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Take A Whack At It

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Do you have a goal, or a dream, or something you want to do, and you just can’t take the first step? Take a whack at it. You know, you can’t hit a home run unless you step up to plate. You can’t catch a fish unless your line is in water. Whatever it is you want to do, go for it right now. I’m giving you full and complete permission. If you want to sing, go sing in the shower. Sing to your friends. Go to karaoke. Give it a shot.

There are too many people that I know in my life, and one of the reasons I started this daily growth hack, was to give them some inspiration. They have dreams. They have goals, and they keep telling me, “Doug, I wish I could do what you’re doing. I just can’t. It’s good for you, but for me, I’ve got x, y, and z reason that I can’t do what I want to do.” I hear this every single day. In my coaching business, this is a key indicator. Look, I can stop you from all of this problems. Just go for it. That’s the answer. It’s as simple as that. Take a whack at, whatever it is.

Do you want to be a professional tennis player? Get out and play tennis. It’s really as simple as that. Just step outside, step up to the plate, and take a swing. Babe Ruth, one of the home run kings, right? Do you know he struck out more than almost anybody else? Yeah, but yet, he stepped to the plate each and every time, and when we think of Babe Ruth, well most people anyway, think of him, think of him as a home run king, and he is. The reason he is is he took a whack at it. He stepped up to the plate each and every time and took a big swing.

Now in business and sometimes in life, I believe it’s all about hitting singles rather than swinging for the home run, but in order to even hit a single, you’ve got to step up to the plate each and every time. It’s a simple insight, but this is something I see plaguing a lot of people and probably plaguing me right now. So, what I’m going to ask you to do, grab your journal. Take out the five to thrive, your mind, your body, your soul, your relationships, and your business, and ask yourself in what area are you holding back? In what area do you have a dream and an aspiration of some sort and you’re holding back, you’re not quite going for it at full throttle? Then, write that down, and why? What are your excuses?

Now if you can’t think of anything, that’s okay. We all have these self-protection mechanisms, and maybe you don’t have anything yourself. Maybe you’re going all at it with everything in life. If that’s you, I applaud you. I really do. You’re one of the rare cases, and you’re an inspiration to me. But if you’re also one of those people that are holding back, you’re also an inspiration to me, because you’re taking time to go through those daily growth acts. You’re actually taking time to do the work.

In doing the work, write it down and ask yourself, “Geez, is there something I’m always talking to people about? Am I always saying, ‘Wow, I wish I could go to Thailand, but I just don’t have the money, or my boss won’t let me off work,” or whatever it is? Or, ‘Geez, I wish I could go rock climbing, or run a marathon, or sing,’ whatever it is, “go to The Voice the show.'” Who knows? Whatever it is for you, I want you to write that down.

Now, what I want you to do is take a whack at it. What’s the first easiest step that you can do in those categories? So whether it be your business … For example, I’ve always wanted to go rock climbing. Why have I done it? I’ve had opportunities. I’ve taken classes. I just need to step up to the plate and do it. All I have to do is simply call up a friend who rock climbs and go with him or take another rock climbing class. It’s really as easy as that. That takes the, “I wish I would,” or, “I want to,” category and puts it into the, “I’m going to do it,” and, “I’ve done it,” category. That’s going to free up energy for you to achieve so much more greatness in your life, and that’s what I want for you.

The second thing I’m going to ask you to do, besides doing the work, is to share this with three people. I want you to share this with three people that you care about. By sharing this, you’re going to open that conversation up and build your tribe. I talk about this in each and every daily growth hack, because it’s so important both doing the work and sharing this and growing your tribe. So, share this and grow your tribe.

Take it even a step further. Here’s your bonus! For me, I want to share this with a couple people that rock climb. Why? Well, they’re going to know right away one that I want to rock climb. Two is it gives us conversations we can have either on the way to go rock climbing or potentially while we’re there and build that bond. Now, these are friends I already have, so I want to continue that friendship. And of course, if these are people I’m spending time with, I want to go deeper. I want to go much deeper than, “Hi. How’s the weather?” And, that’s what I want for you. I want that for you, so you can become the author of your own story so much readily and more easily. That’s it for me today. Go out have a great time. Remember, be the author of your own story.

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Pain Provides You 3 Choices

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Pain is just part of life, we all go through pain. The pain of an event, a loss of a loved one, pain that is physical. Either way, pain provides us three ways to respond to it. I want you to do is think of these three ways and think about which one you actually fall into more often. And just be honest with yourself.

The first one is the initial reaction to ignore the pain, or blame others. Now, this is events in your life, other people, or blaming yourself. Now you could ignore it, and act like it didn’t happen and bury it and stuff it deep down inside of you like we often do. That’s what I used to do a lot of times is do that.

Or you’ll also see people playing the victim role, we talked about that in the last Daily Growth Hack. They play the victim role and they blame themselves, or they might actually blame somebody else. And it’s that persons fault that they’re suffering, or feeling the pain. I most recently talked about seeing this with a breakup, even though it was a long time ago. But the pain was still there for the person, about the breakup. And they were still blaming and playing the victim role, seeking attention to blame the other person. That’s one way. So one way you can deal with pain is by blaming other people, blaming yourself, or just ignoring it.

The second way you deal with pain is just changing your life conditions. It could be pain or something going on, you could go ahead and say, “You know what? I didn’t pay a bill and someone saw that and it causes a lot of pain cause it damages my psychology because Susie knows I don’t have money so I’m gonna work really hard to make money.” So you’re changing your life conditions. So maybe I get another job, so I’m working two jobs so I have enough money that I’m always paying my bills.

Or maybe it’s pain in the sense that, really simple, like hey my knees hurt when I run. And so I’m gonna change my living conditions in the sense of, I’m gonna get better running shoes, I’m gonna get a running coach that’s gonna teach me to pose running. I’m gonna drop some weight, change my diet so my body doesn’t have as much weight on me knees. I’m gonna foam roll my calves so that they’re shock absorbers, etc, etc.

So the second way you can deal with pain is just by changing your life conditions. The third way you can do it is by changing your blueprint. And we haven’t really talked about the blueprint. But the blueprint, and what I’m talking about is really changing your physiology, your focus, and your meaning. So changing the way that you respond to things. We talked about physiology before, what I mean by that is chest out, shoulders back. The way that your physiology is showing a commanding performance. Or, chest down, shoulders rounded really shows a depressing physiology so to speak. But also your focus and meaning. So what you choose to focus on when you experience that pain, and then what you make that mean. And that’s really important here cause that changes your blueprint or the way that you see things.

So let’s go back to that breakup. I’ll just talk about as if I was that person that went through the breakup, it isn’t me but I’ll act as if. So instead of playing the victim role and blaming somebody else, one thing I could do is change my physiology. Well, one, I could imagine that if I was hurt my shoulders would be slumped, my head would be down, and you could picture somebody that’s going through an emotional hurt or a breakup that’s really sad for them. But instead maybe what I do is I take a deep breath, diaphragmatic breath, I put my shoulders back, my head up, my chest out, and I get in that really powerful stance. Feet nice and wide, I’m really in a powerful stance.

Then maybe I change my focus, instead of focusing on the hurt from the breakup maybe I’m focusing on the opportunities that are out there now. There are so many people to meet, now I have some free time, I can actually go out and do the things that I like to do. By doing that I’m changing the meaning. Wow, yeah this breakup hurt but jeez I got all these opportunities now. I can go to events, I can really focus my time on my personal development, I can really focus on me so I can now attract a better, higher quality person. A better fit for me. I can really just live life.

