Foundations of Business & Where to Focus Your Efforts Pt. 2

I could give you all one gift.It would be this if the nexttime I tell you to do somethingand you're scared,go do that one thing.Right can I flip thequestion on you, chris?Yeah, you are asking.So I'm going to Isaw Henry again.So Alec, go ahead.I'm going to talk to Henry.OK you're asking why ittook so long kind of takingso long for so manypeople to do this thing?I guess I'd ask, what?Why did it take you so long?Like, at what point didthat flip in your mind?Like you said, you triedadvocating this stuff,you tried putting it off.Where was that switchin your head that.At what point in timethat you realizedthat you could takeresponsibility,that you could have thiskind of change in mindsetas from an artistto fully owning it?You had to startthe recording again.I already did.Oh, yeah, Yeah.Top of it.No good co-pilot here.All right.Look, I think I'm going totry to answer this question.The best way I know howOK, which is this is Ibelieved that for a longtime I didn't change.I didn't want to do thedifficult things because I toldmyself a different narrative.I told myself, I'mnot good at this.I don't know whatI'm doing, and Iknow that I'm good at thisother thing called design.Some stay in my littlecomfort zone because I knew,like every timeI went to design,I was going to score a point.And doing things likesales, public speaking,being in front of clients, thatwas all something I told myselfI had to do, but Ididn't want to do.So this narrative that youtell yourself the wordsthat you choose tocode and experience,turn it into anemotion and a memory.Those are kind ofdangerous thingsif you don't usethe right words.And that's why I harpon this all the timeabout words that weall choose, sometimesvery carelessly to describethe things that we're doing.We we generally just judgeourselves a little bit tooharshly and don't giveourselves any roomfor error or forgivenesswhen we screw up.And then we're not verypositive in encouragingwhen we're doing thingsthat are new and different.So when I'm a babe in the woodsthe first five years tryingto run a company withessentially no mentorship, noone to model after no oneto call on the hotlineto say, hey, yeah, what do youdo in a situation like this?And I tried.I tried calling people Ithought were successfuland they would give mesome pretty random advice.It wasn't until I metmy business coach.That I then surrendered.And just listen tothem and you peoplein the faithcommunities, you knowthat you must surrender togod, that you must give upa part of this to then letthat person into your heart,into your body and your mind.You know this.The word surrender andfaith are a big partof that conversation.Disclaimer Christo isnot saying that he's got.No, I'm not.Go on.No, no, not even close.I'm saying find something thatyou think is going to help youand just submit yourwill to that thing.OK, Melinda asked methis really big question.And she said, wereyou always confident?I'm like, no, when didyou become confident?And it came downto this one thingwe were able to isolate it.I became confident whenI was at Art Centerin the first semester in school,when I realized somethingthat I was a better studentthan most of my classmates.And I thought Ioriginally thoughtit was because I wasa better designer,I didn't think that actuallywhen I really went back in timeand studied what washappening in my mind,I said it was a better studentbecause most students werebusy defending theirwork resisting.And I didn't know at the time,but they were saying, yeah,but but but thisis why I did this,and this is why I don't want tochange this, why I don't wantto move the type around orcome up with a new conceptbecause they fell inlove with their old self.And for whatever reason,I became very detachedfrom my own self.And it did work, and Ilistened to my professors.And when they said to dosomething, I just did it.So my confidence comes inthe definition of myselfas a really good learner.When you're a learner,nothing is expected of you,except for to show up and try.So every day I wouldshow up, I didn'tthink my work wasthe best, I justwanted to learnhow to be better.But by learninghow to be better,I became the best in my class.It worked out pretty well,so for a lot of you guysthat you're going into territorythat you don't know Priscilla,is that going into marketing?And she's like, I don'tknow what I'm doing,I need to validate what this is.But if she had just said toherself, I'm here to learn.All the pressure is gone.I'm not saying I'm an expert,I'm not saying I'm a teacher,I'm not saying anyof these things.I'm just a really good student,if you say that yourself.What can't you do then?You never expect to go to agolf lesson or a tennis lesson.The first time andexpect to be an ace.You don't expect to learn howto do the tango your first timeout or salsa danceyour first time out.Nobody goes intothinking like this,but for some reason creativepeople in our businessesand the different tangentialfields that we get into,I don't know whywe tell ourselveswe have to be the