EntreLeadership - #95: Living Powerfully and Saving Time

Episode Date: April 13, 2015

Need advice from those winning every day? We're featuring real estate moguls Jason and David Benham on facing the tough times, as well as time and productivity expert Laura Vanderkam. http://www.entreleadership.com/podcast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Charismatic, passionate, as integrity, humble, servant, faithful, inspiring, persevering, positive, flexible, driven. This is who we are that call ourselves leaders. Helping business leaders grow themselves, their team, and their profits. This is the Entree Leadership podcast. Now, here is your host, Ken Coleman. We are coming to you from the Music City, and this is the podcast of Leaders by Leaders. and four leaders. Really happy to have you on board with us today. Here's what's coming up.

Our feature interview is with David and Jason Benham. They're twin brothers, by the way, and they've co-authored a new book, whatever the cost, facing your fears, dying to your dreams and living powerfully. Little tease here, you know we love to give books away. So after that conversation, we'll give 50 copies of this brand new book away. You're going to enjoy that. And then one of my favorite authors, Laura Vandercombe, hopped on the phone with our very own Christy Wright recently. And this is one of my favorite books. In fact, I read this by The Pool in about 45 minutes. The book is called What the Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast,

A Short Guide to Making Over Your Mornings and Life. It is a fascinating read, really good stuff. And so Christy does a wonderful job with that conversation. That's coming up as well. And then we check in with Jeremy Coward. I think one of the coolest guys on the planet, a well-known photographer, one of the most successful photographers in the country and a great entrepreneur in his own right. So that's all coming to you. But before we get

to all that, we love to give you another business tip from our friend Clayte Mask, the CEO of Infusion Soft. Clay, how you doing out there in Arizona? Doing great, sunny and beautiful and glad to be talking with you, Ken. Are you by any chance on the driving range? People want to know. I wish. That would be great. Yes, sir. Arizona's got some great golf. All right. So, Clay, this is an important topic today we're going to talk about because the little things in business can absolutely add up to huge mistakes, to huge bogs in our time. So how do we take these day-to-day tasks and automate them to actually save us some very valuable time? Yeah, you know, one of the big things that we see over and over is leads that slip through the cracks. We see this across

businesses everywhere. Folks who have expressed interest, business cards you've received, phone messages that have been taken. You've got people that have an interest, and many times they've actually said, please call because I'm ready to buy. And yet we do a very poor job in business, generally speaking of following up with those new leads. And so that process of lead follow-up is critical.

That's probably the one that I think is most painful that we see across businesses. Second one is customers, when they come into the business and they're first getting started, the welcome process, the ongoing customer experience, the follow-up that occurs so that a customer who purchased product X knows that you offer product Y or Z. Too many times business owners sell product X, and the customer goes and buys product Y and

Z that our business owner offers, but the customer buys it from a competitor. We don't want to have that happen. So repeat sales and welcoming and really wowing that customer, another great opportunity for follow-up. And then, you know, last one is any kind of workflow, whether that's a collection process or an internal workflow. These are just processes where a little automation, a little automated follow-up can make a big difference. So those are a few areas where we see just day-to-day, small businesses can improve their efficiency, save time and grow sales with automation.

But I'll tell you what, everyone's looking for more time, aren't they, Clay? I mean, it really is money. Time really is money. Didn't understand that when I was a kid. Now I get it. All right, hey, tell us again why InfusionSoft is on the planet. You bet. Everything we do is to help small businesses succeed. Our sales and marketing software is all about helping our customers get organized, grow sales, and save time so that they can have the business and the life they want. All right, folks, we believe in Infusionsoft. That's why we've introduced you to them. We believe that this is vital. And so we've created a website with Infusionsoft. Very simple, infusionsoft.com slash entre.infusionsoft.com slash entre. Clay, I've got to tell you, man, I really enjoy these

tips, and I am going to very soon get out there to Phoenix, Arizona area. We are going to hit the little pill, I promise. All right. Sounds great, Ken. Thanks so much. All right, we'll talk soon. Two feature conversations this podcast. The first is with David and Jason Benham, the authors of a brand new book called Whatever the Cost, Facing Your Fears, Dying to Your Dreams, and Living Powerfully. Now, personal note, I get to interview some amazing people on this podcast. You know that. You get to listen in. And some of these folks, I know personally. Some I know better than others. Full disclosure, I know these two gentlemen very, very well, blessed who have known them since college, and I've watched them grow from minor league baseball players to guys that

almost made it to the majors who had to start all over when they left baseball. And I've seen them build an amazing family, both of them, as well as an incredible business. By the way, these guys have been given so many awards. It is easy to say, and easily proven, to say that they are two of the most prolific real estate entrepreneurs in the country. So these guys get it, and you're going to enjoy this conversation. Let's get right to it. Here I am with David and Jason Benham. All right, guys, I want you to take us to the early days.

