If Normal People Did "Nightmare Mode" for 30 Days, They'd Achieve More than Most Accomplish in a Year
The framework that'll blow up your life forever and get you to achieve your big goal
Nightmare mode can save your life.
It’s extreme and most people have never heard of it. This isn’t for people who want to cruise, work a boring job, and retire at 65 with a peanut payout that’ll get destroyed by inflation. To escape the hell of normal you must think differently.
Here’s how nightmare mode works, and how you can use it to become unrecognizable.
The nightmare mode operating manual for extreme transformations
Now we’ve got the kiddie warnings out of the way for the softies, let’s get into it.
Nightmare mode was invented by a Youtuber named Alex Becker. He’s not my favorite flavor of burrito, but I’ve still learned a lot from him (because people you disagree with blow up your limiting beliefs).
Alex used to be a US soldier then started multiple businesses that made him more than 8-figures a year. He says nightmare mode is a big part of his success.
Nightmare mode is where for 14-30 days you do nothing but wake up, eat, work on your big goal, exercise, and sleep.
It’s a period of extreme focus.
Rules:
No alcohol/pot
No junk food
No video games
No dating or p*rn
No phone (distraction machine)
No social media (unless it’s posting content attached to your goal)
People aren't successful because they can't focus or get anything done. Nightmare mode fixes both problems. All the bullsh*t like housework and people-pleasing is nuked harder than Chernobyl.
This way of living isn’t sustainable and it’s not supposed to be. It’s a temporary short circuit to get you more focused than a Zen monk after 20 years of teaching meditation.
You use nightmare mode when you need to get stuff done.
Why nightmare mode works
The core problem is normal people are too busy.
And they can’t focus because technology f*cks with their minds and they’re not aware of it. To paper over the cracks we acquire bad habits. These ease the pain. When you have a lack of discipline in one area of life, it bleeds into other areas.
Before you know it, that one beer you drank last Saturday turns into a p*rn addiction, Netflix tv show bingefest, 4 pepperoni pizzas, and a litre of Coke.
Nightmare mode gets you back your sense of discipline. It temporarily shows you what life is like without all the bad habits.During nightmare mode the brain fog from all the bad habits lifts and you experience some of the highest energy of your life.
It’s addictive.
I did nightmare mode accidentally
My friend Ayo is the one who introduced me nightmare mode.
When he explained what it is I realized I’d already done it. 10 years ago I was in a dark place. I had a job I hated and felt lost.
After a transformational event with Tony Robbins, I started nightmare mode. I stopped going out to nightclubs. I quit drinking. And divorced my loser friends (including my lifelong best friend).
At nighttime I’d drive to the local Casino 30 minutes from my house. I’d sit in the car my aunty gave me for free – because I got forced to sell my BMW – and I’d read finance books in pure darkness (it was a good metaphor for that time in my life).
I knew I never wanted to be broke like this again.
I thought if I spent enough time around Wall Street through books, I’d discover what they knew. And I did. The lessons alone later made me millions of dollars from investing (shout out to Peter Lynch, Warren Buffet, and The Wolf of Wall Street).
Instead of doing 30 days of nightmare mode, I did several years back to back. I wouldn’t recommend that level of intensity, but hey, I’m a psycho :)
Nightmare mode is just obsession in disguise
Most people fail at their big goals because they lack:
Intensity
Urgency
Obsession fixes these problems. When you’re obsessed you do work you can’t stop thinking about. It takes over your life.
Instead of having multiple piss-weak goals that have the energy of a bee’s d*ck, you have one big goal that has the force of a tornado. You’re never the same again.
Writing is that obsession for me.
I’m about to take a holiday and wasn’t supposed to write new stuff this week. I lasted one day not writing. And here I am writing again because I can’t f*cking stop. This obsession has led to everything good in my life – including a wife, kid, and millions of dollars. I don’t say that to brag.
I tell you because if it can happen to me, why not you?
30 days of nightmare mode will make you a psycho
Psychos are seen as a bad thing.
We used to lock them up in mental institutions. Now we just let them get high on crack coca!ne and let em live in places like San Francisco while getting government free money.
But in the world of high performance, psychos are special creatures.
Psycho is code for obsession. It’s code for:
High energy
“Get the F out of my way”
Never giving up
Overcoming failures/rejection
Using tragedy as a form of motivation
I wish more people were f*cking psycho… it’d fix a lot of problems in the world.
30 days is the perfect hit of obsession to get hooked.
The best way to use nightmare mode
Nightmare mode only works if you point it at the right goal.
I’ve seen nightmare mode work best for people looking to build a side business that eventually takes over their life. Why business?
Business is a freedom machine.
When you build a business it’s self-improvement in disguise. It helps you transform your mindset. And it turns your skills and experiences into money that’s a resource to do even more good.
Owning a business is true freedom.
No one tells you what to do. You set the rules. You write the mission. You market it however the heck you want. You create the memes.
Everyone should try to start a business before they die. If you don’t do it, you haven’t lived. Sorry.
I’m about to go into nightmare mode when I return from my holiday in 2 weeks. I’m going to come back and lock myself in my cave. I won’t shower for multiple days on end. I won’t have a phone near me. I won’t be talking to extended family.
I’ll be building something new for my business that’ll help 100,000 people start writing online. It can’t be done without nightmare mode. It needs too much focus.
Final Thought
I dare you to turn on nightmare mode for 30 days.
You won’t be normal anymore if you embrace obsession. People will say “you’ve changed” and you’ll say “that’s right, mate.”
Nightmare mode helps you achieve more in 30 days than most achieve in 12 months, and probably, 10 years. Dare to try it. Become obsessed.
Tell me in the comments section below whether you’d ever dare do nightmare mode & why.
Quick note before you go:
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Love it because I love the hyper focus. I may not do 2 weeks, but I may dip my toe into the water with a 3 day stint.
This is exactly what I needed to read at this time, and I found it.