“when you count backwards, you mentally shift the gears in your mind. You interrupt your default thinking and do what psychologists call “assert control.” The counting distracts you from your excuses and focuses your mind on moving in a new direction. When you physically move instead of stopping to think, your physiology changes and your mind falls in line.” 

“the end of the day, you are going to need to do more than think if you want to change your life.” 

“Small things are not small at all. They are the most important things of all. And they add up.” 

“If you want to make your dreams come true, get ready for the long game.” 

“If you have one of those impulses that are pulling you, if you don’t marry it with an action within 5 seconds, you pull the emergency break and kill the idea.” 

“Forget motivation; it’s a myth. I don’t know when we all bought into the idea that in order to change you must “feel” eager or “feel” motivated to act. It’s complete garbage. The moment it’s time to assert yourself, you will not feel motivated. In fact, you won’t feel like doing anything at all. If you want to improve your life, you’ll need to get off your rear end and kick your own butt. In my world, I call that the power of a push.” 

“The problem was very clear. It was me. I was holding myself back, five seconds at a time.” 

“Life is not a one and done sort of deal. You've got to work for what you want.

“it’s not the big moves that change everything—it’s the smallest ones in your everyday life that do.” 

“That’s how confidence grows—one small, courageous move at a time.” 

“There are these two young fish swimming along, and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, “Morning, boys, how’s the water?” And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, “What the hell is water?” 

“When it comes to change, goals, and dreams, you have to bet on yourself. That bet starts with hearing the instinct to change and honoring that instinct with action.” 

“she was pushed forward by something way more powerful: herself. That’s what courage is. It’s a push.” 

“It’s so sad because waiting for validation will be the death of your dreams.” 

“Sometimes there is no next time, no second chance, or no time out. Stop waiting. It’s now or never. When you wait, you aren’t procrastinating. You are doing something more dangerous. You are deliberately convincing yourself “now is not the time.” You are actively working against your dreams.” 

“changing people’s behavior first, which in turn changes their self-perception of the kind of person that they are based on the kinds of things that they do.” 

“the most obvious, important realities are often the ones that are the hardest to see and talk about.” 

“locus of control.” The more that you believe that you are in control of your life, your actions and your future, the happier and more successful you’ll be. There” 

“If you don’t learn how to untangle your feelings from your actions, you’ll never unlock your true potential.” 

“You can feel uncertain and be ready. You can be afraid and do it anyway. You can fear rejection and still go for it.” 

“There are only two words of advice you need to improve any relationship. Say It” 

“As Damasio puts it, human beings are “feeling machines that think” not “thinking machines that feel.” 

“If you’ve ever wondered why it’s so hard to make yourself do the things that you know will solve your problems and improve your life, the answer is simple. It’s your feelings.” 

“Whatever is happening right now, this is it. This is your life. And it’s not going to begin again. You can’t change the past, but in five seconds you can change your future.” 

“She said that she didn’t want to try out because, “What if I didn’t make it, Mom? What if I am not as good as I think I am? If I don’t audition, at least I can tell myself that I’m amazing—I’m just too lazy to have what I want.” 

“Waiting won’t help. Waiting will only make it worse. When you sit with fear and uncertainty your mind makes it expand; it’s called “the spotlight effect” and it’s one of the many tricks your brain plays in an attempt to keep you “safe.” 

“Dying before you’ve actually pushed yourself to live.” 

“It’s not safer to stay quiet. It’s not better to keep the peace. It’s not futile to try. It’s not risky. You are wrong. All your excuses and reasons are wrong. There is no “right time” to improve your life. The moment you move you’ll discover your strength. That’s the way to bring the REAL you to the table—by pushing the real you out of your head and into the world. And the best time to do it, is right now when your heart tells you to move.” 

“Silence is always the problem. Deciding not to say what you feel creates what researchers call “cognitive dissonance” between what you truly believe (in your heart) and what you actually do in the moment. Those problems build up and, over time, they can break your relationship.” 

“If you get anything less than six hours of sleep a night on a consistent basis you are basically going through your day with the exact same physiological symptoms as if you were drunk. You have a foggy brain, you're forgetful, you're moody, you might even notice that your balance is a little bit off, you feel kind of heavy in terms of the emotional weight in your body, so you've got to get onto a great sleep schedule.” 

“Given the choice between accomplishing something and just lying around, I’d rather lie around. No contest. —ERIC CLAPTON” 

“You need to hear this loud and clear: No one is coming. It is up to you. It has always been and will always be up to you. You may never feel inspired or clearheaded enough to seize a moment, but you have to force yourself to do it even if you don’t want to. Nothing is changing unless you make it change.” 

“Waiting around for something to change will slowly kill you.” 

“#5SecondRule. When it comes to goals, dreams, and changing your life, your inner wisdom is a genius. Your goal-related impulses, urges, and instincts are there to guide you. You need to learn to bet on them.” 

“Jean-Baptiste also saw this. He wrote to me that he realized “that nobody was going to come and get me to live the life that I want to live and that taking action is the only way to create my own space into the world.” 

“You’ll never feel like doing what you must do.” 

“Leave nothing important unsaid.” 

“If you are wondering if the Rule works if you count forward 1- 2- 3- 4- 5, instead of backwards 5- 4- 3- 2- 1, the answer is no—it doesn’t. Just”

“When there’s no crisis and you are just stuck, it is much harder to force yourself to react. There’s no emergency. That’s why it is so easy to postpone action. Day in and day out you just do the same old thing.” 

“Waiting for the right time to get real in your relationships is a fool’s errand. There is no right time to have the conversation, ask the hard questions, say “I love you,” or take the time to truly listen. There is only right now.” 

“Her moment of courage teaches us all that it’s not the big moves that change everything—it’s the smallest ones in your everyday life that do.”

“Waiting until you are ready will not make it happen. The world doesn’t work that way.” 

“You may be afraid of finding out that you suck, like my daughter was. Let me tell you what really sucks: being older and regretting that you never went for it. Being 30 and realizing you let fear of what your friends thought keep you from ever really putting yourself out there when you were younger. Friends, by the way, who you never talk to anymore. Being 56 and realizing you should have divorced your spouse ten years ago. Being 45 and wishing you had had the courage to take on a project at work that you now realize would have changed the trajectory of your career. Or sitting in college classes earning a degree to please your parents when knowing in your heart that you want to be doing something else with your life. There is no right time. There is only right now. You get one life. This is it. And it’s not going to begin again. It’s up to you to push yourself to make the most of it and the time to do it is right now.” 

“The first and most important step is to stop saying you are fine. You are not fine. You need to quit pretending that you are, and state for the record what’s bothering you. There is a lot more in store for you than what you’ve got going on right now, and the first step to getting it is to stop pretending that everything is okay.” 

“some of our traits are more fixed and automatic, but many are “free traits” that we can adjust in order to advance a core project in our lives.”

“In all of modern history, no single invention has so perfectly captured the perverse power of the mind to defeat its own best intentions as the snooze button. Situated” 

“It’s not because things are difficult that we don’t dare. It’s because we don’t dare that things are difficult.” 

“It’s called “locus of control.” The more that you believe that you are in control of your life, your actions and your future, the happier and more successful you’ll be.” 

You can't control how you feel. But you can always choose how you act.” 

You must learn how to separate what you feel from the actions that you take.