Darcy Curry, Author at Author of Your Own Story

Running Your Life Like a Project

Now, when I talk about running your life like a project, what I’m really talking about is a conversation I had with a friend of mine. Now, he’s a business owner, and he manages several projects on the given day. He’s really efficient at it, but when it comes to his life when he leaves work, his life seems to fall apart. He looked at me and said, “Doug, what do I do? Like, you know, I go home, my relationships are in shambles. I can’t seem to get fit, my health, my energy is just down. I just can’t manage all of this.” And as soon as he said, “I can’t manage all of this,” a light bulb picked off in my head. He’s a project manager, so why isn’t he managing his life like another project?

So here’s a tip that I learned a long time ago, that I picked up. So I manage multiple projects across multiple companies, and the way I do this is by using project management software. So about three or four years ago I started using the same exact software to manage my life. Now, it sounds like it puts a lot of restriction, but in this organization and management, there actually is freedom, and that’s what I found. It really took me a long time to get around that. I had my own perception of what freedom should look like, what I found out was, when I organized things in the project management software, it allowed to me knock off those tasks quickly and efficiently.

So, what did I do? I went over and I used a software program called Teamwork PM, and I’ll put something down in the notes so you can check it out too. And I actually manage all of our company’s projects, both internally and for our marketing agency, in particular, all of our clients. So I’m managing hundreds of projects in a given week. One of those projects and the one that’s most important is my personal project. Now, why do I say it’s the most important? Well, if I can’t take care of myself, I can’t take care of my family. If I can’t take care of myself and my family, I can’t take care of my clients and customers. If I can’t take care of them, I can’t also take care of my employees. If I can’t take care of them, I can’t take care of you, and I can’t deliver these Daily Growth Acts to you.

So what I’ve done is, I went over to Teamwork PM and I signed up for an account, and I set it up. And for right now I have, one of my projects is Doug Holt 2017. Now, it’s not a catchy name, I recommend you come up with a better one, but that’s what I have right now, it was quick and dirty. But what I did is, I broke it down into my Five to Thrive, and the reason we came up with this Five to Thrive was, over decades of me taking personal development and business development, I recognized that there were five things that came into a holistic package; your mind, your body, your soul, your relationships, and your business.

And if you don’t have a business, remember, if you haven’t heard previous shows, your business can be a goal. If you’re in school, that’s your business. If you’re retired, maybe it’s philanthropy. But either way, these five things make up a holistic package, or a wheel of life so to speak. Now, what I’ve done is, I’ve broken my project management into five major categories, into my Five to Thrive. And inside of that, I’ve come up with two items, keystone habits so to speak, two items that, if I do on a regular basis, will get me to my goal, make me be a better man, make me be the man of my dreams.

Now, I’m already there to some degree, and I’m not comparing myself forward, but in comparing myself backward I can look at my accomplishments by looking at the tasks and milestones I’ve hit. So I’ve set my 90-day game. If you’re not familiar with the 90-day game, go over to AuthorOfYourOwnStory.com, you can find out more information there. But I’ve set my 90-day game as milestones. So every 30 days I have to hit a certain milestone, just like I would manage my business. I have to hit daily task; they’ll tell me, “Hey, your task is late.”

So one of my tasks, for example, is to speak Spanish. Or one of my goals, I should say. So every day I spend 45 minutes going through a Spanish audio and doing exercises. One of my other tasks is to work out. It’s as easy as checking off that list. Another task of mine is to reach out to a particular friend, to make sure that they’re doing alright. Now, maybe some people think, “Hey, look, you’re reaching out to friends, you shouldn’t have this on a task list. It’s your friend, it’s a heart thing.” Well, it reminds me. It reminds me to put myself back in my center, and it works for me.

And for business, I have goals for my businesses. What items should I do? In fact, for my business, one of my goals is to check the project management software, ’cause then I can manage all of these projects and make sure nothing’s slipping through the cracks, and do what I do best in my companies, which is the high-level strategy. And that’s where I excel, and that’s where I can add the most benefit to my staff. So I’ve chosen to do this and then talking to my friend, who is a project manager, I said to him, “Hey, what if you managed your life like it was a project?” He paused for a second, and then all of a sudden you could see the lightbulb go off in his head, and he just got super creative and fired up. And he went right to work. And I’m proud to say that since I talked to him, he’s actually successfully been managing his life, his relationships, his mind and his body. He’s been going to the gym, he’s getting his workouts in. Because you can look at it.

Now, there are sometimes you may not get things done on your project management, or in your software, your task, or whatever it may be, and that’s okay. You can set up simply and easily, and remember, it’s a game. This is life, it’s supposed to be fun, you’re here to enjoy it, please. So don’t take yourself, or the project management, or your task, or your to-do’s, or even you 90-day game, too seriously. It’s not worth it. But what it does give you is actionable items that you can knock off every day, and I encourage you to do these first thing in the day.

I try to set these off in the morning, so before I do anything else I have my PM for my life ticked off. Once that’s done, myself, my heart, my body, my cup so to speak, is full. And I can allow everything else extra that’s inside of me to pour over into others, and it allows me to give back exponentially. And my ultimate goal, as I’ve talked about before, is to touch the lives of over one million people in a positive way, so I can make the world a better place, and that’s what I’m trying to do today.

