Fix Your Attitude First

There are things in life you get to do that have an expiration date. Whether you love them or resent them, eventually their time on your calendar comes to an end.

If you have children, one of those things is driving them to school.

Because I know that season won’t last forever, I decided to use that short window each morning to focus on something that actually matters. Not grades, school drama, or daily schedules.

Attitude.

Every day, as my kids get out of the car, they say the same two words out loud. “Effort and attitude.”

The reminder is simple. You can’t always control what the day brings, but you can control how you show up to it. And if you fix your attitude first, everything else has a chance to follow.

Shane Parrish captured this perfectly in his Brain Food newsletter when he wrote:

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“What you believe about the work shows up in how you do the work, and how you do the work determines your results.

Fix the attitude first. Everything else follows.”

He’s right. But the hard part is not understanding that idea, it’s living it, especially when things aren’t going your way.

That’s also where the advantage is.

Because when something is hard, most people struggle with it. And when most people struggle withit, the few who do separate themselves quietly over time.

So before you try to fix your results today, ask yourself this one question: What attitude am I bringing into this day?

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You Can’t Outperform Your Attitude