And you can see by going through that story, so that story of changing my physiology, changing what I’m focusing on, and changing my meaning, it’s a totally different outcome. So instead of going through depressed mode. Super depressed, blaming everybody else, I’m now changing it to all the positives. And really, it’s just a matter of changing those three things. My physiology that allows me to get into that state of opportunity or possibility. And then I’m changing my focus, what am I choosing to focus on? Am I choosing to focus on the negative? Or am I choosing to focus on the opportunities or something different? And then when I focus on something different I can also change what it means. It’s just a shift. Now, changing what it means is really not changing anything when you think about it. I have an opportunity to create a story over here about me being a victim or creating another story over here about me being the hero and having all these other opportunities in my life.

Now my reality is the same, but yet, I’m still totally different. When you think about it, I’m just choosing to be the author of my own story and choosing which story fits me best. Now, if I go into victimhood a lot of things are gonna happen. Probably there’s a greater opportunity for my immune system going down and getting sick. Who wants to hang out with somebody that’s in victim role all the time? Unless you’re in the victim role, you’re codependent. You don’t want to be around those people anyway, right? So, for somebody that’s positive and for somebody that goes, “Jeez this breakup really hurt. But however, it just wasn’t the right person, now I’m able to work on myself so I can attract, draw in, and bring in the right person. I’m gonna focus on myself. I’m gonna do those things that I loved. This is a great opportunity for me.” And that is just a different energy and a different story. And that is exactly what being the author of your own story is all about.

I hope this helps you. What I want you to do is grab your journal, write out your five to thrive. And look at where you’ve had pain in these areas. A common one I hear about in The Author of Your Own Story group when I get messages is, wait. Pain and wait. Pain and relationships with a breakup. Where are you experiencing pain? And I want you to write down what that pain is. And then I want you to write down which of these three choices have you made currently, in that area? Now if you chose the victim role, that’s fine, don’t beat yourself up. But then choose something else. Choose to change your living conditions, or I would say, go even deeper. Choose to change your blueprint. Change your blueprint, what your physiology is, what you are focusing on, and also what you make it mean. Do this all through your five to thrive.Of

Of course, I want you to build your tribe. I don’t want you to have a tribe of victims. The people around you are naysayers and negative. You don’t need that in your life. You need people that are gonna uplift you, put wings under you and lift you up as you lift them up too. You can start by lifting them up and building your tribe by sharing this with three other people. Grab the first three people that come to your mind, share it with those three people.

To take a bonus step, what I recommend doing is something that I do. Is share with somebody that you want a relationship with. Now this is not a romantic relationship, so to speak. But someone that you want a relationship, a friendship to have with. Somebody that you look up to or somebody you’re saying, “Hey look, this person is in my avatar, this person is doing what I want to do. I’m gonna share it with them and bridge that conversation.” So do that right now. Don’t stop in a moment of insight without taking immediate action.

That’s it for me today, remember to go out and be the author of your own story.

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Imagine You Are The Idea

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Recently, I had someone reach out to me, and they wanted help with a new product they were developing. What they wanted to do was hire me as a consultant, but truthfully, they just couldn’t afford our fees for our agency. So what I did, though, is I didn’t want to leave them empty-handed, so I provided them an idea.

I just told them, “Hey, look, here’s something simple you can do. You’re at the infancy stage,” and I know many of you listening to this have ideas, and you’re at the infancy stage, where you’re just developing them. I said, “Imagine you are the idea.” So let’s take a cereal box as an example. I want you to imagine that you are the cereal box. Now, if you’re a cereal box, how do you make yourself more attractive so customers want to pick you up and buy you? How do you make yourself more attractive to the grocer, so you get more shelf space? How do you make yourself actually fit into a shopping cart better? How do you make yourself stand out from all the other cereal boxes?

Maybe you’re a parking meter. How does it feel when coins are inserted inside you? What does it look like once you’ve expired? How could you be even easier to use as a parking meter? Well, now, one thing that could come to mind is credit cards. Well, how could that be easier? Well, you could say, “I could use bitcoin, and I could just transfer that over, or transfer it from my mobile device.” The key here is to imagine that you actually are the idea, whatever that idea is. So if I’m Author of Your Own Story University, if I’m actually that university, how do I actually let you know how amazing I am, how amazingly jam-packed full of useful information I am?

And there are several ways you can go about it, but what I want you to do is pick your idea. Whatever idea’s floating around your head, grab a piece of paper and imagine you’re that idea. How do you feel? How do you look? How do you interact with the world? And what could you do better? What is it that can make you more user-friendly? What is that idea? Putting yourself in that idea’s shoes gives you that mental shift that often people need to actually push a little bit further forward. Now, this is obviously a small and simple trick, but I’ve learned over the years that at the infancy stage of product development, this is a great way to get you out of that linear thinking, that really analytical thinking of developing the product, and actually get you more user-friendly, and bring you to market, and bring up new ideas, and I hope that does that for you too.

That’s it from me today. Remember, build your tribe. Go out there and share this with at least three people you know. If you’re not doing it, do the work. Come on now, you’ve got to do the work in order to get any benefit of this. Imagine your idea. Be that idea. It’s a simple exercise, but it pays dividends. Even if you’re a service company, imagine you’re the service. You can do this, and you can apply this to all kinds of aspects of your life. That’s it from me today. Remember, go out and be the author of your own story.

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No One Is Coming To Save You

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I want to let you know that nobody is coming to save you. There is no Superman unless that Superman lives inside of you. We all go through challenges and struggles, but you gotta understand, you can’t play the victim role.

Just recently I was privy to a barrage of text messages coming through, and somehow I was copied on them. Through all these text messages, was a barrage of just victim hood. It was a woman complaining. You see, what happened was her baby’s father had left her. They had actually broken up four years ago. During that time, she is still lamenting about the breakup. Now, her beautiful son, I had a chance to spend time with him. He’s just an amazing being. But of course, he got back home and was excited to share with his mother his awesome adventures in the mountains, and all the things that were going on great.

All she could focus on was what he was doing, and how she was left out. Now, mind you this is a breakup four years ago, yet she’s still doing that. The result was her son crying. Her son bawling because here it was, her mom was hurting, and her mom … Instead of enjoying and embracing his laughter, his fun, and this young child’s joy of the world focused on her own pain. Her own loss, and her own victim hood. This is such a shame, and it made me extremely upset as you could probably imagine.

It also made me think, “How often are people going through on a day to day basis, walking around like a victim?” I see this, I just got back from the gym. I see this in people walking around, and they’re upset that somebody else is using their equipment, and it’s really the small things, right? There’s also the big things in life. How often do you blame your parents for your past? Or your boss, or your co-workers? Are you blaming a spouse, a loved one, a friend, for something that’s not happening for you? Are you not at your mental capacity because teachers didn’t teach you, or you weren’t given the educational opportunities that you felt you deserved? Maybe it’s not your fault that you’re overweight, or you’re not strong enough, or you’re not athletic because of genetics, or something else going on. Or those other guys, they’re just cheaters.