So, that’s my hack for you today, I hope it’s helpful for you. If you have any questions, go to the AuthorOfYourOwnStory.com community, I’m happy to answer any of those questions, and exactly how I use the PM, and help you set up your own, or what other questions you might have.

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Public Commitments

Today’s topic, public commitments. Hi, I’m Doug Holt with Author of Your Own Story, and this is your Daily Growth Hack, where each day we give you a tip, trick or insight to help you uplevel what we call the Five to Thrive that is your mind, your body, your soul, your relationships, and your business.

Now when I’m talking about public commitments, what I’m talking about is putting yourself out there. Taking a goal, a dream, or even a small task and making it known publicly. Now, the restaurant industry figured this out many years ago. They used to have a real big problem with cancellations of reservations. They used to typically say you’d call up a restaurant and you’d say, “Yes, I’d like a reservation for six please,” and they would simply say, “Hey, call us back if you change your mind.”

Many people didn’t, and so one restaurateur figured out quickly that if he actually asked for a public commitment, and ask the individual, “Hey, if you can’t make it, will you call me back?” The person would say obviously, “Yes, I will,” making that public statement.

Now, it’s a one on one statement, that’s still a public statement. They found that cancellations dropped dramatically, not cancellations but even no-shows dropped dramatically. Now, you can take the same tip and apply it to your life.

I use this with my coaching clients and I use it with myself. Take a goal, a dream or something that you desire and say it out to the world publicly. Take these daily growth hacks, for example, these daily growth hacks take a lot of time and a lot of resources to produce yet I made a public commitment to produce over a year’s worth of daily growth hacks for free and give them out to the world.

Now, by making this public commitment, it has pushed me in doing this. Now all my excuses, the lighting is incorrect, the sound is incorrect, I’ll have to produce these in my office because it makes it easier for me to be the author of my own story, yeah, that’s not the perfect environment is incorrect. I can make all of these excuses but instead I hung it out as a public commitment, I made this public commitment to my colleagues, I made this public commitment to friends, and I put it on social media.

Essentially, painting myself into a corner where if I didn’t produce these on a daily basis, people would know I was lying. People would know I’m falling short of my goal. Also, this allows the people around me to rally around my cause, to support me.

You see, I have a family. I have work. I run five different companies so it’s very easy for me to say, “You know what? I don’t have time for these daily growth hacks,” or, “I can’t do this.” Now, I’ve made this public statement and now I have the support of my wife, the support of my family, the support of my colleagues, the support of my employees to take the time to produce these for you.

This is an easy hack that all of us can use yet very few of us take the opportunity to do it. Why? It’s scary. What if we fail? “Doug, what if I mess up? What if I put this goal out to lose ten pounds in 90 days and I don’t do it?” That’s okay. You’re striving for it. To me, what’s not okay with being the Author of Your Own Story is making excuses of why you’re not doing it. Falling short of trying to achieve your goals.

You see, I don’t care if you don’t hit a goal, as long as you’re working towards it, as long as you tried. If you tried to hit a goal, you’re going to become a better person along the process.

I’m going to ask you this today, look at your Five to Thrive. Take out your journal, write them down. What are your goals in those five areas? Now, if you’ve gone to authorofyourownstory.com and take in our free seven-day course on how to jumpstart to becoming an author of your own story, you’ve already worked on your 30-day game. This is a fantastic experience. What I’m going to ask you to do is take it one step further. At all your five areas, publicly tell people what you’re striving for. If it scares you to put this out there, all the better.

Doing things that scare you are the things that allow you to grow. Growth is outside of your comfort zone, not inside it. Make your public commitment. One of my public commitments is to be able to speak conversational Spanish within 90 days.

Another one of my commitments is at 40 to play competitive sports again. Another one of my commitments is to grow my fifth new business to generate over a hundred thousand dollars each and every month within 90 days.

I tell you this because these are public commitments. Any area of relationships within 90 days, I plan to produce a book for my child that he can read when he’s older. These are my public commitments and I’m making them publicly to you. Now that you know, you can rally around me.

You can even say that these are ridiculous. It doesn’t matter, I’m putting this out publicly to the world and I’m asking you to do the same. Look, if you need a safer place to jumpstart off of, go to the Author of Your Own Story community where people just like you are making these public commitments on a regular basis where you can be supported by like-minded individuals who are here to encourage you to live the life of your dreams.

Make your commitments today, make them publicly. This will help you to achieve your goals. That’s it for me today. Make sure you go out and make those public commitments. I can’t wait to see them.

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Floating Down The River

Today I’m going to share a little insight into something that happened to me. I’m going to share this with you in the idea that hopefully you can see it happening in your life and pull yourself out, even a little quicker than I did.

See, about a month ago I started my fifth business. All my businesses are actually been created around my life and my lifestyle. This fifth business, we’re actually coming out to solve a solution that we saw a need for in the fitness industry. You see, in the fitness industry, there’s a lot of people that’ll help out business owners with their marketing, but only pick out one vertical. So, maybe that’s just social media or PPC or actually organic traffic. We wanted to create a complete solution that automated that process for fitness professionals at a price that they could afford. This has never been done.

