Transcription
What's going on everyone? My name is Ali Al Carguli. I'm the founder of Next Level Systems where we help entrepreneurs become productivity machines in six weeks. I'm also a post-doctoral fellow at the NASA propulsion lab.
Um, and in this video I want to talk to you about a systematic approach to instantly double your productivity and just by the sheer understanding of this model that I use that I've taught a lot of people. You're going to be able to instantly double your productivity just by understanding this because you're going to gain some nuggets that are going to help you implement it instantly, maybe even during the time you're watching this video.
Now, I've came up with this model when I was in grad school. So, just for context, right now I'm 28 years old. When I was 25 years old, I was living in Boston. I was finishing my PhD um in satellite communications and um then later in that year, I found out I had ADHD and then I graduated my PhD and then I built a productivity system and then I got my job at NASA and then I built my business. Now I'm running a company. Um and I've achieved like a lot of success quote in like 2-3 years. Uh, and a lot of that has to do with this model is when when something clicked in my head about productivity. Um, that's really when the game was changed forever. And then I taught that to other people. I showed it to other people and then they started using it as well. And then they they started being more productive too.
So there's four words in here next to four numbers. And there's four other words in here. And if you just understand those eight words and understand what they mean and how they work in correlation to each other, that alone could turn your productivity understanding upside down. Again, this is a very systematic engineering lens of looking at it. Don't worry, it's going to be very simple, very easy to understand, nothing too complicated, but it is going to involve some analogies from the world of computers because that's basically what where I learned this stuff.
Um, and I want to go ahead and explain to you is basically um there's execution, there's cognition, there's mindset, and there's awareness, right? These are think of them as four things that are happening that need to happen in order for you to go from an idea to action. And they have to kind of go in order. Or like let's say you have an idea in here. This is like the realm of ideas where like you come up with one idea, you want to do something, you want to start a project, start a business, scale a business, grow a business, do something, I don't know, get your dream job. And then here is like where it actually happens in the real world. So like think of this as like inside your mind and think of this as like the world. And think of this as your brain, four layers of your brain that bridge the gap from like whatever ideas you formulate into like actually seeing them manifest into the world. They they have to go through this line over here, right? They have to go through awareness, mindset, cognition, execution.
I'm going to give brief explanation of each one of these things. And I'm going to explain to you why each one of these has a word next to it. Execution here has actuator next to it. Cognition has function next to it. Mindset has data next to it. And awareness has function next to it. Again, don't worry about the complex words. I'm going to explain what all that means. It's very, very simple.
So, basically, in order for you to know what you want and to be able to capture ideas and figure out what it is they need, you need to first be aware of it, right? Like you need to be aware of who you are, what you want, what you're trying to achieve in life. Because without any level of awareness or like without being able to notice what's what what what it is that you want or what's going on in the environment around you, then there's no point in formulating any plan to go and get it cuz you don't even know what you want. And that's something I noticed in a lot of people, especially people who have ADHD who are like just stuck um is they they they are they think the problem is execution. And very often there are significant execution challenges. We're going to address it later in the video and how to solve them. But awareness is usually a problem that no one no one looks at.
I when I when I, for example, I have over 3,700 clients in my first program and I have over 130 clients in my second program. And I I kid you not, maybe 80% of the time, 85% of the time when I ask someone and I say, "Hey, like what do you want? What is it they want in life?" Like like if you were to be, I don't know, 95 years old looking back on your life with regret. Like what is it that you want to regret? No one answers that instantly. People need to pause and think very very deeply. Uh and very often people are not even aware of what they want long-term. They're not aware of the what they want short-term uh and they're unable to bridge the two and then they're unable to see how that connects to the rest of the layers.
So the very first step you need to do which is the reason the reason it's a function function means it's something that you do. It's a it's an action. It's something that has to happen inside your brain. You need to cultivate awareness. Very first thing you need to ask is like what do I actually want longterm and what do I want short-term? If you just do this exercise where you write on a piece of paper, what do I want longterm? What do I want short-term? and you bridge the gap. That alone is something that's extremely helpful.
Once you go ahead and figure out what you want and you have the awareness, let's say this is check. We are done with that part. We're going to scratch it over here. Then you move on to mindset. And mindset is essentially your beliefs. And there's two important beliefs. There's beliefs about yourself and there's beliefs around your the world. And very often, again, 9% of the people I speak to, including myself previously, I'm no angel or no saint. It was through uh making those mistakes that I had to go and and learn these things and build those systems for myself. So I made those mistakes countless times. Like I used to have faulty beliefs about myself and about the world. And if you have the wrong beliefs, then you are screwed from the get-go. For example, if you're trying to start a business and you deep down have the belief that you're not capable of figuring it out and you incapable of starting a business and you assume like I don't know, the economy is awful and no one's going to buy my products and services. Well, then those beliefs, your brain is literally going to lock in on them and you're not going to be able to see like those will will manifest as reality because the human brain the circuit uh is wired to whatever it is that you feed it is going to is going to help you find it. It's not necessarily going to like actually manifest in the real world. Like we still live in a physics-based world where like you need to go and interface with things. You need to take action and and to affect things. We're going to talk about that in the execution module. But the beliefs basically anchor your vision. Think of the beliefs as like a lens, like a pair of glasses that you put in your eyes. And if you have very like limiting beliefs about yourself and about the world, you're basically blocking your vision and you're unable to see forward. Uh that's something that's very heartbreaking and very saddening. So please please do not do that.
