Throughout my early life and career, it was critical — and felt like life-or-death — to achieve success. Get straight A’s. Get the top exam scores. Aim for the top job possible. Do everything you can to support the team, the company, and the co-workers.
Otherwise, I would face angry and disappointed parents who would shame us. Hostile bosses. And angry co-workers.
I internalized those thoughts. I bottled up that stress. And, I smiled, and carried on. I became a “workaholic” — prioritizing work, work, and more work.
I spent decades of my life chasing this perfection, struggling to please others. From taking exam preparation courses, to studying at nearly all times of the day, to saying “yes” to everything, all to the detriment of things like self-care, social life — and even dating life!
Before I adopted the Mental Power Hacks mindset, I held myself to an impossibly high standard. But reaching for the unreachable was a paradox: in my mind, I could never achieve success, I felt I constantly got in my own way, and I ultimately felt a constant sense of grinding, unhappy misery.
The constant inner critic made me feel like I was an imposter. I would constantly think about all of the “shoulds” and the “woulda couldas” — with a constant feeling of disappointment — that gnawing feeling that I could have gotten more done.
And this led to feeling tired all the time. Feeling like I need more energy. I had too much to do. There’s no hope. I’m not good enough. I can’t make a mistake. I don’t deserve any love.
Success + Failure = Happiness
Fast forward to now. I have reached a pinnacle. I work at the best place on Earth, and am humbled and privileged to treat and serve veterans and war heroes. I consult and advise major companies and innovative start-ups. And, I train the next generation of physicians, healers, and leaders. I’m blessed to have amazing co-workers and teammates.
Throughout all this, I have learned how to best achieve success and appreciate failures:
- I have worked at busy, world-class hospitals. I have managed hundreds of patients in mission-critical settings where lives are at stake. All this, while managing successful research programs and administrative projects.
- Yet, I have struggled deeply with feeling inadequate. Feeling anxious. And feeling as if I were stumbling around in my career, or not making it to the “top.”
- And, in my own personal life, I struggled with simple things, like dating. Or, enjoying a party. Learning how to relax.
- Now, I manage to make both work and personal life fun, enjoyable, and gratifying.
I’ve learned how to be content, how to motivate myself, and how to deal with setbacks and failures — and ultimately set up my ideal life.
My pivotal life moment: the threat of death
So how did I pivot from becoming a workaholic, to a happier, more fulfilled yet productive professional? It started with a phone call.
The wake-up call happened in 2017, when I flew to a conference to Switzerland to present about work in mental health technology. My brother called me. He said he was hospitalized.
Devastating news. He was found to have end-stage renal disease. “End-stage” essentially means just that: it is the end. Without further treatment, he would die.
It would be the end of one of my closest friends in life. I served as the best man to my brother’s wedding. I grew up, with my brother, in a makeshift set of bedrooms in the garage of our house. And, I remember spending time playing video games, sharing compact discs (CD’s!), and watching Star Trek: Voyager with him.
So to hear that my brother might die — devastated me.
How I redefined success
I became determined. Soon, I spent years going through medical tests, getting ready to donate a kidney for him, ensuring that I myself was healthy so that I could be there for the transplant surgery.
For the first time in my life, my definition of success expanded beyond professional accomplishments — to include social happiness and personal gratification.
And, I became acutely aware of the power of saying “no” to all the things that I used to do to make others happy and like me. I became acutely aware of how to make myself happy, to choose opportunities that made me feel gratified, fulfilled, in a new kind of success.
Ultimately, I learned that success means something different to so many people. It could be success with family life and having children. It could be financial success, earning as much as possible. And, it could be success with physical fitness — ranging from toned 6-pack abs and marathon-running powers, to recovering and rehabilitating from injury.
Mental Power Hacks? Why “mental power”?
I used to think about mental health as something that didn’t apply to me. Many ethnic cultures view mental health as optional. Something that is nice-to-have. But for the average person, they may think that nothing is wrong with them! Mental health is for those other people — people who are ill, sick, diseased.
In fact, I postponed my own mental health for the longest time! I stewed in loneliness, sadness, and anxiety for years, without realizing it.
Once I sought answers, and found myself growing and improving, I realized: we ought to reframe mental health as mental power.
Here’s the key: your own mental power is a source of strength. Your mental power can be used to accomplish goals, boost the quality of your life, and achieve success. Mental power can help you become emotionally & financially wealthy, socially wealthy, and spiritually wealthy — leading to love and happiness.
And why “hacks”?
The Internet is filled with listicles of hacks, tips, and tricks. It’s slow work. It took me a decade to find the right combination of hacks that worked for me, to get me to my own life success & happiness. So why call these Mental Power “Hacks”?
Hack means it’s a workable fix. In today’s fast-changing world, there is no time to implement a large, unwieldy productivity system. We must implement achievable, easy-to-implement fixes that work — hack by hack.
Hack also means experiment. You must be open to trying multiple new hacks, to try hacking your life. You must view life as a series of experiments.
Finally, hack means to engineer things. I trained as a computer scientist and informaticist to make computers do work for me. But you don’t need to get a degree from an engineering school to get technology to do your bidding. In today’s digitally-driven world, you must learn how to harness computers and apps to make them do work for you.
With the right hacks, you can use technology to achieve mastery and success.
Join Mental Power Hacks
I have seen poverty and treated the uninsured. I have coached people in their lowest moments of life. And I personally struggled with the feeling bad, feeling inadequate, and struggling with low self-esteem. And I’ve overcome them — with a series of hacks — to live life to the fullest.
And throughout my journey, I’ve learned from top performers — people who have the right mental power and employed the right hacks to propel them to the top of their game. I’ve teamed up with some truly amazing people who will share their stories here at Mental Power Hacks.
So, my hope for you is that these lessons, these hacks, these tips, and these tricks — combined with new systems — can benefit you to get the most out of life, enjoy happiness, and be productive.
I started Mental Power Hacks because I want you and the world to be successful, productive and happy. I’m grateful you are here. Welcome!
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© 2020 Steven Chan. All rights reserved worldwide. Copyright violation may subject the violator to legal prosecution.