What we did, my partner and I, is we put our heads down for the last couple weeks and really got to work. We got to work brainstorming on how we could fit this in. What were all the possible things that a business owner could possibly need? Obviously, I’ve been a business owner in the fitness industry for almost two decades. We know exactly what’s needed. Now it’s time to get to work, and we’re passionate about this. Now along this way, I got burnt out. I was putting in the long hours. I was putting in the work. I loved what I was doing, but I was missing things along the way. Now, of course, there’s seasonalities in business, seasonalities in your life. There are seasons where it’s time to play and there are seasons where it’s time just to get to work and get it done.

Now it’s time to get to work, and we’re passionate about this. Now along this way, I got burnt out. I was putting in the long hours. I was putting in the work. I loved what I was doing, but I was missing things along the way. Now, of course, there’s seasonalities in business, seasonalities in your life. There are seasons where it’s time to play and there are seasons where it’s time just to get to work and get it done.

Along that way, what happened to me was I was actually missing time with my family. I was missing time with my son, who’s only ten weeks old. I was missing time out playing. My in-laws were here and people were out hiking or floating down the river or going kayaking. I was missing these events because I was here, in my office, getting things done. Going crazy on the whiteboard. Trying to figure out the absolute best product we could put onto the market. We had it. Now we got to build it. I was excited about that, but what I was doing was drinking copious amounts of coffee, keeping myself up late. I just wanted to get done because then, I could go play. Finally, just yesterday, my wife pulled me aside and said, “You are going to go down the river.”

Now, what she meant was, “You need to take a break. You need to step out of this work and actually go float on the river.” There’s a river right by our house, and it’s absolutely gorgeous. I had been passing on this. The reason I had been passing on this is I was building the product with the idea that we could hand it off to the rest of our team, which we typically do, and they could go and actually put it into action. We were almost there. We had about 10% to get it across the finish line. My business partner was even messaging me, saying, “Hey, get outside. You’re working hard. You’re working almost too much. Get out and enjoy life.” You know? This is something that I preach all the time, but I knew in that seasonality of that this is the time to get the work done, but I also was missing out.

So reluctantly, I shut my laptop down with only about 5% of the work left to be done, and I went floating on the river. Now, I got to tell you that this lit me up. Being in the water, floating down, the sun on my face, trees out there, absolute beautiful environment with people that I love filled my soul. It filled my soul to such a level that I was able to come back into the office the next day and get that 5% done and get it done with enthusiasm and more efficiency than I could have possibly done otherwise. I’m sharing this insight with you because I know a lot of you out there are doing the same thing; you’re grinding it out. I applaud you for that. Sometimes it is the seasonality to grind it out, but remember the why you’re doing it.

It filled my soul to such a level that I was able to come back into the office the next day and get that 5% done and get it done with enthusiasm and more efficiency than I could have possibly done otherwise. I’m sharing this insight with you because I know a lot of you out there are doing the same thing; you’re grinding it out. I applaud you for that. Sometimes it is the seasonality to grind it out, but remember the why you’re doing it.

You see, what I missed were those precious few moments with my son that I could have stepped out and spent with him or that precious connection time with my wife because, by the time that I came out of the office and went home, I was actually tired. I was worn out. I had given my everything for this business. I’d given my all to create this product that would better the world, that would better these fitness professionals who would take this product and then help other people. What a great story. I loved it, but I wasn’t being the author of my own story, and I found myself out of balance. Even though I was in that seasonality of grind, it wasn’t the outcome that I was desiring. That small step of taking the time to float down the river filled my soul, filled my relationships, filled my tank.

I’m sharing this with you again because I want you to look at what you’re doing now. Maybe you’re like me. Maybe you’re in the seasonality of grinding. Or maybe you’re like the old me, maybe you’re the business owner who’s always grinding. I didn’t end up with five businesses because I just sat on my butt; I worked my tail off. During that, I lost a lot of things. I lost relationships. I missed out on a lot until I figured out how to be the author of my own story. That’s why I provide these daily growth hacks. I provide these daily growth hacks so you don’t make the same mistakes I did. I’ve invested way over $100,000 in personal development and business development and I want to give that all to you.

One of the things I want to remind you about is, what is your why? Why are you doing the things that you are doing? Open your journal and write those down. Write down your real reason why and then take the time to enjoy them. You get the chance to be the author of your own story today. Go out and float down your own river. That’s it for me today. Have a great day. As always, go to authorofyourownstory.com, where you can get more tips, tricks, and insights to help you become the author of your own story.

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Being Right Vs. Being Happy

I was at the gym this morning working out and there were two guys talking. One guy turned to his friend and started correcting his form. Now, I had just met these guys a few days earlier and the instinct to jump in and tell him that his advice was wrong, was really high in me. I mean, I really had to fight it.

You see, I’ve spent over two decades in the fitness field and acquired over 18 degrees and certifications and have been teaching fitness to people, as well as, to fitness professionals for a very long time. That innate nature inside of me just to correct him and give him the right information was going so strong and it made me start to think, “What is the outcome that I want?”

You see, I just met these guys and they were both really nice. I could’ve stepped in and said, “Hey look, the advice you’re giving is really bad.” This person might actually even hurt themselves and embarrassed his friend. I could tell that he was actually really enjoying helping his buddy out and really what I would’ve done is just push them both away.

