Matt S. Law Studios

Author: Matt L

  • Leap Before You Look

    Leap Before You Look

    There’s something to be said for leaping before you look. Often people are paralyzed by indecision, analysis, second-guessing, procrastination, planning, pre-planning, pre-planning-secondary-analysis-comparison. We wait for perfect organization, the perfect plan, the perfect weather, the perfect social situation, the perfect alignment of the stars and planets.

    Here’s a better idea: Just start, then figure it out along the way.

    While this advice doesn’t pertain to activities that could potentially kill you (parachute first, THEN jump), with most of the activities and goals that we have in life, most people suffer from mental inertia. If you remember your Physics 101, “an object at rest remains at rest.” So if you are at a complete stop right now, the hardest part is getting started. But the other half of the law of inertia says this, “an object in motion tends to remain in motion.” Once you start a task, it’s much easier to keep going, to make adjustments to your plan along the way. Ever noticed how much easier it is to steer a car that’s moving compared to one that’s parked? Successful people use the law of inertia in their favor, rather than allow it to hold them back.

    So whatever project you’ve been putting off: Start!. In your life, you will regret most the things that you never attempted.

    What do you regret never attempting? (That’s an actual question, not a rhetorical one, I’d love to hear some answers)

  • Attack Despair With Gratitude

    Attack Despair With Gratitude

    A funny thing about the human brain is that it is only capable of experiencing one emotion at a time. While people are somewhat capable of multitasking intellectually (women better than men), emotions are a whole different animal involving the focus of specific neural pathways in the limbic system of the brain and the autonomic nervous system. If you’ve ever taken a speech class or public speaking class, you may have been taught that you can trick your mind out of fear or nervousness by replacing it with excitement, or enthusiasm, or even anger. You can just roll up a magazine or newspaper and pound it against a wall or a table to get your blood pressure rising and work yourself up into a near-frenzy and presto, you are no longer nervous. I just wouldn’t recommend this before giving a somber eulogy.

    So, whenever you are suffering from depression, hopelessness, anguish, dejection, despondency, discouragement, forlornness, gloom, melancholy, misery, ordeal, pain, sorrow, trial, tribulation, wretchedness, or any other synonym for despair… the quickest way to drive it out of your mind and body is with gratitude. Just keep repeating to yourself, out loud if you need to, every single thing that you are grateful for. Even if they are dumb things that you never thought about. Anything within arms reach of you right now, be grateful for it. Then just stream of consciousness your way into everything else in your life that you can think of.

    I am grateful that I have this baseball cap. I am grateful that I have fingers with which to type. I am grateful that I can feel with the tips of my fingers. I am grateful that I can see. I am grateful for the dull ache in my muscles after yoga this morning. I am grateful that I am healthy and fit. I am grateful for the air in my lungs. I am grateful that I can take deep cleansing breaths that expand my chest and grateful for exhaling the toxins out of my body. I am grateful for grapes. I am grateful for cats (just sometimes not MY cat). I am grateful that my cat bite is nearly healed. I am grateful for the books I’ve read and will read, the books that I wrote and will write. I am grateful for the people in my life. I am grateful for the time I had with my fiance. I am grateful that I can choose to have my mind focus only on things that are uplifting me and energizing me and keeping me centered and serene and at peace.

    What are you grateful for?

  • Analyzing the Cause of Death of Your Dreams

    Analyzing the Cause of Death of Your Dreams

    When we are children we have big dreams and goals. We have zero understanding of finance, or economics, or world anything. All we know is that we want it all. Sports cars, space ships, a team of racing camels, a mansion in the clouds; all while being both a rock star and the king of Norway. Of course some of those things are possible, some are dependent greatly on your bloodline, and some are ridiculous and frivolous. But that’s okay, you’re a kid and it’s your dream.

    The real danger is when you are an adult, or at least old enough to understand a little bit about how the world works. It’s dangerous to develop a dream at that point later in life. Because when those dreams die it kills what’s left of the child inside you; which is another way of saying it pushes you that much closer to death.

    Do you have a dream that you’ve given up on?

    It may not have been a big, honking, audacious dream. Maybe you just wanted to complete your doctorate. Be a full-time spouse or parent. Travel to Israel and walk in the footsteps of Jesus. Be able to support your parents in their old age. One of these things leapt into your heart one day as more than just a “oh, that would be nice if…” but rather as a “I will, I shall, I must one day…”

    But if it’s something that you were passionate about at one point, then you have to ask yourself, “How did it die?”

    Was it murder? Did someone kill your dream? Either someone in a position of authority that forced you to abandon it. Or someone intimately close to you that made you choose between your dream and your life together.

    Was it disease? Perhaps something in your environment killed it. Usually the number one environmental cause of the death of a dream is ridicule. If enough people around you make fun of you for having a dream, it can get slowly whittled away.

    Was it attrition? Did your dream just starve to death? A great slayer of dreams is “busy.” Busy keeps us from accomplishing so much in the way of personal relationships and achievements, because it keeps us focused on now, focused on a survival mindset. We neglect our dream and it wastes away.

    Did it just die of old age? Procrastination kills more dreams every day than any other enemy, we just don’t realize it because it started killing them years ago. We delay, we put off, we hesitate, until finally it just makes more sense to not think about it anymore.

    I want to give you two insights about dreams.

    • First, treat your dream like it’s a baby.

    Babies are vulnerable and fragile. You can’t set it aside in the woods for a few hours and just hope that a pack of wolves doesn’t find it. You need to protect it from the wolves. Nothing is as fragile as a newborn dream. People will attack your dream for one of two reasons. A friend may push you to test your resolve. Someone else may push you just because they’re a jerk. Either way, don’t expose your dream to anyone unless you’re prepared and willing to fight for it.

    Babies require care and nourishment and warmth and love. You need to think about your dream, talk about your dream, be emotional about your dream. As you feed your dream, it grows. Its immune system gets stronger and it becomes more resistant to disease. You don’t have to keep your dream swaddled forever, eventually you can start sharing your dream with others. Some of those people will be good for your dream and they will help guide and nurture it. Some people will hate the fact that you have a dream and you should never bring your dream around them again.

    • Second, dreams can be resurrected.

    Dreams are like a metaphorical baby not an actual one. A dream that has died can be brought back to life. Usually this involves removing the source of what killed it in the first place. That’s why the dreamicide post-mortem is so important. If your dream was murdered, then lock away or banish the murderer. If it was diseased, then change your environment to a healthier one. If it was attrition then start spending time and effort on the act of dreaming again; take 15 minutes to write down all of your dreams and goals. If it died of old age… well, I hate to say it, but some dreams do have an expiration date. For instance, I always thought that I would be married and have started my family before I turned thirty. I still dream about a wife and children, the time frame just has to be adjusted because I waited so long.

    So if you have a dream: Protect it. Nourish it. And make it a Priority in your life. Treat your dreams like they are a matter of life or death; because in reality they are.