Parenting

In this special class, my wife Alexandra joins us to share her Top 10 Big Ideas on how to celebrate the most creative time of your life. Discover how to mother from your essence, be a self-care queen, ignite your desire power and see your mothering as holy work + invisible art as you bring more fun and play and mindfulness into your heroine’s journey.

Did you know the word “parenting” comes from the Latin “to bring forth”? Yep. Begs the question, what do YOU want to help bring forth in your kids?! In this class, we explore 10 of my favorite Ideas on how I’m approaching fatherhood and going for dad of the year while doing my life’s work.

Carol Dweck is one of the world’s leading researchers on the science of motivation. This book is a collection of brief essays on various aspects of “self-theories.” It’s essentially a bridge between her extensive academic research studies and her popular book Mindset. It’s amazing. Big Ideas we explore include the two frameworks (entity vs. incremental) and their two goals (performance vs. learning), attributional retraining (aka learning the best way to respond to failure!), and moving from contingent self-worth to wholehearted self-esteem.

Angela Duckworth is the world’s leading authority on the science of grit. In fact, she pioneered the field and, as Daniel Gilbert says on the cover: “Psychologists have spent decades searching for the secret of success, but Duckworth is the one who found it.” In this Note, we explore the two facets of grit (hint: passion + perseverance, why they’re important and how to cultivate them.

This is our fourth note on one of Joe De Sena's great books. Joe De Sena is the founder of Spartan and one of my favorite human beings on the planet. In this note we explore De Sena's 10 Rules for Resilience. It's packed with Big Ideas that will help us collect "Resilience Data Points", make a mark on the world, and respect fear as normal so that our children may do the same. Aroo!

This book is a scientific look at Purpose by one of the world’s leading developmental psychologists—a powerful look at how to cultivate purpose in our children (and, for that matter, ourselves) and why it’s so important. Big Ideas we explore include a definition of what it means to be purposeful (and a look at the alternatives), the #1 thing that gets in the way of discovering and creating purpose, 9 key things parents can do to help their kids with purpose, why entrepreneurial spirit is so important and a four-word mantra to reduce timidity and build courage and confidence.

Did you know that Fred Rogers was an ordained Presbyterian minister who was given the unique charge of working with children and families through television? Yep. Since watching the documentary Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, I’ve fallen in love with the man and his “relentless commitment to all that is best in people.” This is a quick-reading collection of some of Fred’s best wisdom gems gathered from various sources and organized by different themes. Big Ideas we explore include: Your eulogy (in three words!), an enraged Mister Rogers (= fierce love in action), a barrelful of songs (your barrel overflowing?), swimming with Fred (143!!), and making goodness attractive (remember our #1 job: ENCOURAGE others!!).

This is our third Note on (Mister) Fred Rogers’ books. I read all three over the course of a week after falling in love with the man via the wonderful documentary Won’t You Be My Neighbor? This book, as per the sub-title, is all about “Wisdom for Parents and Children from Mister Rogers.” Like the other books we’ve featured, it’s a super quick-reading and equally inspiring collection of brief wisdom gems from our beloved neighbor. I loved it. And, I’ve been enjoying channeling Mister Rogers’ warmth and presence and wisdom in my role as a father to our two little E’s: Emerson (6 as I type this) and Eleanor (2!). Big Ideas we explore include how to deal with disappointment (big and small!), growing (kids AND parents), the complexity of being a parent, setting limits and the power of saying, "I'm sorry."

I got this book after watching the wonderful (!) documentary on Mister Rogers called Won’t You Be My Neighbor? It's a collection of wisdom gems from various sources-a quick-reading portal into Mister Rogers’ brain that has an amazingly calming, uplifting effect. (At least it did for me.) Simply reading his words seemed to elevate my consciousness and make me a kinder, more patient person. Big Ideas we explore include: Be the best at whatever you are, our #1 Job in life (hint: Encourage others!!), I Like You (just the way you are), being a living example, Mister Rogers' creativity (hello, torture!), perfect parents/kids? (nope!), and the gap (the essence of human creativity).

Carol Dweck, Ph.D is a Stanford Professor and one of the world’s leading authorities on the science of motivation. She tells us that our “mindset”—how we see the world—determines a *huge* part of our overall happiness and well-being and achievement. In this Note, we’ll explore the difference between a “fixed mindset” and a “growth mindset” and some Big Ideas on why we want to learn how to live from a growth mindset. And, of course, how to do it!

Lanny Bassham is one of my favorite teachers. He’s an Olympic Gold Medalist and World Champion rifle shooter. He won a silver medal after having what he calls a “mental meltdown” in the 1972 Olympics. Then he spent several hours a day for the next couple years talking to every gold medalist he could find about how they were THINKING while they were performing at such an elite level. In the next Olympics in 1976, Lanny won the gold and then began teaching his “Mental Management System®.” Since then, he’s coached Olympic teams from all around the world and has also worked with the Navy SEALs, Fortune 500 businesses, the PGA and its players and other elite performers in sports and business. He boiled decades of wisdom into his fantastic book With Winning in Mind. He and I connected for an interview and I’ve been personally practicing many of his ideas for years. Then recently sent me a copy of his latest book — this one. I read it the next day. It’s AWESOME. And, well, here we are. Of course, it’s packed with Big Ideas and, as always, I’m excited to share some of my favorites!