So um once you go ahead and fix your beliefs about yourself and about the world, um then that takes care of that. And then one one way I really like to think about this is to think in first principles and to think in physics. I always, for example, I I run a team. I I have a six-seven figure company and I run a team and in my team I always tell my team okay we should do this thing and the moment I sense that someone hesitates or says oh no one has done that before or this cannot be done I just simply ask give me a physics reason why this cannot be done like does it violate the laws of physics this is something I learned from my PhD adviser who says whenever like you're wondering if something can be done or not uh skip analogies and skip what people have done and skip copying other people and just ask like is there a physics reason why this cannot be done now in my I have a strong advantage because I did a PhD in engineering, meaning I understand mechanics, Newton's laws very well. I understand electromagnetics, Maxwell's laws very very well. So, I can very quickly filter out what's actually physically true and physically not true. But I bet you can do the same even if you don't have engineering or physics background. Uh you can do something very very similar where you can just ask yourself, okay, um like what is it um that like like is there is there a physics reason why this thing cannot be done? Say I want to scale my company and I want to I don't know earn 10 clients in the month of July. Well, I can just ask myself, okay, like is there a reason why that cannot be done? Um well, I don't necessarily have the skill. Can I acquire the skill? Is there anything stopping me from doing it? Yeah, what should I do? Okay, let me go ahead and do that. And then that's where we're going to talk about execution cuz now we're still formulating beliefs.
So now we're aware of what we want and we have the right beliefs around it. Like mindset is something that's very very important. Then there's the third layer which is cognition. So now that I've that that I figured out what I want, let's say I want to scale a company and then I I adopted the right beliefs, which is I am someone who's capable of solving problems. And the way I can do that is I can point out to other examples or scenarios where I solve problems before and I just use that to to strengthen that belief. And then I can ask myself, okay, well, how am I how am I actually going to get there? So think of like the awareness as like what? Think of the mindset as kind of like the the like kind of like the like the what and the why. And then think of like the mindset as like is it possible? And an even better question is is it favorable? Cuz instead of just asking if it's possible, say is it favorable is something that's like would be amazing. And not only would it be possible possible and favorable then that's a much stronger belief. That's a much better thing that you can insert as a piece of software. And the reason this says data while this says function is this is like a piece of stored code. like this is like almost like a line like a belief like a sentence that you store and it's stored inside your brain and you can reference it. So it's very easy to replace that. Again the way to do it is to overwrite it, insert a new line of code and then just use evidence to reinforce it.
Then you move on to cognition which is the how. It's a very important question is how am I actually going to get there? So again let's use the example I just used. You want to scale a company. You have the awareness of it. You have the beliefs that it is possible. The economy is fine. Like even if the economy is tanking, people always value quality. People always transact goods and services. People always trade since the dawn of humanity. So that's not an issue. Well, now we can ask cognition. How? Cognition is basically your cognitive ability. It's basically your ability to learn, ability to process information, your ability to just do anything worthwhile. And if you're able to do this very very well, this this is what makes someone like quote smart. This is like a lot of a lot of uh people who are able to process things very fast, learn things very fast. Uh they have high cognitive abilities. But even with limited cognitive abilities, you can still make the most out of it simply by asking how and by building road maps. So the human brain is like likes to likes to um build road maps and build steps. And if you can visualize the path towards something, then you're a lot more likely to do it. This is where it's helpful for example to watch videos like this. Like these videos are really honestly I mean sure they help you amply your awareness. I may help you shift some beliefs but the thing I really want to uh help you a lot here is is in cognition is I want to show you how I'm thinking about things, how I'm approaching things, how I even built this model in the first place because as a systems engineer it's much more valuable for me to teach you how to think in systems than it is just to give you some systems that work. The systems that work will help you short term but if I want to help you macro longterm then I need to teach you how to think in systems.
So, cognition is all about the how, the strategizing, the problem solving. Um, this could be like an hour video on its own. So, I'm not going to go into it as much. Um, I'm going to cover in a separate video. Basically, again, this is a function. These are things that you do like learn, think, uh, things that are happening inside your brain.