Maybe it’s in your soul. Maybe you were … Had something bad happen to you, and you just can’t embrace God, or the spirit, or universe, or whatever you want to call it. It’s just not for you. Maybe it’s in your relationships. Maybe it’s the other person’s fault. Maybe someone broke your heart, they left you. Maybe someone passed away and you just can’t move on, and so you just focus on the victim hood over, and over again. We all see this. Social media, you see it, where most people are showing the best parts of their lives, the are’s others out there, right? There’s others out there showing the worst parts. They’re lamenting over a lost love of some sort.

Where in your business? Is your business not good enough ’cause your employees don’t work as hard as you are? Is your business not good enough because people don’t get your idea? Or are you an employee that’s waiting for that next strike? Your boss isn’t paying you enough, so it’s not your fault that you don’t work as hard.

Wherever it is, we all do this, and we all go through this in some way, shape, or form. Some are bigger than others. If you’re listening to this, I’m going to let you know that it’s really important to identify these ways, right? What I want you to do is grab your journal. Take out your five to thrive. That’s your mind, your body, your soul, your relationships, and your business. This is time for you to do the work, get real, and get raw.

Where are you blaming somebody else? Where in your body, are you where you want to be? If you’re not where you want to be, are you actually subconsciously or consciously blaming someone else, or some other factor about that? What about your mind? Are you blaming someone else because you can’t do something, or maybe you’re not smart enough, or whatever your excuse is. Are you … Who are you blaming? Who is it you’re really doing? I recommend asking yourself five times. Now, this is nothing to do with the five to thrive, but ask yourself five times. What happens often is you come up with a deeper answer. What does that look like? “Am I blaming somebody for not being where I want to be in my body?” Then you write the answer down.

Then you ask yourself again, “Am I blaming someone for not being where I want to be in my body?” Hmm, new answer comes up, you write that down. You do that at least five times. Usually by the fifth time you’re going to find something that’s actually going to be raw. Something that’s going to be a little bit more real. How you can tell this often times is a little water gets in the eyes, you know? The sprinkler system starts to turn on. You actually start to feel and embody the truth and the reality of that.

Now if you’re a business owner, and all my clients that I coach are business owners, this is where you get to get raw in all your areas. The holistic aspect, but also your business. Often times business owners aren’t where they want to be, because something else. Somebody else, so I really want you to get where you are. If you’re not a business owner, even if you’re a student, why aren’t you where you want to be, right? Are you subconsciously blaming someone else?

When we subconsciously blame and play the victim role, we take control out of our hands. When you don’t have control, you can’t be the author of your own story. Now, I’m not talking about being a control freak, but I’m talking about being … Having control over your destiny. Having that feeling of hope. If you don’t have that, even subconsciously, you’re blaming somebody else, it’s holding you back. You’re allowing yourself to play small.

What I want you to do, is do the work. Grab your journal, write out your five to thrive, and ask yourself that question five times. “Where in my …” whatever your five to thrive, fill it in. Mind, body, could, relationship, business, “Am I playing the victim role and blaming somebody else?” Even at my level, I find that I do this often. I blame other people. “Oh my friends, they always want to go out and get beer. That’s how they want to hangout.” It’s a small level, but really my passing off judgment, am I passing off the blame, am I passing off the excuse for not being as lean as I used to be, as I’d like to be? Absolutely. I’m totally passing that off, and that’s not fair to them, and it’s certainly not fair to me.

If I’m doing this, I’m guessing you are too. All my clients are doing this, so it’s a human nature thing, and something we always want to check into. First, do the work. Always do the work. You have this opportunity, take it now. Second, invite three people to join you. Pick three people right now, first three that come to your head. Who are they? Who are the first three people in your business that come to mind? Those are the people I want you to focus on with this one. Also relationships. Build your tribe. Build the people coming. All you have to do is share this video or this audio with them, and tell them that you want to talk about it. That you just want to have a conversation, or you want to know their thoughts.

It’s just a way of building your tribe, and making your life better, and bringing your army and that support system behind you. We all need support, and this is one way of doing it, just by sharing this message. That’s it for me today. As always, remember, go out and be the Author of Your Own Story.

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Episode 100

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This is episode 100, and we’re calling this the “End cap to season one.” Why? Because season two is going to be new and different, and we’re really excited about it. Yes, we’re going to have the Daily Growth Hacks each and every day, but we want to let you know what’s coming up in season two.

See, I just got off the mountain, I was hanging out with my family. We were swimming in lakes and living the Author of Your Own Story lifestyle. I wanted to film this really quick for you. Season two, what’s going to be different? Yeah, we’re going to have our Daily Growth Hacks, and it’s something you can look forward to. But there are two main things I want to talk to you about. One is doing the work. We can’t do the work for you. We’ve produced 99 episodes. 99 before this one, where we have tips, tricks, and insights for you to go through. Now, if you haven’t done it, download all 99 now. Make sure you have them in your archives, and what I want you to do is go to a coffee shop, or right after this, take massive action and go through all 99, and do the work.

Make a commitment right here and right now, that moving forward every day you’re going to join us. Join us in the morning before you go to work, or before you’re doing anything. Have a cup of coffee and your journal out, and start. Start doing the work with each tip, trick, and insight. Now, we’re also going to be doing a listener Q and A. We get tons of questions, and I love answering them. But now we’re going to try to answer them live. We’re going to answer them live here on social media, but also through this podcast. I want you to enjoy those.

Also with season two, we’re going to be doing deep dives. Deep dives where we interview people who are living the Author of Your Own Story lifestyle. These are experts, as well as everyday people that have just figured it out. They’ve taken the chance, they’ve done the work, and they’ve dived deeply into the life. What I want to do is bring them in, ask them questions, and hopefully give you some inspiration. When you get a chance to know them and see how they’ve actually done it. How have they achieved the success in their lives, and how are they living their dreams? My hope is that this inspires you, and it also gives you tips, tricks too, to help you jumpstart or leapfrog their mistakes, and get to your Author of Your Own Story life a little quicker.

Now we’re really excited, and tonight I’m going to be working on the Author of Your Own Story University. We’ve got over 200 MP3 players, and a big box sitting right next to me. I’m super excited, we’re going to be loading those up with just a ton of information for the Author of Your Own Story University students. If you’re not a student, you’re not enrolled on the wait list, get on there now.

Last but not least, we put together a mashup for you. A mashup with the previous 99 episodes. Some tips and highlights, but I want to give a shout out to my team that makes this all possible. Yeah, I sit here in front of the camera and the microphone and just spout out whatever comes to my mind. But the team is what makes this a reality. That’s Billy, Ken, Darcy, Umad, Victor, Lilly, and Carol. Not to mention our amazing interns that we have, and our team is growing. We invite you to join us. The last thing, the last thing besides do the work, there are two things I need you to do.

is doings do the work. Second thing is build your tribe. Share this, share season one with friends and family. Pick at least three people. Why three? Because, if somebody’s sick, or someone’s not interested, that’s okay. But if you have three people, you have three people you can turn to on a regular basis building your community. Now, I recommend building it to three people each and every day. That way you’re looking at 1,000 people that are on your side. Your team, your army, whatever you want to think of this, these are your tribe that are following you in your Author of Your Own Story life, and people that you’re able to have bigger conversations with.

