Habits and Hustle - Episode 113: Saul Blinkoff – Disney Director, Dreamworks Producer, and Podcast Host “Life Of Awesome!”

Episode Date: April 27, 2021

Saul Blinkoff is a Disney Director, Dreamworks Producer, and Podcast Host “Life Of Awesome!” Filled to the brim with stories and wisdom Saul takes us through his “success as a failure” and delivers some of the best and most inspiring anecdotes you may ever hear. Finding comfort in the uncomfortable, the preference of pain in the moment to the pain of regret, and how nobody just wakes up great, are all pieces of Saul’s story and all accompanied by a thrilling retelling from his life. Eager to hear from someone who grinded their way into working at Disney? Needing that one story and the honest bluntness that comes with it to get you after your own success? Don’t miss this one. Youtube Link to This Episode  Saul’s Website/Podcast  Saul’s Instagram  ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Did you learn something from tuning in today? Please pay it forward and write us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts. 📧If you have feedback for the show, please email [e-mail]  📙Get yourself a copy of Jennifer Cohen’s newest book from Habit Nest, Badass Body Goals Journal. ℹ️Habits & Hustle Website 📚Habit Nest Website 📱Follow Jennifer – Instagram – Facebook – Twitter – Jennifer’s Website Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Vitamin Water Zero Sugar just dropped in all new taste with zero holding back on flavor. You can be your all feeling. I'll play and all self-care you. Grab the all new taste today. Vitamin Water Zero Sugar, nourish every you. Vitamin Water is a registered trademark of glass O. Hi guys, it's Tony Robbins. You're listening to Habitson Hustle,

fresh it. All right you guys, if you want to feel uplifted, inspired, and educated, you must listen to my next podcast with a friend of my name, Saul Blinkoff. Saul began his career as an animator for the Walt Disney Studios, working on hit films like Mulan, Tarzan, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and many, many others. He then made his directorial debut with Disney

doing a ton of different blockbuster movies. The list is endless. He speaks around the world, sharing practical tools for success, meaning and fulfillment in all aspects of life, not just professional. He hosts an inspirational weekly podcast, his own called The Life of Awesome. He is super down to earth, just a great guy, and high energy, very motivational, and I think you're gonna really, really like him. And you're gonna really enjoy this podcast. So stay tuned.

I've never actually heard, I've heard from other people that you're a really great speaker, you're a super motivational and like all that stuff. And so I was like, it peaked my interest number one. And then when I started to like, you know, go into the weeds, but before I knew you were going to come on, I started listening to your new podcast, Life is Awesome. I should say the life, no, Life of Awesome. Is it name? There you go. Yes. And I started to listen to the episodes. And first of all, you and I are so aligned, like even how you name your podcast, like the titles of the podcast.

Right. And you're like, I want to be like book cover titles, like three words, nice and simple, like the title succeeded failing, which took me an hour to come up with. But when I came up with it, I went after my wife and my honey, do you realize how brilliant that title is exactly at failing? You don't think you can do it. When I was to my wife and my honey, do you realize how brilliant that title is? Exactly. At failing. You don't think you can do it. You don't think you can succeed at failing.

Because failing is failure. That's right. I know you get that. But what are you going to say? No, no, no, no, I think it's like, I agree. And I think it's like, it's very funny because you have a lot of wisdom. You're very young.

And like, I find that like I'm sure. Not Jay Shetty, young. Because that's young. Oh, now very young and like I, you know, and I find that like I'm sure. Not Jay Shetty, young, because that's young. Oh, now Jay Shetty's like, you know, next level, yeah. Next level, yeah. I know I couldn't believe it. I'm like, he's literally like a toddler and I'm like, he's used out all this wisdom, you know? But you're, you know, I mean, maybe you're not that young,

but you seem to have a lot of wisdom. And you kind of like, well, tell us a little bit about or tell me us as habits and hustle, people listening here. What is your background? How did you kind of like morph and evolve into like being this wise man, doing motivational speaking, speaking things, like, you know, all over corporate, you do a lot of corporate things as well Like you're speaking engagement. I do yeah, yeah Yeah, and how did you kind of come to have this podcast life of awesome? Well, okay good

Well, you know, look, I've made my career in animation in Hollywood at Disney for a long time dream works now and About 11 years ago, no, let's go back more. Let me really go back. It was before I got married, I married 19 years. So we're talking like 22 years ago, I was at a wedding. And it was in Israel, it was an outdoor wedding, and I have asthma, or at least I did back then, I'm outgrown at thank God.

Oh, is there? I was running through a lobby to get an asthma spray. And I was running through this lobby. Their lobby was filled with teenagers. They were all sitting there hanging out and I ran and got the asthma spray. As I was running back through, these teenagers are all sitting there hanging out

and just doing what teenagers do. I stopped running and I just had this overcome feeling of, I gotta share some wisdom with them This 20 something years ago Jen and I said to them What's your goals in life? What do you want to try to accomplish? Because I went through hell to get into Disney animation that was a dream. That was really my incredible Mountain to climb I went through a lot and I learned a lot through that process and I wanted to share that feeling and tools, literally

tools for them to reach more successful plateaus in their life with them. So I stopped for five minutes and talked to them. I missed the entire wedding. An hour and a half later for real. And if my wife was with me then she would be like, honey, could you let the teenagers just chill? Like, let's get back to the wedding. And something came off, like something went off in me in that experience. I remember another experience a couple years after that, I was in Boston visiting BU and I was on a public bus and there was a kid there and we just started talking and I started sharing my story with him and I saw he was engaged and it was working.

So that was where I noticed there was something in me. I mean, I tell people a lot of there's ever something you think you may be interested, but you're not sure you're ready to commit. If you would have told me 25, whatever years ago, someday you're going to want to be a motivational speaker, started a podcast. I wasn't there. But if we get these little signs along the way that just need to be cultivated and blossom a little bit, we can see what the potential, what they can be.

And then the speaking just started. You know, I was first speaking at universities and then communities and corporate. And over the years, people said, hey, when is the podcast coming? When is that coming out? And I was like, yeah, maybe soon, whatever. And then about a year, actually about maybe two,

three years ago, I was a guest on a podcast for Kathy Heller. She's a podcast called Don't Keep Your Day Job. Yeah, I was on her podcast. Oh, you were? Yeah, not only were you there, but you spoke at her retreat event. So I spoke the day after you at that event, by the way.

Oh, you did. No, that's so funny. And if I did, she used the one also who was, she was telling me like a long time ago, oh my God, like it was so great. He had such like great nuggets of wisdom and like how, not my god, it was so great. He had such great nuggets of wisdom and not just wisdom, but how you execute on those pieces of information or those great thoughts that people kind of pond or pontificate, you're able to execute it very well. It resonates. It resonates.

Right, I tried. Thank you. That experience of speaking to her tribe, you know her people was just another one of those moments where I was like You know what maybe I really should consider doing a podcast So for the last year I really focused on you know titles and names and episodes and then this last Christmas vacation I was off for two weeks and I'm like I'm gonna do it and my wife and I sat down and we said are we doing this? Because it's that it's a family affair in our home, you know? Are we doing this? And then we were all in and the feedback I've been getting has been great. And people call me or text me, they're like, wow, this is really impacting me.

I was going through something and it's just such a, and you know, you know, being a successful podcaster, having that the world's ear is such an incredible responsibility. But the meaning that we get from sharing ideas and seeing that it impacts people, it's uncompromising, it's amazing. I love it. Yeah, no, I agree with you. I like that.

I mean, what I really liked about your content and what you speak about, not just in your speaking thing, engagements, but on your podcast is you have a few through lines that I really connected to you talk about tenacity you talk about putting ideas into action you talk about discipline and You know and how all those things are so important to kind of you know to kind of Create like to self-actualize, so to speak, right, to become the best version of yourself. Yeah.

You know why, Jack, will you know why I focus on those? If I can just interject. Yeah. I hear from people a lot, as I'm sure you do. A lot of people have dreams or goals of things they want to accomplish. Nobody wakes up and has no vision or no dream or no goal.

