The Game with Alex Hormozi - Why 85-Year-Old You Doesn't Care About Sh*t | Ep 543

Episode Date: May 30, 2023

"I think having an accurate representation of where you’re standing is not bad." Today, Alex (@AlexHormozi) shares the importance of acquiring skills and building confidence through repeated exposure to certain situations. He also talks about valuing one's own opinion over the opinions of others and thinking about the long-term perspective in decision-making.Welcome to The Game w/Alex Hormozi, hosted by entrepreneur, founder, investor, author, public speaker, and content creator Alex Hormozi. On this podcast you’ll hear how to get more customers, make more profit per customer, how to keep them longer, and the many failures and lessons Alex has learned on his path from $100M to $1B in net worth.Timestamps:(1:40) - Best way to have status is to be confident(2:55) - Give yourself irrefutable proof to combat negative self-talk(5:01) - Transfer domain-specific confidence to multiple situations step by step(8:10) - Always level up from past achievements(10:11) - Deflect judgments, value your own opinion over others'(12:32) - My 85-year-old self doesn't care about a lot of things.Follow Alex Hormozi’s Socials:LinkedIn | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Twitter | Acquisition

And so if I want to acquire a skill or a trait, I have to look at what I have to do in a certain situation and then repeat that enough times that I can say, hey, you know what? In these types of situations, I tend to act this way, which means that I believe not am I patient or not that I'm pretty patient. Welcome to the game where we talk about how to sell more stuff to more people in more ways and build businesses worth owning. I'm trying to build a billion dollar thing with Acquisition.com. I always wished Bezos, Musk, and Buffett had documented their journey. So I'm doing it for the rest of us. Please share and enjoy. Yeah, one of those weird things that I kind of enjoy is that like I walk into places looking the way I look.

And I get treated poorly, like plenty. And I just like, I kind of like it in a weird way. Because if I do a lot of business anywhere, like eventually they do find out. And then I like seeing like who treated me well and who didn't before that point. And that's just like, for whatever reason, it's like a sick experiment that I like running all the time. I did one photo shoot where I was wearing a suit that I couldn't afford. And that was when I was the poorest I've ever been. It's interesting though because as much as like I'll poop.

poo, the, that vibe. Like, from art of war, the whole idea is to look strong when you are weak and look weak when you are strong. Like, it's an art of war. And so the idea is, like, when you are, when you are weak, you want to avoid as much conflict as you can by fronting, right? And so, like, there's elements that make sense to it. I don't agree with it.

But honestly, there's just one photo shoot. The rest of my life I was in, like, T-shirt and whatever, because I was a gym owner. This regard that whole suit thing, mostly because there was a guy that, who, like, sort of hired to, like, help me build personal. and he basically just made me into what he wanted, like he thought I should look like, which is like everyone else. And there's a reason I think that I never wore it again. Like, I never wore the suit again. I hated the haircut he gave me. And it was just like, that's it for me. So I think that the best way to have status is be confident. And I think the best

way to be confident is to have proof. And so it makes sense that you're not confident. If you don't have proof of why you should be confident, that means that you're not delusional. And I think that that's a good thing. I think having an accurate representation of, of where your standing is is not bad. And so I think that that gives you awareness to improve your relative standing by working hard and stacking that proof so that when you do walk into a room,

you can say this is what I have done. And so I don't need to beat my chest and heparvado and charisma. I can just say, like, here are the facts. And you can choose to make whatever decision you want off that. But I will just present to you what is. And the thing is, when you present what is, there's no one who can refute that. And then I think that's always the decision

I prefer to be in. I was having a relatively heated conversation the other day with someone, I basically was like, I don't really know what you choose to believe about me. I was like, but here is the evidence that I have. I was like, so you can do what you want with that. I was like, but you can't deny that it has happened. And so I think that the hardest person to convince is yourself when you're starting out.

And so since, and like for me, I definitely have for sure been more insecurity driven than like passion driven, especially in the earlier days. And so if you have a lot of negative self-talk, you want to give yourself irrefutable proof that you are, that you have done the type of work that the type of person you want to become does. And I think that was like a really big key and kind of like solidifying my identity was basically it on the things that are facts. And then like that's it. Like no one, I can't refute them. No one else can refute them. Like, am I good at sales? No idea. I have done this many of them. So I would believe that I've done more sales than other people have. I can state that. Right. And so like trying to stack these bricks that no one could refute gave me a little like house of an identity.