Just coming off the mountain, I was with my family, and we were able to talk about, “Hey, what’s going on?” And talked about a lot of things in the Daily Growth Hacks, and had common conversations, and different ideas, and different ways of thinking. The conversations just flowed, and was deep, and was touching, and it brought us all closer. Our ages were nine years old to 40. It was really nice to see even the nine year olds talking about the Daily Growth Hacks, and different aspects of ways that they see them. Of course funny, but also great.

I want you to have that. Build your tribe. There’s two things I’m going to ask you to do. Do the work, and build your tribe. That’s it for me today, enjoy the montage.

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Don’t Be Miserable in Advance

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Seneca said, and I’m going to read it because it’s a quote, “It’s ruinous for the soul to be anxious about the future and miserable in advance of misery engulfed by anxiety that the things it desires might retain its own until the very end, for such a soul will never be at rest. By longing for things to come it will lose the ability to enjoy the present things.”

Now I think this is so appropriate, especially for today in today’s society. The other day I had someone come up to me and said, “Doug, we need to talk.” Now it was done via text-messages, but that’s how I heard it, “We need to talk,” in kind of that deep tone if you can imagine. And it was very easy to go, “Oh crap, what do we need to talk about? Is something wrong?” This is a client of mine and I was just like, “Wow, what’s going on with his or her life.” I went through this process and I’m going to guess I went through this process for all of three seconds, but sometimes three seconds can seem like an eternity. But right away I went right back to my training, and that training has come from years, and years, and years of experience and really working on this. But I went, “I don’t know what he means. He could mean that something’s wrong or something’s amazing, so how do I know?” And I just kind of let it brush off.

But I do remember in the past- Oh, in the past I would’ve thought, “Oh man, what’s going on? What do they need? Something’s wrong, something’s broke et cetera, et cetera,” and I would’ve been miserable about a future advance, or people perhaps it was a visit. Like, maybe it was a guest visiting that I was a little anxious about. It could’ve been somebody coming into town that was staying with us, or even sometimes I say “yes” to speaking events like six months or a year in advance and it gets closer and I’m like, “Oh man, I got to go and speak at this event and I don’t know who’s going to be there,” and, “Geez, do I really want to go, and I’m going to miss my family.” I go through this whole list in my head, and that one, it lasted a little bit longer but it usually lasts only a couple minutes top and then I spin out of that pretty quickly, again, because of my training. But, back in the past, that would have lasted with me for weeks; just kind of been, “Oh man, I got to a speaking event and this is what’s going on.”

I’m sure you can relate. If I called you right now or texted you and said, “Hey, we need to talk,” or that common phraseology, often times we go right away into the worst parts of the future. We project this meaning into the future about what it could be or something bad. You know, human nature, you come up with almost the worst-case scenario. But now if you’ve been listening to these daily growth hacks, you know very well that you have complete control of this, right. You can define the story any way you want. So, what I chose to define is like you know, “We need to talk,” I was like, “Awesome, I look forward to it.” It’s a coaching client of mine and all of my coaching clients I develop really deep, personal relationships with them. So, I actually turned it around, like, “This could be really great. I’m really excited. I wonder what’s going on, what’s happening.”

And so just to give you an idea when we got on the phone, he needed to talk because he just doubled his business. He doubled his business with just a few mental tips, a few mental clicks and changes that he had put into his psychology that was allowing him to produce better results and he was so excited. So he actually got his financial statement, closed a couple key clients, and doubled his income, and so that’s why he wanted to talk; so it wasn’t bad at all, right. But, had I been to that miserable state I would have lost contact with reality, I would have lost contact with this present moment with, again, my family, which I talk about so much on this podcast, but I spend so much time with my wife and my so. When I’m not traveling, I’m here. I got whiteboards all over this room, we got a new one behind me that I don’t use that much. But I would have lost that, I would’ve sat down, I would’ve been moping around and really just waiting for the phone call kind of dreading it.

But at this point, it just changes it. I don’t let misery predict my future. I don’t play into that misery, instead, I want to change my paradigm; so, “What else is possible?” And you always have three possibilities. You have the miserable one, you have the positive one, or what’s else? What else is possible for you? That’s something I want you to think about. Right now if you have your journal, is there something in the future that’s coming up for you that you’re dreading. Maybe it’s a date, maybe it’s an event that you’re going to, maybe it’s just talking to somebody, or whatever it could be. What is it? Write that down, and then what I want you to do is write what else is possible for that, write a positive scenario for that. And this isn’t all about just being happy, this is really about controlling your own destiny and your own life. It’s really about being the author of your own story, right, because if you were to live in that misery you’re going to miss a thousand precious today’s, a thousand precious nows and moments, and I don’t want you to do that.

So write that out and then write down a positive meaning that you can associate with that. Remember, meaning equals emotion and emotion equals life, so change that up for yourself, really make a difference. And that’s going to allow you to enjoy today, enjoying this moment. And if you’re like the old me, this could give you a whole week of your life back and enjoy, and that’s priceless; a week of your life, holy cow, that’s just amazing. And if you can do that week after week after week, then you’ve mastered the art of being the author of your own story. That’s it for me today. Remember, go out build your tribe.

Share this with at least three people right now that you think would enjoy it, and spark a conversation with them. I don’t care if the conversation is about how bad my background looks or how you don’t like them. It doesn’t matter to me. What really is important to me is that you share these with a least three people so you can build your tribe, build the people that you’re having conversations with that matter, and build your base. That’s it. Go out and be the author of your own story.

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No Man’s Land

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Today, I’m specifically going to talk about business. Now, if you’re not a business owner, just stay tuned, because this could apply to you, or at least you’ll learn a little bit more about the things that you should understand.

Often times, I’m very lucky that I get to see the insides of a lot of businesses. Now, I see them through two different lenses. I see them, one, with my clients. So my coaching clients, what I do is kind of more a business lifestyle coaching, so it’s a one year program where I do a deep dive with the business owner and we go over all their Five to Thrive on a weekly basis, and also long-term visioning. And part of that is I actually get to see inside their financials, and helping them strategize their business to help it grow.

The second lens that I see it through is as an investor. I’m able to invest in businesses, which I’m very fortunate for, and often times that investment is an exchange, as a role or a seat on their advisory board, and I’ll also look at the financial statement. When I look at their financial statement, oftentimes they’ll show, “Hey, look how profitable I am, Doug, I’m love for you to come in as an investor, and kind of act as an advisor or a coach, so to speak, and help us tweak some aspects and see how we can grow this business, and we’ll give you X percentage of the business.” But when I look at their PnL, or I look at what’s going on, and I look at maybe there are three or four business owners is the one I’m thinking of that I just recently talked to, and they’re profitable. They’re making over $300,000 a year. That’s fantastic, except for one problem.

There are four partners in this particular business, and none of them are receiving a paycheck. Okay. This is kind of common, in fact, it’s almost always common, but the problem is, is to replace two of the key members, they would have to bring in somebody at a salary that would be $150,000 a year minimum to replace those two key members, and that covers all their profit. Now, you have two other partners in there that aren’t getting paid that are hoping for some kind of payout, and now they’re willing to give me a large chunk of that business to come in as an advisor and help them grow and help them scale. That doesn’t equate. They’re in an area of what I call No Man’s Land. They need the investment, they need the intellectual capital, and they need what I can bring you with my marketing agency and then my coaching to help them scale their business to get to the next level. They’re at that gap. The problem is that they can’t afford it, and they can’t afford to pay somebody else.