We all have some goals in our lives, whether it's make more money, more successful relationships, whatever our dream is. But I have find that most people are not really putting in the discipline to achieve those goals. I'll give you just one example, which I think I mentioned one of my podcast episodes. When I was in college, I went to a school in Columbus, Ohio, Columbus College of Art Design, and it was a very competitive program to get into Disney. That year, Disney picked, I think, about 15 students and thousands around the world, very

competitive. And one of the things that Disney looks for in their portfolios is drawings of humans and animals. You have to draw from life. They're not looking for cartoon characters. And one of the things we did is we went to the zoo and you go to the zoo to draw animals from life. And there was an elephant outside walking back and forth constantly, which is the greatest thing to have one animal repeat an action for an artist. It's like the most luxurious day you're going to have it to zoo. And we all go to the zoo. We're all in this Wendy's cafe and getting hot chocolate. The boys are

flirt with the girls. The girls are flirting with the boys and all that and Andy my best friend and I go outside to draw the elephants. It's a bitter cold freezing day and Andy and I were the only ones out there drawing the elephants and if you get going up to any of those students in that Wendy's and say Is your dream to work at Disney? They'd all want to go. Yeah, that's my dream. I'm wearing Mickey Mouse sweatshirt Yeah, I'm a Disney guy, yet it's my dream. And you know that Disney tells you in order to get into Disney, you got to draw elephants.

They're like, yeah, I know that. Then what the heck are you doing in the Wendy's? If you're lucky enough to have a goal and lucky enough that the company you want to work with is telling you exactly what you need to do in order to achieve it. Because it does not forget, a lot of people they have have a goal but they don't know how to achieve it. If you get the recipe for how to achieve what you want, why would you not follow it? And if you went up to every single one of those people and that went in these and asked them,

why are you not out there? You know what they would have told you? I can't. Why not? It's too cold. Oh, oh, you mean it's painful. Oh, you mean it's uncomfortable. That's right. And I find, and I want to shake people, which is another reason that I like to share this message is that I know you have the goal, but how far are you really willing to go? Are you really willing to get out of your comfort zone? I get frustrated. I hear people like, oh, I'm inspired watching Netflix.

I watched another Michael Jordan documentary, or a documentary on Tony Robbins or whoever. And I'm inspired. That's nice. You watch that documentary. Do you know what they all have in common? They work their butts off insanely and that there's discipline behind everything. If we're really willing to put on the work and to really invest in it, then why can't we

have our goals? But I find that most people, they're just like, you know what? I'll settle for, okay, I'll settle for good. That's why I actually titled my podcast Life of Awesome, because if someone comes up to you, they ask you how you doing, you're going to go, yeah, things are good, that's good. That's like the answer I gave just to kind of, I'm not going to go that deep with you, and we'll just stop it good. But if someone comes up to you and they say, how are things going, and you look at them and you go, things are awesome. You know what they would say to you, but why did you win the lottery today? Did you,

did you have another kid like what happened? No, nothing. Why does awesome have to be dependent on something happening to us? Why can't we just wake up every day and realize life is a gift and that enough is awesome and that should motivate us. So those are kind of the ideas which really propelled me to do this podcast and share these tools with people. Yeah, no, I love it. For so, it's interesting. I did a TED Talk a year ago

called The Secret to Getting Anything You Want in Life. It's all right. I've watched all your stuff, too. I'm surprised you didn't know. You're so good. I love it. I see it. Yeah. That was great. You know, I've watched all your stuff, too. Oh, you have. Oh, okay. I see. I see it. Yeah. That was great.

You know, I appreciate that. Even if you're just blowing smoke up my butt. No, no, no. Your husband, your husband, the sweetest guy in the world, has been singing your praises to me for years. I, like, no, for real. Like, everything that you've done, I'm always tall. You know, he's, he gets on. I know, you know, he's like my, he's like my

publicist, you know, I go a place and they're like, oh yeah, congratulations on so and so or this and that. I'm like, how do you know? They're like, oh, we're adding to Noah or Noah told us or Noah like, he's a guy. He's a guy. I mean, it's very nice. I appreciate it. Thank you. But you talk about a couple of things that I find interesting. Well, first of all, the story that you just told about when you want to become an animator for Disney, whatever. And yet, it's the hard work that people have a goal, but they don't want to kind of like do the follow-through,

which could be the discipline and the hard work. So in my TED talk, I talk about how would I went after Keanu Reeves, right? And I you know, in my TED Talk, I talk about how when I went after Keanu Reeves, right, and I took my, my, a couple of friends and, you know, people wanted to go and they wanted to meet him, right? But when it turns out that it was in minus 40 weather, they laughed at, you know, everyone went home after like 10 seconds, but I stood there outside for like an hour waiting, right? And so there is like, there is something that you said.

And a week later, he was in your living room. Like five days later, right? Five days later, right? Right, exactly. So the point, I think what I think that, like when I heard that story and like other things that you talk about, it like the, it does like resonate so deeply with me

because it is, sometimes it's as simple as just like doing the work or going that extra mile and not settling for the default, right? And so, you know, I think you were saying also like Jim Rohn, who's, you know, you said to Tony Robbins, Guru, what was the quote that he said? I was like, the what, you know, hold on a second, we must, we must all suffer one of two things, the pain of discipline or the pain ever regret, which is so true. And I live by that. That is one of the greatest quotes I have ever heard. And for your listeners listening, check this quote out again. I'm going to miss quote it out because I don't have it in front

of me, but he's basically saying to us, you're going to have one of two pains in life. You're not going to escape pain. You're going to have the pain of regret. And you get to choose which regret you want. Now, you're going to have one. He didn't say you can choose regret or no regret. You're going to have one. And here's the choice he says, you could have the regret or the pain of regret of looking back at your life and thinking of all the things I could have done. All the people that got in my way, you could have that pain, the pain of looking back and going, you know what, I wish I could have done. All the people that got in my way, you could have that pain, the pain of looking back and going, you know what, I wish I could have been more. Or you can have the pain of putting the discipline and the work in to accomplish that goal. There's

going to be a pain either way. That's what he's saying. It's not really you're choosing one of two regrets, you're choosing one of two pains. It's either the pain of regret looking back and saying, I could have done more or the pain of, you know what? I'm gonna work my butt off to accomplish something and it's gonna be painful, but I'm gonna grow. And then if you do that one, guess what? You look back at your life or a back at your year or back at your day and guess what, no regret.

Isn't that something we all want? Don't wanna look back and go, yeah, I did something. And by the way, in that, let's not set our goals so high that they're unattainable. All right, we say like, shoot for the stars, end up on top of a mountain. At least shoot higher than you want to be. But shoot as high as you can, you know?

That's the part of the goal. No, absolutely. And I think that there's a big difference between knowing information and then acting on it. So let me say something. So I want to talk about something that I heard you talk about, which is, of course, back to wisdom. You say this three stages of person can exist

and when it relates to wisdom. Do you remember talking about this? I do. Yeah. Let's talk about that because I think what's important is, and what I try to do on this podcast is give people practical, you know, information that they can then take and then try to really apply into their lives to make it better, right?

And so, I think a lot of times what happens is, it's one thing to know something, to have wisdom, but it's one thing to know something, to have wisdom. But it's another thing to then take it and then apply it into your life. So let's talk about that. Yeah, sure. I mean, look, it's, it's, this is, these are, these are thoughts that I've processed for many years. And I've noticed that. I think they're like you're saying there's these three ways that we relate to wisdom. And let's just say wisdom is whether you're reading a book or you're listening to a podcast,

or you're listening to a speaker, or you learn anything. Anything that we learn, the first place exists is in our minds. It's in our heads. I learned something, no, it's in my head. It doesn't mean I've made it real. The only way to know that if that wisdom has been concretized is to not just know the wisdom, it's to live the wisdom.

But stage one of listening to anything is understanding what is the wisdom saying. Literally, what is the point to speak, Jen, you gave a TED Talk. Hopefully everyone in that room will listen to you, which was an awesome TED Talk, by the way, if you guys have a listen to it, go check it out. But if everyone, hopefully everyone in that room listened and understood what Jen was saying. Okay, number one, I got it. I got the point.

