🛏️ TREE 568: Navy Seal vs billionaire

Please welcome this week’s guest author Kody Duncan who writes the very excellent weekly newsletter Habit Examples. I know it’s excellent because I wrote a guest post for it last week. 😉 The posts that aren’t by me are also excellent, which is why I’m sharing Kody with you this week. He’s doing it all – words, images and music.

Kody started keynote speaking for 1000+ person conferences at just 16 years old, met his Idaho-born wife in Honduras while they both were serving missions for their church, then graduated in psychology from BYU. Now his #1 goal is to help 3000 people build better habits in 2023 through his newsletter. You could be one of them.

Grow slowly
Jeff

‘If you wanna change the world, start off by making your bed.’

After 37 years serving as a Navy Seal, Admiral William H. McRaven wrote a bestselling book making exactly that argument.

Could making your bed be that big of a deal?

He points out that:

• It’s the first domino toward having a great day

• It develops discipline and attention to detail, both required for success

• If you've had a hard day, your bed is a reminder that you did one good thing today.

Kinda makes you wanna make your bed, right?

Before you do – did you know billionaire Mark Cuban vowed to never make his bed for the rest of his life?

He even once refused a business deal solely on the grounds that the business made bed sheets.

His reason?

8(ish) mins/day × 365 days ≅ 52 hours annually spent making his bed.

Over 3–4 decades, it quickly becomes months of his life spent making his bed, only for it to be messy again later the same day.

‘I vowed that I’d keep my sheets and bedding clean, but I would NEVER make my bed.’

Many would consider Mark Cuban to have ‘changed the world’…

…despite never making his bed.

So do you need to make your bed to change the world, or not?

Depends.

Do you need personal validation, discipline, and a sense of accomplishment?

Or do you just need more time?

There’s no wrong answer.

Maybe habits aren’t objectively ‘good’ or ‘bad’ after all.