feeling like there's pressure rising because you're not seeing the results that you want, or maybe actually you have found your groove. And if you found your groove, well then this episode's probably going to be really great in helping you just reconnect with yourself and knowing that you're you're ticking all the boxes. Now, if you're not, that's okay. Because the idea is that, you know, we don't want this year to be just another year. We want it to be, you know, bigger and better than that. We want it not to be just another year of, you know, setting goals and trying to break them and all that. We want it to be a year where you moved with intention. Or you want it to be a period of time where you moved with intention. Now, in this episode, what we're going to be doing is we're going to be stripping away this whole new year, new me noise, and we're going to zoom in on kind of some of the things that really, really do matter. And this is stuff that's worked great for me, stuff that I've taken from other people as well. And hopefully it can really change the way you go about doing things this year. Now, we are we are 25 days in, right? So we've already kind of missed the ball a bit, but that's okay because I find that it's usually the first 30 days that most people struggle. If you haven't found your groove, this episode is going to be great for you because everything, everything is intention. Even doing nothing. If you decide to do nothing, if you don't do something today, there is intention behind it. You intentionally decided to do nothing. So we want to make sure we're intentionally deciding to do something that is going to get us closer to where we want to be. It's not about, you know, pressure to hustle. And it's it's okay if you're off to a bit of a slow start this year. As I said already, we're already 25 days in. I'm just getting back to the podcast. But we really want to talk about, I guess we could call it radical accountability. If you're not going to do what you said, like if you're not doing what you said you wanted to do, that's on you, right? So you need to keep yourself honest, you need to keep yourself accountable, and you can do that in numerous different ways, and we're going to talk about that. But let's talk about how to reclaim your rhythm, your groove, reset your focus and make the rest of your year this year, hopefully, your best year yet. But it's on your terms. So that's what we're talking about today. Get cozy, get comfortable. We're back to usual group routine and groove for myself. We're going to have these episodes coming out weekly, and I appreciate the conversation, Banter. Now, if you do enjoy these episodes, drop down below a comment. Say hi. Let me know that you are enjoying them. What do you want to see? But you know, share this with someone else. Like I appreciate all the comments, all the support. But at the end of the day, if we want to help other people further their lifestyle, we need to get it in front of them. And I can have that help done by you because no better way to mark it than to have other people that have already listened to it, you know, help other people realize what they're missing out on. So we're gonna dive into it, we're gonna roll the intro and let's get cracking. So the first thing that I want to talk about is intentionality is unavoidable. I already said it before, right? Anything that you do is intention, whether it's every action or whether every inaction. So by me deciding to do this podcast today, it's intention. If I was to say, you know what, I'm not gonna do it today, I'm gonna do it tomorrow, there's intention there. You might not know what the intention is behind it in terms of what that means and what that leads to, but doing nothing is still a decision. Now, what you tolerate is also what you're choosing. Let me say that again. If you're dealing with something and you have an issue, you have a problem, you're struggling with something, if you're tolerating it, if you're happy to, you know, receive it, if you're happy to tolerate it, then you're choosing to be okay with it. So we need to really, really make sure we get our headspace right on that. And I do apologize if you can hear the birds. Oh, and by the way, just a little side note, if you if you're watching this and you see a whole different background, I moved house, haven't even set up my new place yet, got back from the Philippines and gotten straight back into this for you guys. So you will see this change. There will be a bit of a podcast, you know, how I'm gonna be doing it, where I'm gonna be doing it, and all that. That will change probably over the next 90 days. So just you know, stay tuned. We've still got to do a lot of like furniture and layout design and stuff, but there's gonna be some big changes, pretty exciting changes. I'm excited for it. Anyway, what I was gonna say was you got to be asking yourself this one question Are your current results the outcome of intentional alignment or is it from simple autopilot? Now, there's two parts of this which is actually it's okay, but it's it's not okay, right? If you're an autopilot, that can be pretty good. If you're in a rinse and repeat kind of game where you just need to just do the reps, autopilot is great because you're just gonna be cruising. But you've got to also make sure that the outcome that you're achieving