Just don't fight
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[00:00:00] Hey, and welcome back to Next Level Chess Podcast. I'm Grandmaster Noël Studer, and today I have a quite quick episode for you with just one very actionable advice.

I'm sure you know that feeling that you sit down at your desk, you have training planned, and suddenly your brain starts negotiating. You feel like you're not really feeling it today. Maybe you have a little headache. You're like, "Mm, maybe I shouldn't do the hard training that I planned. Maybe I can just watch some opening video or go to YouTube or postpone the training altogether."

And if you're anything like me, you know how this ends. Because you will find some brilliant reason why today really is the day that you should what you feel like, and you shouldn't do what you actually planned. And 20 minutes later, you might find yourself watching some Netflix show on the couch.

And this is a real problem if you [00:01:00] wanna get anything done, because, again, if you're anything like me, what happens is the more often you do that, the smarter your brain is getting at coming up with these justifications for actually just not doing the hard work. And the more I give into it, the more I will come up with new ideas of how to trick myself.

And before too long, I'm just hanging out on my couch all the time without really doing what I wanna do.

And so recently I've worked with a very simple rule that has helped me get stuff done and distinguish between times where I just try to argue myself out of doing hard things and times where I should actually take a rest. For example, if I'm just, ill or if it would be dangerous to do a certain kind of activity, obviously you don't wanna push yourself into doing it.

So here's the rule, and this rule is so simple, it might make you laugh a little bit. But the [00:02:00] rule is: just don't fight. Which means, when you have something written down, just don't fight about it with yourself. Instead, just do it. Because that's really the point of nearly no return for me. If I start allowing to discuss in my brain the pros and cons of doing the thing, it's already too late. The brain will come up with something smart.

And so this is what I've done the past few weeks and months. And I've used it with my wife, Alessia, as well, because that helps a lot when you have a partner through this rule, because then you can check in on each other. And probably one of the two usually has the kind of temptation of not doing something, but the other can then say, hey, let's not fight. Let's just do it. So for example, if we plan to go to the gym and somebody's saying, oh, I don't feel it. No, just don't fight it. Let's go.

Back when I did my half marathon training, when I looked out, soil was raining, minus five degrees. If I [00:03:00] would start discussing it with myself, no chance. But instead, just don't fight it. Put on the clothes and go.

And for chess, that means if you plan to solve difficult tactics on a certain day, then just do them. Don't allow yourself to discuss, oh, today I feel a little bit this, this, that. Nope. Just do it.

Last but not least, if I plan a tough discussion with someone that I feel like, oh, I need to have this discussion, but it's going to be uncomfortable.

Again, such an instance where if I let myself discuss with myself, I'm always going to find a way to not do the thing that I should do, that I want to do. So there is also just, I plan it. Okay, let's just execute it.

And here's the thing. Now, this rule is very cool and it has helped me execute way more of the things that I want to execute. But it's not always going to be dreamland. So I have this rule. I decide, okay, I'm not going to fight. [00:04:00] And I don't feel like going to the gym and I go to the gym. Now, it would be amazing to telling you this tale of every time I go to the gym, then I feel so inspired and I am so happy and I lift the weights and I feel perfect.

And that's just not how stuff works. It's not going to be perfect. So sometimes I go to the gym and for the whole time of being in the gym, I don't really enjoy it. When I go for a run in minus five degrees, I don't really enjoy that experience. Sometimes I do, but more often than not, I don't. But what I really enjoy is the feeling after I finished.

Once it's done, I'm so happy that I did actually do it. And that's really what's important because for building health, for building up a skill, whatever, it's just important that we do it at the best of our abilities at this moment.

And that's where the positive effects come from. From consistently, continuously [00:05:00] compounding these small wins throughout your days, throughout your weeks, throughout the years. And really what I'm trying to optimize for here is how do I feel after I've done a certain thing? Because when I feel kind of, oh, I'm happy I did it, I'm proud I did it. This was difficult, but let's go.

That feeling only comes for me when I know I actually did something that I didn't feel like doing. Otherwise, if I feel super inspired and I have a great working day, that's nice, but it's not like I'm feeling like, "Oh my God, that was so cool." The real feeling of "Oh my God, I'm so proud of myself," comes when I actually didn't feel like doing a certain thing.

I knew it was good for me. I somehow find a way to push myself to do it, and that's where that feeling comes from of "Yeah, I'm so proud, and now I can go on the couch," right? Now, if I did all the stuff that I wanted to do, then why not relax? But not instead of doing what I wanted to do.

And there's [00:06:00] really only one time that I wanna override this. And it is when pushing through and doing the thing that I plan to risks real and lasting damage.

So let's say a very clear example. If I slept only two hours and I plan to drive for two hours somewhere, and I don't feel mentally fresh at all, driving is very dangerous if you are not well rested, so I don't sit in the car and drive. That is an emergency for me because there is a real cost.

But when we look at, let's say, going for a run, going into the gym, even more like when it's about working, writing this article or reading out this article or, for you, training chess. There are not that many days where you can really say this is an exception in terms of emergency that you're risking something.

Like, risking to lose games, just to be very clear, is not at all [00:07:00] an emergency. And if that feels like an emergency, then you definitely need to work on your mindset and shift to a growth mindset, because that's just part of the game.

So if you wanna apply this, just write your own training plan. And then, strictly define what is an emergency. Let's say maybe you have kids and your daughter needs you absolutely in this moment. Obviously, you're not just saying, "No, I'll just train chess instead. I don't care if my daughter needs me." So you can write out these emergencies.

But very, very often what you will realize is you'll anyway be at home, you'll anyway do something, maybe even do something digitally, and it's just between, am I going to do the hard thing that is actually really pushing me forward, that makes you become the person that you want to become?

Or is it doing the thing that is very easy at the moment, it feels good, but you're not really developing and building character and improving your chess skills? And if it's the choice between those two, then just use [00:08:00] that rule, just like I did for the past months. Just tell yourself, "Just don't fight. Just do it."

And by the way, it was a very fun coincidence that I recently listened to a podcast episode from Mark Manson. Can highly recommend his podcast, Solved. It was a podcast where they discussed what self-improvement strategies actually worked. So they looked at 2,600-plus studies and made a meta-analysis.

And the number one thing in self-improvement that has the best effect according to those studies is actually doing the thing. So turns out this is even backed up by real science. So just go do it. Don't fight anymore, and execute.