The early days before Benham companies existed. You're chasing the dream, minor league baseball. Circumstances happen. And these men and women listening, they understand this better than anybody. Life just happens and throws you curveballs. I have to use that, baseball analogy. So take us back to those early days and when you realize, okay, now it's time to start something. How did it kind of evolve,

see an opportunity? What did that look like? You're talking about the days before we went to school with you? Oh, no, no, no, no, no. The days after we would school. No, no, no. Nobody wants to know that about me. That's in later volumes. Yes. That's in your second book. That's when we realized that you were very gifted with gab.

Yeah, it doesn't surprise either of you that I'm on a microphone. But no, it does not. Not one bit. Here we go. Let me bring this back to the question. Our dad taught us that discipline is doing what you don't want to do to accomplish what you truly want. So we had that ingrained in us. And then as athletes, we were chasing the major leagues. But Jason and I had to actually die to that dream in our heart.

Now, what we say to people, when you die to your dream, you die to it in your heart, but you chase it with your hands and your feet. You go after it with everything that you've got. And while you're waiting for your dream, you've got to hustle while you wait. So there's a really interesting dynamic with dying to your dreams. And what we write about in our book is that we never made it to the big leagues, but we chased it with everything that we had. But in our heart, we said, okay, God, it's all yours. So we held, we held it with an open hand. John Quincy Adams quote there. Yes. When he was, duty is ours. Results are God. You got it. Yeah, it's one of my favorite. Of course, this is interesting. So let me just jump in here,

because this is an important distinction for folks to realize that when one dream dies, it doesn't mean that a dream doesn't exist somewhere else or that us as dreamers has to die. That's how we're created. This is very interesting. So the dream of Major League Baseball dies, but you don't wither up and go home. Even before the dream died, we had to die to it. Yes. And one of the keys that we learned to leadership is that when you do die to dreams, you find your identity in who you are and not what you do for a living.

That's big. That's big. It's so important. So we've got to stop right there. Because I do this all the time with our audience. When I think you need to soak on something, we stop. And that's the key right there. That when we die to our dreams, it is about who we are, meaning how we're created, our true identity, versus what we do.

And by the way, that is the very healthy mindset that we need to persevere. The greatest leaders have that mindset. It's so true. And they're willing to go through the hard times. the good times. They don't topple over with pride when everything's good, but they're not crumbling in despair when everything is bad because they have been released in their heart. What happens to me and what I do for a living does not define who I am. Well, we had to learn the hard way, and just in my own personal story, and I write about this in the book, is I went

from a baseball bat to a broomstick. But here I was, kind of living the dream, and then all of a sudden, you're mopping a floor. Six months later, I'm sweeping a broom at a local high school as a janitor. You don't sweep a broom. You use a broom to sweep. Okay, thank you. I'm mopping a floor. I'm sweeping. That's humbling. It was very humbling. It took a year. I did that for almost a year. Thank God Facebook didn't exist then because I would have never told people what I did for a living. I was too ashamed. I was too embarrassed.

You weren't going to Instagram a picture of your mop going spinning the next couple hours with this guy. That's right. No, that's exactly right. So, I mean, it got to the point to where during a sports award ceremony at this local high school. And I watched the athlete of the year and all these things and all the parents are there. And it's a black tie. And I'm standing back there in the back. with my khakis on and some trash bags jammed in my pocket sitting there thinking, whoa, you know, 10 years ago, this was me. Jason and I, we were running these athlete events and now here I am.

And you're receiving the awards. But when you do experience a certain level of success and you're in a green room about to speak, you pay attention to the person who's coming in and filling up that water bucket, who's putting out the goodies for the people. And you're like, you know, let me say something to this person. because you remember I was in those shoes. But you go back and... Now it makes you appreciate it. During that time, that's right. And it strips you because you have no opportunity to identify with your success.

That's right. Because you don't have it. Let's get practical for a moment. I love where we're at. The opportunity presents itself to start a company. You go from janitor to you figure out the benham companies. Now, this is the context, folks. One of the most successful small businesses in the country.