on autopilot is an intentional alignment to what you actually want to be achieving. A lot of the times some people just get into a rut, they get into a bad habit. Therefore, it's on autopilot, therefore, it's not aligning to where they intentionally want to be. So, what you want to make sure you're doing is you're intentionally aligned to what you're doing on a regular basis and rinse and repeat that. That's what you want to do. So you've got to ask yourself that. Now, I'm not here to talk about, you know, you've got to be hustling, you've got to be doing it all, but but I will say this is you do need to have full ownership of whatever it is that you're doing, right? We need to reject the glorification of constant motion. Now, that can be hard. I'm a person that I just got to be doing things simply because I'm building something of my own ambition and I'm relentless to that. I own it, I love it like it's my own child, but I understand everyone has different needs, different goals, ambitions, and priorities. And the way I live my life is not going to be the same way that you live your life, right? And I don't expect that. But what I do expect is that, you know, you again, you're replacing this hustle mentality of go, go, go or what other people are telling you, oh, you should be doing this, you should be doing this. Here I am doing a podcast saying you should be doing this. But really align it with honest alignment. We're coming back to a key word here, alignment. We want that alignment to be obviously aligned to what you want, the values you have, the things you enjoy, and you know, your purpose, your passion. You want all that kind of flowing together and building that Venn diagram of what you love. And again, coming back to that point, it's like, are you choosing something? And if you aren't choosing something, you've got to be okay with that. So if you're not sure if this is actually the right way to proceed, the question you can be asking yourself is this right? If you choose to do something, would future you thank you for this? Is this gonna get me closer to where I want to be? These are the questions we should be asking. Right? Now, like I said, we're only day 25 into all of this, and you're not behind, right? The new year scares the heck out of me. I hate it. Simply because I have to start from zero again. Last year in the business we did record revenue. Profit wasn't too bad, but we we didn't necessarily make less less profit, but didn't necessarily grow either. But, you know, to be able to see the growth in certain areas in terms of taking on a new staff, having a warehouse, higher cost, but we still managed to do what we needed to do, like do the minimum in terms of profit. I'm happy with that. Now, just because you don't have the success that you expect, just because you're starting from zero again, just because maybe, you know, this is your first time doing it, or maybe you you're a bit behind, it's day 25. It's okay. Everyone feels sorry, no one ever feels perfectly ready for anything. Whether it's January 1st, whether it's going out to do your first speech, or whether it's you know, getting your first job. A lot of the time we have to just figure it out as we go. That's how we get experience, right? And unfortunately, when it comes to a new year, new me, there is this whole new motivation wave where people crash hard. And it's around this time. That's why I decided to postpone doing content till about now, because this is when most people are crashing out. They've started to do something, they're trying to say, I'm gonna do you know 30 days of this or I'm gonna do 365 days of this, and they've realized by day 25 or 21 or 30 that they've gotten out of it, and maybe they picked up a different groove, and that's okay. Usually what I like to do is I usually take my time into the new year, get myself into a groove that naturally feels aligned, right? And then I'm naturally able to just double down on those things. Now I've started posting short content for my business, and I'm doing that in a way that suits my needs, not doing it the way it suits someone else's, and we've seen great results because I'm being consistent with it, because I've made it without friction. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is you haven't missed your shot. If you haven't started, if you haven't gotten to your groove, that's okay. We're still at the beginning. We haven't even hit 30 days yet, right? At the time of me recording this. So what actually really, really matters this year for you is this, right? You you gotta ask, sorry, that's not what matters. You actually gotta ask yourself what really matters for you this year. And also ask yourself, what is just noise? What is the stuff that's just you know, it's just there, it's just happening, and but it's not it's not really relevant, it's not really getting you to where you want to be. Those are the things we want to be asking ourselves, right? The next thing I want to mention is stacking. We want to stack days, we don't want to stack pressure. Now, a good year is made of good days. So, how do we start small and make many good days? And I guess the way you could probably think about this is asking yourself, what would an intentional day look like for me? Right? And that will be your compass, that will be your guide. It's not your calendar, it's your