Their dream, of course, as business owners, as most business owners are, is to turn a profit and also to be able to eventually step out, or have an exit of the business. But if they are actually to pay somebody, pay somebody a workable salary, or what we’d look at as a salary that most people would take to cover their spot, so whatever tasks that they do. Remember they have two key members in this business. So to pay somebody, it’s a minimum of $150,000 a year for the two key members. Now the other two, you could probably find somebody at a little bit lower rate, and they’re going to be listening to this, so no offense here, but they know this, but still they would be at a deficit right now, right? If you were actually to take that $300,000, reinvest it into the business by hiring in and replacing those four key workers, you’re in a deficit. You’re at a loss all of a sudden.

When I look at a business, and if you’re an employee and you look at a business, and you look at you’re in a business where your boss is just doing a ton of work, what would it cost to replace that key person, or that key personnel that’s part of the business. That’s what we want to look at as far as what we call No Man’s Land. No Man’s Land again is that point where you’ve built a business, you’ve done your sweat equity, and that’s amazing, and if you’ve done that I applaud you. I’ve been there, I totally understand what you’re going through. However, if you want to replace yourself, and truly be a profitable business, you should be able to at least pay yourself and replace yourself, or at least have the income that you could replace yourself, if you get sick, something happens, God forbid there’s an accident, something along those lines.

In that gap, that gap between start-up phase and then real profitable phase where you can bring in somebody else to come in as an advisor or a key position in your company, you’re in No Man’s Land. You’re in this little space where you really need to figure out how to make that profit, how to make that next turn. Maybe it is bringing in an advisor and then negotiating something with them. But figuring out what that is. Now, if you’re an employee, you want to look at your business or your boss’s business, and see if that’s in No Man’s Land too.

I would guess that almost every business I’ve ever looked at that has gone through the No Man’s Land phase hasn’t thought about it. They haven’t thought about the fact that they’re in a position where it looks profitable, it looks like they’re doing great, but actually when you pencil it out and you add in all the other factors, the sweat equity, and you replace those key people, they’re actually in debt, and they’re actually not profitable at all. This isn’t to despair them because there’s a way around that. You have to come up with an actionable plan to get out of No Man’s Land.

That’s it for me today. Just a quick business tip, something I see all the time, and I hope you don’t get into … Well, I hope you do get into No Man’s Land, recognize it, and then get out. The key to everything, of course, is just recognizing these aspects of it. Again, if you’re an employee and your boss is in there, if you have that kind of relationship, sit them down and talk to them about it, and look at what that is, because not that anybody personally is replaceable, but you need to make sure that a business is able to sustain income revenue in case something happens to somebody, and therefore I can pay the rest of their employees, their staffs, and everybody can have a nice livelihood, and of course be the author of their own story.

Have a great day, and remember, share this with at least three people that you know. Build your tribe. Start the conversation. I love to talk to you about it more in the Author of Your Own Story group, and that’s it for today. Have a great day, and remember, go out and be the author of your own story.

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Meaning Equals Emotion and Emotion Equals Life

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Now, when you think about it, every day we make things mean something. Listening to this Daily Growth Hack, or watching this on video, you’re associating a meaning. A meaning not only to what I’m saying, but a meaning to you, and to how you’re interacting with this audio, video, or what’s coming out. What does it mean to you?

That meaning equals emotion. It triggers some kind of emotional response within you. For example, if what I’m saying excites you, you get excited, you get the emotion of excitement. Hope probably, enthusiasm. That brings energy inside of you. It not only brings energy inside of you but also radiates out. You can see if somebody’s excited about something, and it’s contagious, right? That emotion, that emotion is part of life, right? You can also say that the emotion is that what brings somebody a truly magnificent life. Not just an ordinary life where you’re humdrum going through your days, it’s actually the emotion that brings the character, the good stuff to life. It’s love, it’s passion, it’s energy, it’s excitement, it’s hope, it’s really getting in there.

You know, also it’s the sadness. Unfortunately, you have to see the valleys and go through the valleys to actually recognize the mountains. If you’re always happy, they call that crazy, right? No one ever is always happy. Now, but you can control things, to a certain degree. That’s the way you associate the meanings to those things that control the emotion. For example, the other day I was hoping to get an email from a client. The client did not email me. Now, I had an option there. I got frustrated, upset, and then I started saying, “Well what does this mean? Is the client mad at me, are they upset, do they not like the service that was I providing?” It was very easy for me to get frantic, anxious, and maybe even depressed, and scared, right?

But I didn’t associate that meaning. The meaning I took from that is, “Hey, the client didn’t get back to me, and therefore I got tons of space and time to do everything else that I wanted to do.” Everything else that was in my journal that I planned on doing that day, and I got excited about it. I flipped it around. Turns out, the client had an emergency. They actually had a tragedy in their own lives that they had to take care of in order to get back to me. Everything worked out fine.

Now, if I would have associated that meaning, so the meaning of despair, “The client isn’t getting back to me ’cause they don’t like me, they don’t like the work, they’re not happy.” Whatever it is, that would spill over to my whole day. I would start panicking, maybe even trying to contact them, trying to figure out what’s going on, talking to my team. I’m like, “Hey, pick up the phone. Hey, what happened? Did something go wrong? Did you hear back from them?” Going back and forth, and then being stressed out, and going and hanging out with my wife, and my child, and just having that stressed out energy that nobody wants to be around. Trust me, nobody wants to be around it ’cause I’ve been in that for years as a young business owner.

I could have gone for that story in the back of my head, and just really been worried about it, consumed. Which also means I wouldn’t be present with anybody I interacted with. Instead, I made it mean nothing. I made it mean, they didn’t email me, that’s just a fact. Okay, whatever. I moved on. I decided to not create a story about that, and then I got excited about the free space that I now had to work on other projects and things that I wanted to work on. I did, and I took that excitement, I took that energy, and I applied it throughout my businesses. I also was able to hang out with my wife and child, be fully present and happy, and joyful about it.

That’s what life is about. Remember when you have to mean, it’s whatever you make that mean, equates to an emotion, and then emotion equates to having an epic Author Of Your Own Story life. What I want you to do is write this equation out in your journal, and write it in big, bold letters, right? Meaning equals emotion. Emotion equals life. Now what I want you to do is think about things that are going on. How are you reacting to what I’m saying right now? What are you making it mean? Is that serving you? Is that serving you as the Author Of Your Own Story? Is that serving you as the person that you want to be, and the person that people want to be around? Does it serve your story?

Now, you can do this through your five to thrive, but what I would really like you to do is every time something is happening, catch it. When you’re writing in your journal, and you should be journaling daily. Most successful people journal on a daily basis, throughout history. In fact, if you go over to the Author Of Your Own Story Facebook page, we shared an article that somebody else wrote. It was shared by one of our members, it’s fantastic, and it talks about people throughout history that are actually using journaling on a daily basis as one of their best ways to get their ideas out of their heads. Like Leonardo Da Vinci for example, or past presidents, or people that you just think about throughout history have been very successful, life changing individuals.

With that said, I want you to be one. I want you to be one of those individuals if you choose to be. I think you are. If you’re taking your time to go through this, you should. You gotta do the work. What I want you to do is when you’re journaling and you’re coming up with something like, “He said this, she said that. He did that, he did this. Someone didn’t do something. This happened to me. I got Doug’s Daily Growth Hacks for Author Of Your Own Story, and we’re almost at episode 100.” I think episode 100 comes out on the 28th of August. Maybe you haven’t been doing the work.