Whatever it is, that's number one. Most people stop there. You see stage two, so important, and that is, how does the wisdom I'm hearing relate to my life? If I'm hearing a piece of wisdom that tells me how to be more patient as a husband, and I go, yeah, I think that actually does make sense. That's a good way to work on patients.

Stage two is, how can I relate that to, oh, you know what, with my wife sometimes? I'm not that patient with her. I expect her to answer the questions so fast, and let me get back to my career, where I should really be listening a little bit more. You know what, I should apply that more in my life with my wife.

I see how that relates to me. That's stage two. But stage three, it's the most important stage. Stage three is, now that I know it can relate to my relationship with my wife, let me actually use that as a tool, which means next time my wife actually speaks to me or asks me a question, I actually do stop and listen to her speak a little bit more. It's actually taking the wisdom that we've learned and making it real into action. Because if we don't bring it into action, then we've wasted all our time. So many times I hear

people say inspiration on it, this person's inspiring. Inspiration comes and goes. It goes to our fingertips. It's literally worthless. If it doesn't lead to action. And the only way I think, Janet, the end of the day that we grow as a human being is to actually apply these wisdoms, not just to be someone that knows the wisdom, but to live it and make it real. Right, so I agree with you. Do I have a question?

So let's say that's the case, so you have the wisdom and you're, how do you get yourself in your opinion to then apply it right that's the issue right people could people can have the goal they know to your point earlier they know what they want they they know in their head you know to some level what they want to be doing they can they can hear it and that's why people are lists that's why all this stuff there's a mezillion podcasts and all sorts of different people that they can, you know, that people relate to and they listen and listen and listen

and they hear it and they go to seminars and they sign up for courses and then they get stuck between, okay, having that information and then, you know, you applying it. We have the only way to apply it. Yeah, the only way to apply it, in my humble opinion, the only way to apply it is You have to step there. How do you apply it? Yeah, the only way to apply it, in my humble opinion, the only way to apply it

is to have tools. You must have tools. I'll give you an example. When I was, there's about five or six years old, six years old, we lived literally two blocks away from the public school that I went to in Philadelphia. I grew up in Philadelphia. And my mom would say to me, my twin sister,

my older brother, before we left every day to walk to school alone, she could have said, you know what, I want you to go to school and be careful along the way. How does it six year old? I know how to be careful. I would have been like, yeah, mom, I think that makes sense to be careful. She's don't know how to do it. So you know what she would say? What? She'd say, go to the corner. And when you're at the corner, I want you to look up at that pole with the light on it. And if it's red, don't move. And if it's yellow, don't move. And if it's green, look to the left, that's tool number two, look to the right, tool number three,

and then cross the street. She gave me those three tools. Even though we have a lofty goal, I want to be careful on my way to school. I still need those tools to help me get there. I'll give you one other example. It's a little more practical. A couple of ago, I was with a, I was leading a men's trip to Israel. And this one great guy brings me aside. He says, Saul, you know, after

this trip when I get home, my wife's going to ask me for a divorce. And I said, yeah, what's the problem? He was, well, I don't want to be divorced from her. I'm like, okay. He's like, do you have any advice for me? I'm like, look, I'm not a marriage counselor. Let me ask you a question. If your wife said to you, if we talked to your wife right now and asked her, what are two things my husband should change about how he lives? What would your wife say about you? And he said, my wife would say that I need to spend more time with her and that the time I spend with her should be more quality time. I'm like, okay, great. Then here's what she do. Spend more time with her. That's tool number one. And when you're

with her, put the iPhone away. Like literally put it away. But then I told them, but if you do that, you know what will happen? In two or three years, you will be spending more time with your wife and it will be quality time, but you will resent your wife. And you will want to divorce her because the only reason you're doing those things is to make her happy. I said, which is a good reason, by the way, but I said to wouldn't it be great if you actually had the idea yourself to want to spend more time with her? And if when you were with her, it was your idea to put the phone away because you actually wanted to connect with her more and you had a craving to find out more about her day. You see the tool I gave him was, yes, spend more time with her and put your phone away. But before that, get back into the mindset of why did you get married in the first place.

First of all, why did you get married? Not why did you marry her? Why did you want to get married anyway? Why? Because you were 23 and that's just what people did. My friends did. My parents did it at the age and I just want want to be normal so I get married. And who will I marry? The cute girl that laughs at my jokes. I'll marry her. Okay, so now you married her. Why her?

Because she laughed at your jokes? Because guess what? After she hears your jokes for 10 years, she's not going to laugh anymore. What you're going to hear at the divorce? You see, the reason we need to get married or have a relationship is because at the end of the day, if we're going to grow in life, we need to have someone else's perspective on us.

We should think of a tree gen with a cross section of a tree. If you think of those outer rings of a tree, that's like our social media. Think about Facebook. Maybe you have a thousand or three thousand friends on Facebook. If you have someone on Facebook that you don't even know your friends with, by the way, I have many friends on Facebook. I don't know how many friends with Facebook. If you have someone on Facebook that you don't even know your friends with, by the way, I have many friends on Facebook. I don't know. And what if one of these people text you privately and goes, you know, I heard you speaking last week and you should have been a little more humble. You were a little arrogant. I would have been like, who are

you? I don't even know. Oh, we're friends on Facebook. I don't know you. I've been like, who are you to talk to me? I don't even know you. But hopefully as we go closer to the center, we're people that we really do care about. Loved ones, friends. Hopefully at the end of the day, we have one person who can actually call us on our stuff. One person that can tell us, you know what, you acted a little arrogantly and I'd be like, you know what, thank you. Thanks for telling me because at the end of the day, if we want those marriages to work or those relationships to work, in any relationship, if two people always have the same point of view, one person is useless. At the end of the day, if I'm going to grow, the only way to grow is to find out where my flaws are, is where I need to work on myself. I guarantee when Steve Jobs invented the first iPhone,

which is the greatest product in history, other than Coca-Cola in my humble opinion. Coke is not good for you and I know who I'm talking to. But it tastes damn good. But I guarantee when Steve Jobs finished creating the very first iPhone, I'm sure he was like took his team in the board room and congratulated them for the champagne and you know what he probably told them. That's a little bit silly. But that's a good deal for him.

But I'm hoping he would have said to them, you know what he probably told them? That's a little actually, but that's been a little bit. Downfall, right? But I'm hoping he would have said to them, you know what? Come back tomorrow morning and tell me how we're going to make it better. You see, the tool is, if I'm going to grow than the flaws that I have, and we all have them, those are the answer keys to me growing. And people need tools to answer your question. How do you achieve any of these goals? You need to have tools. Look, I have my wife and I were busy as heck.

We have four kids in a puppy and I have career and I'm a dream works and I have a podcast and many other things and I'm a dad and I wasn't, we're busy. And I could go a day without even speaking to my wife other than can you pass me the water. And my wife have a habit, a ritual, whatever you want to call it, that every night we finally got the kids to sleep, or at least the younger ones, and we walk the dog together.

We walked the dog. You know, my wife and I get to do it, we get to talk. We get to hold hands and talk and walk around a couple of blocks and we get 10 minutes together every day. And without that dog, I tell you, I would have been busy and we just lie in bed and we're just, we fall right asleep. That's it. There's no whisper time.