I sat back and relaxed and just simply had conversations with them. What this made me realize is as little as three years ago my need to be right was so strong within me that I actually shattered relationships around me. I chose a black versus white scenario where there was no gray. I did this in relationships, friendships, but also in my marriage. Now it could’ve been doing the dishes. You see, I was brought up a certain way that when you did dishes you had them so sparkling clean even before you put them in the dishwasher and I would correct my wife.

I would go over and say, “No, no, you’re not doing this right,” and talk to her. Taking out the trash, “No, no, no, we actually we’re going to sort it a certain way.” There was my way, the right way in my relationships. What I found is it caused so much strife between my wife and I, between my friendships.

I constantly felt that I needed to correct people. This could’ve been on news stories, politics when I’d hear people disseminating information that was just blatantly incorrect. See, I had a shift. I had a shift where I decided, “What is my outcome in the situation?” In a conversation, I don’t have to be right and often times I probably am not. There’s a gray area. If it’s a relationship conversation, I can choose to be happy. Sit back, relaxed, and have that conversation.

Now I see this a lot within my own family when they’re talking about politics. You have people on the left and you have people on the right. Sometimes they just don’t agree, and they end up really driving each other apart, and not enjoying each other. In fact, disliking the other person based on opposing views.

The reason that is, is because their view is right. The other person is wrong. When you make somebody else wrong, you’re just pushing them away. You’re saying, “You are not enough. You are not good enough for me. I am right, you are wrong.” Now, I’m going to give you the opportunity here or the paradigm shift that you have the possibility of choosing to be happy in these situations.

Don’t be like the old Doug creating strife, creating this situation where you have to be right and it’s so hard to bite your tongue. When really you could have this outcome of this amazing relationship with somebody and actually open yourself up to learn another point of view. Fast forward to today, I actually seek out people with opposing points of view so I can learn more, because I realize how much it was so important for me to be right, rather than just being happy.

I can tell you from my own experience in relationships when I’ve made this shift from wanting to be right, versus, wanting to be happy, it has made me such a happier person. It’s opened me up to new relationships and my relationship with my wife has never been better.

I’m going to ask you this today, where across your five to thrive, but especially in your relationships are you striving to be right? Are you striving to be right with a coworker? Are you striving to be right with a friend? Are you striving to be right about politics? Is it about sporting events? “My team’s better than yours.” Where are you stuck in the black and white situation of being right, versus, being happy? Where is this creating unhappiness in your life?

Once you have that down, I’m going to ask you to do one more thing and that takes action right now. Take action in this moment of clarity to choose happiness. Look, you have the right to be the author of your own story and that starts with creating your story in the moment, in the moment now.

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Making Excuses Vs. Being Resourceful

I just got off a call with a friend of mine who coaches men to be their absolute best. He’s amazing at it. He’s built a very successful business and a lifestyle that most of us could only dream of. He’s extremely talented.

He asked me a question about one of my goals. Now, one of my goals is to be able to speak conversational Spanish within 90 days. Now, I just want to be able to have a basic conversation in Spanish and I’m far from that goal.

We were talking about this and kind of joking, as we often do. I asked him what other languages he speaks. His response was really interesting and one that I’m going to share with you. His response was, “You know what, Doug, my girlfriend and I, we tried to learn Italian, but it didn’t work out.”

So of course I asked more. What happened? “Well, you know, we hired a coach,” he went on to tell me, “and it just wasn’t structured the right way. The coach was kind of new at it. Yeah, he spoke Italian, but we just didn’t really learn anything so I just gave up on it.”

I found that to be very interesting. Because oftentimes, how often do all of us start a goal, hit one roadblock, and then just give up on it? Rather than using our resources or our resourcefulness.

See, I found this with Spanish. I recently relocated to Bend, Oregon. That’s where I’m filming this right now. Now here in Bend, it’s beautiful, but there are not nearly as many Spanish speakers as of where I’m from natively in Southern California.

So it’s very easy for me to make an excuse. Now back where I grew up and back where I lived, many many many of my friends speak fluent Spanish. But here in Bend, I don’t know people who speak Spanish. There aren’t as many Spanish-speaking natives here. So it’s hard for me to find people to have a conversation with. Very easy for me to give up.

So what I did was something very different. I went online. I went online and hired a Spanish coach. More than that, I came up with a structure for the program. I hired a woman named Ana. Ana’s amazing. She lives in Brazil. She’s been coaching Spanish for over a decade.

Now as I relayed this story to my friend, you could just see visually his face open up at the possibilities and perhaps the opportunities that he had missed out on. So what I did was just something that took a little shift and became resourceful.

With Ana, I talk to her. The more and more I talked to her, I realized that I was able to leverage geo-arbitrage and pay Ana a very good wage. I pay Ana $8 an hour to teach me Spanish. She’s a professional with a master’s degree in teaching foreign languages and tons of experiences.

As I talk to Ana about her career and what she did, I found that by teaching Spanish to foreigners, she made double the average salary that she would at home. So she was able to take care of her family and live a very, very good life on her own terms.

I also found that listening to audio books in Spanish, listening to Spanish music, I went out and I actively seek out Spanish speakers. I call up my friends and annoy them to the ends that I get them to speak Spanish to me and try to let me speak my Spanish to them. It always results in comedy.

