How to completely change yourself in 12 months and become better than you are

At one fine moment in my life, I realized that something was missing in me: you seem to be living, but something is wrong and wrong. I looked at myself from the outside and in the mirror, went through one strong training on my own, read a couple of educational books. I made disappointing conclusions that I have a bunch of bad habits, I devote almost no time to my health, I am not popular with girls, my level of disorganization is off the charts, and in addition, I often avoid solving complex life problems.

After realizing this fact, something in me switched and pulled me forward: of course, not immediately, but movement began towards the goal - to become better than I am. I took this feeling and worked on myself for 12 months. Now I can say with confidence that the algorithm below works, and I would like to share it with Lifehacker readers.

It doesn't matter how many days are in your life, what matters is how much life is in your days!

Sport

It all starts with sports and its implementation in your life. We start with basic exercises, but you need to do them every day. These are simple exercises: squats, abdominal presses (lifting the body), push-ups. It all starts with repetition 5 times and increases by 1 time every day; you can do two repetitions a day. In a month, you will be doing 35 squats, 35 abdominal exercises, and 35 push-ups. Then you can increase the number of repetitions as needed, but be sure to do it every day.

Every person needs to find his own sport, and you shouldn’t follow fashion: everyone runs, that means running, everyone does yoga, that means yoga. Look for a sport that suits you completely: loads, interest, time, financial component, people. It should become an extension of your essence.

Over the course of a year, I tried yoga, the gym, boxing, running, swimming, jiu-jitsu, aikido, and cycling. At the same time, I practiced several types for several months. It was a great time, because it was definitely beneficial for my health, and I also understood more and more what exactly I wanted from sports.

My choice fell on jiu-jitsu and swimming - this is the basis of my sports development. Now this has been for the rest of my life, since the pleasure I get in my classes is difficult to express in words, and my success in this field only reinforces this conviction.

How to become better in appearance: have you looked better?

Explore the latest fashions. Browse popular magazines. Thanks to them, you will know about all the new hairstyles, makeup that is popular today, and other fashion trends. You can buy the best trending new items for you in the near future.
Find out what texture your hair has. You might like your friend's hairstyle. This does not mean that it will look the same on you. As a rule, it depends on what structure the hair has. Straight and curly curls hold their shape differently.
Choose a haircut that suits you. This way you will undoubtedly become better in appearance.
Use cosmetics that enhance your beauty and disguise imperfections. Cosmetics are considered powerful beauty tools. But don’t hide yourself under makeup and don’t force yourself into fashion. Because not all makeup trends are right for you.
Cleanse your skin regularly. When you wash your face, use cleansers. Choose those that suit only your skin type. Do this once a day, in the evenings before bed.
Choose a good wardrobe. Emphasize your own ideal parameters, hide unwanted ones. Choose the colors that best match your eye and hair color.
Keep track of the condition of your belongings. Washed and ironed clothes look better than dirty clothes that have been lying around in the corner of the bedroom for a week. It doesn't matter what things you decide to choose. First, make sure they look good.

Follow trends and choose the best for yourself

Books

You will have to read and read a lot. An excellent result is 40–50 books per year. I read 42 books and understand that 50 books a year is realistic. The main thing is to read without stopping. And, of course, don’t watch TV and don’t spend too much time on social networks.

Read only to develop your mind: psychology, Russian and foreign classics, self-development, finance - no pulp or entertaining books.

Take notes on the gist of what you read, what impressed you or didn’t like in the book, memorize the quotes. This way you train your memory and can always surprise your interlocutors with clever sayings from books.

Ayn Rand’s book “Atlas Shrugged” greatly influenced me with its fundamentality and strong dialogues, as well as situations similar to events from my life.

My morality, the morality of reason, is contained in one axiom: reality exists in one choice - to live. Everything else flows from here. To live, a person must consider three things to be the highest and decisive values: Reason, Purpose, Self-Respect. Reason as the only instrument of knowledge, Purpose as the choice of happiness, which this instrument must achieve, Self-respect as the indestructible confidence that he is able to think and his personality is worthy of happiness, which means worthy of life. These three values require all the virtues of man, and all his virtues are related to the relationship of existence and consciousness: rationality, independence, purity, honesty, justice, efficiency, pride.