And then finally, uh, this is relevant especially if you have ADHD is execution. Execution is actual implementation. The reason this says actuator is if you were to think of yourself as a mechanical system where you have like processing and computing and and all internal things going on, the thing that actually interfaces with the real world is called an actuator. For example, if you launch a satellite into space and it deploys solar panels, you need an actuator that makes it actuate and actually release that. Uh, and for example, when when an airplane takes off and and you press a button and and the the the um tires and the wheels like go on like uh inside the plane to reduce the drag, the amount of air, which slows it down, which makes it burn more fuel. Which cause wear and tear on the plane. A little off topic. I love I love planes, so I get uh pretty um sidetracked when I think about planes. But so the idea is that that's something that's an actuator in in the real world.
If you're someone who has executive dysfunction, especially if you have ADHD like I do, which is why I was just sidetracked thinking about airplanes, um, is executive dysfunction is an issue with someone who has ADHD. And executive dysfunction is basically like your ability to like perform your cognitive abilities into the real world. What I mean by that is that someone with normal executive function is able to remember things clearly is able to like implement has enough dopamine levels that are a bit more or less like consistent or more consistent than someone with ADHD such that they're able to summon like the will to take an action and actuate the thing that they need to do. Problem is when people have ADHD their execution circuitry is usually fried up usually have executive dysfunction. Also to make things worse you are usually time blind. So act execution actuation is all about the when and where it's a performance issue. So this is performance, right? Performance is like you executing, right? Like obviously those three involve the thinking which is like also a very important part of performance. But when it comes to like actually performing something that you've pre-thought about, that's all execution. And someone who has ADHD or someone who struggles with time management, procrastination, things of that nature, like the worst thing you can do is beat yourself up for that because you literally cannot help it. your brain circuitry is literally not optimized for execution.
Now there are things that you can do to do that. For example, uh you can first thing you can do is like you can remove distractions and make the things that you got to do so incredibly um like like so incredibly interesting by contrast to everything else. For example, Jerry Seinfeld who's a comedian who has ADHD um or I think he has ADHD. He sounds like he's someone who definitely has ADHD. Um, and he he would when he would go write jokes for his shows, he would go lock himself in a hotel and he would say, "I can either write jokes or I can do nothing at all." So the the the the alternative is boredom. And what do most people do these days? They they don't do that. They have their phones, they have their computers, they have food that they can like there's all sorts of activities that spike your dopamine that are stronger alternative to the work that you got to do. So one that like the easiest laziest ADHD execution hack is just get rid of everything else like to the extreme that doing the work becomes actually interesting because boredom is the thing humans hate the most.
So once you go and do that other other ways to solve execution and actually get yourself to actuate for example in the case of your someone who has ADHD is to use your calendar more regularly and use your calendar as your actual to-do list. Like one of the best hacks you can do as someone with ADHD is to skip your to-do list and go straight to the calendar because what that allows you to do is that allows you to actually like visualize the task at hand and be able to get it done right away. That's one thing you can do. Other things that you can do are like more physiological like you can avoid uh foods that spike your blood sugar cuz that's that's going to cause you to be lethargic and it's going to cause you fatigue and drop in energy. Uh you can do things like exercise, movement, cold showers, all that other stuff that you've heard. But there's a lot of things that you can that you can use. But the easiest way to do this is to use external systems. For example, if you're struggling with time blindness and time is an issue, you can use an external system in the form of a calendar. If you are someone who has bad memory issues, especially like people with AD, a lot of them have bad memory issues. Then you need a system to help you remember things and you need an external system that helps you figure out what it is that you want and and not forget about that. A lot of people I work with literally forget what their goals are. Like they're not on the back of their mind and you have to constantly sell yourself on what the goal is. You you can have a system for that. So execution can be really solved by uh external systems. And if you're interested in learning more about execution systems, especially in the context of starting or scaling your business, I'll put a link below for my peak performance program. You can check it out um and then you can learn more about that.
But in summary, what we're doing over here is we have awareness, mindset, cognition, execution. Uh this is a system I came up with during grad school that has helped me function very very efficiently and understand why my brain does things the way that it does. Uh if you want me to dive deeper into any of these concepts uh like maybe write in the comments. Let me know what you think. Let me know if there's any questions you have. Um I'm hoping that by now the the reason you can double your productivity is using some of the nuggets that I explained to you in in this video is now you have an actual understanding that your brain and your processing is split into layers. And if you can diagnose which one of these four is the issue. For example, if you have hardcore ADHD, then you can focus hardcore on execution, then you can dive deeper. If it's timeliness, focus on your calendar. If it's memory, focus on your goal setting and and and remembering things using an external system. Build systems around that. If it's cognition, there's ways around that. If it's mindset, there's ways to install new beliefs. If it's awareness, then you can journal. Um you can you can spend you can meditate. You can do other things. There's there's all sorts of tools and strategies. But without having an understanding of which layer of productivity it is they need, it's going to be very very hard for you to actually be productive.
But yeah, that being said, I will see you guys in the next video. Peace, love. [Music]