The benham companies. real estate. I do want to talk about how you saw the opportunity, those early days of, I don't know how to run a company, but we think there's an opportunity. Let's just go. Let's run to first base hard. Talk about that. Well, let me start by saying, first, we didn't see the opportunity and jump at it. The opportunity presented itself to us. Which happens a lot. Yeah, that's exactly right. But you took it. Our eyes were open. But here's the thing. Here's what happened. We basically just had to provide for our families. We didn't sign for big bonuses when we played baseball. So we were doing anything. We were mowing lawns. You remember that time. We were mowing

lawns. We were doing whatever it took. But we earned our real estate licenses together and thought, hey, you know what, let's try selling some houses. We could probably make some decent money doing that. And in being faithful in the little, that's what prepared us to be faithful in the big. And so as we were faithful in that one thing led to another, then all of a sudden an opportunity presented itself in specifically the foreclosure industry and the fact that there were so many houses that were being foreclosed on. And these banks needed somebody to manage and liquidate these houses. David and I stepped into that, and it was just, it was like Rocky's Bell, you know, when he's

getting wrung and all of a sudden you hear that, dang. Well, let me tell you what happened. This is very simple stuff. You don't hear this in business school. I say this all the time, but you were in the right place. That's right. And the right time found you. You know that whole colloquialism.

Oh, he's in the right place, the right time, as if it was dumb luck. Yeah. That's garbage. That's right. You guys are in the right place. You're being faithful in the little. God had you where he wanted you at that time, and all of a sudden, his timing or the right time came along. That's wonderful.

Here's a very interesting thing that we applied, and this is a great shout-out for our fearless leader, Dave Ramsey. Jason and I had read a quote from him about, and he says this quite often. If you live like no one else, soon you'll live like no one. That's right. So Jason and I saw this opportunity. And here we were. The opportunity presents itself to us in real estate. We see that there are lots of foreclosures.

We started recognizing around town it says bankrupt, who cares? We'll get you alone on this house. I mean, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to think, okay, at some point, those are going to go into foreclosure. Banks didn't have a streamlined liquidation process or a management system in place for that. So Jason and I said, you know what, if we move our families in together to live under the same roof and get our monthly budget down as little as possible, then we can take all the money and sew it back into the company and build it. We'll be living like no one else, and soon we'll be living like no one else.

So we did that. And for two years, we lived on $1,500 a month each. Now, I had three kids at the time. I've got five now. He had two kids at the time. That was tough. Yeah. But we did it.

But we did it. Yeah. And we look back now. And having built our business, we have no debt on our company. We have no debt on our houses. We have no debt on automobiles. We have none of those. All of the principal.

that this great organization stands for. Jason and I, by God's grace, have applied, and they all ultimately come from the scripture. And so we were being the right people, identifying properly, not with what we did for a living, but who we were in Christ. The opportunity then shows itself up, and the right moment happens. And then at that moment, we're willing to make the big sacrifices to build the company. Okay, now, can I get really practical on how we built our business specifically in terms of finances? I mean, this is the Entra leadership.

Let's teach. Let's teach. There's a lesson that the Old Testament teaches us that before the children of Israel were to enter the promised land, there was a very specific command that said in the first three years, don't eat of the produce of any of the vegetation on the trees of the ground. Don't eat it. God would continue to provide mana for them. In the fourth year, tithe at all. And in the fifth year, you can enjoy it. Now let me ask you this, and you probably know this. What's the stat? 95% of small businesses fail within the first how many years? Five years. Five years. That's right. You know what happens is the folks who should be modeling that biblical principle in that first five years, it is not time to live off the fruit of the land. Put it all back in. It is not time for you to go out and buy that Beamer and to buy these things. You put it all back in that business and you stay small.

You stay sleek and high-speed, low-drag. And trust me, in that fifth year, from fifth year on, you're going to enjoy things that you were never able to enjoy. And it's the same thing with the bamboo shoot. You know, in the first five years, it goes deep, but it doesn't get more than two or three. feet tall. But in that sixth year, it goes bonkers. That's what we did with our business, and God hooked it up. But so good. You know, Dave says this all the time. He says, I want your company to be on the cover of slow company. Yeah, yeah. That's right. And that's what you've just said. Slow growth. That's what you guys did. That's right. That's how we had to do. And it is

hard, especially when you realize all that you can do and all that you can grab. The scripture says, do not wear yourself out to get riches. Don't wear yourself out for it. Now, it doesn't mean you can't go and get it, but just don't wear yourself out for it. So just go nice and slow. You're not going to burn out. You'll see a lantern burns on oil. If the oil is not in the lantern, it burns the wick. So you've got to have that oil. That's why Jason and I talk about biblical principles. That's the oil for us. And so when we built our company within, let's see, we were right at our, between our fourth and our fifth year, we decided, you know what, let's franchise this thing. Three years later, we had 100 locations across 35 states.