that I could build confidence off of, but it was based in reality. And I think that's why I hate the whole fake until you make thing. Because the big disconnect that people have is when they hear me talk about this stuff, they're like, but I haven't done anything yet. But the reality is that you need to chunk down what the things you have. Everybody's done stuff. You've been alive for your whole life, right? It's just that like the how you extrapolate the skill or the trait or the ability,

you have to general, you chunk up one and then transfer it down. So it's like, okay, I've never sold before. but what have I done? Well, I was prom king or what do you know? I mean like I was able to ask girls to go out on dates. Okay. Like you're able to approach strangers when there's high stakes. So you like chunk up and then chunk back down into sales. And so it's like, how can I transfer? And then telling yourself and reminding yourself of the situations of fact that you've done something similar in nature to the new thing you want to do is basically how you transfer the confidence from specific to general over time. And so over time, if you've done that transfer,

and acquired new and new skills, then you can level up and say, I am good at acquiring skills quickly because I have done it many times. Right. And so like the more general you can apply that, I think the more general confidence you have, whereas many people and rightfully so have more like specific confidence as in like, I'm really good at video games. Like you can see a guy who's a complete dweeb, can't talk to people, can't whatever, but like you put him in call of duty and all of a sudden he's like a fucking God. Right. And he has like the biggest ego and whatever. Now mind you, you probably need to fix that. But like people have domain specific expertise and domain-specific confidence. And so I think the idea is how do I transfer that domain-specific confidence

to general confidence to multiple situations, which is you do step by step. You take that, you know what? I was able to work hard at video games in terms of what I did there. I spent five hours a day for three years playing Call of Duty. I'll bet you if I spent five hours a day for three years doing this, that I would be as good as this as I am at Call of Duty. So now I have a reasonable way to transfer what I did to a new skill. And so the more times you make that transfer, the more generalized your skill set becomes. And I think that then becomes the internal confidence where you can say, like, I feel confident that I can learn this thing, do this thing, because of what I have done. I think it was just introspection of like, why am I confident

at these things and not confident at these other things? And then I would always have the answer. I would like, well, I've done that a lot. And I'm like, huh, well, maybe if I do a lot of other stuff a lot, I'll be confident at those things too. And then if I wasn't confident in something, then I would think, well, I'll bet you. That's why I have these simple things like, well, if you do more of it, you will suck less. I love the Chinese proverb, which is that everything must be hard before it can be easy. And so just like, well, and framing a lot of social situations as skills, even character traits as skills. Like, how is someone patient? Well, they do this thing, which means that if I present someone with a similar condition over and over again, and then they change their

behavior, then they have become patient, which means that a trait is a skill, which means it can be learned. And so if I want to acquire a skill or a trait, I have to look at what I have to do in a certain situation and then repeat that enough times that I can say, hey, you know what, in these types of situations, I tend to act this way, which means that I believe not am I patient or not that I'm pretty patient. Real quick, guys, if you can think about how you found this podcast, somebody probably tweeted it, told you about it, shared it on Instagram or something like that. The only way this grows is through word of mouth. And so I don't run ads. I don't do sponsorships. I don't sell anything. My only ask is that you continue to pay it forward to whoever showed you or however you found out

about this podcast that you do the exact same thing. So if it was a review, if it was a post, if you do that, it would mean the world to me, and you'll throw some good karma out there for another entrepreneur. And the longer I continue to act that way, the more patient I can say I am and have proof that I am because of what I've done, not because of what I say. I would have a tough time saying no, because fundamentally everything is human behavior in response to conditions.

And so if there's anything skill or trait-based trait, which is really just a more generalized skill that applies to more situations, it's just stimulus response. And so if we want to have a different response or basket of responses, then we need to train that response with repeated exposure to the same stimulus. So it's like if you want to be good at sales, then you get into situations where selling happens and you do it over and over again and you train the outcome that you want. And if you're like, well, I've never had confidence in that. Again, you chunk down and think, okay, well, what else? What else have I done that's similar to

this that I can transfer over? Like, this is where you get into the woo-woo of like telling yourself the story, but it's really just giving yourself the proof of what you've already done and how that applies to today. And then that's why it's always just leveling up. from the things you've done in the past. So it's like, okay, well, I've built a company to 100 billion before. So how do I build one to a billion? Well, do I know I can build it to a billion? I'm confident I can because I haven't done it yet.

But I have evidence that I've done this. And so I think it's reasonable to believe that if I do this for five times the length of time, that I could build that. Okay, then that feels like a reasonable bet. And I think that when I'm 70, I'll be more confident than I am now. And confident said differently is just secure in who I am. And so I think I'm significantly more secure now than I was when I was 20. And it's because A, I have fewer things to prove to other people because I have proven more of them to myself.

