WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.760 You wanted this thing, you expected to be hard, reality now matches conditions. 2 00:00:03.760 --> 00:00:06.640 So our expectations now match conditions. This is what heart feels like. 3 00:00:06.640 --> 00:00:09.120 And then all of a sudden it's like they got permission to feel shitty. 4 00:00:09.120 --> 00:00:12.160 And by getting permission to feel shitty, they stop feeling a shitty because they're like this is 5 00:00:12.160 --> 00:00:18.800 just my new world. Welcome to the game where we talk about how to get more customers, how to make 6 00:00:18.800 --> 00:00:22.160 more customers, how to keep them longer, and the many failures and lessons we have learned 7 00:00:22.160 --> 00:00:28.080 along the way. I hope you enjoy and subscribe. One of my favorite things to do is to scrape 8 00:00:28.080 --> 00:00:33.920 through people's twitters that are aphorists and come up with little pity statements and then 9 00:00:33.920 --> 00:00:37.440 break them down. So I want to go through some of the things that I've learned from you 10 00:00:37.440 --> 00:00:42.800 over the last year or so. Go into those. And then there's some talking points that I don't think 11 00:00:42.800 --> 00:00:48.320 have heard you speak about before as well. I want to get on to. Beautiful. So the first one is 12 00:00:48.960 --> 00:00:54.000 so many lives would transform overnight if they realized my life sucks. I have nothing going 13 00:00:54.000 --> 00:00:58.480 for me. Really means I have nothing to lose. And that makes you a very dangerous person. 14 00:01:00.400 --> 00:01:07.360 So in any kind of game position, so like in business, right, every position has advantages and 15 00:01:07.360 --> 00:01:11.040 disadvantages. And a lot of people look at the really big guys and they're like, man, they, 16 00:01:12.080 --> 00:01:17.200 they're like, they're looking at me like, must be easy for Alex, right? And I remember when we had 17 00:01:17.760 --> 00:01:22.160 Jim launch and we had a very big company, I would tell the guys who are coming up, I was like, 18 00:01:22.160 --> 00:01:25.040 if you're trying to compete against me, I was like, you have advantages. I was like, if you're on 19 00:01:25.040 --> 00:01:28.560 a sales call, you're like, listen, you're just a number to Alex, you're never going to talk to Alex, 20 00:01:28.560 --> 00:01:32.720 right? Here with me, you're going to get my attention. I'm the one, right? I was like, that's how 21 00:01:32.720 --> 00:01:36.800 you're going to throw stones at me. I was like, but on the flip side, if it's me marketing to the 22 00:01:36.800 --> 00:01:40.800 masses, I'm going to be like, this kid's in his mom's basement. He has no idea what he's doing. He's 23 00:01:40.800 --> 00:01:44.720 been in business for 12 months. And of course, he has no idea. Like, wouldn't you want some of his 24 00:01:44.720 --> 00:01:49.760 thousands of success stories behind it because we've made a system? Like both sides have advantages. 25 00:01:49.760 --> 00:01:54.080 And so what happens is people are in this small position where they're more nimble, they can give 26 00:01:54.080 --> 00:01:59.840 more personalized attention to people, et cetera. And they see it as a pure disadvantage. And so 27 00:01:59.840 --> 00:02:04.720 you can flip the fact that you have nothing going for you with, you have nothing to lose. And that 28 00:02:04.720 --> 00:02:11.680 means that you can take lots of risks very quickly and end up in the exact same position you are, 29 00:02:11.680 --> 00:02:17.120 which is nothing. And so if you eliminate downside, it should decrease your action threshold, 30 00:02:17.120 --> 00:02:21.200 meaning you should be able to do more things faster, rather than do fewer things because you don't 31 00:02:21.200 --> 00:02:26.400 have a great life or things going for you. And so I think if people flip that, a lot more people 32 00:02:26.400 --> 00:02:30.960 would take action because they actually realize the advantage of their position. Jack butchers says, 33 00:02:30.960 --> 00:02:35.680 you get rich by taking lots of risk with small amounts of money and you stay rich by taking small 34 00:02:35.680 --> 00:02:40.640 amounts of risk with lots of money. Yes. I wholeheartedly agree. I didn't know that was just quote. 35 00:02:41.520 --> 00:02:45.280 He may have repurposed it. There's something called chili and drift. Do you know what that is? 36 00:02:45.280 --> 00:02:52.560 No. So it's a phenomenon at the core. It's not the opposite. It's the quote that weren't 37 00:02:52.560 --> 00:02:57.280 said by Churchill often get like erroneously attributed to him. It's like all quotes lead back 38 00:02:57.280 --> 00:03:00.880 to Churchill, even though they didn't. And socrates. Yeah. It's like it's just one of those things 39 00:03:00.880 --> 00:03:06.320 with like, I think the Churchill once said get rich by making larger amounts. It's like, no, he's 40 00:03:06.320 --> 00:03:11.760 fucking, but there's another one as well. That a good friend, James Smith talked about, which is, 41 00:03:11.760 --> 00:03:16.080 if you're succeeding at a job that you hate, imagine how good you'd be at a job that you loved. 42 00:03:16.080 --> 00:03:21.440 And that's kind of the same, this person is starting from essentially zero. How much fucking 43 00:03:21.440 --> 00:03:26.240 worse can it get? Right. It's the downside. If you can eliminate someone's downside for action, 44 00:03:26.240 --> 00:03:34.000 it's like then the bias, it should bias you towards taking action. Why is it that people in that case, 45 00:03:34.000 --> 00:03:38.560 if they do have nothing to lose, still feel like they have lots to lose? Because I think most of the 46 00:03:38.560 --> 00:03:44.080 times, so this, I think this is really important is that they have nothing objective little 47 00:03:44.080 --> 00:03:49.360 lose. And so everything that they feel like they have to lose is purely made up in their mind. 48 00:03:49.360 --> 00:03:52.640 It's stories that tell themselves about what other people are going to think about them when 49 00:03:52.640 --> 00:03:55.760 those people aren't even thinking about them to begin with, right? But like that's where they 50 00:03:55.760 --> 00:04:01.120 live all of their lives or live out all of the potential downside is in the mirror reflection of 51 00:04:01.120 --> 00:04:05.920 what other people will think about them in the future should they fail. And I think that is the, 52 00:04:05.920 --> 00:04:09.600 like if we were trying to get real and I'm like talking to somebody like, well, I mean, 53 00:04:09.600 --> 00:04:12.640 because I know that if I actually had somebody in front of me, they'd start squarming, right? If I 54 00:04:12.640 --> 00:04:16.000 said the first thing, right? Like you have nothing to lose. And then because then they do have 55 00:04:16.000 --> 00:04:19.840 something to lose. And I just have to name it for them and be like, okay, who's the person in your 56 00:04:19.840 --> 00:04:23.520 mind? Who's the voice? It's like, blah, blah, blah, six questions deep. It's my uncle. Okay, 57 00:04:23.520 --> 00:04:31.120 why like, let me state it this way, will your belief that you're going to be viewed as a failure 58 00:04:31.120 --> 00:04:37.520 by your uncle be the sole reason that you live the rest of your life below your potential and regret 59 00:04:37.520 --> 00:04:44.640 everything that you don't do because of uncle Tom. That's the wrong one. Uncle Harry. When you say 60 00:04:44.640 --> 00:04:48.880 like that, all of a sudden they're like, I don't know what uncle Harry have that kind of power. And 61 00:04:48.880 --> 00:04:52.560 then all of a sudden it breaks and then they like get free of it. And so I think it's getting really 62 00:04:52.560 --> 00:04:56.720 specific and really narrow on the, because people say it's society. It's other people. It's like, 63 00:04:56.720 --> 00:05:01.600 it's usually one or two voices. And if you can get really specific on whose voice it is, 64 00:05:01.600 --> 00:05:05.600 then you can name it. And then like, I think I'm a big believer in like shame only existing 65 00:05:05.600 --> 00:05:08.640 the shadows, which is like, once you put it in the light, you look at it and you're like, 66 00:05:09.600 --> 00:05:14.080 my mom, that was really it. Like when I really think about it, it's because it's not even just my mom, 67 00:05:14.080 --> 00:05:20.000 it's my mom in this circumstance. When I come back home for Thanksgiving, I just am so afraid of 68 00:05:20.000 --> 00:05:24.160 the combat that she's going to make. It's like, well, what if we confront that? Okay, your mom, 69 00:05:24.160 --> 00:05:28.560 you sit down at Thanksgiving dinner and you haven't made money yet and you quit your job. Now what? 70 00:05:28.560 --> 00:05:32.160 Is that better than you spending the next 60 years hating her or resenting her for the fact that 71 00:05:32.160 --> 00:05:35.520 she held you back? And then it's like, when you give the real scenario, they're like, well, shit. 72 00:05:35.520 --> 00:05:38.480 And then like this weight comes off and they're like, fuck, I guess I should do this. And you're like, 73 00:05:38.480 --> 00:05:45.360 yeah, shame on me. This is nice. I like that. And it definitely is cleansing to just be like, 74 00:05:45.360 --> 00:05:49.600 look, here it is out in front of you. And it realized just how irrational it is because we don't 75 00:05:49.600 --> 00:05:53.360 want to look at it. Because it's in the shadow. And we put it in the shadows because of how it makes 76 00:05:53.360 --> 00:05:59.120 us feel about ourselves in my opinion. And so it's so scary. We avoid it. We avoid it. We avoid it. 77 00:05:59.120 --> 00:06:03.040 We avoid it. But it's like, I think the faster you can kind of build that muscle of like, 78 00:06:04.000 --> 00:06:08.240 I've got this hesitation. What is the real reason? Because logically, I can do that whole thing. 