The Last Lecture is an inspiring handbook for life written as a follow-up to a viral talk by Randy Pausch. Randy was a Professor of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. When it became terminal, he gave his “last lecture.” The talk was recorded. It went viral. And this book was written with Jeffrey Zaslow as a follow-up. Over 20 million people have now watched that talk and, if you’re one of them, you know just how magnetically inspiring Randy is. The book features fifty-three micro chapters—each telling a different story from Randy’s life. It’s packed with wisdom and I’m excited to share some of my favorite Big Ideas so let’s jump straight in!

Nonviolent Communication has sold over 1,000,000 copies. Why? It works. There are four key components to NVC: Observations + Feelings + Needs + Requests. In this Note, we'll take a quick look at each of them along with some other Big Ideas to communicate more compassionately.

Want to make your relationship work? Then you’d be wise to turn toward the world’s leading researcher on the science of what makes love work: John Gottman. This book has sold over 1 million copies and it’s easy to see why. Big Ideas we explore: How Gottman can predict divorce with 91% accuracy (in < 15 minutes), a quick look at the 7 principles, the power of cherishing your partner, turning toward (and not being a tech rat), how to solve the solvable problems and starting “I love you” with the “I.”

Will Bowen committed to going 21-days without complaining, criticizing or gossiping and challenged his congregation to do the same. 7 million purple bracelets later, Bowen created a little revolution and in this Note, we’ll check out some Big Ideas on how to quit getting your complaint on. And why you should care. Big Ideas range from shutting down the complaint factory to the fact that we’re all self-made—but only the successful will admit it.

Eat Move Sleep. The simple, powerful keys to optimal health and well-being. We talk about these fundamentals ALL the time and this is my new favorite book on health. Big Ideas we explore include 10,008 hours and 36 minutes (the magic # of elite performance), candy for cancer cells, the power of measuring whatever it is you want to improve, how to buy willpower at the store, and a vaccine for the common cold.

As you might have noticed, it’s easy to stress ourselves out as we strive to step up to our heroic potential.

We’ve established the fact that our brains don’t have parallel processors like a computer. As much as we’d like to think that we can multitask, we can’t.

In our last +1 we chatted about the difference between FALLING in love and STANDING in love.

We’ve talked a ton about Deep Work and going Deep in general.

In our last +1, we talked about shadows and attending your own lectures.

Today we’re going to have some fun mapping out how to use micro-moments of frustration to catalyze the next-best version of you, antifragile style.

Before we bid farewell to George Leonard, how about ONE more little idea from the Aikido (and life) master?

One of my challenges as I step up my athletic game is finding the time to train as I have some very tight time constraints on how much time I’m willing to put into my training.

At the end of my recent talk I keep on talking about 😉, one of the CEOs came up and asked me how to apply the wisdom I shared to his parenting. He had a 5-year-old like me.

Not too long ago, I introduced you to Leonidas—my Spartan sweatband. Yes, I realize it’s ridiculous that I wear this all day every day. That’s the whole point. (Hah.)

After watching that Mister Rogers documentary I keep talking about (this one), we got a bunch of his books. One of them is a recently published, beautifully illustrated collection of his poetry-songs called A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood.

The other day Grandma and Grandpa visited to hang out with the E’s. We had a nice time. 😍

In our last +1, we had fun reflecting on a new ritual Emerson and I are having fun with. It’s been super fun to reflect on ancient Stoic wisdom via Ryan Holiday’s modern medallions. (Thanks, Ryan!)

Not too long ago, we started giving Emerson $10 every week.

In our last +1, we talked about how I’m attempting to make the idea of saving and investing money much cooler than constantly spending money.

As we’ve discussed many times, one of my absolute favorite things to do in life is curl up in bed next to Emerson and read together. It’s an essential part of our PM Bookend and one we miss only on rare occasions.

This morning I was wrapping up yet another AM1 Deep Work session when I heard the tap-tap-tap little knock on the office door.

In our last couple +1s, we flipped through my notes from session number 150-something with my Yoda/spiritual Godfather Phil Stutz.

In our last +1, we wrapped up the tour of my notes from a recent chat with Phil.

In our last +1, we talked about being Efficient vs. Effective.

In our last +1, we hung out with Jon Gottman and learned that successful marriages feature partners responding to one another’s bids. (Did you do your quick, napkin Relationship Bid Math?)

In our last couple +1s, we’ve been talking about Jon Gottman and his wisdom on how to make a marriage work.

A little over seven and half years ago, Emerson was born at home.

In our last +1, we practiced some virtue mastery via our new (and always-evolving) Virtuegong practice.

In our last +1, we blew up some belly balloons with our kids.

In our last +1, we did some detective work and discovered that sugar is often disguised with 61 different names.

Big news at the Johnson house: We recently got a new robot vacuum cleaner. (Hah.)

In our last +1, we spent some more time with Trevor Moawad and explored some more wisdom from his great book, It Takes What It Takes.

In our last couple +1s, we’ve been chatting about Trevor Moawad’s wisdom on what he calls “neutral thinking.”

In our last +1, we hung out with some scientists and doctors who decided to test whether or not FOOD prescriptions would be more cost-effective (and health-boosting effective) than just normal prescriptions for medicine.