best.Your first social media carouselpost, got to be a winner.What first time you dostrategy for a client,you've got to knockit out of the park.When did that happen?So if you guys recall,if you watch enoughof our old protocols,the first timeI did strategy was thefirst time I did strategy.I barely learned enough of it.I just went straight to thefirst client and said, hey,I want to introduce somethingthat I just learned.I literally use those words.I think this can bevery helpful to you,and we're going tohave a good time.You guys want to try.Yeah and during thatcall, I messed up.Because they askedme, what does thismean, what's the differencebetween this wordand that word, chris?I'm like, I don't know,let's just try thisand see what happens.I gave myself allthe room to fail.They had a great time.But I learned so muchmore in the process.So all of you, ifyou guys can justadopt this learner'smindset, there'sa Japanese phrase for thisand I don't know it right now.I have it on mycomputer somewhere.Japanese seem to have words forall these interesting concepts,right?I'll find it for you later.It's called thelearner's mindset.And that's whatyou want to have,and you have that there'sno pressure to perform.There's no pressure to impress.All of it's gone, it'sall stripped away.So when I met my businesscoach and he told me.Break off that relationship withthat partner, I broke it off.Business partnerwhen he told me,stop doing the calls the wayyou're doing and just ask,I just did it.I didn't understandhow the oxygen worked,but I just felt like it would.I had faith.And I tell this story one moretime, my brother asked me,like, who's his business coach?You're listening to?What credentials does he have?Who's he worked with?Where did you go to school?What degrees does he have?So he was working at itlike a left brain person.I was just all emotionand intuition and gut.I had zero answers for him.I never looked at his resume.I didn't look intohis background.I just said, here's my teacher.Here's my master for today.And I just listenand you know what,I'll tell you one of the reasonswhy it's so motivated to listenbecause I was paying himmoney to teach me something.Why would you pay somebodymoney not to listen to them?That was it, I alwaysthought that was foolish.So, you know, mytherapist and my familytherapist that Iwent to, I probablywent to see her a dozentimes and that was itbecause I'm africking good student.I learned what shetaught me, I learnedhow she did what she did, andI'm applying those lessonstoday because I felt likeafter a couple more meetings,I'm like, there'snothing left here.She's not givingme anything new.I'm moving on.I'm finding another master.OK Mr Andrew Kaminsky,you're still here,I want to ask youa question, Henry,and I'm going togive you as much timeas you need to think about thequestion before you answer.I'm curious why when you andI started working togetherover a year ago?Well, when I told you todo something two years.Why did you do it?Same reason I was paying you aG an hour, maybe a lot of money.Yes no, no, no.I mean, I was payingyou a G an hour.I'd be stupid not to do it.And I don't know.I think this mindsetthat I have isyou have to if youdon't make a move,you are going to be in thesame problem or situationyou are tomorrow.Yes, so that is mymindset, so whenI get on the calls with youand we go down our, you know,where I'm stuck and where Ineed your help, we just hammer.And then I have a laundrylist of things to do.And I do.And so the answer is, yeah,like people that pay attention.And that's why, you know, andit's not just a money thing,either.I mean, the insights thatyou give me is, again, youseeing outside of thebottle and my blind spots.This is why I hire you privatelyis because I need somebodyto uncover my blind spots.My wife's goingto tear me apart.You know, my team is just goingto tell me what I want to hear,you know?So there's too manydifferent dynamics.I want someone who cantell me straight in my eye,knock it off or.Like, just giveit to me straight,like the way you giveit to me, and that'swhy I listen, I apologize.I have AI have an interviewwith Tavon Campbell from the Larams, so I got to gethim on the podcastand he's havingsome video issues,so I got to get him going.But that's my answer.OK, thanks, Henry.Another call I wouldlike to dive deeperwith Henry because he'sone of those rare birdsthat I've met in my life wherebecause I'm still curious,like he's worked witha lot of coaches.Look how he chooses to listento one or not the other.How he decides to hiresomebody and not the otherand why he quits oneversus the other.So understandinghim and his mindsetmay help you guys out a lot.OK, I want to addresstwo things there.Yes, the word isshow sin or show sin.I don't know how to pronounceit, and that is the exact word.Thank you very much.Your internet sleuths, you.And I also want tocomment on somethingthat Daniel de Jesus said.He's always like,always name your layers.I always need more layers.And I'll tell you somethingwhen you have 100 elementsand you go and do thatoption layer thingwhere