79 00:06:08.240 --> 00:06:13.200 Cool. You have nothing to lose. You're poor. Great. Zero. Right? Okay. But then what is it that I'm 80 00:06:13.200 --> 00:06:18.560 that I do have something to lose? It's relational capital. It's status within my tiny micro community 81 00:06:18.640 --> 00:06:25.040 that doesn't matter. But like my perceived status. Okay. Name the names. And but by pulling it out 82 00:06:25.040 --> 00:06:31.200 from the shadows, it'll be like that confrontation from here to here is I think where all the fear is 83 00:06:31.200 --> 00:06:36.560 because it's embarrassing to be like, it's my mom. The other perfect thing or great realization, 84 00:06:36.560 --> 00:06:39.520 I think, for anybody that's starting out and is feeling self conscious about what other people 85 00:06:39.520 --> 00:06:44.160 are going to think is when you're starting out by design, there are so few people looking at you 86 00:06:44.240 --> 00:06:48.320 that even if you do fail, no one fucking sees. Right? So this is something we realized when we 87 00:06:48.320 --> 00:06:52.320 were running nightclubs that we would try and launch a new event around fresh as we can September. 88 00:06:52.320 --> 00:06:56.480 And we would have this great idea and it would be everything would be about flamingos or 89 00:06:56.480 --> 00:07:00.640 everything would be it would be a smart night on a Tuesday. So people could go out after they've 90 00:07:00.640 --> 00:07:06.400 been to sports club of whatever it was. And then it would flop, right? And we'd do 150 people 91 00:07:06.400 --> 00:07:11.120 and all of the guys that work for us would be stood outside looking destitute and upset. And they go 92 00:07:11.120 --> 00:07:14.880 so embarrasable there. So it looks like there's more room. Oh, we did. We had so many tricks. We 93 00:07:14.880 --> 00:07:19.200 pumped the pump the room full of smoke. We would pad the back off so that everyone had to go to the 94 00:07:19.200 --> 00:07:24.000 front. We get the DJ to play music, also to shit. But all of the boys would be like, fuck, 95 00:07:24.000 --> 00:07:27.600 this makes us look so bad. Everyone's going to think that we're shit. I was like, no, no, no, no, 96 00:07:27.600 --> 00:07:32.000 150 people are going to think that we're shit. Like the advantage of running a shit business that 97 00:07:32.000 --> 00:07:37.760 doesn't reach many people is that not many people saw your shit business. And that's when you 98 00:07:37.760 --> 00:07:41.040 starting out, people that are concerned about becoming a content creator. I'm worried about 99 00:07:41.040 --> 00:07:44.400 starting a podcast because what if everyone sees how shit my podcast is? It's like, dude, 100 00:07:44.400 --> 00:07:50.880 no one's going to see your shit podcast. It took me three, three and a half years to get even 101 00:07:50.880 --> 00:07:56.080 an appreciable amount of people listening to this show. And it was effort three times a week. No one 102 00:07:56.080 --> 00:08:00.080 cares when you start. So you can be liberated from that as well. And it's just objection handling, 103 00:08:00.080 --> 00:08:04.800 objection handling, objection handling all the way down. I think a couple of frames that are 104 00:08:04.880 --> 00:08:09.760 just different frames are on content making since we're on the topic that helped me was one is 105 00:08:09.760 --> 00:08:14.080 seeing it as practice rather than the game. So like when we're doing a podcast, if you start, 106 00:08:14.080 --> 00:08:17.520 it's like, hey, I'm going to do a podcast. I'm going to post it's practice for me getting better for 107 00:08:17.520 --> 00:08:22.320 future may rather than like, I'm like, this is the main game. It's like, no, the game is the whole 108 00:08:22.320 --> 00:08:27.040 thing. And this is just like, we're still in preseason. Like these, these, these, these scores, 109 00:08:27.040 --> 00:08:30.720 these touchdowns don't even matter yet. Right? Now you can say yet, even though like I can still 110 00:08:30.720 --> 00:08:34.000 feel like I'm a preseason, but I think from a mental framework, it actually decreases the 111 00:08:34.000 --> 00:08:37.520 stakes associated with doing it. And I think that's been helpful for me, especially it was in the 112 00:08:37.520 --> 00:08:42.640 earlier days. The other one was kind of the equal opposite of this problem, which is not wanting to 113 00:08:42.640 --> 00:08:46.640 start because no one's watching because it feels like you're doing all this work. What's the point? 114 00:08:46.640 --> 00:08:53.040 What's the point? And so I actually, the little mental trick that I had was one, I track lots of 115 00:08:53.040 --> 00:08:57.440 stuff. And the more ways you track, the more ways you can win. And so it's a little thing that I 116 00:08:57.440 --> 00:09:00.800 found out. So like if you track 100 sets and the only need one of them to go up, so you feel like 117 00:09:00.800 --> 00:09:06.240 you made some progress. So that's like an easy one. And the second thing around the tracking is 118 00:09:06.240 --> 00:09:10.240 that I would look at like the biggest possible number. So a lot of times you can see like the 119 00:09:10.240 --> 00:09:15.840 impressions of, you know, a post that you make, even if you only got like 16 likes, I like 100 120 00:09:15.840 --> 00:09:20.240 impressions. And I thought to myself, I was like, well, if there was a room of 100 people, 121 00:09:20.240 --> 00:09:24.000 I'd be stoked. Like that would be awesome. Especially in the early days, I was like, that would be, 122 00:09:24.720 --> 00:09:29.600 I would totally feel like that was worthwhile. And so taking those little impression numbers and 123 00:09:29.600 --> 00:09:34.720 pretending that they were like micro events that I was making the work or the content for, 124 00:09:34.720 --> 00:09:39.040 all of a sudden made it feel worth it for me. And so the combination of I can have a small room 125 00:09:39.040 --> 00:09:42.800 and I'm really impacting like when I get a view that has like 13 views on it, you know, I'm for 126 00:09:42.800 --> 00:09:47.520 like a video in the early days, I'd be like, well, shoot, I made this video and 13 people saw 127 00:09:47.520 --> 00:09:53.440 like a small room like that works. But looking at both absolute growth and relative growth. So 128 00:09:53.440 --> 00:09:57.600 it's like, okay, why went from 10 followers this month to 15 followers this month? It's like, 129 00:09:57.600 --> 00:10:01.040 well, you can say that you only gained five followers. I was like, or you can say that you gained by, 130 00:10:01.040 --> 00:10:07.040 you went up by 50%. And that was exciting. And so then I, because I'm a sell projection guy, 131 00:10:07.040 --> 00:10:10.720 I'll like, okay, well, if I do this every month and the team knows this, because I, I project 132 00:10:10.720 --> 00:10:14.400 everything out, I'm like, we do this because I, I'll predict where we're going to be in like 12 133 00:10:14.400 --> 00:10:21.840 months. And I usually hit it very, really, very. But how do you account for the unforeseen 5 million 134 00:10:21.920 --> 00:10:27.600 play video that comes in? Well, that's my padding. Right. So what, like, I'll project out with 135 00:10:27.600 --> 00:10:32.560 no white swan events. Yeah. Yeah. But it was something good happens. Yep. But just if we keep 136 00:10:32.560 --> 00:10:36.640 doing what we're currently doing at this trajectory, we compound at 13% a month. Yep. That's what it 137 00:10:36.640 --> 00:10:41.440 is right now. So 13% monthly. And that's just on one of the platforms run. And so I can just see 138 00:10:41.440 --> 00:10:45.840 what we're going to be at six months. And that's exciting. So James Smith gamifies it in the same way. 139 00:10:45.840 --> 00:10:50.640 I do see. Yeah. Absolutely. Exactly the same way. And he always says that it's just like playing 140 00:10:51.360 --> 00:10:55.680 levels on a computer game in this month. Wow. Like I got another XP point or whatever. And I think 141 00:10:55.680 --> 00:11:00.400 that's very important because social media and the fact that it is associated with status, 142 00:11:00.400 --> 00:11:03.600 even though everybody says, oh, you know, it doesn't really matter. And blah, blah, it does. Like 143 00:11:03.600 --> 00:11:08.960 it's very hard for us to remove the human hierarchy from what is evidently just quantified 144 00:11:08.960 --> 00:11:14.320 fucking status, right? On a on a screen. And what he did was he removed himself a lot 145 00:11:14.320 --> 00:11:18.480 existentially from that by saying, it's not comment on my worth as a person. It's not a comment 146 00:11:18.480 --> 00:11:23.440 on whether I'm, you know, going to be loved or accepted by the world. It's me putting some stuff 147 00:11:23.440 --> 00:11:27.840 out. And wow, we won this month. Yeah. And this month, oh, maybe we didn't win. Why didn't we win? 148 00:11:27.840 --> 00:11:31.200 Well, I'll go back the same way as if someone beat to a FIFA, unless you like a pro FIFA player or 149 00:11:31.200 --> 00:11:34.640 whatever. But again, with that, what's the difference between the amateur FIFA player and the pro 150 00:11:34.640 --> 00:11:40.560 FIFA player, the pro has put his existential connection to his content and the success of it. 151 00:11:40.560 --> 00:11:45.280 All right. So many little things on this that I want to go into. One of them is so Dr. Kashi's 152 00:11:45.280 --> 00:11:49.360 my closest friend. He's like a behavioral, whatever loves studying why humans do things. 