Modern Samurai System - The Harada Method

Hey everyone, 

Thanks for tuning in.

Today I’m going to explain everything I know about The Harada Method, how it works, and how you can implement it into your life. 

What is the Harada Method? 

The Harada Method is a goal setting method intended to make a person self-reliant towards achieving their goals. It was created by a Japanese high school teacher named Takashi Harada.

He wanted to improve the athletic performance of the track and field teams within the high school he taught at so he implemented and perfected a system over a period of time which is now known as The Harada Method. 13 of his students went on to win gold medals in the national track and field competition in Japan. It is now known as the world's best process in day-to-day management. 

One of the most notable athletes who implements the Harada Method to great success is international Baseball sports star Sohei Otani. In its essence, The Harada Method develops self-reliance within an individual. 

According to Norman Bodek, the man who brought the Harada Method to the west, “Self-reliance is the ability of each person to become so skilled at something that she or he is virtually irreplaceable.”  .

And that’s what you want to become as you make yourself through the world.

How does it work? 

The Harada Method helps you create a clear map on becoming self-reliant and it brings together a number of components to create a foolproof goal setting system. These include: 

• A 33 Word self-analysis survey to gauge your self-reliance, you pitch yourself up against certain values such as authenticity, confidence, honesty, etc, score yourself and note down what you can do to make your score better. 

• A long-term goal setting form that outlines your goals and purposes, past successes and failures, and anticipated obstacles and how to overcome the.

• An ‘Open Window 64 Chart’ which is a framework to come up with tasks and routines to accomplish your goals, which are then prioritised and added to your long-term goal form.

• A routine check sheet, which is a daily check sheet to track your routines and build habits

• A Daily Diary - an incredible planning tool to help you map out your day, prioritise your tasks and reflect on how the day went. 

Becoming Self-Reliant

In his course, Takashi Harada outlines a five step process to becoming self-reliant and implementing The Harada Method, these are: 

1. Step 1 - Set a Goal. Any goal, be it big or small. Ultimately you want to set a life goal that you will spend the rest of your life pursuing, but it may take you some time to get to that point. You may want to start on a smaller goal that might take a month or a few months to achieve and then work your way up to something bigger. 

2. Step 2 - Define your purpose as to why you want to achieve that goal. One of the most powerful things that I found about this is that it gets you to not only look at yourself, but also at other people and how you influence them in both tangible and intangible ways by achieving your goals. For example, if my goal is to lose weight and get a better body, I benefit because I look better and I’m healthier and I have more energy (tangible), I also feel way better about myself and have more confidence (intangible); others will benefit, like my wife and my kids because they get a better version of me that shows up for them, my wife is more attracted to me, I bring more energy to them so it improves their lives overall. When you can look at the whole picture, purpose becomes self evident and you become more motivated to stick to your goals.    

3. Step 3 - Self-analysis of your past successes / failures, strengths / weaknesses and obstacles you may have to overcome. By looking at our past failures, we can see what was going wrong at that time and how we were showing up in a few key areas of life - our Mental state, our Skills, our Health and our overall Life. By taking yourself through this process you will begin to see patterns of why you failed. Similarly, by analysing your past successes you will begin to understand where you need to be to start winning in life again.  

4. Step 4 - Building a foolproof action plan. We do this by implementing the incredible resources that are utilised such as the 64 open window which targets 8 key areas that you need to target for your goal, and 8 tasks or routines within that area that need to be completed to move you toward the goal. You’ll then pick some of these tasks and move them into your daily diary to get you taking action day to day. 

5. Step 5 - Developing routines / habits to propel you to success and hold you accountable. In addition to your tasks you may have routines that need to be done on a day to day basis. This is where key resources such as the routine check sheet come into play to hold you accountable with your daily habits you’re trying to develop. 

How to implement it into my life.

If you want to implement the Harada Method into your life, the best way to start is by completing the Udemy Course available here which will give you all the resources mentioned above including workbooks and spreadsheets that you can work with alongside the course. 

It’s filled with great content including video footage with Takashi Harada himself, and there’s also a ‘fast’ method in which you can skip to certain videos to complete the worksheets etc. faster. The great thing is that it’s available at a really affordable price. 

Over time, I plan on creating additional resources around the Harada Method such as notion templates that you can take advantage of instead of using spreadsheets or physical sheets of paper.

Best of luck and we’ll see you in the next article!