There's no talk. There's no intimacy. There's no communication. The fact that we have that ritual. So the idea is really you need to have tools without tools set up inspiration. We'll slip right through our fingertips. Keep coming back. You got plenty of space. Oh, not how you would have done that. You like working with people you can rely on. Like USAA, who has helped guide the military community for the past 100 years. USAA, get a quote today. Vitamin water just dropped a new zero-sugar flavor

called with love. Get the taste of raspberry and dark chocolate for the all-warm, all fuzzy, all-self-care, zero-self-doubt- you. Grab a with love today. Vitamin water, zero sugar, nourish every you. Vitamin water is a registered trademark of glass O. Yes. Yeah, no, I agree. And you know, to your point, I would, no one I would usually not now. And I think it's, I always tell people, like unless you, you have to plan like you would

anything else, right? We used to go for a walk every night to a, for dinner because that way that you end up talking to the person at that time, right? So, I'm crazy busy, you know, he's busy, the, you know, it's like, it's very easy to kind of then live parallel lives with somebody. Because then you're doing your thing, you're doing their things,

and then one day turned into one year, and that's when everything starts to dissipate. However, now we don't do those walks anymore, because when you have kids, it gets even harder, so you've got to figure out different rituals. Now I'm going out a rabbit hole. But what I was going to say is, that's why for me, in general, with my life, besides what I was

going to, but size that particular ritual, morning routine, evening routines are extremely important for me to say a point professionally and or personally, right? Like, to put in, and when you know you have certain places where you would dip, you know you have sort of places where you would dip, you got to like create those places. So like, for example, if you know you're the kind of person to listen to a lot of podcasts and sign up for all these seminars, and yet you see a pattern in your behavior where you're not, nothing's moving the needle, you're

not growing, you're not changing, you know, Have the self-awareness enough to be like, okay, what do I need to do to change that by making a small little change here and there, right? That's how you do it. Absolutely, yeah, I said it. And also, what I like that you said is you need to know where you're going to slip. You need to know where those flaws are. Even if you have that set time in that ritual, you need to know, even when I have that ritual, this is a place where I might sleep a little longer or I might not read when I want.

And that's where you need to have mentors or friends or your spouse, someone to coach you and help you. You know, I get a call a couple weeks ago from Buddy of Mine. He's like, I really want to write a book. This is what he said. He's like, I just don't have time. And I'm like, first of all, no one has time. Right.

No one has time. No one people have time where they're in the hole in jail. Like when I watch Shawshank, you're going to be like, yeah, you don't have time. And I'm like, first of all, no one has time. Right. No one has time. No one people have time where they're in the hole in jail. Like when I watch Shawshank, you're going to be like, yeah, that's true. Yeah, I feel like. They go in prison. I'm like, that must be so nice. Just no one has asked you for anything.

You can do it every, that's amazing. I get some reading done, you know? Exactly. I know, you still look like it would be such an awful thing now. It'd be great to be stuck in a hole by myself. So I'm tearing and climbing the same thing. It's a great idea. I know. So I tell my buddy an awful thing now. It'd be great to be stuck in a hole by myself. So I'm Terry can find me. It seems like a great idea. I know.

So I tell my buddy, I might look, you want to write a book. Let me ask you a question. What time do you wake up right now on Sundays? Like Sunday wake up about 9, 9, 30, and my great set your clock for 8.30. Well, forget it, set your clock for 9. And you have 10 minutes every Sunday morning

that you will write your book is like, but it's gonna take many hours. I'm like, how many hours you're putting in now? Well, none. So here's what you do. I said to him every Sunday morning, 10 minutes, you go into another room. And that is your time to write your book. And here's what you're going to tell your wife and kids. Nobody talks to daddy during those 10 minutes. And not only that, I said to him, you take your iPhone and you're not going to silence it. You're going to shut it off. Because if your phone is on, but it's silence, a little text comes up, you're going to look over and say, well, is that important or not? You just wish to. And then there's no discipline. And guess what?

Not only will you work for 10 minutes every week on this writing, but all week, that feeling that you have that you want to accomplish. And I want you'll at least know that you can look forward to it. See, whatever goal we have as long as we're taking small steps and we have a set time and that really is the tool I want to share with your listeners. It's if you want to accomplish something whatever it is, you have to have a set time to accomplish it and that means. And I said to them this, I'm like like if you go to Disney World of vacation and you got to be at the Magic Kingdom at nine o'clock, you tell everybody, you know what, I won't be there at nine o'clock,

I'll be there at nine, 15, because even on vacation, those 10 minutes are my writing. And if we approach that discipline to just writing and we approach that same discipline, to relationships, to eating better, to health, to every aspect of our life, then we feel like we wake up, and you know what, I'm in control of my life,

and we will see huge steps over a long amount of time. And guess what happens, you wake up at six months and you spend many, many hours writing your book and most of it's done already, as opposed to right now where you haven't set time. That's what I told them. I agree, also it's non-negotiables. I mean, people ask me all the time, like,

oh, how do you stay fit? Or how do I do this? There's certain things that they're important to you. And you say this a lot too. If something's important to you, you make it a priority. And there's no, you'll do anything that you can to get it. And it's true. And I live and die by that, right? Like it's

really important to me to be fit and to live healthily and all those things. So what do I do? No matter what time my day starts with work, I will wake up an hour earlier than that so I can exercise. No matter what, you know, I just have that morning and start the day on your terms. On my terms, exactly. Right. Because a worse feeling is, you know, when you let yourself down, forget about letting everyone else down in front of you, but it's even worse when you let yourself down. And you're not, you know what I mean?

And you're not even, you're a worse person every other way when that happens to the outside world, right? Because- I'm a great lyric from an old Billy Joel song. I'm talking old. Not his greatest hits, the songs that everyone knows. I will say this name in most of the- Okay.

I never heard of that song. The song is called James. Okay. No, I never heard of that one. I would imagine not. Right. All the Billy Joel nerds like me know it. Okay.

He has no one lyric in that song. As a kid, I remember it. He says, I'm not going to sing it because my kids really dad don't sing. Okay. He says, do what's good for you or you're not good for anybody. Yeah. It's good for you or you're not good for anybody. You want to be good for your family? Then you got to take care of you. You want to be good for what you got to take care of. That's what you're talking about. That extra hour that you give yourself is not just the foundation. got to take care of. That's what you're talking about. That extra hour that you give yourself

is not just the foundation. Everyone needs to hear this. It's not just the foundation of, make sure I have time for myself. If you hear the tool the Genghis said, make sure I have time for myself. It almost sounds selfish. You're just like, no.

It's only when I have set time for myself that I can then be who I need to be for my family. It really is the most way to give to them, right? Absolutely. And to everything, I mean, I don't have, like I said, the exercise is extremely important for a lot of things. That's why I even do the podcast on treadmills,

but not because that's technically exercise, but movement. I feel like, no, I'm just gonna walk in place. You know, you show, you just walk around your desk a few times, you know. We can walk around the desk a few times. We can walk around the desk if we do this podcast. But I do think I think it's really, really important to have non-negotiables for yourself and be self-aware and realize where you have those, where you

slip because that's the hardest part, right? And I also think it's important to like when you know your weaknesses, you find people who can balance out those weaknesses with what you're good at. Because nothing happens in an isolated situation. I don't think any success. You have to, even when you find a partner for, you know, relationship, like husband, a wife, a girlfriend, whatever you want. And also professionally, you find people that compliment what you're good at.

So it's not, right? So, you can have success. That my father-in-law taught me, I shared it before, which is in any relationship, if two people have the same point of view, one person is useless. If my wife agrees with everything that I ever do and sees everything like me,

then why do I need a wife? It's only the challenge by this. That's the most important thing in a relationship I think is finding someone that helps you by going against you. But the foundation is to know that there are my side. And if you have that foundation of trust and relationship and I know that someone's really on my side, then I know that they can say anything to me. And you need that.

Absolutely. I know we shouldn't be Jen where it's like, oh, you know what? You know, you brought this up to me and yeah, I can handle it. You go over to that person and you beg them. Tell me how I can work on myself. Think right now for a minute, if you're listening to this and you have someone you work for, most of us have a boss of some kind. What you never drove home and thought about the list of all the ways that you wish your

boss was running the company differently. You never had that idea in your head of the ways that you wish your boss was running the company differently. You never had that idea in your head of, you know what, if I was running the company, I could do it like this much better. I wish my boss that we all have lists of everyone we work with, how they should change. If you're lucky right now and your parents are still alive, you don't have a list in your head of how my mom should have treated me differently growing up or my dad, or how they should talk to me differently now. We all walk or if you're married, you don't have a list of how you wish your spouse was different. We all walk around with lists, constant lists in our heads. Some of them we verbalize, most of them we don't, of how everyone else in the world should change. Now take that same energy and make a list about you. Because at the end of the day, the only person

you can really change is you. And if we want to change the world, it starts right here. We need to work on ourselves. You work on yourself. You're driving your car. There's a pothole. You're going to be in the car going, oh, you know what?