153 00:11:50.320 --> 00:11:54.640 And so people who are most successful a lot of times with their, it's not that they necessarily 154 00:11:54.640 --> 00:11:59.600 have more willpower. They find ways to, they find other ways to reward themselves. And so he's like 155 00:11:59.600 --> 00:12:03.840 the more skills you have, the more ways you have to reward yourself. And so somebody who, 156 00:12:04.720 --> 00:12:10.160 somebody can extend how long their time horizon is because they do gamify it. So people who don't 157 00:12:10.160 --> 00:12:14.960 have the skills of figuring out ways to reward themselves in the meantime can't make it the whole way. 158 00:12:14.960 --> 00:12:18.480 But that's like when you're doing cardio and you're like, okay, it's five, you know, it's five 159 00:12:18.480 --> 00:12:22.560 times five to get out of here, right? You create microgames within the longer game to keep yourself 160 00:12:22.560 --> 00:12:28.720 going. And the thing is I've seen that across verticals. So like if you look at it, so Travis 161 00:12:28.720 --> 00:12:34.880 mash is a Olympic lifter Olympic lifting coach out of North Carolina. And he has this really 162 00:12:34.880 --> 00:12:39.200 cool way of getting lifters to PR every workout. It's every personal record every workout. And what he 163 00:12:39.280 --> 00:12:45.440 does is he have them map every single set and rep range for every single lift at every weight. 164 00:12:45.440 --> 00:12:50.560 And so what happens is all you have to do is go through your book of 200 lifts and every single 165 00:12:50.560 --> 00:12:55.280 weight. And you can always find one that you did a year ago. Oh my god, this is my eight rep max PB 166 00:12:55.280 --> 00:12:59.360 on good mornings. Yes. And you're like, well, I can hit nine on this or I can add five pounds to it. 167 00:12:59.360 --> 00:13:05.680 And so every workout they win. And so they get excited because they get rewarded every workout. And 168 00:13:05.680 --> 00:13:08.960 so that's why it's like the more easy track, the more easy you can win. And then I think that's 169 00:13:08.960 --> 00:13:14.880 those little micro wins can keep you going over the long game that you have to just keep playing. 170 00:13:14.880 --> 00:13:19.280 One of the other associated tweets that you did was if your life sucks the easiest things to 171 00:13:19.280 --> 00:13:23.600 change your environment. Oh, yeah. This is something that I saw moving from a very good life 172 00:13:23.600 --> 00:13:30.800 in the UK to now as excellent of a life as I can imagine in Austin. And I met about a million 173 00:13:30.800 --> 00:13:34.720 people throughout my time as a club promoter and had a handful of friends and I was like, fuck, 174 00:13:34.720 --> 00:13:41.120 like I I feel like my people met to friend conversion should be higher than this. I feel like I'm 175 00:13:41.120 --> 00:13:46.160 the the funnel is very wide and like the conversions are very low to use your terminology. Yeah. 176 00:13:46.160 --> 00:13:51.280 And then moved out to Austin. And it's like I have more friends than people have met, which is 177 00:13:51.280 --> 00:13:57.040 just fucking insane. So definitely changing your environment. What other ways given that not 178 00:13:57.040 --> 00:14:01.760 everybody could move to Austin? What other ways would you say if your life sucks the easiest 179 00:14:01.760 --> 00:14:05.840 thing is to change your environment? What other ways could someone do that? I mean, the environment is 180 00:14:06.640 --> 00:14:10.800 I mean, like, you know, this is a I'm gonna tangent. I'm gonna come back. So if you've ever heard 181 00:14:10.800 --> 00:14:14.960 somebody say like, man, I hate Cincinnati Cincinnati sucks, right? They go some city and like they 182 00:14:14.960 --> 00:14:19.360 go there for two days and they make a judgment across the entire city, right? But it's like, okay, 183 00:14:19.360 --> 00:14:25.600 let's go really deep. You ate at three restaurants and you saw seven total people in Cincinnati. 184 00:14:26.160 --> 00:14:30.800 Does Cincinnati suck or do the two restaurants that you went to or the seven people that you were with 185 00:14:30.800 --> 00:14:35.600 not are they not that cool? Well, it's so easy to just move like two miles down the street. It's 186 00:14:35.600 --> 00:14:39.360 the same reason people do stay cations. It's like you don't even need to change cities. You can be 187 00:14:39.360 --> 00:14:43.040 in the same city and still change the environment. Like just moving out of your mom's basement. 188 00:14:43.040 --> 00:14:46.720 You know what I mean? It's just going into another place with four guys can change the environment. 189 00:14:46.720 --> 00:14:51.600 And so like that's the the thing that to me was so telling on this was so heroin addiction. 190 00:14:52.560 --> 00:14:58.320 Super addicting about that way. And when a bunch of soldiers came back from Vietnam, they had 191 00:14:58.320 --> 00:15:02.560 been addicted. I don't know if you've heard of this, right? 25% of soldiers who went to Vietnam 192 00:15:02.560 --> 00:15:09.920 tried heroin. It was like an insane statistic. And in the US, 90% of heroin addicts who go to 193 00:15:09.920 --> 00:15:16.400 clinics relapse. So have a 10% long-term success rate tough. The stats are completely reversed from 194 00:15:16.400 --> 00:15:21.360 people who got addicted or did heroin in Vietnam and then came back to the US, which then you 195 00:15:21.360 --> 00:15:26.560 could make the you could draw the line, which is it's better to change your environment than to 196 00:15:26.560 --> 00:15:30.160 even do anything else. Because what happens is you eliminate all the triggers and cues that are 197 00:15:30.160 --> 00:15:34.800 associated with habit that you're trying to destroy. Do you see that the American government was 198 00:15:34.800 --> 00:15:38.240 absolutely concerned that there was going to be an epidemic? Yeah, they were they were adamant. 199 00:15:38.240 --> 00:15:41.040 The all of these soldiers were going to come home and it were going to be these veterans that were 200 00:15:41.040 --> 00:15:47.520 all addicted to heroin. Yeah, wild. And there are for sure. But proportion so much proportional 201 00:15:47.520 --> 00:15:52.000 less than their quote should be because the problem with the current system of and like 202 00:15:52.000 --> 00:15:57.040 for anyone's listening, you can still extrapolate the principle or the concept. People are in the 203 00:15:57.040 --> 00:16:01.200 environment that they are addicted. They change environments and they go to a clinic. They change 204 00:16:01.200 --> 00:16:05.520 the environment. They change their behavior. And then they go back to the same environment and 205 00:16:05.520 --> 00:16:09.840 their behavior changes yet again to match the environment. And so it's like if you want to change 206 00:16:10.400 --> 00:16:15.120 your actions, the easiest thing you can do is just change the environment. Because if you can do 207 00:16:15.120 --> 00:16:18.480 that a lot of times, a lot of the negative things you have, you just don't get triggered. You 208 00:16:18.480 --> 00:16:23.600 don't get the cue for the behavior. It just gets extinguished. So the way that I've worked this into 209 00:16:23.600 --> 00:16:29.520 my home working setup is I think I have six or seven different places that I can work at. 210 00:16:29.520 --> 00:16:32.960 Yeah. And I do different tasks at each one of them. So I've got a place I'm writing a book. 211 00:16:32.960 --> 00:16:35.840 I've got a place that I write my book. That's first thing in the morning. I've got a place that I 212 00:16:35.840 --> 00:16:41.920 do my emails out. That's a recumbent desk bike, which is fucking unbelievable dude. Zone two 213 00:16:42.080 --> 00:16:46.640 180 minutes a week of zone two cardio. 180 minutes a week of emails with zone two cardio. 214 00:16:47.360 --> 00:16:50.800 The place outside, I've got my studio record inside. We've got two living rooms at different 215 00:16:50.800 --> 00:16:54.720 houses that I can go into. And I'm like different spots for each one. And if I'm in this vibe, 216 00:16:54.720 --> 00:17:00.160 I'm over here and everything's a bit go for a walk, come back, move somewhere else. Now I'm in a 217 00:17:00.160 --> 00:17:05.440 different mode. Totally. And I, I'm actually, so it works in the equal opposite too. If you want to 218 00:17:05.440 --> 00:17:08.800 start something, right? So like what we were talking about was extinguishing bad habits by changing 219 00:17:08.800 --> 00:17:13.440 the environment by eliminating the cue. But on the flip side, if you want to start a habit, 220 00:17:13.440 --> 00:17:17.280 like for me, one of my, quote, famous ones is like, I want to put sunscreen on. It's like this time. 221 00:17:17.280 --> 00:17:21.920 It's like one habit that's like 80 20. Why do you need to put sunscreen on so much? Because 222 00:17:21.920 --> 00:17:25.760 oh, not not so much. Like if you do like, it's like kind of like walking. Like if you just walk 223 00:17:25.760 --> 00:17:31.040 once a day, and if like if everyone just did that, like you add 10 years to everyone, it's like, 224 00:17:31.040 --> 00:17:36.480 what are the few things? It's like baby aspirin walk. Like if you do that, crushing it from a like 225 00:17:37.440 --> 00:17:41.840 skin cancer prevention a and then be just like less wrinkled Alex future. 