I recently read The Ultra-Ego Effect by Todd Herman. Imagine you're waiting for a keynote speech to start, and the event organizer rushes towards you and says, the keynote speaker didn't show up. I need you to give the talk.
You know the topic well, and you've delivered a similar talk to a small room of people, but there are over 1,000 people in this audience, and you don't have any notes. How confident would you feel getting on stage? Now imagine walking on stage as Steve Jobs or Oprah Winfrey and adopting their poise and persuasiveness.
How much more confident would you feel on stage? Top performers throughout history have embraced secret identities to boost their performances and get to the next level in their career. When singer Beyonce feels nervous before performing in front of 20,000 people, she turns into Sasha Fierce, an alter ego she created to make the leap from a shy choir girl to a pop superstar. The instant she lets Sasha Fierce take over, Her posture improves, and she's excited to get on stage.
When it comes time to do a complicated dance move on stage, Beyonce isn't worried because she knows Sasha Fierce will perform the dance free of self-doubt. Beyonce isn't being fake or inauthentic. She is simply using an alter ego to bring forth qualities she already has and push through her comfort zone. When you assume the identity of Steve Jobs or Oprah Winfrey during a speech, you are not abandoning yourself. Instead, you're using an image of Jobs and Winfrey to bring forth the most confident part of yourself.
After several thousand hours of coaching, author Todd Herman has found that using an alter ego is the quickest and most reliable method to achieve optimal performance in all domains of life. Because the instant you adopt an alter ego that you trust, your mind gets busy thinking, acting, and feeling the way the alter ego would and is too busy to be plagued with self-doubt. If you want an alter ego you can trust, override self-doubt, and perform with confidence. There's a few steps you must follow.
First, identify the where, what, who, and why. Determine where you're struggling and falling short of your expectations. Are you struggling to transfer your skills from practice to competition? Are you struggling to complete your projects or get your business off the ground?
Or are you struggling to hit your next performance milestone? May that be a scoring average in basketball, a rating in chess, or a half marathon time. Once you determine where you want an alter ego to show up, Determine what qualities that alter ego must possess to help you move through your struggle and make progress.
When I did this exercise, I realized that if I was calm, clear-headed, and confident under pressure, I would do a better job of transferring my golf skills on the driving range to the golf course and improve my golf game. I also realized if I was more focused, determined, and creative, I would complete more of my projects and take my business to the next level. Now, the who. Who embodies those qualities?
When I think calm, clear-headed, and confident under pressure in a game of golf, I think of a golfer named Cam Smith, who seemed to make every putt under immense pressure on his way to winning the British Open in 2022. Now, his mullet and mustache aren't my style, but they show that he's immune to people's opinion, which is an admirable quality during competition. And when I think focused, determined, and creative, I think of Bradley Cool's character in the movie Limitless. I also think of Tim Ferrisss and Malcolm Gladwell.
When you consider who embodies the qualities you want to emulate. Don't limit yourself to people. Kobe Bryant's alter ego was a snake, the black mamba, because it was fast, smooth, and terrifying. Once you've identified who or what embodies the qualities that will enable you to move through your struggle, come up with a name for your alter ego. After I went through my list, I came up with the name Cool Cam for my golfing alter ego and Limitless Man for my creative entrepreneurial alter ego, which was the combination of Cool's character in the movie Limitless and Ferriss and Gladwell.
Now, the why. Why does your alter ego have complete confidence in their abilities? This is where you think of a compelling story to explain why your alter ego is extraordinary. Stories are your alter ego's fuel. Without stories, your alter egos lose their power.
When I assume the identity of Cool Cam on the golf course, I remind myself that Cool Cam has hit thousands of golf balls, played in hundreds of high-stakes tournaments, and has won on the biggest stage. So he's not afraid of any shot. As Limitless Man, I tell myself that I've published several books, TV shows, and podcasts, and been mentored by the highest performers on the planet.
Plus, I can use 100% of my brain's capacity thanks to a smart drug that permanently upgraded my brain. Once you've determined the where, what, who, and why, and you've named an alter ego that you can put to the test, test it, but start small. Use your alter ego in practice before bringing it into competition.
Use your alter ego in a casual meeting. before bringing it into a critical meeting. Also, go between using it and not using it and feel the difference.
Do one meeting with your alter ego and one meeting without it. Then determine which meeting went better. If you find your alter ego is making you more effective, you'll be more inclined to use it when you feel nervous.
During a trial period, introduce an artifact that you can use to trigger your alter ego. Having an artifact to trigger your alter ego allows you to effortlessly activate your alter ego. Instead of willing your alter ego to work for you, you just imagine its power emanating from an artifact you've chosen. See it like Black Panther's suit in the Marvel movies.
Black Panther walks around without the suit most of the day, but when danger is present, the suit automatically emanates from his necklace, giving him superhuman abilities. Some common alter ego triggering artifacts include a special pair of shoes, a hat, a ring, a watch, or a pen. Dr. Man Luther King Jr. put on non-prescription glasses before interviews to trigger his distinguished intellectual alter ego.
A U.S. Army colonel puts on a golf shirt when he gets home from the army base to trigger patient, playful, loving dad mode. And one of Herman's clients has a framed photo on his desk of his grandmother who survived the holocaust. When facing a challenging situation at work, he turns the frame just slightly toward himself to switch on his grandmother's strength. I use headphones to trigger my limitless man alter ego. When I put them on, it feels as if I've just taken a smart drug.
I move quickly and crank out work. When I get distracted, I reactivate my alter ego by either adjusting my headphones or taking them off and then putting them back on. In the end, Tim Rohn says, if you're not willing to risk the unusual, you'll have to settle for the ordinary. When you're on your deathbed, you won't remember how weird it felt when you started using your alter ego. You'll just be thankful that you found the confidence and courage to do the things that you're proud you did.
That was the core message that I gathered from the alter ego effect by Todd Herman. Embracing an alter ego is weird, but effective. I highly recommend you pick up this book to have a deeper understanding of how to create and use an alter ego. If you would like a one-page PDF summary of insights that I gathered from this book, just click the link below and I'd be happy to email it to you. If you already subscribed to the free Productivity Game email newsletter, this PDF is sitting in your inbox.
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