Well, if you haven’t been doing the work, you could feel bad about yourself, and get depressed, and get down, and do whatever it is you do when you get down. Or you could say, “Hey look, I haven’t done the work, but I’m making a choice right now. I recognize this, now I’m going to do the work.” Then get excited about that. That is two different lifestyles. The meaning, emotion, life, right? Meaning equals emotion. Emotion equals life. What I want you to do is start writing it down. Go back to your journal in the past, if you have it. And look at some of those things that you’ve written, and look at the meanings that you’ve associated with those, and then the emotion that’s tied in with that meaning.

Then if it doesn’t serve you, I want you to flip that around. All right, that’s it for me today. Remember, build your tribe. This is your life, you are the Author Of Your Own Story and you need people around you. You need a bigger tribe. Share this with three people right now, right now. Don’t wait. Share it with three people right now that you think could benefit from this, and then go out and be the Author Of Your Own Story.

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Accountability Partners and Rocket Booster Friends

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Rocket booster friends, as Lisa Nichols calls them, who I love by the way, and if you get a chance look up Lisa Nichols if you’re not familiar with her. Also, accountability partners. That’s a word I use in my coaching and just in my daily life. What’s the importance of having these people in your life? Well, accountability partners are those people that are going to keep you on the path. They’re the people that are going to give you encouragement on your journey to becoming the author of your own story.

Remember, this is a journey. It’s not like you just get there and that’s it and you throw your hands up. It’s a lifestyle. It’s a journey and these are people that encourage you along the way. These are also the people that give you a swift kick in the butt if you’re falling off, or if you go into the excuse train, right? You go into those excuses of why you’re not doing things. “Oh well, I’m not doing the actions at the end of these daily growth hacks, because of what?” We all have time to do them. That’s when an accountability partner really comes in handy. I have an accountability partner and my accountability partner is one of the world’s highest level coaches. He and I actually coach each other. The way it works is Tuesday I coach him and Thursday he coaches me.

When I say, “Coaching,” we’re real, although we are coaching, we’re also being accountability partners with each other. It works differently for both of us, but I’ll walk you through kind of the process that I go through and maybe that can help you with your accountability partner. Before I do that, let’s talk about who you should pick. Now, if you don’t have an accountability partner now, first step is you need to get one. It’s not a should, want, you just need it. I think it is one of the most important things on your journey and your path of continuous growth is to have these people in your corner. Now, almost every daily growth hack I talk to you about building your tribe and I talk about it for a variety of ways, or reasons, excuse me, but one of the most important ones is the more people you have around you that are having conversations like you and I are having right now, the faster it is that you’re going to get to your goals and it up levels you, right?

What’s that saying? A rising tide raises all ships. The people around you, as they continue to grow, so will you. It lifts the level of conversations you’re going to be having. It also keeps you on that path. Now, out of those people you want to pick somebody who is, what I would recommend, is someone who’s equally as motivated, if not one level above you. This is the same theory we always talked about in fitness about having a workout partner, right? Do you want that workout partner who is more dedicated than you, right? Who’s not going to allow you to sleep in for your workouts or miss that set, or go, “Hey? Yeah, my arm’s a little tired. Let’s go out to the pub.” You don’t want that person. You want the person that’s like, “No, we said we’re doing five sets of five and we’re doing them and we’re going heavy.” That’s the person you want as your accountability partner too.

You also want somebody that you feel very comfortable being vulnerable with. An accountability partner is someone you should be able to not only share your wins but also your losses, right? Because it happens. We’re all human. I don’t care who you are, things happen, right? Things happen where maybe you’re not going as fast as you want to, or you take the wrong path, or you say or do the wrong things, and you don’t want judgment around that. You want someone who’s going to encourage you and gently remind you of why you’re doing what you do. See, my journey, my path should be and is totally different than yours. We may have some things that are similar. Maybe you want a mobile lifestyle that allows you to control your businesses while traveling around the world like I do, or maybe you want a great relationship, like I happen to have with my wife, but our goals are different and probably our reasons why are different because our backgrounds are different.

With that said, you want to choose an accountability partner you feel extremely comfortable with. Now, this doesn’t have to be somebody you know extremely well, right? When I started with my coach, we didn’t really know each other that well. We knew about each other, had kind of talked back and forth, and it evolved into this relationship that we have today. With that said, you want to find somebody who is extremely motivated. Someone who’s going to show up on time, every time with you. You don’t want the person that’s going to be five minutes late, one minute late to a call because that’s just disrespectful. I mean, it happens every once in a while, but you want somebody who’s going to be on time, and is in your corner, and fully supports you, and you want to be able to fully support them.

Now, your accountability partner, usually there’s some reciprocity there, right? You are accountability partners with each other. There are times when you can get, or usually hire an accountability partner, whether it be a life coach of sorts, or there are actual programs out there that you can just hire someone to keep you accountable, and that’s great. That’s a one-way street and that’s where you’re doing a transaction. You’re giving them money in exchange for them keeping you accountable. That’s fine too. I find the emotional exchange to be much more valuable than the monetary exchange. That’s just from my personal experience. This person’s going to keep you accountable and it’s somebody that you’re going to want to meet with at least on a weekly basis. Now, I know a lot of people that are very successful that have had the same accountability partner groups for decades and they meet everyday.

They can get on the phone at like 5:00 in the morning and meet every day and just say, “Hey, how’s it going? Checking in. Where are you?” Boom, boom. They have a whole system. Now for me, it’s about the five to thrive, of course. I talk about that every time. If you’re new to Author of Your Own Story and to the daily growth hacks, we talk about the five to thrive. Specifically, that’s your mind, your body, your soul, your relationships, and your business. In my experience of doing this for over 20 years, it’s a holistic paradigm looking at every aspect of the existence of the human, right? Obviously, we lump things into together the best we can. What happens is, we get on and for the first five minutes it’s just kind of shooting the bullshit, right? We go back and forth and we’re just kind of catching up, giving some jabs, making fun of each other, as guys do. We’re both very sarcastic guys and so we just talk.

“What’s going on with you?” “I don’t know. What’s going on with you?” Just a quick catch up. Then we go right into it. We talk about what your numbers are. Again, you want to go over to Author of Your Own Story and look at the Seven Days to Becoming the Author of Your Own Story, so you can see the 30 day game. Now, we do a real quick intro to the 30 day game and if you’re in the Author of Your Own Story University, you’re going to get a chance to see the 90 day game. That’s actually really what I play with myself and with my high-end clients. It’s a little bit more complicated, but that’s how I set my goals. I set my goals quarterly, so every 90 days I have a goal. Now, I have longterm goals too. These 90 day goals are smaller rocks and components of these two-year goals and visions and longterm visions. With that 90 days, I break them down to those things that I want to do on a weekly basis or a daily basis.

For example, for the body, one of mine is a workout. I want to workout six days a week and four of those I want to do heavy weights. When I get on with my accountability partner, he’s … “Doug, what’re your numbers?” The numbers are kind of like basically you do it or you don’t. If you don’t … If you do it, it’s a great job, keep moving forward. “How’s that feeling? Go in.” We move forward pretty quickly if you’re hitting your numbers. Then if you’re not, then it’s, “Why?” A perfect example is I have a 17-week newborn, so if you’re watching this you can see the bags under my eyes and if you’re listening to this, just imagine. I can get really tired. It’s sleep deprivation times 10. My alarm goes off, I’ve been up all night. My wife luckily takes care of our newborn, but I still wake up, so I’m still up.