226 00:17:44.080 --> 00:17:49.680 Sun tan lotion or SPF stuff is like the the 80 20 of that, right? Instead of having a zillion 227 00:17:49.680 --> 00:17:53.360 other things. It's like, okay, I don't like it. I realize the reason I don't like it is I don't 228 00:17:53.360 --> 00:17:57.840 like oil on my hands. It sounds so stupid. But like that's enough punishment for me doing it that 229 00:17:57.840 --> 00:18:02.080 I stopped doing it. And so I had to overcome two things. One was that I hate the oil on my hands 230 00:18:02.160 --> 00:18:07.680 and the second is that I don't remember. So I put one thing of sunscreen at each of my watering 231 00:18:07.680 --> 00:18:12.320 holes. So I get queued because I see it as soon as I sit down. So I eat lunch at the same table. 232 00:18:12.320 --> 00:18:16.560 I work at the same table and I'm on my nightstand. There's three places that I spend my time. And so 233 00:18:16.560 --> 00:18:20.880 I have one in each of the three places. And then the type of sunscreen I have is that I have one 234 00:18:20.880 --> 00:18:25.760 that's dispensed through a thing. So I don't actually have to touch it. So it's like, do I know what 235 00:18:25.760 --> 00:18:28.880 it's like if you can identify why you don't like doing something, then you can isolate why am I 236 00:18:28.880 --> 00:18:32.240 being punished for this behavior and think, okay, is there way I can fix it? And the other is, 237 00:18:32.240 --> 00:18:36.080 how can I cue myself on a more regular basis by changing my environment rather than setting an alarm 238 00:18:36.080 --> 00:18:39.520 on my phone where if it goes off right now and a little podcast, I'm not going to pull out 239 00:18:39.520 --> 00:18:44.560 suntan lotion or I'd have to carry everything with me, which I would never do. Right? That would 240 00:18:44.560 --> 00:18:48.160 punish me far more than just not putting it on to be in with. And so just thinking through both of 241 00:18:48.160 --> 00:18:52.800 those things, anyways, that has been really helping for me in starting and queuing myself to do new 242 00:18:52.800 --> 00:18:57.520 behaviors that I want to do and then also stopping behaviors that I don't want to do. Very nice. 243 00:18:57.520 --> 00:19:03.200 Most distractions come dressed as easy opportunities. This is interesting because 244 00:19:03.920 --> 00:19:09.360 as people begin to accumulate the success that they say that they want, this becomes an 245 00:19:09.360 --> 00:19:16.080 increasingly big problem. Yeah. I think it was Indie Grove who said this, probably Churchill. 246 00:19:17.680 --> 00:19:21.440 There we are. Talking about the one up for Winston. I might have been Packard. I think I've 247 00:19:21.440 --> 00:19:26.640 actually been Hula Packard. It might be one of those guys. He said that businesses die of 248 00:19:26.640 --> 00:19:33.600 indigestion, not starvation. And so they overeat. They're not starving. It's the entrepreneur that, 249 00:19:33.600 --> 00:19:37.360 and this is like you get back to human behavior, which almost all roads lead back to it. But 250 00:19:38.880 --> 00:19:44.080 the entrepreneurs get reinforced for changing direction because nothing worked, nothing worked, 251 00:19:44.080 --> 00:19:48.000 nothing worked. You changed that direction. Something clicks. And so what happens is you learn a lesson 252 00:19:48.000 --> 00:19:53.200 from that. You're like, oh, so if I change direction, good things happen. But that's not the right 253 00:19:53.200 --> 00:19:56.320 lesson, which is one of my favorite things about entrepreneurship is making sure that we learn 254 00:19:56.320 --> 00:20:00.080 the right lesson from the from the from the instant to the circumstance. It's like I hired a 255 00:20:00.080 --> 00:20:05.360 sales guy. He did a bad job. All sales guys suck. Not the right lesson, right? But that's actually 256 00:20:05.360 --> 00:20:11.360 something that is pervasive in even the internet community of like lessons that people they'll tell 257 00:20:11.360 --> 00:20:14.640 the story and then they'll say the lesson. But sometimes the lesson, all we know is the facts of 258 00:20:14.640 --> 00:20:20.320 what happened, not necessarily the thing you took from it. Anyways, I was making a point, 259 00:20:20.320 --> 00:20:27.440 Churchill, starvation, easy opportunity. So the the the higher up in business you get, 260 00:20:28.000 --> 00:20:32.160 the more attractive the opportunities that you have to learn to say no to. And this has been 261 00:20:32.160 --> 00:20:37.920 really hard for me because at every level, like I thought great, I have I can check the box on 262 00:20:37.920 --> 00:20:42.640 distractions. I've learned to say no to $10,000 opportunities. But then when you're when you're 263 00:20:42.640 --> 00:20:46.880 making $100,000, then you have to be able to say no to 100,000 opportunities. And the thing is 264 00:20:47.040 --> 00:20:50.720 I called the woman in the red dress. But the woman in the red dress, have you heard this like this 265 00:20:50.720 --> 00:20:56.080 little analogy I have? No. Okay. This is like one of my favorite analogies. So in the matrix, 266 00:20:57.440 --> 00:21:00.720 Morpheus takes him through training program to teach him one thing about agents. And so they're 267 00:21:00.720 --> 00:21:04.960 walking down the street and there's all these people going going. And he says, were you listening 268 00:21:04.960 --> 00:21:08.640 to me or are you looking at the woman in the red dress? And he says, look again, it looks back. 269 00:21:08.640 --> 00:21:14.400 And the woman in the red dress you walk by is an agent putting a gun in his head. And I see 270 00:21:14.400 --> 00:21:19.760 distractions the same way, which is that the better you become, the more attractive the woman in 271 00:21:19.760 --> 00:21:26.080 the red dress is. And so you can say no to a six, but what about a seven? About 12? Exactly. 272 00:21:26.080 --> 00:21:29.680 What about hypothetical thousand? Yeah. Right? Like that's that's really what it becomes because 273 00:21:29.680 --> 00:21:34.800 there is no limit on the upside. And so that's why having like some of the soft stuff of like this 274 00:21:34.800 --> 00:21:39.120 is the vision. This is what we're trying to do. And there's a hundred other things I could do. 275 00:21:39.120 --> 00:21:43.040 But each of the cost of those things is the one thing that matters most. And I think that 276 00:21:43.920 --> 00:21:47.600 one of the things that Layla has been so good at helping me with. And I think a lot of my 277 00:21:47.600 --> 00:21:54.000 success earlier on was propelled by the fact that like when I met Layla, I had a car practice 278 00:21:54.000 --> 00:22:01.440 agency. I had a dental agency. I had five gym locations. I had a gym launch business where we 279 00:22:01.440 --> 00:22:06.320 did turn around. I had all of those things going on. And there was no CEO besides me. I see 280 00:22:06.320 --> 00:22:10.480 of all of them because I didn't understand how the stuff worked. And I also made no actually, 281 00:22:10.480 --> 00:22:15.040 I mean, I made money from all of them, but no income. Like everything was just enough to break 282 00:22:15.040 --> 00:22:18.880 even. And it was nine spinning plates. And it was because like I was so opportunistic. And it's 283 00:22:18.880 --> 00:22:25.760 very classic new entrepreneur to just say yes to everything. And Warren Buffett said that 284 00:22:26.880 --> 00:22:31.360 the difference between really successful people and the most successful people, this is me paraphrasing, 285 00:22:32.000 --> 00:22:37.440 is that the most successful people say no to almost everything. And I've tried to take that 286 00:22:37.520 --> 00:22:41.840 because it's so hard. And I think that a lot of the, you know, it's so simple and so hard, 287 00:22:41.840 --> 00:22:45.680 which a lot of success habits are, which is like if you do the same thing for a very long period of 288 00:22:45.680 --> 00:22:52.240 time, I think this is Neil shoot Shane. I can't remember the name, but I'll say that yeah, it's 289 00:22:52.240 --> 00:22:58.160 Churchill again. He said success comes down to doing the obvious thing for an extraordinary 290 00:22:58.160 --> 00:23:03.280 period of time without convincing yourself you're smarter than you are. And I just love that quote. 