See, my friend who is an amazing coach, he didn’t take it to that next level. Which got me to thinking. Where do all of us, in our five to thrive, in our mind, in our body, in our soul, in our relationships, in our business, do we have a goal and hit one roadblock and make an excuse?

Maybe it’s, “I’m not going to get as fit as I want to because, you know, the gym’s too expensive. Or it’s too far away. Or, you know, I need new running shoes. Or I’m not quite there yet.” Rather than being resourceful and coming up with ways to get to our goals.

So I’m going to ask you this because I know it occurs for me. Where across your five to thrive are you experienced this, making an excuse rather than being resourceful and pushing yourself across that next line? Where are you falling just short because you’re coming up with a barrier that makes it easy for you not to follow through?

Write that down. Then what I want you to do is look at your journal. In your five to thrive. Look at these areas that you made these excuses. I know I have mine and I’m sure you have yours.

Where are you in these areas and what can you do right now, at this very moment, to take action? To take the next step? Is it signing up for a sports league? Is it simply getting your clothes ready for a workout? Or even better, is it putting your clothes on right now? Rather than waiting tomorrow and going out for a walk or run? Going to the gym? Calling a friend? Telling somebody you love them? What can you do right now at this moment to take action and eliminate the excuses and utilize your resourcefulness?

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Talent Always Wins

Throughout my life, I’ve played soccer, and I’ve played soccer at a very competitive level. Although I only played one year in college, I played after that as well. I can tell you, I have never been the best guy on the field. Just haven’t. I’m not the most talented soccer player. I certainly don’t have the build, and I certainly don’t have the skills the other guys have had. Yet, I’ve been able to maintain being able to play at a competitive level because I will outwork the other guy.

I know in my mind that I am willing to put in the work, put in the hustle, and actually do what it takes to run through and make that extra step to get the ball. Now, in soccer, I can make this analogy apply to almost anything I’ve been involved in. I’m not the most talented in business, certainly. I’m not the most talented or gifted speaker, but I’m willing to do the work. I’m willing to do the work that pushes me forward.

I’ve seen this time and time again. I didn’t get this as some innate being or something that was just inside me. In fact, my father, one time when I was a kid, told me I always give up. I remember that. But what I started to see over and over again was hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard. Now, what I saw was, in my sporting career, was actually the guys on the team who tended to be the most talented would give up. They were lackadaisical. They knew they were good.

Yet, I was always picked at the top five on every soccer team I’ve ever been involved in. The only reason I was picked at the top is that I’ll hustle. I’ll actually go out there and grind it out each and every time. I love it. I love the competitive nature that soccer gave me. I love the physicality. I loved everything about the sport. I also had a mentality. People listening to this … a lot of the guys I played soccer with through the years listen to this, and they know. They’ve heard me say this sometimes. I’m a defender.

When I’m going down the field and someone’s got the ball and they’re coming near me, I’m mentally thinking, “That’s my ball. They took my ball and I want it back,” and I go in with that ferocious feeling and I get that ball back most of the time.

Now, I’ve applied the same philosophy to business. Not an aggressive, competitive stance, but in the idea that I know I can grind it out. I know I can have the longevity and pull myself up by own bootstraps and get the work done.

There are a lot more talented business people out there, but most of the people that I run into that are extremely talented stop short of the finish line. They don’t actually push themselves and run through their goals. See, it’s just like training or just like working out. If you and I were to get on the field and we were to sprint 40 yards, would you run through that 40-yard line or would you stop just a few yards short? Now, I know you’re listening to this or watching me right now, and you’re the type that would run through each and every time.

But what I want you to consider is that there are times in our lives that we don’t push through. There are times in our lives that we don’t run through the finish line. These are the times that we want to recognize and recognize as patterns. Why aren’t we doing those little things necessary to push ourselves through that little bit extra?

Now, I also often hear from people like, “Hey, there are other people doing this. They’re more talented than I am,” “There are more talented graphic designers, so I won’t start my own graphic design business,” “There are more talented people in the acting field, so I won’t become an actor even though that’s my passion. I’ll sit back and I’ll work in my accountancy office instead of following my dreams.” I can tell you that my personal life experience, and life experience of most of the people that I talk to and my mentors, is that talent works and talent works well only when talent is working hard. But, unfortunately, talent doesn’t tend to work hard.

You have the opportunity of just pushing through just that little bit extra. So I’m going to ask you this, in your Five to Thrive … Write this down. That’s your mind, body, soul, relationships, and business. Where are you not pushing through that 40-yard line? Where are you running towards the finish line but stopping just a little bit short because you can see the end goal right in front of you? Where are you not sprinting through that finish? Now, what I want you to do is write those areas down. Don’t judge yourself, but write those areas down and ask yourself why.

Why are you not sprinting through? Is it your career? Are you just kind of coasting? 5:00 comes around, and you have a normal job and 5:00 is your let-out time and so 4:50 you’re starting to shut down the computer. That’s not going to get you to your goals. Sure, we all have done these things at times, but where can you put that little bit of extra effort in and push through? Because you know when you put that extra effort in, time flies, you have more fun, and you enjoy it better. You feel better about yourself.

So, where are you doing this across your Five to Thrive? Now, when you’ve got this down, ask yourself why you’re doing it. If it’s something you want to do, push through. Then, what I want you to do is ask yourself, “How does that feel?” How does that feel to push that extra little bit through?