I wish that pothole wasn't there. Who did that? You're going to blame them? No, why don't you control the? And then I wish that pothole wasn't there. Who did that? You're going to blame them? No. Why don't you control the one thing you can take your car and sort of to the left? I don't know. And you know what else you'll do in those relationships?

Instead of being in the tug of war and relationships, always trying to change someone. You will be much happier person because you're just like, you know what? I'll accept them as they are. I don't work on myself. Let me work on myself. And that's the greatest battle in life, by the way. I tell us to my kids all the time. The most difficult thing in life

is interacting with people, working on relationships with people because they go through this school. It starts at six years old. You know, you have little ones, you know, and sometimes it's come home and there's someone at school that said this or that. But at the end of the day, those relationships with people around us, whether it's a trader Joe's online or someone cutting us off on the car, whatever it is, while they are all difficult, that's second to the greatest battle, which is working on ourselves. Because what those relationships do is they make us have to work right here. And that's where we're uncomfortable. You know, I'm not going to work on me. That's

the ego. I'm perfect. It's them that has to change. They're the ones that cut me off. Okay, so they cut you off. Laugh at them and slow down a little. How many times have you driving the car and someone won't let you get in? That ever happened to you? They won't let you in.

They don't think it was that good. I always could just throw off your day so bad of five more seconds. And I start to get angry and like, you know what? Is it gonna throw my day off? Five more seconds, big deal. More from our guest, but first a few words from our sponsor. Text us to receive up to five automated marketing text to your number.

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how to use Excel better. And not only were they incredibly helpful, I got to learn some very easy practical things in under an hour. And I will tell you, I'll be using many more courses to come. No matter your goal, LinkedIn Learning helps you learn the skills to make it happen. LinkedIn Learning, try free for one month at LinkedIn Learning.com slash free month. That's LinkedIn Learning.com slash free month. That's the hardest thing, though. I think changing behavior, I mean, it's one thing to be self-aware. That's, I think, number one.

And then the changing of someone's behavior, your patterns of behaviors is so, so hard to do, right? It's like, I think that you have to be so resilient, or like, that's a good segue into like, sometimes the resilience of trying, you know, tomorrow's a good segue into like, sometimes the resilience of trying, you know, tomorrow's another day, you can try better next time, try better next time, because it is very, very difficult to do those things. Yeah, you know what else, when we fail,

I think there's a big mistake that I've done this before. I think we all have, at least I know I have. Sometimes when we fail, we see ourselves now as a failure. There's a big difference between failing and being a failure. When I told you, I told you earlier that I work really hard to get into Disney and I got rejected twice. And when I rejected my second time, my best friend Andy gets into Disney.

And I gave up on the entire dream. Because reality is said in reality is, Andy was an awesome natural talent Did born with the gift the glow from the creator? He was now where is he now? He was a Disney and now he's at Sony. He said Sony is an art director. Oh, okay. I love that story and I want you to tell that story about How he got in you didn't get in and you call the guy you how he got in, you didn't get in, and then you called the guy, you were, you know,

at that moment, you know my, my question, of course I do. I wanted to have you on if I didn't like look into this stuff because I wanted to, but I love that story. Yeah.

And say it, and I'll tell you why I love it afterwards, but I'll tell you that, I'll tell you that why I love it, because people need to know that, I'll tell you after I don't want to ruin it, go ahead. Okay, okay. Well, yeah, so like I was saying, so like I worked very want to ruin it. Go ahead. Okay. Well, yeah, I was like I was saying.

So like I worked very hard to get into Disney, my sophomore year of college, and I got rejected. And then you have to wait a whole the year to try again. And just think about it's not just the working hard, whatever you're working hard for, the physicality of the discipline of being on a treadmill or getting up and writing, whatever. The physicality is nothing compared to the emotional anguish that we go through. That's where the real battle is. And they told me I had to wait another whole year to try to get into Disney again. So another year goes by and me and my best friend Andy get our portfolios together. And at this

point, everybody in the school knew if there's two guys that are going to get into Disney, it's solid Andy because these two guys never stop working. We never stop drawing. So we get our portfolios together, right? And we send them into Disney. A week or two goes, and I get a call and it's Andy on the phone. I'm like, Hey, man, what's up? He's like, blink off. Did you hear? I'm like, no, did you? He's like, yeah, I'm like, what'd you hear? He goes, I got it. I said, you got what he goes, I got the internship. I got into Disney. I'm like, that's amazing. Congratulations. He's like, yeah, I'm like, what'd you hear? He goes, I got it. I said, you got what he goes. I got the internship I got it to Disney. I'm like, that's amazing. Congratulations. He's like, but you didn't hear. I'm like, no, but they could be trying to call me right now

I got to hang out. We didn't have call waiting back there, right? So I hang up the phone. I'm pacing the dining room. My mom walks in She's like, honey, what happened? My mom and he gets in and she's pacing back and forth and I can't stand waiting Then it hits me, Chad. I'm like, wait, Andy's last name begins I'm like wait Andy's last name begins with the letter H My last name begins with the letter B shouldn't it be alphabetical? Should they have called me first? So I can't stand it anxiety sets in I'm like, you know, I'm gonna call the head of Disney myself. Well, who does that? I did because like you said earlier when there's something you want in your life you will do Anything to get it and there's a story that my kids love me to share is that when I was a kid growing up,

I grew up in New York and he's the love watching Michael Jordan play. Jordan was the man, this is before LeBron James. I love this story too. If any of you are the listeners who are listening right now and you're like, oh, it's LeBron James, you just hush because it's Jordan all the way, okay? That's just a big deal.

I'm a big Jordan fan too, Bob. I'm a big Jordan fan, right? So I'm standing on the side of the court and Jordan is standing on the court with those breakaway pants and he got that basketball he's dribbling, he's got the gum in his mouth and he's chewing the gum and he had that focus. Like nobody had a game face like Jordan. I'll do it since we're on video for your listeners.

It's kind of like, it's kind of like that. Those you didn't see it, you should check out the video. So he has this game face and I said to my older brother who's standing next to me like Jay I'm gonna go step on the court right now and say hi to Michael Jordan and there's security around you're mad As a square garden. You don't just walk on the court my brothers. You're not going no before he could finish that sentence Little Sali was walking out on the court and I'm looking right up to Michael Jordan and I looked up to him and I go Hi, Mr. Jordan and he looks down at me and says, quote, yo, how you doing?

End quote. Inspiring words, he shook my hand, which I've never washed, right? Still had that. Michael Jordan's sweat on it. But you know why I walked out there? Because when there's something you want in your life, there's no can't.

I have a friend. His name is Ari Shabbat. He does these like Spartan races and he's like straining all the time the most you got to have on your Podcast someday. He's unbelievable. This guy is like mud and he has a great quote. He says do what you can't Do what you can't there is no can't so I call up the head of Disney I'm like hey, this is Saul Blinkoff. I want to find out if I got it. Oh, Saul. I have your name on a list here I'm like yeah, Andy goes is Saul Blinkoff. I want to find out if I got it. Oh, Saul, I have your name on a list here. I'm like, yeah, Andy goes, yeah, you didn't make it. I went, what do you mean? He's like, yeah, you didn't make it.

I said, well, what about Andy? He's like, yeah, he got in. You didn't. He's like, oh, thank you. And I hung up the phone. And even just sharing that story with you now, Jen, the emotion comes back, you know, it comes back. And I remember after years of the dreams and the passion and the heart and the standing at the zoo and drawing elephants and the cold and Focus like nobody's business focus. It was over and and I went back to school and he's going to Disney World They called the happiest place on earth. He's going to Sunshine. I'm going back to Ohio in the wintertime What I thought at the time was the most depressing place on earth.

No offense if you're listening to this in Ohio. But you guys know in Ohio, it's cold and it's gray. And I get back to school and I walk in the halls of the school and everyone's coming up to me like, blink off, what are you doing here? Oh, you didn't get into, oh, what happened to Andy? Oh, he got in, oh, you didn't. And everyone's giving me a look of this sympathy.