Yeah, but it was realizing the right time. What have you guys learned? Now, here's another practical thing. What have you guys learned about saying yes and saying no? You know. Well, isn't that a differentiator in success? You get a lot of opportunities that feel like I should say yes. Well, you don't have to swing at every pitch.

Oh, there we go. You've got to recognize that slider out of the pitcher's hand. And we always taught. I could never hit the slide. We always taught our franchisees too. I said, when you start to experience success, what's going to happen is that opportunities are going to present themselves. and that can diffuse the clarity that you had that first brought you that success. When a storm comes, what would cause the common bird to fly low and go seek for shelter causes the eagle to fly high,

and he doesn't even have to flap his wings. We had a couple of franchisees years back. I mean, they exploded, and Jason and I pulled him aside and said, guys, you guys are sitting on, you know, multi-comas. You've got crooked numbers in your paycheck now. Cut this spending out. Now, start sewing that back in, slow down a little bit, have some strategic hires, be willing to sacrifice the money for a little more time at home with your wife and your kids. You can't sacrifice that. Just slow down.

Well, I mean, a year ago, they pull us aside and they're like, I wish we would have listened to you guys because we're so busy, we don't even know what to do, and we're just war out. Now, they're making great money, but they're war out. They've got the wings of a hummingbird. They should have slowed down. That's good. I think one of the great takeaways I'd love for you to share with our audience is what the storm has taught you and allowed you to become better leaders, better husbands, better fathers. And this goes for our lady leaders as well. You know, better leaders, better mothers.

Specifically, how has this trial and walking through it made you better in those areas? Well, it's total, total surrender, total abandonment. You can't be selfish. You have to be selfless. in life, and what Jason and I, the title of our book, I'll just answer that question with the title of our book, whatever the cost, this faith we have is worth living. These freedoms that we have in America are worth fighting for, whatever the cost. But you have to face your fears. Whatever that fear is, you have to be willing to face it.

You can't run from it. You can't duck it and dodge it. You've got to face it, face it head on, because you can get through that. Because on the other side of that fear is your greatest blessing. But then you also have to be, you have to die to your dreams on the other hand. So if you're willing to face your fears and die to your dreams in your heart, in other words, let them go. Because if you don't let them go, if they become your identity, then you will either be overcome with pride when you accomplish them or you'll crumble in despair when you don't. You have to let them go in your heart.

It has been my true privilege to be your friends for over 20 years. I love you guys. I'm proud of you. Folks, these guys are the real deal. And you guys have stayed the course. You've been strong. Thanks for hanging out with us in studio today. I know that our audience is better for it.

Thanks, guys. Thank you, man. Thanks for having us, bud. Well, I hope you enjoyed that conversation, and we want to give away 50 copies of the book, whatever the cost. We want to thank the Benham's and Thomas Nelson for this. Here's how we do it.

Same as always. We just want you to tweet at Andreleadership. and say something about the podcast, the interview, the conversation, whatever you want to say, and include this hashtag, conversation that matters. That's hashtag conversation that matters. And then you're qualified. Producer Eric will put them all in a big hat. Do you actually put him in a hat?

He's behind the glass, so you won't hear him, but he's going to, he does not put him in a hat. But I like the mental image of you printing these names out, cutting them in the little pieces, putting them in a hat, bringing them by my desk, and we make a big deal out of it. That's what's in my head. but that's not what we do. But here's what we want you to do. Again, just hashtag Conversation Matters, tweet to at Entree Leadership, and you are qualified to win. Well, I mentioned this at the start of the podcast.

Do you ever download a book or buy a book? By the way, I'm buying less and less books, producer Eric. I'm now just downloading them. It's so much easier. I still love a physical newspaper. I still love a physical copy of a book. But I find myself downloading more books. So last summer, I get a little week and get away with the wife.