Remember, your competition, whatever that is, even if that’s a competition with your old self, they’re coasting through the 40-yard line as you push through. That’s is for me today. Remember to go to authorofyourownstory.com where you can get more tips, tricks, and insights from experts in all across different fields. Also, remember September first we’re launching the Author of Your Own Story University. Make sure you get on the waiting list today. Have a great day.

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Psychology and Tiger Woods

Imagine that you are approached by Tiger Woods, Tiger Woods in his prime. Now you’ve never golfed before but he puts a bet on the line. He says, “Hey look, I will bet you $5,000,000, we are going to golf one year from today, winner takes all.” Now, are you going to go and do what most people seem to be talking about these days? Are you going to go dive into the psychology behind playing golf? Are you going to go work on getting your master’s degree in psychology? Are you going to pick up every book that you can find at the library or the bookstore on the subject matter of psychology?

Are you going to read every self-help personal development book? I sure hope not, because game day comes, your mind might be right, but your golf swing certainly won’t be. Now I’m not downplaying the role of psychology, but I want to talk about sweat equity, or actually getting some experience. Now if you are going to play, and you really want to get good, you want to win because there is a lot of money on the line, my guess is the first thing you are going to do is you are going go out and get a golf coach.

A coach can help you really exponentially get better rather than just going out there swinging by yourself. They have been there, done that, and a good coach is going to have skills and techniques that are going to help you exponentially improve your game. You are going to go to the driving range, the putting ground, and you are actually going to be practicing, what, 10, 12, 15 hours a day every day?

Again, I’m not discounting the psychological component. Sports psychology I think is extremely important. But implementing sports psychology is actually part of an element to actually getting experience, getting the work done, utilizing that sweat equity to get yourself out there and actually playing some golf. Now if you do that every day, by the end of the year you’re going to have to play Tiger Woods, you’ve got a fighting chance. Are you going to win? Who knows, but you are certainly going to do a lot better than just hiding behind a book.

Now why do I bring this up? I bring this up because on social media I see all these gurus and people that I really respect, but often times they are always talking about the psychology of something. They are talking about things that they have never actually really gone out and experienced. They themselves are hiding behind books. How do I know this? Because I’ve had one of them reach out to me. One of them reached out to me and the first thing they said to me is, “I apologize.”

Of course, I was taken aback. “Apologize for what?” They said, “I apologize because I was listening to your daily growth hacks, and I was criticizing them. You stumble over words, you are not professional. There are all these things that are going wrong with the daily growth acts. I mean I like the information but it’s not as polished as a radio person or a radio personality.” Or, “Your background is off. Then, Doug, I caught myself. I realized that I’ve wanted to have a show of my own for over five years and I haven’t done it, and here you are out there doing it.”

They looked at me and they said, “what’s going to happen a year from now is you’re going to get better, you’re going to get good at this, and I’m still going to be here and that’s why I apologize.” Now see I don’t talk about this to brag about myself or anything, this person came out to me. That takes a lot of guts, but the idea is they are preaching to better your psychology and what they practice. They are preaching things that they have never experienced rather than just going out and getting your hands dirty and starting something, working at it. There is no better experience.

As a business owner myself, I can tell you I’ve made more mistakes than I care to admit, but I learn from those mistakes. Those learning lessons are things that I would never get out of a textbook. I’m going to ask you, you are playing Tiger Woods a year from now. Let’s take Tiger Woods out of the game and let’s imagine your five to thrive. That’s your mind, your body, your soul, your relationships, and your business. Where, a year from now, are you going to have a $5 million bet on the line. Go ahead and put that bet, something you really want.

Where are you hiding behind waiting to get the right information? Waiting to get the psychology, waiting for the best personal help, or personal development guru, or self-help book that’s out there rather than putting the rubber to the road. Maybe you need to get a coach, maybe you don’t. Maybe you just need to go out there and experience and fail and pick yourself up time and time again so you get better at it. I don’t know, this is your journey, this is your story. I’m here to help you become an author of your own story so you can go out and live a life of passion and a life you’ve dreamed of. You deserve it.

I want you to grab your journal, don’t just listen to this and just think of this as another exercise. Grab your journal, write down your five to thrive, write down where you want to be a year from now, and then get resourceful. You want to start a business, but don’t know anything about business and not sure where to go? Talk to a business owner? Don’t know any business owners? Great, look at social media. If you are on Facebook, I’m sure you have a few on there that you can just ping and ask. Or, LinkedIn is a great resource. Heck, walk down the street into your brick and mortar shop and ask them. When I had a brick and mortar store for over 15 years, I had people come in every single year and ask me questions.

I would sit down with them, oftentimes I would go for a walk or get coffee and share my knowledge and help them shorten the distance of that learning curve that I went through. I encourage you to do this, I really appreciate if you go over to the author of your own story community and share your insights. This is going to help others grow as well, and you are going to help me impact over a million people which is my goal.

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My Back Hurts

Today I’m going to talk about the body and I’ll relate it back to other areas of your life in a little bit. Now, I had a fitness professional reach out to me that needed help with a client. What they were talking about is their client’s back was hurting while working their abs. What they were looking for are ways of strengthening the back so they could advance. Now, I get this topic a lot or I get this question a lot because of my background. I also hear this from clients, from friends, from just people in general. Especially when getting ready for the summer, everybody wants to look good when the weather gets warmer.