291 00:23:03.280 --> 00:23:06.240 Why do you not need to convince yourself that you're smarter than you are? Because you're doing 292 00:23:06.320 --> 00:23:11.040 the same thing. I think it's because you think you can handle both. And so you're like, oh, I 293 00:23:11.040 --> 00:23:14.240 got this. Okay, because if you did think that you were smarter than you are, you would then start 294 00:23:14.240 --> 00:23:18.000 to take on more stuff. So quote from John Maxwell, which I absolutely adore that says you cannot 295 00:23:18.000 --> 00:23:24.400 overestimate the unimportance of practically everything, which is just fucking perfect. And it's 296 00:23:24.400 --> 00:23:29.440 the cool, it was so Greg McEwan's essentialism is one of my top five books of all time. And it's 297 00:23:29.440 --> 00:23:36.160 for this precise reason that it's an antidote to the type A fallout, right? I can do it all. I will 298 00:23:36.160 --> 00:23:41.600 do it all. Watch me suffer and bear this burden. And you're like, look, you can do the hard work 299 00:23:41.600 --> 00:23:48.560 thing, right? You can you can do that. But the working hard and being spread thin are two different 300 00:23:48.560 --> 00:23:55.360 dynamics. And one of the one of the like interesting idea I've been playing around with a little bit 301 00:23:55.360 --> 00:24:01.840 recently is periodizing work. So in the same way as your weightlifting coach will have the guys doing 302 00:24:01.920 --> 00:24:07.360 his submax for 90 days, he has building up for 90 days, he has comp rep, he has blah, blah, blah, 303 00:24:07.360 --> 00:24:14.160 blah, blah, whatever it is, mobility. That's a much easier way to blend what we're talking about 304 00:24:14.160 --> 00:24:17.520 here as maybe a little bit earlier, I think you need to specialize more as you get bigger and bigger 305 00:24:17.520 --> 00:24:23.680 because the distractions are going to be even greater. Special, how so? So if you are the CEO of 306 00:24:23.680 --> 00:24:28.320 your company and then someone comes in with you've got so much more downstream from you that if you 307 00:24:28.320 --> 00:24:33.040 get distracted, the repercussions, the ramifications of becoming distracted are magnified even more. 308 00:24:33.600 --> 00:24:38.640 What do you think about that? Do you agree? I think the the specialist piece is the piece that 309 00:24:38.640 --> 00:24:42.320 threw me because I always feel like the higher up you go, the more generalist you become. 310 00:24:42.320 --> 00:24:47.680 In terms of skillset, but not in terms of projects or in terms of projects. Specializing projects, 311 00:24:47.680 --> 00:24:50.400 generalizing skills. There we are. Yes, I like that. 312 00:24:52.720 --> 00:24:57.440 Hey guys, love that you're listening to the podcast. If you ever want to have the video version 313 00:24:57.440 --> 00:25:01.840 of this, which usually has more facts, more visuals, more graphs, you know, drawn out stuff, 314 00:25:01.840 --> 00:25:06.080 sometimes it can help hit the brain centers in different ways. You can check on my YouTube channel. 315 00:25:06.080 --> 00:25:10.480 It's absolutely free to check that out if that's what you are into and if not, keep enjoying the show. 316 00:25:12.880 --> 00:25:16.640 The first step to achieving a massive dream is conquering tiny impulses. 317 00:25:17.920 --> 00:25:21.840 I think it's exactly what we're talking about earlier. It's like if you like, 318 00:25:21.840 --> 00:25:31.440 I got a there's a a tweet that I may actually you you were the one who made it go viral, 319 00:25:31.440 --> 00:25:38.160 right? Which was when you quoted me quoting you, David Guggen. It's just this endless human 320 00:25:38.160 --> 00:25:41.760 centipede of fucking home Aussie quotes. It was really Churchill who said it first. 321 00:25:44.960 --> 00:25:49.280 But it's like you don't you don't you don't build confidence by shouting affirmations in the mirror, 322 00:25:49.360 --> 00:25:54.720 but by stacking or having an undeniable stack of proof that you are who you say you 323 00:25:54.720 --> 00:26:01.920 want. Thank you. That worked yourself out. Thank you there. I'll quote you to you, which is a new 324 00:26:01.920 --> 00:26:13.120 a new low. So so that right? A lot of people were like, no, but what if you don't have any successes? 325 00:26:13.200 --> 00:26:19.760 Like how do you get started? And I still think that the the quote is 100% valid is that they don't 326 00:26:19.760 --> 00:26:24.080 realize the validity of the smaller things that they have done up to that point. And so it's being 327 00:26:24.080 --> 00:26:29.120 able to transfer your successes of like, okay, like did you get dressed this morning? Like did you 328 00:26:29.120 --> 00:26:32.720 did you get in front of the computer? Like you have evidence, it's smaller evidence, but you have 329 00:26:32.720 --> 00:26:37.120 enough evidence to make the claim that you can do this. And then you do that enough times that 330 00:26:37.120 --> 00:26:41.440 you have enough evidence to make a claim that you can do this and support it. And I think that's 331 00:26:41.440 --> 00:26:46.640 where the big outcomes come from lots of of of constrained tiny impulses of saying like, you 332 00:26:46.640 --> 00:26:50.720 know what, I'm going to get this tiny victory. And I know how to say no to that. I notice a hair say 333 00:26:50.720 --> 00:26:55.520 no to heroin today or whatever. That would be a hard one, you know, larger, probably larger. 334 00:26:56.400 --> 00:27:00.720 But that's the idea. It's just stacking as many of those pieces of evidence that give you proof 335 00:27:00.720 --> 00:27:05.280 that you are who you say you are that you can you have done what you say you can do. Yeah, it's 336 00:27:05.600 --> 00:27:11.920 the the challenge of action or belief first is something that I've been playing around with so 337 00:27:11.920 --> 00:27:16.560 much. And my friend James, he wrote a book, the C word, like confidence. It was a book about how 338 00:27:16.560 --> 00:27:22.720 to be confident, right? And I do feel like a big footnote summary could have been that quote from 339 00:27:22.720 --> 00:27:28.480 you proof. And the problem is this is something that I've seen as well. A good example coming from 340 00:27:28.480 --> 00:27:34.000 a world where I was successful in business before I was successful personally. I have a skill set 341 00:27:34.000 --> 00:27:40.560 now. And my capacity within this particular skill set and the performance of what that does 342 00:27:40.560 --> 00:27:45.360 are intrinsically linked, right? There's almost a linear relationship as I become better at 343 00:27:45.360 --> 00:27:49.200 networking with guests with recording, with doing all the other things, the show increases. 344 00:27:49.760 --> 00:27:54.080 When I ran a business, there was so many degrees of freedom between my inputs to the business. 345 00:27:54.080 --> 00:27:59.840 And the success of the business that someone with like malignant imposter syndrome could always 346 00:27:59.840 --> 00:28:03.920 explain away how things had gone well. So I would say, oh, it's because we timed the market, right? 347 00:28:03.920 --> 00:28:07.600 Oh, it was because of like this member of staff that we brought in. I mean, I trained him, but 348 00:28:07.600 --> 00:28:12.880 really he would have been great without me or whatever. And self doubt can sort of weadle its way in 349 00:28:12.880 --> 00:28:20.560 in very sort of nefarious ways when you do that. Then switching to something where you have a relatively 350 00:28:20.560 --> 00:28:25.600 undeniable stack of proof, even undeniable to the part of you that wants to deny proof, right? 351 00:28:25.600 --> 00:28:32.240 Which is that imposter syndrome. After a little while, it's just a crushing weight that you, I call 352 00:28:32.240 --> 00:28:37.280 it imposter adaptation. So you know, if you continue to disprove your imposter syndrome in the real 353 00:28:37.280 --> 00:28:41.200 world and it persists, you have to admit to yourself that it's got nothing to do with your 354 00:28:41.200 --> 00:28:45.600 capabilities and everything to do with your addiction to feeling like an imposter. This is just a 355 00:28:45.600 --> 00:28:51.120 trend of how you think about the world. You're looking for competent, you have competence without 356 00:28:51.120 --> 00:28:57.040 confidence, which is a lack of belief and confidence without competence is self delusion, right? 357 00:28:57.040 --> 00:29:01.840 So you need to have this balance between the two. But people when they say, well, surely self 358 00:29:01.840 --> 00:29:05.840 belief becomes before action. I'm like, well, not particularly, not if that's not your nature. I 359 00:29:05.840 --> 00:29:10.400 don't think like you're asking for delusion there. And it is significantly easier for you to think, 360 00:29:10.400 --> 00:29:16.000 I am a fitness person. If you just went to the gym and did 10 push-ups, then I am a fitness person 361 00:29:16.000 --> 00:29:20.880 when I go to the gym tomorrow and do 10 push-ups. Like where's the show me spit and sawdust? 362 00:29:20.880 --> 00:29:30.160 Where's the fucking reality of this? You know? I agree. Good. Opportunities only look like 363 00:29:30.160 --> 00:29:35.120 opportunities in the rearview mirror. Today they look like risk. How does someone get around this? 364 00:29:35.120 --> 00:29:42.480 This asymmetry between the fact that in retrospect, it seemed totally obvious. And yet the thing 365 00:29:42.480 --> 00:29:47.600 that you're looking at right now, looking forward, you go, that might not be obvious in retrospect. 366 00:29:47.600 --> 00:29:55.200 Again, it's tough because a lot of the big wins, like Uber's the classic example, right? 