Ayn Rand

"Atlas Shrugged"

What you are doing now is the work of your whole life.

Once, during a master class on management, one of the participants asked me a question: “Maxim, I don’t understand why you worked so hard and devoted yourself so passionately to someone else’s business? It wasn’t your company!”

I froze for about thirty seconds. The words “this was not your company” did not take root in my head. How is this not mine? This was my company! I believe that once a person has taken up the Business, he must fall in love with this Business every day. Or don't do it at all.

I worked as a sales specialist for three years. Of course, I didn’t immediately love this job. How can you love her if you can’t! But I saw successful colleagues, began to communicate with them, found vivid examples of excellent salespeople like Joe Girard in books, delved deeper into my product, and an amazing, inexhaustible world of possibilities and knowledge opened up to me, which I have been mastering every day since then. I fell in love with my product. Once this happened, I became the best salesperson of the year in the company.

It doesn’t matter who you are: a singer, a steelworker, a croupier, a kindergarten teacher, an engineer, a translator or a bus driver - each of us is capable of making the world a better place if we consider our work as our life’s work.

Discipline

What distinguishes a strong personality from an ordinary person is discipline. Regardless of your mood, motivation, external circumstances, family relationships, do what is necessary at a given moment in time.

Learn to swim against the tide of life circumstances, educate yourself so that your internal state does not depend on what is happening around you. It was very difficult and everything did not work out right away, as there were breakdowns. But again and again I moved forward with the support of loved ones and the inner desire to go through this path at all costs.

Where can I start? From the morning ritual. Here is the simplest and most effective method for honing discipline: when the alarm clock rings, get up immediately, wash your face, turn on music, do exercises with strength exercises, then a contrast shower, a healthy breakfast (without fried or sweet foods) and reading a book (you can do it on the way to the office) .

You need to do this until you can do it automatically and without forcing yourself. It took me 3 months, sometimes, of course, there were failures, especially after overloaded days. I recommend that anyone who wants to change their lifestyle develop their own morning ritual.

We must learn to control ourselves: our speech, gait, gaze and gestures. Wherever you are, at home, at work, at the gym, you should exude confidence and act without unnecessary fuss. Remember the principle of feedback: even if you don’t feel that way, this feeling of confidence and discipline will come.

A very useful exercise for developing inner strength - despite all your natural fears, do not take your eyes off your interlocutor, from passing people who look into your eyes. I won’t lie, martial arts classes helped me with this. But it’s also good to look with a warm gaze, showing that you are friendly.

To educate myself, I learned to deny myself pleasures: bars, alcohol, sweets, cigarettes, impulse purchases, idleness, empty conversations at work. This may not happen right away, but you need to think about it all the time, work in this direction. And one day I said to myself: “Yes, I haven’t drunk alcohol for three months and haven’t eaten sweets for two months.”

I attended sports classes or courses despite my mood, circumstances, weather and my motivation. I made a schedule and followed it, throwing away all my favorite excuses. I liked coming to the gym when others were stopped by something and when there were like-minded people who were ready to support me in these endeavors.

And most importantly, you need to learn to control yourself when little is happening and there is chaos all around. Be an island of calm and cool endurance.

Motivation to become better

Set yourself a main goal - this is the motivation to become better . If you know your goal, you can achieve success. Ask yourself what exactly you want to succeed at and become better at. Perhaps this applies to work, relationships, hobbies, or all at the same time? You won't achieve your goal without motivation. The better motivated you are, the higher the chance that you will be able to realize your plans.
Voice the goal as real. Voice your goal correctly, replace the unclear conditional with the real, accomplished one. This way you will begin to motivate yourself and focus on the main goal. Let’s say not “I want a car,” but “I have a car.”
Create a positive environment . In addition to a clearly formed goal, your close environment can influence your luck. If there are like-minded people in this environment, they also motivate you and support you in difficult moments. You have a good influence on these people because you are also a like-minded person for them.
Use singing for motivation. Do you want to strengthen your relationships with your loved ones? Participate in group singing. Scientists have been able to prove that singing helps relieve stress, anxiety, and pain. When a person is happy, his productivity increases.
Focus on benefits. Take a piece of paper, describe in detail the benefits necessary to achieve the goal - this is what will begin to motivate you. Ask yourself how your life will improve, you will become a sufficient person, meet nice people, visit different countries, expand your own horizons.