Now, I get this topic a lot or I get this question a lot because of my background. I also hear this from clients, from friends, from just people in general. Especially when getting ready for the summer, everybody wants to look good when the weather gets warmer.

Often times, what these people think they’re doing is working their core when really they’re just working their abs. As they’re working their abs, they notice that their back starts to hurt and they feel a strain. The first thing that comes to mind, of course, is the back is screaming, “Hey, help me.” How do I strengthen it? How do I make that back better? They take all their focus and energy to make their back stronger when, really, in reality, what most likely is happening is the back muscle is doing extra work it shouldn’t be doing for the abdominals and the rest of the core region and, therefore, is getting fatigued.

The analogy that I often use is if you and I pick up a really heavy desk, I have a really heavy wood desk in my office, we pick up that desk and we start walking down the street because we need to move it. Halfway down the street, you decide, hey, I’m going to get coffee, I’m going to go get a beer, I’m just taking off. I’m left alone carrying that desk. It’s on my shoulders and I’m starting to fatigue. I’m starting to cry for help because there’s no one there.

Now, am I the problem? No. Not at all. The problem is the person that left. Left me alone. They checked out. Often times, this is what happens with your muscles. Now, again, this is a gross generalization but often times when people complain about a low back pain or strain or fatigue while working out their abs, really what’s happened is they’ve lost that neurological connection and their abs are fatigued and they’ve given out but they have that determination so their low back starts doing the work when it’s not supposed to. It’s not physiologically meant to do it. The low back raises its hand and says, “Hey, I’m not supposed to be doing this work. I’m fatigued. Get me out of here.”

This happens often and so when I was actually a trainer many years ago, I would tell my clients, “Hey, look. There are two options here. One is to suck it up or give it up.” What I meant by that is regain that mind-body connection to your abdominal region and try to perform the exercise safely. Now, if it does not go away, that, again, the low back stops screaming … If it doesn’t stop screaming, quit right then. Often times, and I would say nine times out of ten, people are able to train their abdominal muscles longer and have a better mid-body connection to get the results that they want.

Now, if they were just focusing on the lower back, what would happen? They would actually shorten the muscles of the low back causing additional issues while weakening the abdominals, the exact opposite approach for the result they’re trying to achieve.

I tell you this for multiple reasons. One, summer’s here, people like to look good, and so this hopefully will help you in your exercise routines. But also, this can be applied to every area of your five to thrive. You see, in mind, body, soul, relationships, and business, often times the thing that’s screaming, raising its hand, saying, “Help. I just need your help,” or “There’s something wrong,” that area isn’t usually the problem. Usually, the problem is somewhere else. Something else in the chain has broken down.

An example in your business may be, hey, this marketing campaign isn’t working. Well, is the marketing campaign the issue or is it the product that’s the problem? Or is it the sales process? Or maybe you have an employee who’s just not getting all their work done, they’re frazzled, and finally, they break down and say, “Hey, I just can’t take this anymore.” Now, is that person weak? Do they not have resilience? What’s going on? Maybe you should take a look. Are your systems honed? Is there a problem in the communication process that’s going on? Really take the time to think about this.

What I’m going to ask you to do today is write down in your journal, your five to thrive, so that’s mind, body, soul, relationships, and business, and come up with a problem. Something that’s actually raising its hand and saying, “Hey, look. There’s a problem here. I’m fatigued. This isn’t working.”

Then look at it from a different angle. Is that actually the problem in the situation or in a relationship? Is it the person that’s a problem or is it something you’re doing or a paradigm shift that gets to happen? I want you to write that down. Try to look at this from a different paradigm and see what you can find. Often times when we look at problems from just a slightly different angle, we can see solutions that we’ve never seen before and connect dots and that’s where real expansion happens.

That allows you to become the author of your own story because now you have all the information.

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Using Your Voice to Be Your Own Coach

Today I’m going to talk to you about using your voice and literally your voice to be your coach. What I mean by that is actually recording yourself to coach yourself. Now probably seven or 10 years ago, I don’t know the exact time, I started setting aside an hour in the morning to focus on my day. This time was a time I carved out for myself to better myself in my Five to Thrive. I would set aside sections. In each of these sections, I’d have questions that I would ask myself and exercises that I would do. This was extremely beneficial.

Since that time you’ve seen it called the Hour of Power, the Miracle Morning, people call it all kinds of names and it’s been commercialized over and over again. Certainly wasn’t my original idea and I hope that you take it and run with it as well. Now during this time, fast forward, I’m a husband, I’m a father, I own five different businesses, I coach clients all over the world. I have a busy schedule. Besides that, I really like to play. I love to have a good time. So things that I look for are where I can fit items of my day in, even things that are as precious to me as my Hour of Power into any teatime. So no extra time. I can actually do them while doing other things without losing that value.

One of the things that I found was I could actually record my Hour of Power into a cellphone or into a recording device and listen to it just like I would listen to music or an audiobook. Now what I do with my Hour of Power, most of them of journaling type questions or exercises for my body. For example, I ask myself each day, what are five things that I’m grateful for? Now when I record this I give a pause so when I’m recording I’m answering in my head. For example, I’d say, “What is one thing that I’m grateful for today?” In my head, I’m answering that question. And then I say, “What is another thing I’m grateful for today?” And I answer that question in my head. I’m giving myself pause in this recording. I’m gonna go through. What is my outcome for today?

