Adam Wik's Blog

The easiest person to lie to is yourself.

Out of everyone in the world, the person who lies to you the most is almost certainly you.

Most of the time it’s not something we think about. It’s just a sort of automatic response, or a defense mechanism. We look at the things we’re working on, at the general state of our lives or goals, how we’ve been performing in various areas and – rather than making an objective assessment – we tell ourselves whatever it is we want to hear.

The worst part is si...

Getting out in nature should be reason enough to do more walking.

When most people think of starting an exercise program there are certain images that tend to come to mind – hard work under a barbell or on a weight machine, dripping sweat going all out on a stationary bike or on a long run. These are all great things to aspire to in a fitness program. The thing is, they all share a common trait. They’re all intense.

When people think of getting fit they almost always fixate directly on the in...

Failing to use both intensive and extensive reading when learning a language is a big mistake.

Most people who are learning a second language understand how important it is to read material in their target language.

Even if your goal is purely conversational – maybe you just want to be able to watch movies or only need to use the new language in business calls – and literacy isn’t a concern at all, reading is still too powerful a tool to pass up. I’m all about having conversations as soon and...

A messy environment can do more harm than you realize.

As a part of starting to write more fiction I took the advice of smarter people than myself and made Stephen King’s On Writing a piece of my required reading.

One of the things that jumped out at me is how much he emphasizes setting aside a special area just for you to do your writing in. King argues that having a special place that is set up specifically for you to write and do nothing else not only helps you ignore distractions, but als...

These common obstacles might be what’s holding you back from reaching your fitness goals.

Getting fit, particularly to a basic level, is simultaneously frustratingly simple and incredibly complex.

It’s simplicity comes from the fact that there are really only two things you need to do once you boil it down. The first is to take in fewer calories than you burn or inversely to burn more calories than you take in. The second is to regularly move in some way that challenges your body. That’s it –...

There are tons of benefits to reading fiction you might be missing out on.

I love to read. Always have. To the point where as a little kid I would routinely get lost in the grocery store because I refused to put my book down even when walking and I wouldn’t notice my mom or grandma had turned off at some point.

I’ve noticed something though in my time spent within the circles of self-development and entrepreneurial minded folks – as much as many of them profess a deep thirst for reading so ma...

I’m a fan of Code and Quill notebooks, but there are lots of options for putting together a language learning notebook.

Confession time – I am a bit of a notebook addict.

Okay, ‘a bit’ is too soft of phrasing. A serious notebook addict. I tend to fall more on the eco-conscious, paperless, ‘let’s digitize everything’ side, but there is just something about the experience of sitting down with a nice, physical notebook to draw or write in that I just love. With that in mind, it’s not surprising...

Applying the principles of Stoicism to your life doesn’t have to mean spending hours and hours pouring through works from classical antiquity.

Stoicism – or at least a modernized evolution of it – has become increasingly popular over the last ten years or so. More and more athletes, celebrities, political and business leaders, and other public figures talk about how much they enjoy Marcus Aurelius, or how much their following of Stoic practices has helped them in life.

For someone who is inte...

The three body types pop up often in fitness discussions – but do they really matter?

If you’ve been wanting to get fit for any amount of time you’ve probably run across the idea of the three body types – Endomorph, Ectomorph, and Mesomorph.

Usually this seems to come up in one of two types of discussions, the first being ones about whether or not ‘X diet’ or ‘Y fitness program’ is right for your particular body type and the second tends to be focused on blame shifting (things like, “Well of...

Keeping productivity up when you have a high number of projects to juggle can feel next to impossible.

Whether they’re all work related or it’s a mix of business and personal tasks when you start juggling too many different things then something inevitably gets dropped. When you’re in charge of a big project at your office job, trying to schedule things for the family, get your weightlifting in,
keep the house clean and the fridge stocked, learn a new language or skill, and work on some entr...