you go split to sequence.That one layer turnsinto 30 layers.You know, I'm talkingabout anybody ever do that.It's just release the layers.Oh my God.Yeah, you have tobe careful whenyou hit that button because itjust created like a three layerfile, which is usuallywhat I'm workingwith the bottommiddle and the top.So yeah, that's whyI'm like, do I reallyneed to name all these?Yeah, that's how it happened.OK, guys, any lastlittle parting thoughts.I love seeing all yourfaces, by the way.I love all the cameras thatare being turned on right now.Grace, can you remember peoplethat everything that you didshould be taken witha grain of salt,because we are on a differentjourney, each one of usat a differentpoint in our life?Yeah, everybody.Thank you.Take everything I say with agrain of salt. OK, what else?I think we it might beanother call, unfortunately,but I think Garrett never, nevergot circled back around to.Yeah so Garrett,where's garrett?Hey, hey.Did you did youhave the answers?I did.I wrote down 3 things,but we can put it offfor another time.No, let's do it right now.OK things that I'mdoing incorrectly.I'm not consistentlycreating great content,so I'm not listening to you.I'm not outsourcing everythingthat someone else cando cheaper and better than me.And I have five differentbusiness models.I'm trying tocombine into one and.It seems to stop me.OK, so the fivedifferent businesses.Are you finding theoverlap or they justfeel like you're FrankensteinING things together?I'm definitely finding overlapand but at the same time.Maybe it's going to manydifferent directions,like going, moving 1 inchin five different thingsinstead of goingall the way and one.OK so if you're agambling person and youhave five horses inthe race, all right,put your money on one horseand see what happens rightand then build offthat winning horse.So it can be a challengewhen you're starting out,or if you have finiteresources to try to dofive things simultaneously.Like Jeffrey is askingthat question, I'm like,I'll be careful.You know, it's you're gettingpulled in a lot of directionssimultaneously and you're notgoing to see a lot of progress.So my suggestion,like the way that Iwas able to have successearly in my careerwas to focus inon motion design.That's what I did and thento add these other skillsalong the way.But people kind of knewwhat the heck I was doing.Right so if you can, it'slike that one conversationwe had before about intensity.So if you take a certainbudget and you spread itacross five things, you dilutethe intensity of that effort.So my suggestion is just tryto be as analytical as youcan try to be asunemotional as you canwhen you look at thesefive different conceptsor businesses and saywhich one is the one thatseems to be working?Do I have any kind ofdata to back this up?And generally speaking,that fits really neatlyin the 80-20 rule.Or 80% of yourrevenue comes from 20%One fifth of your efforts.And the other things we dobecause we're distractedbecause there are fun.And I have to tell you, I am24 years into my business,24 years, OK.I'm 49 right now.And I struggle withthis on a daily basis.I was literally up to 4:00in the morning last night.My head barely hit thepillow, I was right right backup again to do thiscall with you guysbecause last nightI had too much tea.I was in the zonecreating two decks,but I was thinking to myselfprior to this moment in time,I don't want towork on this deck.God fricking I don't.I want to, like, respondto some social media.I want to make a new thumbnail.I want to do everything but thething I'm supposed to be doing.Those things don't createany friction or anxiety.I still struggle withthis today to sayto have that conversationwith yourself thatdon't conversationand say, stop that.Focus on what's important.Because this willmove the needle.The rest of this stuffis a distraction.If you guys saw what Idid on a daily basis,like why are welistening to this guy?I mean, I'm still goingthrough it, you guys.I'm still going through it.You know, before I startthe keynote deck, what I do?Check the Facebook, check theLinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube.Answer some commentsback to Instagram.Check the email.Wait, there's a new message onLinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter.Oh my God.And at some point I'm like, huh?Turn everything off.Put the phone upside down.Focus, man.And it's tough.Because we like to dothe things that are easy,not the thingsthat are essential.When we learn thatwe can actuallymake real positivechange in our life.OK, I have to hit Stop.That was a great self diagnosison your part, Garrett.So let's improve thecontent, let's focuson one businessmodel that we thinkis going to work well for us.And then let'sfigure out what wecan delegate to other people.So that we can free up our time.The most important thingyou have as the leaderis to find more time.You have to gatherup all the bitsand consolidateall your free time.It is super critical.These are not mywords, these arethe words from Peter Drucker.OK that's it.Let's stop this.Stopping