When my alarm goes off, it goes off at 5:15, you hit the snooze and or actually hit stop and roll over and just feel the warmth of those sheets and I’m just tired. I might cuddle my wife or she might roll over and put her arm around me and I start thinking, “You know what? Hmm? It’s much better for me just to sleep in today, because if you don’t sleep cortisol increases.” I have all these facts. I have almost the disadvantage of doing a lot of scientific research early on in my career in the fitness industry, so I can come up with all these stats of why I shouldn’t wake up and I should get sleep to justify those. In this instance, let’s say I missed that. Usually, if I miss one workout, I miss two. For some reason, I miss the next one too. I sleep in again. That same reasoning keeps continuing regardless.

If I’m getting on with my accountability partner, what he might say is, “Okay. That’s great. You chose to do that, no right or wrong. Does that serve you? Is this serving you to the higher being of who you want to be?” Sometimes that answer’s, “Yes.” Sometimes it’s like, “You know what? I was just exhausted and I needed to sleep.” For me and my quest in my life, fitness is very important, but so is holistic being and if I don’t sleep, certain times, I can’t have that holistic relationship with my wife, my child, my friends, family, etc., and that’s really important to me. There are other times when I’m saying, “No. You know what? I made an excuse up, I just didn’t hit the workout,” and we’ll talk about why, and what are those reasons. We are at the point where we can get vulnerable and deep pretty quickly. I coach a lot of people and so I require them to come deep quickly and I pull it out of them and he does the same.

We have this pull and respect of a relationship. That’s what your accountability partner should have for you. We also check-in with each other, so we’ll ping each other every once in a while. For example, if there’s a big project. For him, he’s launching part of his business and he’s really hoping to grow it and he’s got a lot of little things that need to be put in place to make that happen. For his 90 day vision, for him to get there, there are all these things that need to happen in order for that to occur when he wants it to occur. I might ping him. I might send him a Facebook message. That’s usually what I do for him, a quick little ping, “How’s it going? What’s happening?” We actually run it all on the Author of Your Own Story project management, so it’s called … You’ll see that. It’s a project-based camp. Author of Your Own Story University members that are listening to this or watching this, you know exactly what I’m talking about.

It’s a sophisticated software system that monitors all of this and keeps it all on track and reminds them. I might send him a quick message, or put a task on there for him. Just a gentle reminder to make sure he’s on the right path and that’s critical. We’ll have this discussion and during this time, right? Knowing your numbers from the five to thrive could only take five minutes. Then we go deeper, right? “What’s the next steps? What’s your vision? How are you feeling about your vision? Do you feel aligned? Where is it going?” We can end there, but often times we’ll go a little deeper and we’ll say, “Is there any area, or one area that you’re struggling in the most?” There usually is, right? Sometimes it’s relationships. Sometimes it’s business. There might be something coming up. Then we go back and forth and talk about it and have a discussion.

Really, the other person is almost like a sounding board and by just saying what my problem is in say, my business while talking I might come up with an idea. I’m like, “Oh my gosh, it’s now so clear in talking to you. Thank you so much.” Then we go about our way. Now, we decided to do these an hour, so again, I coach him on Tuesday, he coaches me on Thursday. That’s how we do it right now. We go about an hour. Although, if something’s going big in somebody’s life, we might just go, “You know what? This is all about you. I know it’s supposed to be my day, but I’m doing well and we need to dive deep into you.” That’s really, to me, that’s how accountability partnerships really work. It’s not just a horse trade, it’s really a relationship. You might consider doing the same thing and finding this for your accountability partner.

Now, if you don’t have an accountability partner, go over to the Author of Your Own Story community, right? It’s a Facebook group. It’s a closed group. We’ll get you in if you’re not in there already and we’ll assign you to an accountability partner. Just raise your hand in the group, introduce yourself, and say, “Hey look, I’m looking for an accountability partner,” and we’ll help match you with somebody else in the group. Of course, we don’t really do a lot of investigation on who’s who. We’re just really trying to … It’s like a dating service for accountability partners. We’re just trying to set you up with other people who are on their journey. The great thing about that is there’s some anonymity to that if I could talk, about you don’t really know these people, so you can share your soul. Also, know that these people that are joining the Author of Your Own Story community are people who are dedicated to the journey that you’re on as well.

They’re also going to be vested in their success and into yours. If anything you get out of this, what I’d love for you to do is right now if you don’t have an accountability partner, grab your journal and write out five people. Five people, that you think would be great accountability partners and go big, right? When I wrote mine down originally, I was like, “Hey, Tony Robins,” but I also wrote down my brothers, friends, family, etc. Now, my wife and I are lifetime accountability partners and I wouldn’t go there for what we’re talking about because with accountability, you also want to include intimate relationships and be able to talk about them with somebody else. Although she is my accountability partner, I also want somebody else that I can talk about too, or talk to.

With that, write down five people. These are five people that you think would be fantastic accountability partners. Take this, this video, or audio, or whatever you’re doing, and share it with each of those, all five of them. I had a friend of mine do this to me. He just … He was like, “Hey, listen to this podcast.” It was a podcast from somebody else and it was all talking about having brothers in your life, like men, and having this group of solid men and he shared it with me and I got the hidden message. Really, what he was wanting … Asking, was for me to be on his team with his group of men and they called it, I can’t remember, it was like a war tribe, or it was something around war. All the men things happen to be around war. I reached out to him and we have conversations like this on a regular basis.

That’s exactly what his intention was, but instead of directly asking me, he just shared a podcast with me, which was great. It worked out really well. You can do the same thing, so share this with five people, the five people that you want to be possible accountability partners with. You don’t have to be accountability partners with any of them, but just share it with them and it opens that conversation. If you get anything out of this conversation, is get an accountability partner as soon as possible and get on board. If you need any help, tips, tricks, how to run it different ways, I’ve done it a million ways and I’ve run mastermind groups for years, and years, and years, as well as, coaching people, I’d be happy to help you out the best I can.

We have other amazing coaches in the Author of Your Own Story group that run their own programs, so you don’t have to join the Author of Your Own Story University or anything, just go over to the group. It’s free, it’s free and it’s only there just to supply information, just to help you out. There are no strings attached, so take advantage of it right now. That’s it for me today. Remember, go out and be the author of your own story.

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What’s The Deal With Daily Affirmations?

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This is a reader’s question or a listener’s question, I should say. One of the questions that came in was, “Doug, what’s the deal with daily affirmations? Are they a joke? Are they real? Should I be doing them, or should I just throw them out the window? There’s so much conflicting information out there.”

Well, I’m here to say that daily affirmations are excellent. It just really depends, like anything, on what you do with them. What I mean is, if your daily affirmation, let’s say, is, “I’m happy.” Maybe you’ve been a little down and you want to increase your happiness so you’re going to do your daily affirmation just telling yourself you’re happy. Now, of course, I think daily affirmations should align with your Five to Thrive, which is also aligned with your goals. Let’s go back to that example of just being happy. If you’re sitting there in a room, you’re saying your affirmations, you’re sitting down, you’re tired, you just woke up, and you’re, “I’m happy. I’m happy,” and you really have this physiology and emotion of just being depressed and sad. It’s not going to work. It’s not going to work for you.

