If your life is not easy...

Then you are doing it wrong!

Despite what Arnold Schwarzenegger, Rambo, and everyone at Nike will tell you, there is no such thing as being tough!

If you have managed to get through your day (so far) without snorting coke, downing a bottle of scotch, or gambling away half your monthly paycheck, it's not because you are tough.

Even though everyone struggling with these addictions thinks it is.

So, how are you able to accomplish something that so many others cannot?

Because you find it easy.

I like dry red wine. So when I go to the store, that's what I buy. To help me out, the winery sticks a label on the bottle: dry.

Not dry for Moshe, Joe and Jessica. It's dry for everyone.

Tough does not work like that. What is tough for you, might be easy for me.

An elephant can uproot a tree, easily. A cheetah can run 60 mph, easily.

However, for a cheetah to uproot a tree or an elephant to run 60, that is going to be tough.

The reason you consistently fail in the things you are struggling with is because you think that the only way to succeed is to be tough.

Hero movies perpetuate this myth. Superman, Batman, and Sillyman.

What is Sillyman?

All of them!

They make people think (especially children) that you cannot solve your problems with the resources you have. You need extra special strength.

Even though it is possible to be tough in the short term, it is impossible for the long haul. No matter how much you train, the best swimmer in the world cannot hold their breath forever.

This is what happens: we watch a motivational movie and get inspired. We bite the bullet, make a bold declaration (when no one is listening), and renew our gym membership. Again.

The problem is, eventually the forces that make you despise what you are doing, win out.

EVERY SINGLE TIME!

I have to tell you, when I first discovered this ancient Jewish concept it hit me like a ton of bricks.

ISN'T THIS SO OBVIOUS!?

Everything in my life is a testament to this truth:

Success never happens with things we think are tough.

Everything does what it finds easy, and doesn't do what it finds tough.

The only difference between one person and any other is the thinking.

You think about alcohol and drugs in ways that make it easy, and the addict does not.

So too, there are things that you would like to achieve, but can't.

Why not?

NOT because it's hard.

ONLY because you think it's hard.

Do any of these lines rumble in your head?:

"I need to get up earlier."

"I need study more."

"I need to be more patient."

"I should stop wasting so much time, lose weight, exercise more..."

"Be someone else."

Why do we torture ourselves trying to be or do something that we have never been able to accomplish?

THE VERY UNCOMFORTABLE ANSWER:

It's a holdover from the pagans. This is how pagans think:

If you give to God something dear to you, then in return God will do something for you.

If you inflict enough pain upon yourself, then you deserve to succeed.

That pain is TRYING to be tough.

The reason why tough goals are not just difficult, but impossible, is that there is no reservoir in your body called "tough." You don't have a limb, gene or extra liver that you can call on to turbo-power your way through. We aren't fighter jets that, with a flick of a switch, pull on the throttle, and a big grimace from Tom Cruise, will scram the jets (whatever that means), and get us to run a marathon.

Whenever anyone says, time to be tough, all it means is: time to inflict pain!

Which is really self-abuse.

Thinking that you have to be tough to win, is abusive.

small is BIG

It's a point the Torah makes in multiple places, specifically in Parshat Naso where it explains how to achieve the ultimate experience (Numbers 6:8).

To be honest, if I were writing the Bible, I would have the supplicant lob off a limb and drink bile for a month.

We can all thank God, that God does not need my advice.

Shockingly, all that is necessary is to abstain from any grape product, shaving, and going to a cemetery. For just thirty days.

Do you think you could handle that?

And even that, the Torah regards as excessive!

This is how refrigerators work: plug it in, open the door, put the food in, go for a walk. This is how toasters work: plug it in, open the door, put the food in, have a cup of coffee. These manufacturers are not better engineers than God.

Therefore, this is how life works...

If it isn't easy, then you are doing it wrong!

PRACTICALLY SPEAKING:

Take a blank piece of paper and write on the top a goal you really want.

On the rest of the page put down everything you can possibly think of to achieve that goal.

Everything.

Now, which of those ideas is the smallest that you can possibly do?

Let's use running a marathon as an example. The problem is, you are out of shape and haven't set foot on a treadmill since the Declaration of Independence.

So, what is the smallest possible step?

How small should it be?

So small that you cannot NOT do it.

Three minutes a day on the treadmill.

"But that won't get me anywhere!"

Yes it will...

Ten minutes. At some point, ten minutes will become the new small step.

And, it will be easy.

And by doing the easy, you will run a marathon.

This is success thinking.

It works because it's easy.

And because it's so easy, you cannot NOT do it.

It's NOT the three minutes that make the difference, it's the difference that makes the difference.

LEARN FROM YOUR ENEMY

How do you turn a well-respected member of society, a family man, stable and financially successful, into a homeless drunk?

With one bottle of beer.

How do you break a diet you've been on for three months?

With one cookie.

Small steps are life's significant steps.

For good, and bad.

Such is the power of the small.

THIS IS THE TRUTH: No matter how strong, smart, artistic, or even rich you are, everyone has something that is out of their reach.

Success comes by making the SMALLEST step towards the GREATEST goal.

This idea is NOT the same as making small or reasonable goals, which is a big mistake. We've all experienced the sting of failure and want to avoid it. But when you choose small goals to avoid failure, you end up failing worse.

Because small goals are really even harder to achieve!

WHY?

Small goals are not inspiring. While they may be theoretically easy, they are practically hard because there is no motivation to achieve them.

So what happens is a viscous cycle of ever-lowering goals. Till one day your goal is just to get out of bed!

And eventually, even that will be too much!

Both NASA and McDonald's employ janitors. So does your local hospital and Dunkin' Donuts. However, they aren't all doing the same quality job. It's the building that does the greatest good in the world that is going to have the most motivated workers.

The more you are striving for the things you really want in life, the easier your life will become.

It's not about having small goals, rather it's small steps to the greatest goal you can imagine.

That is the recipe for an easy (and fulfilling) life.