Useful tips

Finance

Keep a financial journal. Keep it going for a month, two, three and don’t stop. And don’t just manage it, but analyze every month what goes where, why and how to fix it.

I had a lot of expenses on coffee - 1,300 rubles a month. I realized that it was time to reduce the amount, and now the level of spending on coffee is 600 rubles per month. Coffee is my weakness that I don’t want to get rid of.

Many people say that a magazine is a useless thing: “I already know how much I spend and earn.” And you try to keep it for 1 year with accurate analysis and charts and you will see the whole picture of your financial literacy or illiteracy.

Keep yourself in financial asceticism, stop buying what you don’t need or what is imposed by advertising and friends. Most of our purchases are useless and will not be useful in life, and we can quite easily do without them.

Find additional income, even if it is small, but it will motivate you to even greater achievements. Let it be an increased workload, additional work (of any format), freelancing, selling unnecessary things, training other people. The mistake of the majority is that everyone wants a lot of money in the initial stages, but that doesn’t happen. You don’t earn a lot at work right away, so everything in life is gradual.

How to become a best friend?

To become a best friend and maintain friendship for years:

Find time to meet with a friend. Family, work, husband - all this and much more can take up a lot of time. Be sure to find time to see your girlfriend. At least for a couple of hours, get out of the house and be alone.
Accept your friend for who she is . A friend will never remake you according to her own patterns. Therefore, understand and accept your friend with her shortcomings and positive qualities, respect her choice, even if you are not sure that it is right.
Keep secrets. Share everything with your best friend, for example, your own plans, fantasies. Talk about your feelings and worries. Do you want your friend to trust you? Know how to keep her secrets.
Listen, understand. Sometimes everyone wants to speak out. Be able to become a “vest” for your friend so that she can cry. Listen to her, don’t criticize, don’t use phrases like: “I warned you,” just sympathize. Hear her misunderstandings and resentments in time. Let her explain the situation and get rid of her worries.
Be there for you in difficult times. If your friend falls on hard times, put your own affairs aside. Meet with her, listen, console her, develop a plan together that will help “conquer the world.”
Be happy for your friend. Take your friend's achievements as your own, praise her, give her compliments.
Share positivity. Is your friend stressed? Sympathize with her, help her. If she is constantly depressed, talk to a friend and give her a lot of good emotions. Take this into account, look at the good moments every time in any situation that arises.
Be objective. Every friend wants to hear objective judgments from a loved one. The more serious the topic, the more important your opinion will be for your friend. Never flatter or deceive.
Know how to forgive . A person is not capable of doing only good deeds. If your friend made a mistake in something or regrets what she did, forgive her. Find out right away, talk, tell about your own feelings. Understand your friend why this happened to her, forgive her, forget the offense so that she does not break your friendship.

And in friendship

Relationship

This point applies more to men who have not found their soul mate or do not even want it, which is what I was. If you are alone and have a lot of time, develop the skill of meeting girls. Register on dating sites, meet people in cafes and on the street, chat in the gym, ask friends about girls you know.

Try different communication strategies: gentleman, macho, shy, sporty guy. Meet girls smarter than you, admit it, win them over.

In various situations, not everything will work out: the wrong words, the wrong method, the wrong person, failures in bed. But don’t stop, this should strengthen you.

And over time, you will learn to understand the opposite sex, learn to easily start a conversation, and make beautiful compliments. Girls will often reciprocate and feel that you are an interesting personality. But don’t be self-confident, look for someone who will appreciate your qualities “without cuts”, and be devoted and faithful to her.

To put it simply - love, suffer, conquer, break up and start over. Become someone you want to spend time with, with whom you will be comfortable in any situation, be able to understand and listen to the other person. And remember that your significant other can always leave you, so enjoy every moment together.