guide. Now, right now, we've started late in the business, right? I we we came back from being in the Philippines on the 12th and I got straight back into work. So we lost 12 days because we had the store in time away. We weren't doing listings, we were for a period, but then I I said to the team, you know, take some time off, my list went away. Everyone deserves that, right? And you've got to be comfortable with those things because that is intentional. Intentional to take a break. And if you're not willing to take a break because you're scared that everything else is gonna break, well then you have a bigger problem, right? You need to be able to build in that lifestyle what you want. It needs to be intentional. What does an intentional day or year or month or period look like for you? So, what you want to do is ask yourself, what does an intentional day look like for you? Now, you might be starting a new year, you might have a new job, you might be still in the same job, you might be going for a promotion, maybe you're starting a side hustle, maybe you're starting a YouTube content, whatever it is, right? You want to be intentional. What does an intentional day look like for you? And it might just mean, you know, spending 30 minutes to do a single short form reel, right? And just spend the 30 minutes, get it up, get it done. It doesn't have to be perfect, but that's intentional. Intentional day might mean do one more thing that gets you closer to where you want to be. If you do not put this out there, if you do not write it down, get onto Apple notes or get onto your laptop and write it down or on your phone, send yourself a text message. What does an intentional day look like? What does success look like for you that makes a day a win? You I can't define it for you. You gotta put it. If you do need the accountability, you can put it in the comments down below. All right, number five. This is now where we get to the point where we start building our groove and not really setting in some resolution. Instead of like overhauling your life or, you know, whatever, we want to build consistency in areas that really, really matter, that are important to you, right? Not important to anyone else. So, groove, what I find is a trance, is a routine, is something that gets you just naturally flowing and doing because you enjoy it. You you love the process, you're learning, you're getting experience, but you're seeing results and you're getting outcome results. So the groove, if you can get a groove, beats the grind because you're not having to work away, not really understanding what you're working away towards. And you want to create that daily stack. And what I mean by that is ritual. Rituals like routines. We want habits and we want check-ins. You want things that's going to make you do things, make you do things comfortably, help you get into a groove of a habit. So a lot of things are just, you know, second, secondhand nature. And you want to check in on that. Pulse check, make sure things are going okay, reflect on it. Did this, oh, did I do this today? Keep yourself accountable, and then it becomes routine. So, my big, big actionable clause for you today, or actionable step for you today, is this write down one thing you can do today that aligns with where you want to be in 2026. Then do it again tomorrow, then do it the next day, then do it the next day. You see my point here. By doing this, right, it's it's not it's it's all it's going to do is build some discipline into you, right? And you're not too late. The right time for you to own your life is today, right? You don't need some other person to tell you, you've got to follow this, you know, 12-step process to, you know, get your year into the perfect groove or whatever. It's simple. You've already got the answers in front of you. You've just got to have a conversation with yourself, and you actually just got to go do it. Now you will find that some of these things will not stick. You'll find that as you're trying to find your groove, maybe things aren't feeling it. That's okay. It might take you another 30 days, it might even take you three months. But don't start using that as an excuse saying I haven't found my groove. Because I do find that people tend to start blaming that oh, I haven't found my groove when they haven't actually been doing anything in the first place. So that's on you. All right, so I'm gonna leave it there. We're gonna be back here again next week. We're full force into the year. It's so great to be back. I'm gonna be doing a whole batch bunch of episodes so I can get ahead, and then hopefully we'll start to build this out and I can have a little bit of a different setup and layout of how I have these conversations with you. But if there's things that you want to talk about, if there's things that you want to see, uh more than happy to hear from you. Drop down in the comments below. Make sure you are subscribed or following so you don't miss out. But I've got content ready up until episode 250. So we're gonna have seven episodes ready to rumble, and we're gonna fly through them. But if I've got ideas from you, more than happy to add them to the backlog. I'm also happy to continue the conversation. Appreciate you being here. Happy New Year. Hope you've had a wonderful break, and I will see you when I'm looking at you. Ciao, yeah.