Approximately a 3-4 minute read

Good morning!

Before you change your system, it’s worth asking three questions: What am I noticing? Who am I comparing myself to? And do I still love the work when the results aren’t showing up? This week’s newsletter explores how awareness, comparison, and love quietly determine whether your system sustains you or slowly drains you.

Hope you find it useful.

notice.

In my experience, some people don’t fail for lack of discipline; they fail because they’re too exhausted to build a system.

I once worked with someone who felt overwhelmed by work, family, and lack of sleep. The idea of creating a system felt like just another burden.

So I suggested something different: don’t build a system—notice the one you already have. For seven days, I invited him to observe two things: green moments and red moments.

Green moments were people and activities that gave him energy. Red moments were the opposite. They were the people and activities that drained him.

The week passed, and the pattern was clear: Green moments were time with his kids, and red moments were certain meetings and unproductive habits.

The next phase of his system was simply to find simple ways to be with his kids more or to be fully present during the little time he had with them. He found this very beneficial.

We didn’t overhaul his life. He simply noticed what helped and what hindered.

Sometimes improvement isn’t about adding or cutting—it’s about paying attention to how the use of your time, energy, and attention impacts you. You can’t change what you're not aware of.

Try it:

For the next seven days, just pay attention. What gives you energy? What takes it away? That awareness alone might be the most powerful system you ever design.

Comparison.

Comparison is one of the fastest ways to destroy a good thing you have going.

I recently came across a quote I really like:

When you do this, nothing changes about your path; however, you increase the noise.

I saw this firsthand with a player who was tracking everyone else’s milestones rather than trusting his own process. Pressure, impatience, and distorted perspective started to infiltrate his mind. He started questioning and even stopped executing the great systems he had in place.

When he realized what he was doing, we landed on two course-correcting principles: run your own race and turn off the shot clock.

Every system has its own timeline. When you impose artificial deadlines, you introduce self-inflicted pressure that degrades decision-making, performance, and joy.

Focus on what you can control. Trust the pace of your system.

When you stop forcing outcomes, you create space for something better to emerge.

Try this:

When you find yourself comparing or, even worse, being envious of someone else, remind yourself to do these three things: (1) run your own race, (2) turn off the shot clock, and (3) focus on what you can control.

​​​

love.

I was recently with a group of NFL athletes discussing what it actually takes to reach the top. The odds of making it among the best of the best are microscopic, and each of them admitted to having countless moments when it would have been easier to quit.

What's interesting is that when I asked them what got them through the tough times, they said the same thing: Love for what they do.

The path to excellence is filled with friction, pain, and breakdowns. If you only love the results, you'll be less likely to execute the process when the outputs don't match the inputs.

Consider this common question: "What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?”

Now flip it to this: “Would you keep doing what you're doing if the odds of failure were high?"

If you answer yes to that second question, that's a competitive advantage.

Try this:

This week, try to do more of what you love to do.

Hope you have a great week!

Justin Su'a

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