I'm like, oh, like I felt like a loser. My daughter, my oldest, she's 17 almost, and she just took her test today for a license, like an hour ago, she came in in tears, because she failed her test, her driving test, because she missed one turn. And this is a great driver, and all her driving instructors, great driver,

she comes in, she's like, dad, and she has a look like, I will never be able to drive a car in my life. And I'm like, you're taking the test again in like three weeks. But this is the thing. When we fail, reality sets in and we feel like it's never going to happen to me. And when I was at school, I came up with the greatest tool to take that feeling of failure away. And if you're listening to this episode right now, if you ever have a moment in your life when you fail and you're known as the person that didn't accomplish something, do the tool that I'm going to tell you right now and that feeling goes away in a second.

You know what I did? I gave up. I gave up on the entire dream. You don't want to be great, then just give up. But guess what? You're going to get to the end of your life. And it's the pain of regret. What do we do when we fail? We need to remember like I was saying earlier, just because we fail, it doesn't mean we're a failure. And all failing is an opportunity to grow. So during that time when I gave up, I went and saw the movie Rudy, the football player movie, the Notre Dame story. And if you guys haven't seen it, go check out the movie. I go watch this movie. Tears are streaming down my face because I'm hearing a true story

about an unathletic kid, teenager that wants to work at a play at Notre Dame. And he does it after a insane amount of hard work. It's incredible. I love the movie poster for the movie. It says when people tell you dreams don't come true Tell them about Rudy and he gets in by I interviewed him on my podcast two weeks ago And it was incredible to talk to the real Rudy Ruderger amazing But this is the point I want to make for your listeners and that is

Just because we fail doesn't mean we're a failure don't identify ourselves as someone that can't do something because we're doing that, we're allowing ourselves not to try. Nobody wakes up great at anything. You know, Michael Jordan became Michael Jordan, he took 450 jump shots every day before breakfast. We should have a vision of, I'm not a human being, I'm a human becoming, a great rabbi, I want to say that, rabbi David Aaron.

Beautiful quote, we're not human beings, we're human becomings. Webi once said that rabbi David Aaron beautiful quote we're not human beings we're human becoming we would love that beautiful quote. I was part of the story but I really went from a shift in my head from I'm gonna do this this is my dream to I'm worth it will never happen just like my daughter I will never drive a car other than like wait a minute how can I actually do this and you know what I did Jen I called up the same guy Disney. That's why I want you to tell this is the best part. I thought you're gonna forget this part. I called the guy Disney and I said, how can I forget? I lived it. What do you want from me?

I called up this guy. I called up the head of Disney and I said to him, let me ask you how close was I and he goes, Saul, we picked 17, 17 out of 3,800 portfolios around the world and you made it to number 20. I missed it by three. Did how many times our life could be so close to achieving what we want and we feel like we're miles away. But then the best part is what happened right after. I asked him the next question, oh, you rejected me.

Here's how close that was. Why? Why did you reject me? What was I missing in my work that Andy and all these other people you accepted had because you know what's so you need to have more dynamic perspective in your drawing. You know, stand on a stool and look down at the model or go down and look up at the model. Give us some dynamic perspective. That's the answer key to growing. So I go to figure drawing class the next day. And I remember the models in the middle of the room, this woman, she's sitting in the middle of the room in some pose of this 30 students around her. And I go take this big giant wooden whatever,

and they move it right next to her. And I'm standing six feet in the air. My head is like 15 feet up. And I'm looking down at this model. And she's just so I can get that perspective. And she's looking up at me like, who is this nut? And I will still never forget in the back of the room, Jen, a couple of the guys are like, Hey, look at the door standing up on the box. You know, most people are like, Oh, I don't want them to think I'm a dork. I want them to accept me. I want to be popular. Oh, I guess I'll

get down to who cares what they say? The head of Disney just told me what I need to put into my drawings. I'll stand on five boxes. Who cares? If we have clarity what to accomplish? Who cares where people think about us along the way? Stay focused, stay driven, get the answer key to growing. And I really find, and here's a great thing to remember is that when we have clarity on what we're trying to accomplish, and we're taking the steps to accomplish it. That turns into energy. It's energizing. We all know what it's like to lie in bed

and we want to stay in bed in extra 20 minutes. I go through it too. Even the great Jen probably has days where she wants to stay in bed two more minutes, yes. Ma, what's in a while? No, not really. I've given you an opportunity. Every day, every day on day,

what do you talk to me about? Super Jen is human people. Yeah, what's in a while? No, not really. I'm kidding. I love it every day, every day on day. What do you talk to me about? Super Jen is human people. Are you listening? Try to know what's for her guests is human. And we all have those moments where we want to stay in bed a little bit longer. We all have that battle going on.

So you know what we do? Have that extra minute and then get it. I love that Tony Robbins set on his episode with you. I was listening to you. He goes into that freezing cold water. Yeah. And Tony Robbins said, he said to your podcast, and I checked it out. It was awesome.

He goes, you think I wake up and I'm excited to go into the water? And I was like, I would have been like, yeah, he's probably excited. He's like, no, I don't want to go in the cold water either. The great Tony Robbins is human. We all have that side of us. We show is remember that. And if Tony Robbins and Jen could get out of bed, so could we. I love that.

I love that. Okay. That you had the story and no. So he told you this. Did you the next year? Did you show the guy your drawings and you got in or what happens next year? So what I did was you're asking the good questions, Jen. You get me going.

I love you. You're the clicker. You left us on the screen. Yeah, okay. So what I did was, what I did was I worked in an insane amount of hours more to work on my drawings. And one of the things I did not mention in the episode that you heard, I'll share it for your listeners now, is we found out that the head of Disney was coming to our school to look at portfolios. It wasn't that you were allowed to just send your portfolio in at this point to Disney like it was years past. Now that guy was coming to our school, he's going to look at your portfolio and if he

likes it, he's going to send it to Florida to the studio for further review. Because Beauty and the Beast had just come out. It was nominated for an Oscar for Best Picture. It lost silence of the lens, very different films. Oh, very different. And because that happened now, everybody wanted to work at Disney. There was no Pixar then. There was no such thing as Dreamworks. If you wanted a job in animation, it was dizzy and it was very competitive.

So this guy, Bill Matthews, comes to our school. He's an old guy, one of the original animators on sleeping beauty and They bring me into this room and I'm supposed to show my portfolio and he's going through the portfolio and he I'm terrified Terrified because before that my mom would tell me I'm a very talented artist My mom says I'm so all my sons so talented, but now this is Bill freaking Matthews Basically used to hang out with Walt Disney. It's basically Walt Disney looking at my world He's working the portfolio. He goes he goes saw my boy. I love his voice. He does cool voice He's like saw my boy. I like your drawings. I'd like to send your portfolio to Florida for further review

Would you like that? I'm like what I like that. Yeah, I'd like to send your portfolio to Florida for further review. Would you like that? I'm like, what I like that. Yeah, I would like that. And I handed to him and listen to this, Jen, as I hand on the portfolio, this is a true story. I hand on the portfolio. I don't let go. And he doesn't let go. And I'm in a tug of war with a 75 year he's like, oh my boy, what are you doing? And I yanked the portfolio out of his hands. And I said, Bill, let me ask you a question. Where are you going after this school? He's like, well, I'm going to that school. I'm going there.

So I said, when you actually need this portfolio in Florida, he's like, well, not for two more weeks. Why? I said, because any drawing I do tomorrow has to be better than every single drawing that's in this book. What did I want Bill Matthews to say? I wanted him to say I love your work I want to send it to Florida. It's exactly what he said, but it wasn't enough Because of course when we fail we should find out why even when we succeed

Find out how to become better and you know I have look at my portfolio The guy that has a perspective that's not my mom. I guy from Disney who can tell me what I can work on. So I take the portfolio, I'm about to walk out of his office and he says, and I look back and I go, be like, let me ask you one more question. Any ideas what I should work on in my portfolio? He's like, yeah, you should draw effects in your portfolio. I'm like, what's that? So when you guys watch a Disney movie like Lion King, whatever that's raining, fire, water, smoke, that's a division of animators called effects. They're called effects animators. He's like, you should put that in your portfolio. Now,

I had no dream to become an effects animator at Disney. But when Bill Matthews tells you to put effects in your portfolio, you start drawing water quickly. So I go back to my dorm room and here's the end of it. Listen to what happens. I take that portfolio and I put it under my bed. And I said, what if it doesn't even exist? This entire portfolio that I put blood, sweat and tears on, what if it doesn't even exist? Can I actually create a new portfolio in two weeks? And that is exactly what I did. Because this is what I did not want to happen. Check this out. I did not want him to get that portfolio in two weeks and go, oh, saw.