367 00:29:55.200 --> 00:29:59.360 Like let's start a business where strangers pick up girls who are 16. You don't mean to drive 368 00:29:59.360 --> 00:30:04.960 them to their friends' houses. That sounds like a terrible idea, right? But in retrospect, 369 00:30:04.960 --> 00:30:08.160 you're like, no, it'll be totally fine because there's going to be a mutual rating system and blah, 370 00:30:08.160 --> 00:30:11.280 blah, blah, blah, blah. Taking out the fact that there are people who've been captured and 371 00:30:12.240 --> 00:30:17.680 we'll put that to the side, right? And the thing is it's like, just because we're on the 372 00:30:17.680 --> 00:30:22.800 investing side, what we found is that there are always reasons to say no to a deal. You can always 373 00:30:22.800 --> 00:30:27.520 find reasons to say no because there's nothing that's risk-free. Even treasuries have risk. 374 00:30:27.520 --> 00:30:32.000 US economy could collapse and treasuries could be worth nothing. And you could create a really 375 00:30:32.000 --> 00:30:36.880 compelling argument. Lots of influencers spend a lot of time doing that, right? Is it likely? 376 00:30:37.680 --> 00:30:41.840 Maybe? I don't know, but it's probably less likely than a bank failing because if the US 377 00:30:41.840 --> 00:30:45.760 fails, all the banks might have fallen are also failing. So which of these is great to risk? 378 00:30:45.760 --> 00:30:50.960 So then you start comparing risks rather than trying to eliminate risks. And so if we're looking 379 00:30:50.960 --> 00:30:54.560 at opportunities, that's why risk-adjustive return is one of the things that a lot of investors 380 00:30:54.560 --> 00:30:58.960 look at, which is like, is there a way that I can appropriately adjust this risk to normalize 381 00:30:58.960 --> 00:31:05.680 different opportunities? And I think that that single skill set is one of, if not the most 382 00:31:05.680 --> 00:31:09.520 important skill sets is an entrepreneur because fundamentally it's betting. That's what we're 383 00:31:09.520 --> 00:31:12.160 doing. We're making bets. Every day we bet with our time, we bet with our money. 384 00:31:13.360 --> 00:31:17.520 With the limited constraints we have or limited resources we have against unlimited opportunities. 385 00:31:18.240 --> 00:31:21.360 Because that's the hard part is that there are unlimited women in the red dress. Now there's 386 00:31:21.360 --> 00:31:25.920 some fours and there's some sixes and there's some eights. But you have to both rate the girl, 387 00:31:25.920 --> 00:31:31.680 right? The opportunity. And then also how crazy is she? Right? Or whatever risk factor you want 388 00:31:31.680 --> 00:31:35.200 to associate with this? Is she going to stab me in my sleep? I don't know. Just you have a crazy 389 00:31:35.200 --> 00:31:37.440 expert for it. I don't know about it. I don't know. Right? And so that's what we do the 390 00:31:37.440 --> 00:31:43.360 dildos process. But like the way that we, because I just just tied up this chapter in the book that's 391 00:31:43.360 --> 00:31:48.320 coming out, is when we're organizing opportunities that we're going to pursue with a business, we look 392 00:31:48.320 --> 00:31:52.640 at what are the ones that we have the absolute highest likelihood of success that we need no new 393 00:31:52.640 --> 00:31:57.840 skills and no new effort? If we can do that, or the least amount of new effort and no new skills, 394 00:31:57.840 --> 00:32:01.760 that would be the first thing we're going to do. And then once we take off all the ones that take 395 00:32:01.760 --> 00:32:05.440 basically no effort and no extra skills, we're like, okay, which ones take more effort and still 396 00:32:05.440 --> 00:32:09.760 no skills? And then once we do that, then we're like, okay, now we can start learning a new skill 397 00:32:09.760 --> 00:32:12.960 and of the different skills that we could learn, which of these is going to give us the highest leverage 398 00:32:12.960 --> 00:32:16.960 as in most output for the least amount of input. And that's pretty much how we tick down 399 00:32:17.760 --> 00:32:21.200 which of these opportunities we want to pursue because those have the lowest likelihood of not 400 00:32:21.200 --> 00:32:26.320 happening. Does this work in the personal world as well? This one is an investor that isn't in 401 00:32:26.320 --> 00:32:31.200 business that's just thinking about life opportunities. Do I want to learn to salsa dance or code? 402 00:32:31.200 --> 00:32:38.640 I think that the investor frame is simply people who have been scored and quantified on their 403 00:32:38.640 --> 00:32:43.920 ability to make decisions. And so I think that we can learn a ton from how investors make decisions 404 00:32:43.920 --> 00:32:50.800 overall. It's like why Ray Dalio's book Principles became like a best seller, even though 99.9% 405 00:32:50.800 --> 00:32:54.400 of people who are reading the book aren't even investors or definitely not investors at his level. 406 00:32:54.400 --> 00:32:58.800 But the principles of good decision making are just quantified and we have a scoreboard for these 407 00:32:58.800 --> 00:33:02.880 guys being excellent decision makers. Whereas most other people you don't have a real scoreboard, 408 00:33:02.880 --> 00:33:08.800 so we can't tell how valid is their advice. And I think that's what makes taking advice from 409 00:33:08.800 --> 00:33:14.480 really world class investors who've been doing it for decades as a great source of information 410 00:33:14.480 --> 00:33:18.720 because we can validate that they have a stack of undeniable proof that they are who they say they are. 411 00:33:18.720 --> 00:33:25.040 Very nice. Okay, so this was not Churchill this time. So this was this is something that I've 412 00:33:25.040 --> 00:33:30.160 actually relied on a little bit myself whenever I get to a low point where I think why do I even 413 00:33:30.160 --> 00:33:35.920 bother I just remind myself this is where most people stop and this is why they don't win and this 414 00:33:35.920 --> 00:33:39.760 relates to another one which is a reminder for the gladiators in the arena who feel beat up and 415 00:33:39.760 --> 00:33:45.360 scarred with no hope in sight building a business is hard hard feels shitty this is what hard feels 416 00:33:45.360 --> 00:33:53.520 like and this is why most people can't do it but you can this is what hard feels like is so 417 00:33:54.240 --> 00:34:00.400 fucking nice to lean on it is so nice to lean on take me through that low point there's actually 418 00:34:00.400 --> 00:34:08.080 a story a little goosebumps telling it so I was way back in my day like you a party party promoter 419 00:34:08.080 --> 00:34:13.200 but I was in a fraternity so I was president of fraternity and this was my first semester being 420 00:34:13.200 --> 00:34:17.440 president and so you have a pledge class you get two pledge classes as a president you get a fall 421 00:34:17.440 --> 00:34:21.520 on a spring and then that's your 10 year and then another president comes in and what we knew 422 00:34:21.600 --> 00:34:24.560 and this will be really interesting for the audience from a human behavior perspective is that 423 00:34:25.120 --> 00:34:31.120 like clockwork every time we start a new pledge class within 14 days 10 to 14 it was like clockwork 424 00:34:31.120 --> 00:34:34.880 they would all get together and they'd revolt and they'd say we don't want to do it anymore 425 00:34:34.880 --> 00:34:38.080 this isn't what we sign up for this is way fucking harder than we thought it was going to be like 426 00:34:38.080 --> 00:34:41.440 we thought we were just going to party with you guys like that's what we expected which also 427 00:34:41.440 --> 00:34:47.600 shows you how long it takes people to adapt or acclimate to a very a significantly more difficult 428 00:34:47.600 --> 00:34:51.440 situation right I'll tell you what happens after and then I'll tell you what happened in between 429 00:34:52.720 --> 00:34:56.720 after we have this kind of talk that we had and I'll tell you how I explain it when I was 430 00:34:56.720 --> 00:35:02.880 president all of a sudden it all vanishes because their expectations of reality have completely 431 00:35:02.880 --> 00:35:07.760 reset we break reality like in the first 10 to 14 days it's so painful for them because it's 432 00:35:07.760 --> 00:35:15.440 such a contrast what we have to do not the fun stuff what's not fun oh my god I mean they can't 433 00:35:15.440 --> 00:35:19.120 drink can't talk to girls the only people they could talk to her brothers or each other and 434 00:35:19.120 --> 00:35:22.160 we're mean to them so they could really only talk to each other and the whole point here is 435 00:35:22.160 --> 00:35:24.800 that we're trying to get them close together because it's a bunch of dudes who don't know each other 436 00:35:24.800 --> 00:35:28.720 from different parts of the campus right and then we have to get them in eight to 12 weeks to leave 437 00:35:28.720 --> 00:35:33.360 as one unit of people who know everything about one another that trust one another that know 438 00:35:33.360 --> 00:35:36.320 everything about the other people in the house so it's like how do you do that well there's only 439 00:35:36.320 --> 00:35:40.720 x amount of communication you can have every day so let's cut out anybody who's not us okay 440 00:35:40.720 --> 00:35:44.480 and then if we really want them to be close together we'll also reinforce that we're mean 441 00:35:44.560 --> 00:35:48.080 but part of what they had to do is they to learn everything about everyone else in the house 442 00:35:48.080 --> 00:35:52.560 and so every pledge has to do something that would impress a brother and then they get a signature 443 00:35:52.560 --> 00:35:55.440 from their brother mean like I approve of you and you have to get every single brother signature 444 