When you got three kids, that's a big deal. And so you know you're going to get to sit by the pool, relax, and no kids, you know, they're not bothering you for a snack. You don't have to worry about one of them drowning. This is a very good time for a parent. So I downloaded this little book on the plane called What the Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast, a short guide to making over your mornings and life by Laura Vandercam. I kid you not. Eric, I read this thing in 45 minutes, and it's so fascinating. She literally interviews all these people and she finds out what the most successful people do in the morning.

And there is a method to their madness. And as scheduling took place, I was unable to do this conversation. So I asked Christy Wright, who gets personal life balance and personal excellence as well as anybody I have ever met. She's one of our Ramsey personalities. And so Christy was more than willing and very excited to have this conversation. So I want you to listen in to Christy Wright and Laura Vanderkamp. Thanks so much again for taking the time to talk with us. Just to get started, Laura, tell me a little bit about what made you want to write this book.

specifically? Well, I am always interested in hearing about how people who do a lot with their time manage to get things done. Like everyone, I'm a student of time management. I want to be able to use the hours I have better. And so by looking at people who are able to accomplish amazing things, I hope I can learn as well. And the funny thing is, I'm not that much of a morning person, but as I have learned about what people are able to do in the mornings to start their day off right, it has definitely inspired me to take that time of day more seriously. And in the beginning of the book, you really kind of outline what our mornings look like and how they can be crazy. And you give a few examples, but one of the quotes I love is you said,

before the rest of the world is eating breakfast, the most successful people have already scored daily victories that are advancing them toward the lives that they want. And that's really what it's about, right? We want to advance our lives towards something that we're proud of. What we do every day, great deal to our lives. These are the foundational habits that help us over time build the lives we want. I mean, if you just think about the image of a drop of water, can over time create the Grand Canyon.

I mean, it really is just day after day doing the same thing. And overtime that builds habits that bring you toward the life you want. And the wonderful thing about doing things first is that they do get done, right? There aren't excuses that come up later in the day. If I was busy, I was tired. If something has to happen, it has to happen first. And that's what I found people had really gotten their heads around who had good morning rituals that were advancing them toward the lives they wanted.

Right, exactly. And you talk about how these successful people, they're very clear on their priorities, and those priorities happen first. so that they will get done. It's the same thing that I teach when I'm speaking on life balance to our Entree leadership group. I say, you know, there's always going to be something more deserving of your time and your money if you don't intentionally add yourself to the top of the priority list. But often, like you said, we just kind of move to the back of the line and we just wait until we'll get to our needs or our wants, our time, our saving last.

And it never happens. It never happens. The world is always going to be clamoring for a piece. of you. And so if you are clear on what it is that you want to do to do these important things, I mean, whatever you want to do to advance your career or grow your business, whatever you need to do to show the people who are most important in your life that they are important to you or whatever it is you need to do to take care of yourself, those things are so easy not to do. Right. They are always the things that could be done later. No one is demanding that you do

them right this minute, and so we don't do them, but then over time, they don't get done. So mornings are a great time for those things. Right, exactly. And I like, too, how you talk about in your section on willpower, you really talk about how, yes, we all have the same amount of time in a week, but I like how you said not all hours are equally suited to all things. So give me some examples of that. So, I mean, there are probably some people who are truly committed night owls. They do their absolute most creative work at night. The problem is that the rest of the the world is not really set up to honor that. You are one of these people. You have to be very careful about how you set up your life in order to take advantage of that time. For most of us,

the morning hours really are better for investing in these things. We tend to have more willpower in the morning. I called my book before breakfast, but I meant before the rest of the world is eating breakfast because it often does help your decision-making ability to have a little the food in you. Right. So eat a good breakfast. I don't want anyone to not eat breakfast. Yes, please eat breakfast.

But once you have, then you probably have more focus in those early morning hours than you will the rest of the day. Willpower is like a muscle. There's some interesting research that's been done into this topic over the past few years, finding that people can exhaust their willpower muscle, that they exhaust their supply of self-discipline and focus as you face temptations during the day. you deal with biting your tongue and traffic. All these things will test your willpower.

Just making decisions will test your will power. If you're making a lot of decisions, you're just spent at the end of it, and you don't have the ability to bring your best self to bear on difficult issues. So if there is something that will require your full energy and attention and focus, it is best to schedule that for the early morning hours. And it's important to them because they know once the work they start, everyone's clamoring for a piece of them. And so if you need to do that, that's a good time.

