4170: Wise People Have Rules For Themselves by David Cain on Discipline

[00:00:00] [SPEAKER_01] Thinking about refreshing the carpet in your home? Now's the time to do it. For a limited time at The Home Depot, get 10% off installed carpet projects on trusted brands like LifeProof, LifeProof with PetProof Technology, Home Decorators Collection and Traffic Master. Plus, with installation starting at just 49 cents per square foot, upgrading your space is more affordable than ever at The Home Depot. Offer valid September 24th, 2026 through October 4th, 2026. Exclusions apply. For licenses, see homedepot.com slash license numbers.

[00:00:31] [SPEAKER_02] Pink Panther us here. Coach and Spotify are teaming up to bring music and style together, and they want you to be part of it. Grab your friends and head to the Tabby Tour, hitting cities around the country with live performances from special artists, exclusive experiences, and personalized products. And discover custom playlists on Spotify, built just for you based on who you are and how you listen. Live your story with Coach. Learn more at Coach.com.

[00:00:55] [SPEAKER_00] This is Optimal Living Daily. Wise people have rules for themselves by David Cain of Raptitude.com. And I'm your narrator, Justin Malik, reading you blogs every single day of the year, including holidays. And without further ado, let's get right to it as we optimize your life. Wise people have rules for themselves by David Cain of Raptitude.com.

[00:01:27] [SPEAKER_00] Every time I post a new behavioral experiment or share a personal resolution of some kind, I get a few emails telling me not to be so strict with myself. They always say something like, It's not good to be so hard on yourself, or We shouldn't be forcing ourselves to do things. This is a common thing to hear in our improvement-focused culture. I used to think it was a reasonable caution, but now I think it's generally bad advice. It seems well-meaning in most cases.

[00:01:54] [SPEAKER_00] People sometimes do go overboard with exercise, frugality, and personal efficiency. But I think it's much more common for people to go underboard in some or all of those areas. And you can bet the person giving you a hard time is one of them. We often hear about the importance of balance in our self-improvement efforts. But what exactly are we balancing? Good behaviors and bad ones? Are we looking for lives that are equal parts wisdom and recklessness? Can you imagine someone saying, I don't think we should force ourselves to brush our teeth every day.

[00:02:24] [SPEAKER_00] You have to live a little. You might have noticed a pattern in the most successful people around you. Wherever they excel, they tend to have personal rules that they take very seriously. Financially affected people tend to hold themselves to certain rules about money. I don't borrow money for anything smaller than a house. I ledger every dollar in or out. I live on 80% of my income and invest the difference. Fit, energetic people tend to have personal rules about health. I run or walk every day, rain or shine.

[00:02:54] [SPEAKER_00] I fill half my plate with vegetables. I don't keep junk food in the house. Productive people keep personal rules about work. I'm always at my desk at 7 sharp. I clean out my inbox every Friday. I don't use social media before 5 o'clock. These uncommonly capable people have figured out something that should be obvious. Your quality of life improves when you set clear standards for how you live. You gravitate back towards so-so in any area where your standards are unclear.

[00:03:23] [SPEAKER_00] It works both ways, like magic. Equally predictable is the resistance you will face from others whenever you do set standards for yourself that deviate from the norm. Quit eating meat and people will try to get you to eat meat. Start going to bed at 10 and someone will try to get you to stay up later. Quit drinking and someone will buy you a shot. Work out regularly and someone will say you're being obsessive. This notion that personal rules constitute forcing yourself

[00:03:51] [SPEAKER_00] is just a way of dismissing self-discipline as a possibility for oneself or others. Brushing your teeth every day doesn't require any sort of forcing or obsessing, just dental hygiene standards you consider non-negotiable. Again, consider the absurdity of it. I don't think we should force ourselves to live within our means. No way I'm going to be so strict with myself. I want to enjoy my life, man. Nobody quite says that, but in many circles it's normal to live that way. Why so much contempt for personal rules?

[00:04:21] [SPEAKER_00] Part of it is probably a kind of tall poppy syndrome. If we can convince others that their attempts to improve themselves are vain or joyless, we can feel safer about our own trajectories. There are probably deeper reasons though. We fear the prospect of losing any of our freedom, and we tend to think of rules as devices that only constrain. To say, I'm no longer going to let myself do X, can feel like we're trading enjoyment and freedom

[00:04:47] [SPEAKER_00] for some drab moral aspiration like purity or perfection. We've all experienced the pain of living under unfair or unsympathetic rules, especially the ones imposed on us as children by teachers and grown-ups. Having our freedom curtailed, often for reasons we don't understand or didn't agree to, is painful. But setting rules for yourself is completely different. Freedom is the whole point. Who's more free? The person determined to live on significantly less than their means no matter what?

[00:05:17] [SPEAKER_00] Or the person who shops like a free spirit? Self-imposed rules aren't constraints, they're good decisions made in batches. They're behavioral boundary markers you get to position yourself through your own experience and wisdom. A good personal standard clarifies and simplifies, eliminating what would be countless painful decision points. You're free from having to stop and negotiate with yourself for the hundredth time on the same issue. Should I have a third drink? Should I quit early and work Saturday instead?