I remember him. Nice guy from Ohio. Oh, I remember that drawing. I remember, oh, look, he put the effects drawings in there. You know why I didn't want that to happen? Because that's what he was expecting to happen. What I wanted to happen was him to open a portfolio and have 450 new drawings in there,

even though he didn't ask for it. Because I wanted to open up and go, oh, saw a nice guy from Ohio, I remember him. Wait, I never saw that drawing. I never saw that drawing. He did a whole new portfolio because then he's not judging my work. Then I'm showing him something about me.

Then he knows, now I'm in this solid draw, the way that I want him to, but this is a guy that works his butt off. And there's a great tool I want your listeners to hear. And if you're listening to this or any podcast for that matter, and you hear a piece of wisdom that resonates with you, you need to write it down, write it down and put it up on your wall. Take down that painting you have of a sunset, because I ain't going to help you

in life. Put it down and put up quotes that you hear that inspire you. So you could live them. And here's what he said to me, the quote that I heard years ago, exceed expectations. Always exceed expectations. They're expecting you there at nine o'clock. You get there at 8.50. They want 10 problems solved. You do 11.

Bill Matthews is expecting, oh, he's going to do that. And some effects. I gave him a whole new portfolio. And that doesn't just go for career. That goes for everything in life. My wife wants me to go to the dry cleaners. Right? To go pick up something. So I'll stop and I'll pick up something else for the she didn't even ask me for. So I come up with stairs on my hunt. I got what you wanted and boom, something else for you. Wow, my husband really loves me. He's really caring. That's how you build a relationship. So eventually I worked on that portfolio, Jen, and I got those pages and I sent him to Disney.

And a couple weeks later, I got a call and it was Andy. I'm like, Hey, man, what's up? He's like, blink off. Guess what? I'm like, what? He goes, they built a brand new wing for the animators. I'm like, really? He's like, yeah, you deserve to be there. I'm like, wow, he's like, guess what else they did? I'm like, what? He goes, they built a basketball court just for animators and like really is that yeah you deserve to be there like wow he's like guess what else they did I'm like what he was they built a basketball court just for animators you love playing basketball like I do he's like you should play on that court I'm like yeah thank you man he goes but there is one more thing I said what he said they put up a piece of paper with a list of the next interns I'm like yeah and he goes you're on the list I'm like what he means like

dude you did it I'm like what he's you mean? He's like, dude, you did it. I'm like, what? He's like, you got in the way. Thank you. He's like, what do you think? Give me for you. Did it. I go over to my tape player. I play his to set. Go live. You guys don't know what tape are. They play music. Okay. He's before. Anyway, I got in and I can tell you and your listeners that even when I got into Disney and I showed up at the airport there and there was a guy with a sign that had Mickey Mouse pointing to my name. He drove me to the Walt Disney Studios, he mentioned what was going through my head, takes me to an entrance and it says, artist entrance and I walk into that entrance and I go into a room and in the room are 15 huge wooden animation desks. This is before computer animation and in the corner on one of those desks is a plaque and it says, Saul Blinkoff, a kid from New York. And I'm telling you guys,

and this is the truth thing, when you hear this episode, don't think that you heard from a talented artist who got his dream. I'm telling you the truth. You heard from an artist who was the worst artist in his school. Listen to what I'm saying. I was not a natural. I'm telling you, you are hearing from one of the worst artists that ever applied, but dang, did I work my butt off. And here's what you wanna walk away with. Nobody wakes up great at anything.

And I could tell you, just starting on an internship, Jen, all the challenges began again, because I was surrounded by people that were a hundred times better than me, and I was intimidated again. And my perspective was wherever I am, I'm gonna learn from the people around me, set a goal for myself,

and I'm gonna outwork everybody. And thank God I found people that helped me work, and there you go. I love that story. I got goosebumps because it's so real, right? Like it's, and I love the fact that like and I saw I we talk about this a lot and I talk about this a lot that I don't I think that talent is overrated. I think that hard work super seeds talent every time, you know I know a ton of people in my life that have who are extraordinarily smart, extraordinarily talented, and it hasn't been those people

that like, you know, hit it to the next level, it's the people that have incredible discipline, incredible tenacity and work ethic, because that's what takes you not just to that, but it takes you over that goal and surpasses it usually. I mean, that's why I love that story. I think it's, I mean, there's so much. It's also like it shows so much grit you have, right? Like you, your desire for your own personal greatness in every aspect of your life, I think is yeah, but it's a plus for sure. You know, sometimes we'll,

I was gonna say, as I was gonna say, let's not fool ourselves here. It is a blessing in the first. I'll tell you a couple years ago, they opened up new pizza place in their ass. We went with the kids and checked out this new pizza place. And the kids were asking like, Dad, what do you think of the pizza?

And I'm like, yeah, it's okay. They're like, Dad, what could be better? And like, well, okay, here's what could be better. The cross should be like this, and then the sauce, and they go, Dad, you should tell them. I'm better like well, okay? Here's what could be better the cross should be like this And then the sauce and they go dad you should tell him I'm like, nah, he doesn't want to hear like that you should tell him I'm like so I go over the guy say, you know at the peaches, okay, you know It's good, but I have some suggestions like would you email them to me? I'm like sure Sorry, right go home and I really know

But the email I don't know I must have been in one of my moods because my email turned into this like No, but the email I don't know. I must have been in one of my moods because my email turned into this like motivating. I literally wrote a line like something like, it feels like you're not waking up every day with the goal of making the greatest pizza on the planet. That's what I said. Yeah, I was like, you think Steve Jobs woke up

and was like, it's what to make a phone like, no, I want to make the best. And I wrote them all these ideas. And you know, it's just, I want to make the best. And I wrote them all these ideas. And you know, it's just I feel like when you want to become great at anything, you want to be great at everything. And I will say that I think the most important thing of all of our endeavors in life that we do want to be great at. And that is it's becoming a better version of ourselves. That's really it. It's not that I want to achieve a dream

of accomplishing something difficult. It's when I accomplish that thing, what kind of a person that I become along the way? If we took a trip, Jen, you and me, with our spouses, I would love to see this, and we go to Mount Everest, okay? Not a beautiful vacation destination. The top of Everest, if those don't know, it's called the death zone,

because hundreds of people die every year, going through that death zone. But if we could take a trip there to Mount Everest, if you wanted to climb that mountain, forget climbing, if a helicopter just put us on the top, which they can't do, because they can't go up there, but if they could, how long would you be up there

before you wouldn't be bored, like two minutes? You take a couple pictures that you could post on Instagram later, there's no wifi up there, but they could. How long would you be up there before you wouldn't be bored? Like two minutes, you take a couple pictures that you could post on Instagram later. There's no wifi up there. There's no Starbucks up there. I'd be like, okay, can we go back to the lodge now? I'm done. Like what would the pleasure be like up there? If a helicopter brought us to the top, it would be fleeting would be nothing. But if we decided to climb the mountain, hang out at base camp for a month to acclimate our lungs to the low oxygen and climb up. Jen, you lose a big toe to frostbite.