But even if you start your workday with something really important, like I'm going to crank out this memo, I'm going to work on my presentation, practice it for the first hour, and I'm going to resist checking email until after that. You will find yourself getting so much more done. And I like it in this section where you talk about important but not urgent things. These are some of the things that a lot of times, like you said, they're important, but they just never happened because they're not urgent. And, you know, I think

a lot of our listeners, a lot of our entrepreneurs and small business leaders really can relate to this because many of us just live our lives by putting out fires. We are just trying to solve the next problem. And so we live our life kind of a slave to the urgent. And so these important things, such as family or rest or creativity or even strategic thinking about our business, never happens because it's important, but we respond only to the urgent. And that is such an important thing to shift your mindset about because the fires are always going to be there. People sort of think, well, oh, when I get through this problem, then I can focus on growing the business, on working, you know, on the business, on in the business, you know, it just doesn't happen that way.

It doesn't happen in a way. You have to carve out time for the important stuff first. There will always be time for the fires because there has to be. If you've got an angry customer on the phone, yes, they're going to deal with that. So I find many entrepreneurs especially would do is that they would tick an hour of the day before those phones started ringing with angry customers and use that time to think about the business, to strategize, to plan, say, where do I want to be, how am I going to get there, who are the people who are going to help me get there? And then once that's done, you can spend the rest of the day putting out fires. That's fine.

Fires will expand to fill the available space. So you have to choose how much space to give them and hopefully choose some space for the important stuff as well. That's a great example. Fires will expand to consume the available space. One of the statistics that you talk about in this section is where, you know, and it's pretty disturbing, as you said, that dual income couples could only find 12 minutes a day to talk with each other. And so whenever I read this, I thought, is that, is that accurate? Is that real? But the way that you kind of outline it, okay, let's look at our week. We have 168 hours. Let's assume we work 50 hours, you know, more than the average work week, and we sleep 56, assuming we get eight a night, which is probably generous there as well. That still leaves 62 hours for other things. And so we're only finding 84 minutes in a week to speak with our spouse.

Like what an upsetting kind of view of our priorities that that is? I think that this is what happens. We don't know how we're spending our time. And so we have a tendency to spend time on the things that are right in front of us, that are demanding. our attention, or that seem to give a slight feeling of accomplishment, you know, like deleting that email, but aren't really that important in the grand scheme of things. Right. Where something like making time to talk with your spouse is not as urgent.

It always can be done later, and so we don't devote adequate time to it. But it's not that we don't have time. It's the numbers that you just said right there. We have plenty of time. Right. We have time for anything we want to do. No matter how busy you are, I guarantee you have plenty of time. for whatever it is that is important to you.

But we tend not to use it. And so because we're not using that time, we're not thinking about how we spend our time, and we're not putting it toward things that are important to us, we tend to believe these stories that, oh, well, I'm star for time. I'm in a time crunch. You know, life just is undoable. And all these other things we tell ourselves.

Right. Yes, we have 62 hours, even if you're working more than the average person, even if you're sleeping quite a bit, you have 60 plus hours per week for other things. So the time is there. You just have to use it. Right. And one of the things I always challenge people with is you will make time for what is most important to you.

And then you go on and you give a section in the middle where you talk about what successful people do on the weekends. And my favorite part of this section was where you really talk about the idea of active rest. And you use the example of cross training. But I really related this to a lot of business leaders I work with and coach, you know, when they have a moment free, they just kind of want to check out. They want to watch TV or check Facebook or do something mindless, which isn't a bad thing. But in the example you give, you talk about, I think the quote is taking up one labor for another, but really just investing in yourself, things that bring you joy and energy in that space rather than something that's just kind of checking out and doing what we call nothing

on the weekend. So talk a little bit about this idea of kind of active rest or taking up one labor for another. So it's not time will be filled with something. Right. And, uh, The question is, well, is it a chosen something or is it a mindless something? So watching TV is something. Surfing the web is something. The question is, is that what you would have chosen? Given the time that is available to you, is that really what you'd like to be doing? And if it is awesome, I mean, there's nothing wrong with watching a great show.