As Tony Robins, and somebody who’s been a mentor of mine for many years calls it … He doesn’t prefer daily affirmations, he calls them incantations. Incantations, but in-can-tations. The reason he takes this phraseology and uses it differently is that he wants your whole body to be in it. I found that to be true, too. You see, even back when I was playing at high-level soccer teams, our coaches would have us visualize. Think about winning. They would have us get into it. I didn’t really get it at the time, but, of course, you’re with a bunch of other guys, and you get worked up, and you’re ready to go. You see this in sporting events, even professional sports, even today. The reason for this is the more you animate or bring your body, your physiology into what your thought process is, the more you’re going to actually feel it.

For example, when you think about, say example we use all the time, you think about a depressed person. What does a depressed person look like? Humped shoulders, slunched head, looking down, really down, kind of a frown on their face. You just kind of say, “That person’s depressed.” Well, if you put your physiology, your body in that position long enough, you become depressed. The same is true if you go the opposite way. So what does a confident, powerful person look like? Right? Chest is out. Shoulders are relaxed, down, and back. Head is up high. Standing is firm. Deep diaphragmic breaths. If you do that position, you become more confident naturally.

The same thing is with your affirmations. With your affirmations, yes, I think they’re critical because I think whatever your mind is thinking of is what you naturally start to move towards. Right? You just start to do that. Whatever you’re focusing on is really what it is. An affirmation is just a reminder of what you want and what you want to focus on. If you have an affirmation to be happy, then what you want to do is go, “Okay, I’m happy,” and really get into it. Think about some times in your life that you’ve just been so incredibly happy. I know for some people, maybe it’s been a year or two that you’ve really had just an unbelievable happy time. Life can throw you down at times.

Think back when you were a kid, or think of a time that you’ve seen a loved one, or you’ve seen a friend. All of us have them. Go there. Go into that moment. Remember what it smells like, what it sounds like, what it felt like. Was it cold? Was it warm? What was that moment? Then get into that affirmation. Don’t sit down. Don’t sit down. Stand up. Get into your affirmations. If it’s something happy … I want to think that I’m playing with my newborn son. He’s 17 weeks now, and oh my gosh he’s when he giggles. How could you not be happy? I get to that moment, just remember, just picture him giggling, and then I got to get excited and go, “You know what? I’m happy each and every day. I enjoy every moment of each and every day, which makes me happy.” That would be the kind of affirmation that I would write down and really get into.

Again, I think you should have affirmations for every category of your Five to Thrive. This is what I’m going to ask you to do: remember, you need to take action. Listening to these or watching these isn’t enough. Take action. We’ve done almost a hundred episodes of the Daily Growth Hacks. You need to take action. Pretty soon we’re going to be taking them down and putting the next season up. So take action now, in this moment. There’s no other time than the present. Grab your journal. Write down your Five to Thrive. Remember, that’s your mind, your body, your soul, your relationships, and your business. Write affirmations, or incantations, or statements, positive statements that lead you in the direction that you want to go.

For example, for your mind, I could say, “I speak Spanish with poise and confidence. I speak Spanish with poise and confidence.” I would say that over and over and really get into it. Imagine myself having a fluent conversation in Spanish, or as fluent as I can because that’s one of my goals by the end of this year, is to be able to have a conversation in Spanish.

Then maybe my body, “My body is full of energy. My body is full of energy. My body is full of energy,” and get into it, right. The opposite happens. I used to be the guy that says, “I’m always tired, I ran five businesses while the time was four,” when I used to say it. I’ve gotten even busier. As soon as I got rid of, “I am tired,” always saying that, my energy increased. It’s the weirdest thing, right? What you focus on is what you get. Now, you have to do the work, of course. There’s no secret to this. It’s really about focusing on something and going towards that goal. These affirmations or incantations are just reminders. Right?

Soul. You can say, “I am peaceful and tranquil whenever stress comes my way. I am peaceful and tranquil whenever stress comes my way.” Whatever you want to say. That’s one that I would use for the soul. I’m making these up on the fly, but I do this a lot. I have a set list of affirmations, or incantations, that I read on regular basis. I take it a step further because I’m just crazy and I get busy. I actually record it. I record it here on a microphone and I listen to it. I listen to it on my way to the gym.

I will listen to kind of a condensed version of what I call my Hour of Power, and in that has my incantations, or affirmations. When I’m on my game, and I’m human so I’m no always, but when I’m on my game, I get into it. I try to loosen my body up. Hopefully I’m running or moving while I’m doing it. Sometimes I’m in the car. I really to repeat them, and repeat them with emotion because I realize that if I’m going to do it, if I’m going to do anything, I might as well do it with my all, with my gusto. Really go out there. I mean, there’s no sense in just half-assing something. There just isn’t. It doesn’t make any sense. Might as well go sit on the couch, or watch a movie, and enjoy yourself some other way.

If you’re going to do something to better your life, to become the author of your own story, you’re going to have to put the work into it. There are just no two ways about it. I’m all for ease and flow, but ease and flow involve work too. It involves doing those little things. I’m here to tell you, as somebody that’s actually written their own story and has been able to live just an epic life, that I continue to live, and travel where I want to, when I want to, run my businesses the way I want to. Live my own story. I’m here to tell you, this is one small step there. All of these are steps. They’re all little critical elements to getting you to become the author of your own story.

So I encourage you unless you’re at the gym … If you’re at the gym, you can take little notes in between the sets, unless you’re doing some kind of circuit. Take little notes afterward. Set a timer. Set an alarm on your phone right now to remind yourself to do this exercise if you can’t do it right now. If you can do it right now, grab a piece of paper. If you’re at work, pull up a Word document. Use a Google document or Evernotes. You can keep these Daily Growth Hacks. Keep going, you know? Then list them. What I want you to do is list your Five to Thrive, list the affirmations, list why you want them, and then practice them. Go into the mirror and practice them. See yourself. Make sure you have the energy. Once you do that, what I want you to do, is do it one more time but take it to the next level. Take your energy, emotion, everything to just one other level.

Last but not least, I want you to share this with three other people. It’s really, really difficult. It’s possible, but it’s really difficult to become the author of your own story if you don’t have a tribe behind you if you don’t have a support team. Imagine going into battle and being an army of one, versus a huge army. Imagine just going and playing a sporting event. Right? Soccer is my sport. Imagine if I showed up to the field with no other guys on my team. It’d be a tough game. You’d just forfeit. The game’s over, right? I want to recruit people as much as possible. I’m recruiting you. I want you to be on my side. I want to live The Author of My Own Story lifestyle the rest of my life, so I’m recruiting you to hold me accountable and have conversations that mean something. Have conversations at a deeper level. Truly that’s what we all want. We all want that.

What I want you to do is recruit three people. If you don’t have three people, go over to The Author of Your Own Story group, join the conversation in there, introduce yourself, and instantly you’re going to have hundreds of people right there. If you don’t, share this with three people and build your tribe. You’ll be surprised at the conversations and the level and the depth of the relationships it takes when you do this. If you’ve been sharing this with three people, pick three additional people, and share it, and continue that conversation. That’s it for me today. Remember, go out and be the author of your own story.

 

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