00:35:55.440 --> 00:36:01.280 by the time you're done right and so that's where each of those side quests become as insane as 445 00:36:01.280 --> 00:36:05.200 you might imagine right and there's lots of you know there was lots of hazing back in the day which 446 00:36:05.200 --> 00:36:09.760 is not fun and you know a lot of sleepless nights and things like that and you go from like 447 00:36:09.760 --> 00:36:13.520 parting with girls feeling like your top of the world all these brothers feeding you drinks be like 448 00:36:13.520 --> 00:36:17.840 you're awesome dude to then like the next day and this is literally how it happens this is how 449 00:36:17.840 --> 00:36:22.480 like the break and reality happens we do the huge party to like launch the new class and the next 450 00:36:22.480 --> 00:36:25.600 morning they all wake up they're all like they all sleep at the house because that's one of the 451 00:36:25.600 --> 00:36:31.280 requirements and they're all hung over it got their ties like vomit in the corner whatever and 452 00:36:31.280 --> 00:36:36.240 we're like great clean it up and they're like what because up to this point they haven't cleaned 453 00:36:36.240 --> 00:36:41.280 after a party because all they did is got to party see the girls and then leave but then all of a 454 00:36:41.280 --> 00:36:45.440 sudden they're like mopping bottom in the corner and they're hung over and they feel terrible and 455 00:36:45.440 --> 00:36:50.000 they're like what the fuck this is what I signed up for right so anyways two weeks of this they get 456 00:36:50.000 --> 00:36:55.040 together and they wanted me to meet them and this always happens because they want to meet on their 457 00:36:55.040 --> 00:36:59.760 their turf and I'm like all right guys what's up and so it's just me all right and my vice president 458 00:36:59.760 --> 00:37:05.280 and like 25 guys so there's like a you know there's like a size comparison of like just animalistically 459 00:37:05.360 --> 00:37:10.240 there's way more than there is of me and so I just asked them a couple questions I was like 460 00:37:10.960 --> 00:37:15.760 who here before pledging started was like I want to be a part of this house like guys were like you 461 00:37:15.760 --> 00:37:24.000 know me okay okay got it who here thought it was gonna be easy who here thought it would be hard 462 00:37:25.200 --> 00:37:30.080 they raised their hands my guys this is what hard feels like 463 00:37:30.080 --> 00:37:34.880 you know all of a sudden there's just like this big exhale in the room they're like 464 00:37:36.080 --> 00:37:43.600 expectations get reset this is normal you wanted this thing you expected to be hard reality 465 00:37:43.600 --> 00:37:49.120 now matches conditions sorry expectations now match conditions this is what hard feels like 466 00:37:49.760 --> 00:37:53.600 and then all of a sudden it's like they got permission to feel shitty and by getting permission 467 00:37:53.600 --> 00:37:56.560 to feel shitty they stop feeling a shitty because they're like this is just my new world 468 00:37:57.280 --> 00:38:02.160 and so then you know you're like listen you give eight weeks you're gonna get three and a half years 469 00:38:02.160 --> 00:38:04.720 other people are gonna do are gonna drive you around late at night other people in a clean 470 00:38:04.720 --> 00:38:08.720 half do you like it's a good investment right and that it was a good deal like you give one semester 471 00:38:08.720 --> 00:38:15.360 and you get the rest of them to just do whatever you want but that concept like that quote and both 472 00:38:15.360 --> 00:38:19.680 of those came from that experience of having someone tell me this is what hard feels like 473 00:38:21.120 --> 00:38:25.520 this is when most people stop and this is why they don't win is also another 474 00:38:26.080 --> 00:38:31.040 beautiful bit of motivation and given that I spent a little bit of time with goggins and camhains 475 00:38:31.040 --> 00:38:34.960 two guys I was telling you about this before you said it must be nice as we walked in so 476 00:38:34.960 --> 00:38:42.400 Cameron Haynes bow hunter extraordinaire lives in Oregon and he has behind the power rack in his 477 00:38:42.400 --> 00:38:48.080 garage where he lifts he has must be nice written and I was like why do you got that put up on 478 00:38:48.080 --> 00:38:52.080 there and he was like it's because everyone says must be nice to be you can must be nice to be 479 00:38:52.080 --> 00:38:57.600 sponsored by height and all of these like top-level bow things and go on Rogan he was there's a video 480 00:38:57.600 --> 00:39:03.520 that went super viral of goggins losing his shit after John Jones won last weekend and the guy 481 00:39:03.520 --> 00:39:07.200 that he's hugging his camp so it's like I must be nice for you to be backstage at UFC must be nice 482 00:39:07.200 --> 00:39:13.360 for this and I've seen what that guy does and that guy picks up a rock that weighs about 80 pounds 483 00:39:13.360 --> 00:39:17.040 and it's got the word poser written on the front of it because people call him a poser and he 484 00:39:17.120 --> 00:39:24.400 carries it up a hill that is maybe like a thousand foot of elevation mile and a half high with no 485 00:39:24.400 --> 00:39:28.400 fanfare at the end no finish line doesn't post it on social media unless the teams they're filming 486 00:39:28.400 --> 00:39:33.520 it with someone else and then carries it back down put it in the boot of his raptor tribes away 487 00:39:33.520 --> 00:39:38.240 and he just does that because he needs to remind himself that he's doing the stuff that is hard 488 00:39:38.240 --> 00:39:43.920 and this is where most people stop and this is why they don't win combined with this is what hard 489 00:39:43.920 --> 00:39:50.240 feels like justifies things being hard now I do worry and I find this in myself sometimes as 490 00:39:50.240 --> 00:39:56.080 well that you can be so good at dealing with suffering that you can actually push yourself 491 00:39:56.080 --> 00:40:01.440 a little bit too far and you're I'm starting to bear more burden than I can basically take on 492 00:40:01.440 --> 00:40:06.320 and the art of not burning out is something that I think a lot of people if you if this resonates 493 00:40:06.320 --> 00:40:10.640 with you the art of not burning out is something that you really really need to be able to feel 494 00:40:10.640 --> 00:40:15.440 and like realizing what happens when you just start to glance off the bottom side of it and go okay 495 00:40:15.440 --> 00:40:19.040 I'm just gonna ease off the gas a little I need to take this afternoon to go 496 00:40:19.760 --> 00:40:23.120 sauna and get some sunshine and chill out and get some food and then I can put my foot back on 497 00:40:23.120 --> 00:40:27.920 maybe a little bit tomorrow and we'll temper it but just it justifies the fact that 498 00:40:29.200 --> 00:40:34.720 I use this stat all the time 90% of podcasts don't make it past episode three and of the 90% of 499 00:40:34.720 --> 00:40:41.040 the 10% that do 90% don't make it past episode 20 so by making 21 podcasts you're in the top 500 00:40:41.040 --> 00:40:47.120 percentile of all podcasters ever in history that's what hard feels like and that's not even hard 501 00:40:47.120 --> 00:40:53.040 it's just consistent fuck me it's less than half a year yeah insane I hear stats like that and I 502 00:40:53.040 --> 00:40:59.280 just think man it is so easy to win like that I mean like when I hear that that's exactly what I 503 00:40:59.280 --> 00:41:05.920 think I'm just like man if everyone is like struggling to win it's like you like most of the pain 504 00:41:05.920 --> 00:41:11.040 that people experience is purely in their own minds and so to your point I think there's an interesting 505 00:41:11.040 --> 00:41:17.920 one between like burnout versus hard and so like for me burnout is when my I would define it as my 506 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:25.520 output per unit of time decreases so I can see that that's measurable right now like I can say like 507 00:41:25.600 --> 00:41:29.520 number of pages that I edit or the quality of the content that I create like my output per time like 508 00:41:29.520 --> 00:41:33.360 the team knows when I like when I'm like six hours seven hours into recording something they're like 509 00:41:33.360 --> 00:41:37.840 I literally start like slumping you're like like physically I just start like slumping and I like 510 00:41:37.840 --> 00:41:45.840 my cadence isn't as like I'm just not as sharp right there's that versus emotional burnout 511 00:41:45.840 --> 00:41:50.480 which I think people mislabel as burnout when really it's just like they don't know how to reframe 512 00:41:50.480 --> 00:41:59.280 reality and so what it really is is they got a comment on a post that bugged them and like again 513 00:41:59.280 --> 00:42:02.800 it's like pulling it from the shadows it's like no this stuff doesn't work it's like hold on 514 00:42:02.800 --> 00:42:06.720 what's the one voice that actually is coming through what is the real thing well there is this 515 00:42:06.720 --> 00:42:11.360 comment okay great it's embarrassing to even have to say that but when you say it then you admit 516 00:42:11.360 --> 00:42:14.800 it and all of a sudden you put it in the light and the shame kind of starts to evaporate because 517 00:42:14.800 --> 00:42:18.880 then you can name it and be like is this comment better than my