Sure. Relaxing or entertaining, you know, sit down with your family and watch a movie, that can be a great way to spend time. Sure. But make sure it's chosen. I like that. We have limited time. And if you are working really, really hard, especially during the week, weekends are

too precious to be completely leisurely about leisure. And that may sound like a little bit of a paradox, but because that time is limited, we have to use it well. If you look at hockey players coming on and off the ice, you know, they have to structure their time off the ice that they're recovering as fast as possible to get back on. To the same thing, if you're running a business, you're working so hard. the pace of life is so fast, you really have to structure your rest so that you can achieve that rejuvenation in the time that is available. But the idea is to plan your leisure time, at least to a

degree, so it's not completely mindless. I love that. And then ultimately, I think that, you know, you kind of wrapped this up well, but it seems like the whole point of all this, Laura, is just to reach your goals and to create this life that you love, because, as you said, time is finite. And so it matters what we do with it. And if we can happen to our days versus our days just kind of happening, to us, hopefully we would get to a place where we have weeks that we're really proud of and a life that we're really proud of as well. Yes, life I would hope would be enjoyed. I mean, why otherwise?

Hopefully we can create lives of meaning and joy, too. There's no point being perpetually unhappy. And that is the end point of all of this is to have a life that is full of joy and meaning for ourselves and the people we care about. Absolutely. Well, Laura, this has been so helpful for me. I know it's been helpful for our listeners on this podcast, and I know that many of these entree leaders struggle with time management.

So I really appreciate you giving us not only the research and the stories to back it up, but also practical steps of things that we can do to make the most of our mornings, but also our entire day and our weekends, as we talked about as well. So your book, What the Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast, you guys can pick that up. And also Laura writes regularly on her website, LaraVandercam.com. And so we'll be, you know, staying in touch with you. And Laura, I really appreciate you taking the time because I know that for me, I've taken a ton of notes that I'm definitely going to look at my mornings differently.

But for our leaders as well, I know they will really benefit from some of these tips that we can start implementing today. Very simple, small choices, as you described, that can make a huge difference in the impact of our week. So I appreciate you taking the time to talk with us, and we will talk soon. Thank you for having me. I want to thank Christy Wright and Laura Vandercam for that conversation. Again, one more time, if you want to go get the book, and I highly suggest you do,

what the most successful people do before breakfast, Laura Vanderkamp. Good, good stuff. All right, we've been telling you a lot about the Entree Leadership Summit. Very excited about this event. And we've never done an event like this before. And if you want to learn more about it, just go to Entreleadership.com slash summit, and you can learn more about it. It really is a phenomenal day.

John Maxwell, Pat Lynchione, Rabbi Daniel Lapin, Dr. Henry Cloud, Christy Wright, who you just heard from, Chris Hogan, and Dave Ramsey, all over a several-day event at the Onnila Costa Resort and Spa. Beautiful, beautiful place, and it's going to be phenomenal teaching. And what we have found out is that we've got a bunch of major heavy hitters who are coming just to attend. And that's always a certain validation that you are scratching an itch. And so we have several folks who are prominent in their space who are coming. One of those is Jeremy Coward, who I talk. about at the top of the podcast. Jeremy is a photographer who is known for his celebrity photos

and just brilliant, brilliant work. Creative, always thinking of new things, he really is a serial entrepreneur and he gets it. And so when we found that he was going to come and attend, I hopped on the phone with him, and I asked him, why would a guy who's so very successful like you and got so much going on, what was your reason for coming? And this is what he said. Well, I mean, honestly, I've always been a huge Ramsey's supporter and fan, and I always am learning something, even the same, you know, some of the same messages, you know, it's just good to be refreshed and hear those again, especially as a creative person, you know, finances can be a bit of a struggle when you're a creative person like myself. So I always love hearing Dave. Of course, John Maxwell is a legend, and I'm always, you know, leave inspired. and refreshed after hearing him speak.

So it's going to be an amazing week. I'm really excited about it. Well, I always love talking to Jeremy Coward. By the way, saw him at church on Sunday. That's always exciting when you run into people like that. We've been going on the same church and we've missed each other, but very exciting to see Jeremy. And he's going to be at the summit, which, by the way, is May 11 through 14. That's this May 11 through 14.

Again, the website, Entreeleadership.com slash summit. We still have some seats. It's going to be a special, special event. So go check it out. We'd love to see you there. I want to thank Clayton Mask for his tip. We always love hearing from him. Jason and David Benham, Laura Vandercombe, and Christy Wright, and Jeremy Cowart for hanging out with us. Eric, the producer, good job, as always.

Hey, folks, that's going to do it for this episode. On behalf of the entire Entree leadership team, we want to say thank you for listening, and we will talk with you again very soon.