[00:05:47] [SPEAKER_00] Should I lie and say I'm sick? Despite our fear of rules, the feeling of acting in accordance with a well-considered personal rule is not a feeling of being bound or hamstrung. It's a palpable feeling of power and independence. The real ball and chain is the liability of not having standards independent of your mood and other acute pressures. Without explicit no-go zones, there's always a possibility of getting sweet-talked into every chance to live a little, whether it's by others or yourself,

[00:06:17] [SPEAKER_00] and there's nothing freeing about living like that. For some reason, we tend to assume that keeping our options open means living with more freedom. But a range of options is just a range of possible behaviors, and personal rules are a simple way to eliminate broad categories of bad or mediocre behaviors from your repertoire, ones that reliably lead to debt, strained relationships, remorse, and other freedom-destroying conditions. It's not hard to see how you might experience more freedom in your life

[00:06:45] [SPEAKER_00] when you don't reserve your option to lie to get out of an obligation, to check Facebook the moment you wake up, or to be hungover tomorrow. After years of striving to not be so hard on myself, I'm now enjoying the freeing, empowering effect of keeping personal rules that I never negotiate with other people, or even with my own bad moods. Clear rules reduce the need for approval, the stress of trying to have everything both ways, and the necessity of constantly explaining yourself.

[00:07:14] [SPEAKER_00] Since I began to recognize the freeing effect of personal rules, I've never felt more independent, and I've never worried so little about what others think. Instead of going by mood or whim, you already know what you will do and what you won't. You know which side of the fence you want to live on. On this side lies prosperity, consistency, and health, and on that side lies remorse, ambivalence, and excuse-making, and other varieties of pain you've finally decided to be done with. And you're still free.

[00:07:43] [SPEAKER_00] You can always hop the fence and get burned again, which will only remind you why you drew a line in the first place. You just listened to the post titled, Wise People Have Rules for Themselves, by David Cain of raptitude.com. And I'll be right back with my commentary. Now I want to tell you about a book that stuck with me, Life at the Speed of Play, Launch Products People Love, by Mark Pincus.

[00:08:12] [SPEAKER_00] Mark's a legendary Silicon Valley entrepreneur and one of the most prolific idea generators around. But as he'll tell you, ideas are a dime a dozen. What matters is picking the right ones. His instant national bestseller is a fast-paced, 170-page read for these uncertain times, full of real-life skills, and a battle-tested, easy-to-follow framework for separating the great ideas from the terrible ones.

[00:08:38] [SPEAKER_00] Y Combinator's Gary Tan says it'll change your odds of success. And it reads less like a stuffy business book, more like you're in Mark's kitchen, already in his inner circle. Go to getmarksbook.com slash old and buy one copy, and Mark personally, not his publisher, sends you a second one free. Two books, about $16 each, so you can hand one to a friend who's stuck.

[00:09:05] [SPEAKER_00] Once again, that's getmarksbook.com slash old.

[00:09:11] [SPEAKER_01] Thinking about refreshing the carpet in your home? Now's the time to do it. For a limited time at The Home Depot, get 10% off installed carpet projects on trusted brands like LifeProof, LifeProof with PetProof Technology, Home Decorators Collection, and Traffic Master. Plus, with installation starting at just 49 cents per square foot, upgrading your space is more affordable than ever at The Home Depot. Offer valid September 24th, 2026, through October 4th, 2026. Exclusions apply. For licenses, see homedepot.com slash license numbers.

[00:09:41] [SPEAKER_00] Thank you to David. I love this one because it took me years to realize it, but without those rules, I personally will slack off on things that I don't love doing, like exercise. It doesn't come to me naturally. I don't really enjoy it necessarily. But when I created a rule that I will do at least one exercise of either squats, push-ups, or pull-ups, or something like that, that got the ball rolling for me and kept me going and doing it every single day.

[00:10:11] [SPEAKER_00] Now, something like this, this podcast that I do love doing, I did start with a rule that I'll do it every day of the year, including holidays, unless I physically can't do it. One thing I'd add to this, if you happen to break the rule, don't give up. Don't say, oh well, I broke the rule, so I guess that didn't work and I'll quit altogether. Think about the fact that you started at all and make another promise that you'll follow the rules

[00:10:37] [SPEAKER_00] or maybe make it so that if you break the rule again, you have to pay someone or donate to something that you don't like or donate to this show if you break the rule. I wouldn't mind that. Kidding, sort of. But even if you don't use money, don't let a mistake, one tiny little mistake or missed day, ruin the whole thing and all the work that you put in. Just recommit and start over. It's not even really starting over, it's just one mistake and you can ignore it and move on.

[00:11:07] [SPEAKER_00] So keep it up, make those rules, thank you for being here and I'll catch you tomorrow where your optimal life awaits.