bigger than my future is this 518 00:42:18.880 --> 00:42:26.240 comment bigger than me and one of the things that I um that has helped me was saying like what's 519 00:42:26.240 --> 00:42:30.880 true about this be familiar with Byron Katie do you know her I've heard her name yeah the work 520 00:42:30.880 --> 00:42:36.080 she does the work and um the the one of the first questions that she asks you is uh is it true 521 00:42:36.080 --> 00:42:39.920 how do you know that it can be true yeah and so it's like the same thing bring it from the shadows 522 00:42:39.920 --> 00:42:44.480 right into the light okay you have this sense yeah there's no shit it's like it's fucking smell 523 00:42:44.480 --> 00:42:50.240 yeah maybe something's a bit maybe something's maybe I might be like a piece of shit maybe 524 00:42:50.240 --> 00:42:54.640 I'm not competent maybe I'm not whatever yeah okay that's and the next one is like what if we 525 00:42:54.640 --> 00:43:01.120 confront it and say like what if they're right now what because a lot of I think a lot of 526 00:43:01.120 --> 00:43:05.520 effort gets put into trying to deny deny reality right like there's this clip that I shared 527 00:43:05.520 --> 00:43:09.760 uh from Tom Billy when he was talking about how he gets made fun of first years being big right 528 00:43:10.480 --> 00:43:14.640 and I think it's a really good clip because his point that he was making um because it's such a 529 00:43:14.640 --> 00:43:20.800 visual easy example for people to understand um he's like is that it's true I do have big ears 530 00:43:22.000 --> 00:43:30.800 and and so that's that's like the if they're like you have no right to be making content are they right 531 00:43:31.520 --> 00:43:37.280 okay and yeah I'm still gonna do it anyways because the thing is like I one of the things that I 532 00:43:37.280 --> 00:43:41.760 had earlier on in my career was like I didn't think I was a really good person like I was like 533 00:43:41.760 --> 00:43:45.040 I'm not a good person yeah like some people like yeah I just had that right and I had a history you know 534 00:43:45.040 --> 00:43:50.080 whatever and one of the things that gave me a lot of respite or relief from that kind of thought 535 00:43:50.080 --> 00:43:57.520 process was like comma that's okay because I can still do the things that create success and not 536 00:43:57.520 --> 00:44:02.800 deserve it and still get it and that actually felt very powerful for me because it was like I don't 537 00:44:02.800 --> 00:44:06.880 have to deserve to success I can still just do the stuff that gets it it's like you don't have to 538 00:44:06.880 --> 00:44:11.200 you don't have to deserve the girl but you can still do the things that get her and do you deserve 539 00:44:11.200 --> 00:44:15.520 it when you have her I don't know who knows I hate the word deserve to begin with right yes 540 00:44:16.560 --> 00:44:20.880 but like that concept because also I could segue into like gratitude around like if you think 541 00:44:20.880 --> 00:44:25.280 you deserve it then you don't you don't enjoy it but um that has been super powerful for me which is 542 00:44:25.280 --> 00:44:31.120 like what if they're right and because a lot of people just trying they spend so much effort trying 543 00:44:31.120 --> 00:44:36.720 to fight the fact that the comments might be right this might have been a fucking terrible thumbnail 544 00:44:36.720 --> 00:44:40.960 yeah you know what this might have been a boring video this this post might have been regurgitated 545 00:44:40.960 --> 00:44:46.960 content this post might have been inspired too closely by someone else's post right what if 546 00:44:46.960 --> 00:44:54.800 they're right and yeah does it make me a piece of shit what if it does and you end up getting 547 00:44:54.800 --> 00:44:59.200 down to base which is pretty much nothing right all that there is is actions all that there is 548 00:44:59.200 --> 00:45:03.120 is what you're going to do in response to this yeah you know what another brilliant uh 549 00:45:04.160 --> 00:45:08.640 add addition to this that you kind of mentioned yeah which is uh the fact that 550 00:45:09.200 --> 00:45:13.440 this is what hard feels like most people get to this stage and they decide to stop and now the bar 551 00:45:13.440 --> 00:45:18.640 is set so low godgan said this in the episode with me and it gave me chills when he said it who's 552 00:45:18.640 --> 00:45:24.640 like it's so easy to be successful nowadays because people are weak yeah everybody's weak Dana 553 00:45:24.640 --> 00:45:31.920 white says it as well yeah i tell my kids it is so easy if you are even a like weekend savage 554 00:45:31.920 --> 00:45:36.880 you will run these kids over yeah and for every single person it's gonna be chills again for every 555 00:45:36.880 --> 00:45:46.080 single person that likes to castigate the very padded victimhood mentality of the modern world okay 556 00:45:46.080 --> 00:45:50.160 cool like you can you can rail against people that say that the world is against them even though 557 00:45:50.160 --> 00:45:56.400 it's not and etc etc how does that inform the way that you should operate in the world right well 558 00:45:56.400 --> 00:46:04.080 okay what you're saying is everybody else it is fallible weak fragile in some way or another 559 00:46:04.800 --> 00:46:10.160 how does that inform the way that you act the way that you should act is holy shit if I have even a 560 00:46:10.160 --> 00:46:16.240 modicum of resilience right this makes the market environment for me so much easier whether I want 561 00:46:16.240 --> 00:46:22.880 to get the girl by the house become successful in whatever domain I choose to the bar is set solo 562 00:46:22.880 --> 00:46:30.480 yeah this uh if we're going if we're going tweets um this segues into one of my favorite ones which 563 00:46:30.480 --> 00:46:35.680 is uh you stay in poverty until you learn the first lesson of poverty which is two words my fault 564 00:46:36.560 --> 00:46:42.720 and so when I was younger I was really angry at my parents like many people are right just a 565 00:46:42.720 --> 00:46:47.920 fighter not doesn't really matter I was very angry and I blamed them for the woes of my life 566 00:46:48.720 --> 00:46:56.080 and I realized at when I was 19 that these people that I hated I was giving all the power over the 567 00:46:56.080 --> 00:47:02.480 fact that I wasn't the person I wanted to be and I was like well it's their fault and the idea 568 00:47:02.480 --> 00:47:10.400 that I had actually given these people that I hated power over my success was ultimately something 569 00:47:10.400 --> 00:47:15.760 that made me feel sick to my stomach and was what allowed me to point the finger of blame inwards 570 00:47:16.560 --> 00:47:22.880 and say my fault and then at least take ownership over the fact that like and like sure maybe your 571 00:47:22.880 --> 00:47:27.040 dad didn't hug you enough or maybe your mom was in present or whatever it is right it's like and 572 00:47:27.520 --> 00:47:32.080 and like I said this the other day and it'll probably piss off a lot of your audience so you know 573 00:47:32.080 --> 00:47:38.880 we can put our soft earphones on um like if you were if you if you suffered from racial inequality 574 00:47:38.960 --> 00:47:43.440 if you've suffered from gender inequality if you suffered from being born in Bangladesh if you were 575 00:47:43.440 --> 00:47:49.520 raised it sexually abused your entire life you would be completely justified in the fact that you 576 00:47:49.520 --> 00:47:54.240 are not achieving the things that other people who didn't have those disadvantages have achieved 577 00:47:54.240 --> 00:47:59.440 and I say this as a white guy who was born in America to a doctor father I understand that but 578 00:47:59.440 --> 00:48:04.480 the same degree you have the opportunity that Chris nor I have which is that you can be an inspiration 579 00:48:04.480 --> 00:48:09.360 to people who just who went through the same thing and succeeded combat despite those circumstances 580 00:48:09.360 --> 00:48:12.880 because I can promise that there is somebody who has had it worse and has done it better 581 00:48:14.000 --> 00:48:18.800 and I think that that one single point of proof and like there's a global point of proof that you 582 00:48:18.800 --> 00:48:23.680 can look for for sure but like you can be that very local point of proof in your community or sub 583 00:48:23.680 --> 00:48:30.320 community and I think um as soon as we shed that that's like I just I'm a big fan of uh power 584 00:48:30.320 --> 00:48:34.640 follows the blame finger so like wherever you point the blame fingers or the power follows and 585 00:48:34.640 --> 00:48:37.280 so it's like if you point it's if you pointed at the government government has the power if you 586 00:48:37.280 --> 00:48:41.760 pointed at your your spouse and say like it's their fault that I'm I'm not in shape it's their fault 587 00:48:41.760 --> 00:48:46.160 they never let me do anything it's like well you're giving them all the power and so it's like 588 00:48:46.160 --> 00:48:51.200 until you're like it's my fault it's also what if it's not your fault what if it's not your fault 589 00:48:51.840 --> 00:48:52.960 it doesn't matter and 590 00:48:58.080 --> 00:49:06.560 like I can't run marathons because I lost my leg at birth and either you can just never try 591 00:49:06.560 --> 00:49:19.840 or you put the metal thing on and you do it anyways