And so I think that there's this great quote by Epicetus. I love, I'm going to read it because it's really good. You compromise your integrity when you seek outside approval. Be satisfied that you live up to your rational principles. Be your own witness if you need one. You don't need any more witnesses than that. There's different translations of it. But basically, if you need someone else to be your witness, it means that you sacrifice your own integrity.

Because you're saying, why can't you have enough integrity to be your own witness of whatever the thing is? Why do I need someone else's approval? Because they would not have nearly the context I have because I lived it. So if you're like, I am this way and someone says, no, you're not, there's a degree where what evidence do they have, what evidence do you have? And you should always have more evidence than them. And so like your opinion of you should always have the highest standing. But inversely, most times it doesn't.

And so I think a lot of the path of like building confidence is simply over time valuing your opinion more than other people's. Like the shoes I wear look probably not fashionable. How much do I care what other people think about the clothing that I wear that they they're not wearing it. Why do they care what I wear? This is great for heat. I don't sweat as much. They're waterproof. I can go to a water park and then I can go to a restaurant and I can work out all in the same thing. Minimizes the drag on my life like, cool. Some people like, that looks really weird. I'm like, cool, then don't wear it. Wear whatever you want to wear. I don't care what you

right? And so a lot of times it's like deflecting people's judgments on you that they don't, that why would I care? Like, what weight does their opinion have on my life at all besides that they have one? So early days, people were like, I would never live my life like you live your life. And I'm like, good. Why are you sharing that with? Like, a lot of times people just make noise with their faces and it does, it has no impact on your life. Like, I'm going to change my behavior in no way. Which if people say things to you and you don't like what they're saying, question is, is there elements of truth to what they're saying. If there is, if there is, then learn nothing from it. Because like some learning is the wrong learning. You're like, you're taking the wrong lesson from your mom who says you should stay home. Should I?

I don't know. If I changed my behavior, it means I learned from what she said in one way or another. Now, I might learn and then rebel more, right? But just thinking through that. And I think the biggest thing with, at least for me, has just been continuing to try and value my own opinion more than a fictitious or arbitrary third party that doesn't even exist. And usually it's one to three voices that I play over and over again in my head. And those people don't even know that I'm playing their voice in my head. And then wondering and asking myself, do I want this fictitious version of this person's voice to be the main thing that directs my life? That gives a lot of power to this. person. And then I ask myself, do I want that person to have power of my life? And then usually the answer is no. And I'm like, who would I prefer to have power of my life? And then usually it's me. And so then it continue to like brick by brick, continue to build the identity of who of the type of man I want to listen to and try and act in accordance with what I think that guy would do. And then if I have enough evidence, eventually the idea of who I want to be and who I am start merging and eventually the same person. I do not as many and they're quieter. Like they're

there. But they don't hit me as hard. They don't weigh down as much. And I think I'm more aware of I'm like, huh, that makes me think this. Again, I go through the same exercise of like, does that person really think that? A, do I really care what they think? B, do I want to give that person the same power over my life that I give to myself? No. Okay.

So it's like these bombs that I've gotten faster and faster diffusing so I can keep living the life that I want to live. I think one last thing is like, I think about this a lot, which is like 85-year-old version of me. Right. I mean, I think about a lot of frames a lot. One of them is that none of it's going to matter. But the other frame is like, like, 85-year-old me

doesn't care about a lot of shit. And so I'm like, man, if that guy I cannot care about a lot of shit. And it's the same person. Why can't I just start living that way now? And so old people don't give a shit if they're wearing fucking comfortable sneakers. Like at what point did they go from like, you know what? I'm going to wear these fashiony whatever things to I'm going to wear these new balances, right?

Like where does that happen? And I think there's degrees of like just being okay with you that allows people to make that shift. And I think a lot of people really envious. Like there's good old people and there's nasty old people. But like I think I would like to be a nice old person. And I think that they're really like jolly and easy. going and I think self-accepting. And I think that's like, I think about that guy all the time. And when I have these stressors or I have these insecurities, I think like, what would that guy

think right now? And that guy usually has very good answers, which is kind of weird, because it means that you have these answers inside of yourself, but you just choose not to listen to them. And so I think it's just making that voice louder while you make the other voices quieter and thinking, do I care about my 85-year-old self opinion of me or the fictitious opinion of this rival that I have right now. And then always remembering that the person with the longest time rise in wins. Because there are people who are ahead of me now who on a longer time horizon, it doesn't matter. And then on the longest time horizon, none of it matters. But that has helped me decrease the pressure in my life, which I think has allowed me to make better decisions,

which I think ultimately, you know, allows me to do the things, more of the things that I want to do rather than more of the things that I think other people want me to do.