Sorry, it had to be you and my hypothetical here. And we carry you the rest of the way. When you get to the top of the mountain, it's not about the view. It's not about the vista that's going to give us the greatest pleasure. You know what? The greatest pleasure comes from looking down at the bottom, seeing that little spec called base camp and going, that's where I started. At the end of the day, the pleasure that we will get from accomplishment is not because

of the accomplishment. Michael Jordan looks at those rings on his fingers and all his other teammates have the same rings. But I guarantee when he looks at those rings, only't you remember? The pain, the anguish, the discipline, who he became as a person as he grew through those accomplishments. The goal of life isn't to accomplish. It's who do we become alone the way? Because at the end of the day, someday, I hate to tell everybody, we're gonna die. Some day, my kids are gonna look at a gravestone. They're gonna see my name carved on it. You know what I don't want them to say? I'm so proud of my dad. He worked

on a lot of Disney movies. My dad directed Doc McStuffins. I'm so proud of him. You know what I want them to say? When my dad tucked me in it night, he spent an extra five minutes with me every single night because he cared so much about knowing about my day. I want them to say, my dad tried to live a life of more integrity and honesty and tried to grow every day. That's the legacy I want to live in. That's the legacy I want to leave both of those. I want to leave it, but I want to live it. I love that. Wow. That's amazing. I love that. I love all what you say. I had a question, but now I don't know how we're

even, it's been going on for over an hour here. I know, I know. I have one question, but, let me just ask this question, even though it wasn't, it was like my first question that I was going to ask you. And, you know, I figure it's not going to be the last question. It may get the last question. But what happens when we don't have clarity of what we want to do? What happens if we don't know? I mean, it's one thing when we have our goals, one thing when we have the work ethic.

It's one thing if we have the discipline. What happens if we don't have the clarity to know where to direct it? Do you have any answers for us? I do. I do. And that is the number one question that I get asked from students over the years.

They'll be like, Saul, I've heard your story, you're motivating them up, but I don't know what my dream is. I don't know what I want. How do I figure it out? So I think there's two ways. Number one. Number one, we have to not wake up and ask,

what am I going to do today that's going to make me happy? What am I going to do today that's going to make me happy? You am I going to do today that's going to make me happy? You know who wakes you hear my puppy back there? You know who wakes up every day and says, what can I do today to make me happy? Children. Children do that. Children wake up and they're like,

what can I get today to make me happy? The goal we have is we get older. Shouldn't be, what can I do to make me happy? Because happy is not really the end goal. Most people of yes and what's your, what are you living for? What happiness? I want to be happy. What are you for years old? You know what it means to be an adult, is to wake up every day and not ask what is going to happen in my life to make me happy. It's how can I live a life that's not happy? A life that's meaningful. And that comes from the word responsibility. Look, I'm a Disney guy. I love Disney movies. The Lion King. Look at Lion King

for a second. Symbol wakes up in the beginning. He's like, I can't wait to be king. He sings a whole song about it just can't wait to be king, right? And Symbol is like finding out from Mufasa, what it means to be a king. And Symbol is like, wow, I could do this. Mufasa goes, Symbol, there's more to be a king than getting real the time. And Sy, Simba, there's more to being a king than getting crazy all the time. And Simba's like, there's more? Wow, amazing.

He thinks being a king means I can do whatever the heck I want. And then he goes, something happens. I'm gonna spoil us for your listeners. If you haven't seen the movie 30 years later, you deserve to have it spoiled, okay? His dad is a spoiler now. Daddy dies, look at the Disney movie. There's always a dead parent in the beginning, right?

That's just how they spam be, right? Finding Nemo, the dead parent. So Daddy dies, Simba goes off and lives in Hakuna Matata world, right? Hakuna Matata is singing again. I'm embarrassing my daughter again, great. He goes off into Hakuna Matata world, which basically means I'm going to live in a world

where I have no obligations, no responsibilities, and sure enough halfway through the movie, who shows up, Nala, oh she's all grown up now, she's all beautiful, they're batting their eyes at each other, they do their little kiss, I always cover my kids eyes when two lines are kissing, not appropriate for them and they're so they're about to do their kiss and they kiss and can you feel the love tonight? Tony Robbins didn't sing on his podcast. He didn't. No, he didn't. You're not nuts him.

I'm not nuts. You're sitting in and they're tossing around. Right. And then finally, she says, them, Simba, it's good to see you. I love you. This is all good. But you got to come back with me. Simba's like, what do you mean?

You got to come back with me. Scar's taken over everything. He's like, nah, I'm not. I'm staying here. She's like, no, maybe I didn't make myself clear. If you don't come back with me, everybody's going to die and you are responsible. And he's like, oh, forget it.

Hakuna Matanich, like what do you mean Hakuna Matanich? He's like, you're beginning to sound like my dad. She goes, at least one of us does. And you know what she does? She leaves him. There's a beautiful thing that Lion King's telling us about relationships by the way. You want to be what's best for someone. Sometimes you got to go against them. You got to

go against them if you love them. But you just told me to tassel the round with him in the sunset. Don't you just want to be with him? Yeah. But why won't he be the king? I know he is the king. I see inside. That's the lyric. She leaves him. Simpa's alone. Rafiki shows up. Hit some on that head, he looks in the water. Remember who you are. Remember the scene, right? I get to do my movasa voice. Simba goes back, he defeats Scar, and Lion King becomes the biggest animated movie of all

time at that time, before Frozen. This is BF, before Frozen. Yeah. And we love that movie, not because we love movies about lions. We love that movie because we're seeing as Simba Climes, that rock and you're hearing that music and the rain, and the power of it. You're seeing a story about a person that has greatness for one reason. He took responsibility.

People that wake up everything and don't have a goal. First ask yourself, not what can I do in my life that's going to make me happy. Figure out where can I take responsibility and where do we take responsibility wherever we have the ability to respond. Wherever we have the ability to respond, that is the response ability. Wake up every day and look around and say where's their need? Where is there a need where are people in pain? Guess where they are in pain everywhere. It's called life Wake up every day and see where there's a need and go you know what? I just noticed that need I have a sensitivity to that then maybe other people didn't notice I'm gonna do something about that

Because then if I wake up with a goal like that Responsibility is motivating and it's energizing. That's the first thing I would tell people that don't know, is start with responsibilities. What a need. Number two is, if there's something that you're interested in a little bit in life, just a little bit, I maybe I don't want to commit to it.

Maybe I don't want to be a veterinarian, but I like animals. So you know what you do? Go take a veterinarian to lunch. Go sit with him and find out what a life of a veterinarian is like, you know know, I like sports. But I don't know if I want to be a sports agent. I can't commit to my, okay, so hold on.

So go read up about what it means to be a sports agent. Date a career, date an interest, find out a little bit about it, and see what sparks. I don't get you to the next level. And then one day you wake up and you're like, I love this. I got to do this because this is where I can find meaning. I love that date a career do this, because this is where I can find meaning. I love that date, a career. That is so smart. Like, who's gonna meet somebody?

And so I'm gonna marry you right away. That didn't work for a Elsa, whoever, and Frozen. Never. I love the Anna, right? She too. I know, I know, yeah, yeah. So you have to date a career. So go on the first date.

If you like that date, go on another date. I'm gonna wait and wake up and you just know. That's, I love that. That's a really good, I love that saying. I've really enjoyed this. I've loved talking to you. And I really, maybe you can come on again sometime and share some more wisdom with us.

I would love that. That would be amazing. I thank you for inviting me, for giving your time to me. And also just, I wish you so much continued success. You're making such an impact out there. And it's really incredible. And I look forward to hearing more about your accomplishments from your husband. No.

You give him a hug from me, okay? Give him a hug from me. I absolutely will. Thank you again. So how do people find you? Do you want to give some suggestions? Yes, absolutely. So I have a podcast like Jen mentioned earlier. It's called Life of Awesome. There's the words Life of Awesome. You can check that out. I'm also on Instagram. You

can find me there. And my website is SaulBlinkoff.com. There's more avenues there. So yeah, come check it out. And there's lots of things that I'm sharing weekly now. And it's a very exciting time for me. So come check me out. Amazing. Well, thank you so much and everyone, thanks for listening. Bye. All out, host the body, Jennifer Cohen, visionary, Stunned, you can get to know. We inspired, this is your moment. Excuses, we in heaven at the Habitat and hustle podcasts, Power by Habit Nest.

This episode is brought to you by the Yap Media Podcast Network. I'm Holla Taha, CEO of the award-winning Digital Media Empire Yap Media, and host of Yap Young & Profiting Podcast, a number one entrepreneurship and self-improvement podcast where you can listen, learn, and profit. On Young & Profiting Podcast, I interview the brightest minds in the world and I turn their wisdom into actionable advice that you can use in your daily life. Each week, we dive into a new topic like the art of side hustles, how to level up your influence and persuasion and goal setting. I interview A-List guests on Young and Profiting.

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