I’ll even walk myself through different exercises and breathing techniques such as box breathing, which we talked about in a previous episode of the daily growth hacks. I’ll also talk about, hey, if I’m gonna be the best man in the world, the best man that I’ve always wanted to be, the ultimate version of Doug, the ultimate version of me, what does that look like? What can I do today to be that person, the person I’m striving to become? This allows me to get focus, get my determination. Make choices about how I want to live my life on my terms. Being the author of my story. At no extra time.

I often do this on the way to the gym, if I’m in a car running errands. Sometimes I’ll actually do this if I’m just really, really tired and I’m sitting down in the morning and you know what? I don’t want to just read and write down through my journal, I want to sit down almost in a meditative state, put my headphones in so I’m just really focused and I’m hearing my own voice. This is different than having somebody else’s voice coming to you. I’m asking myself questions and then in return answering them either in my head or I’m writing them down or I’m answering them out loud. This is a great practice. Studies have shown time and time again that writing things down and speaking your own voice really helps drive it home. Also when you verbally make a commitment, you make a commitment verbally or even writing it down, you tell yourself, I’m gonna do this. This is an excellent exercise and I highly recommend taking advantage of it.

That’s it for me today, take advantage of being your own coach. Recording your own voice and being the author of your own story.

Stay tuned September 1st we’re launching Author of Your Own Story University where each month we do a deep dive in a particular subject. Where you’re gonna get coaching, accountability, tips, tricks, insights, audios, videos, we’ve really thrown it all in there to provide $120,000 value for each and every person at only $167.

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The Power of Intention

The Power of Intention is a book that was written by Dr. Wayne Dyer. This book was recommended to me back in 2005, 2006, by my then business coach, who I would meet with every morning. This man was in his 70s and had built several extremely successful businesses. In fact, if you’ve ever written a check, ever written a letter, or actually if you’ve ever used a piece of software that records notes, which I won’t name the name, you’ve used and touched one of his businesses.

He was very conservative, and when I asked him, “What is the book or resource that you would recommend to me the most?” Here I am, a young entrepreneur running two businesses at the time, really getting after it. He turned to me and said, “Doug, you know what I recommend is The Power of Intention by Dr. Wayne Dyer.” Now, this blew me away. It blew me away for multiple reasons, but the main reason I was really shocked to hear this was here I have this conservative business owner recommending a quote unquote new age-y type of book. When I asked him why, he said, “Doug, the power of intention guides everything.” He said, “The concept behind this book is putting an intention out to the universe, but it also gets your mind going. It sets where you want to go and what do you want to be. What is your intention?”

Well, fast forward to today. This is a question my wife and I ask each other almost every single morning. In fact, just this very morning, we were sitting on our couch having a cup of coffee, and she turned to me and said, “What’s your intention for the day?” Now what she meant is, “What do you want to get out of the day? What do you want to put out in the world and get out by the end of the day? How do you want to act? How do you want to feel? What is your intention?”

I asked her the same question. This serves multiple facets, right? First of all, it gets me thinking about my day and what do I want out of the day? What is my outcome? How many times do we go into the day rushed, where we’re controlled by our boss or our email or spouse or family members or friends? The whole world seems to be coming at us sometimes, over and over again, when by the time it gets five, six or seven o’clock and you get home, you just don’t even know what happened with the day.

Part of being the author of your own story is setting your intention. Not only setting your intention for what you want in the future. Not even setting your intention for what you want a year from now, but what do you want each and every day? What is your intention?

Now when I set my intention in the morning, I actually think about this as I go throughout the day. It occurs to me. Today, what I wanted was peaceful focus, and during the day, as things started coming to me, I said, “You know what? This isn’t where I want to go.” The idea of peaceful focus kept playing in my mind. I was able to really focus on those few items that really mattered to me, and also take time away for myself to have that peace and tranquility.

What also works is, by talking to my wife, I get to know what her intention is. I get to know what she’s living on a daily basis. All too often, relationships, we assume that that person that we fell in love with or a friend or a co-worker or a sibling is the same as when we first met them. Maybe some changes here and there, but just like you, they’re changing every single day. So by stopping and setting your own intention, and then turning and asking somebody else, “What is your intention for the day?” You’re bridging that gap in communication, and building that relationship and that bond so much stronger. So it really serves twofold.

So I ask you today, grab your journal. Write down mind, body, soul, relationships, and business. So you have a holistic perspective, and ask yourself, “What is your intention for this year?” And each day, “What is your intention for today in those categories?” What is your intention with your mind? With your body? What’s the intention with your relationships? What is your intention with your business and your soul? I think you’re going to see this pull you in a direction much quicker than you ever thought possible, and the direction that you want to go to, so you can truly be the author of your own story.

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« Older Entries

Next Entries »

Running Your Life Like a Project

Public Commitments

Floating Down The River

Being Right Vs. Being Happy

Making Excuses Vs. Being Resourceful

Talent Always Wins

Psychology and Tiger Woods

My Back Hurts

Using Your Voice to Be Your Own Coach

The Power of Intention

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