The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 006: Hal Elrod Tells You How To Be Insanely Productive Before 8:00 AM

Starting point is 00:00:00 Here's what he said. He goes, this job selling knives isn't about selling knives. And you can apply that to whatever you do. If you're, you know, I speak, you know, for corporations now, but I used to speak for mostly high schools and colleges. And that's really where my passion is because I said, look, school isn't about school. It's about who you're becoming. Selling knives isn't about selling knives. He said, it's about who you become while you're here. And if you can succeed here at the highest level, you will become.

Starting point is 00:00:30 someone who can succeed at the highest level at anything that you do. And that's what got me. I realized that up until that point for the first 19 years of my life, I had settled for mediocrity from myself. And if I didn't change that, you know, from that day forward, when did I think it was going to change? Are leaders born or are they made? Our host, Ryan Hawk, believes that leaders can be made through determined,

Starting point is 00:00:56 focused work on learning the art and science behind the makeup of other successful leaders. Now it's time to inhale knowledge and exhale success. You're listening to The Learning Leader Show with Ryan Hawk. And welcome to The Learning Leader Show. I am Ryan Hawk. Tonight's guest was an incredibly enthusiastic guy. It's Hal Elrod. He's the number one bestselling author of what is now being widely regarded as one of the most life-changing books ever written. Literally is called the miracle morning, the not so obvious secret guaranteed to transform your life before 8 a.m. Howe is literally a ball of energy. I loved talking to him. This was a jam-packed episode. Promise you're going to love it. A few things we got into. The six practices called lifesavers to do before

Starting point is 00:01:59 8 a.m. every single day. The other thing we got into was something that Howe usually doesn't talk about on podcasts. For those of you who are fans of his, who are listening this because of him, He doesn't really talk about his cut code days and his specific pitch he used when he was selling for cut co. I asked him that because I really wanted to hear why he was so good as a cut code knife salesman. We also got into the key to getting referrals for all of you who are out there, whether you work in sales or whatever industry you're in, everybody needs referrals to other great people. Howe had a specific example of ways to do this and you could literally implement today. ladies and gentlemen without further ado one of my favorites it's how elrod hey how how are you doing i'm doing well ryan thanks for having me on buddy i'm looking forward

Starting point is 00:02:54 to this awesome man again i really really appreciate it and i know i gave the uh the listeners here at the learning leader show an intro of you but i'd like to give you the floor here to intro yourself talk a little bit about your history and what you're currently doing as well yeah don't believe anything you said in the pre interview i don't know i wasn't there i wasn't there to verify any of it. So yeah, so I guess the short and skinny, if you will. I'm really long-winded. It's funny. I'm a keynote speaker. So by doing interviews is the hardest thing for me because I'm used to telling like, you know, 10-minute long stories or 20-minute long stories. So I'll do my best here. But here's the chronological kind of synopsis. When I was 15 years old,

Starting point is 00:03:33 I – well, actually, I'll back up one more. When I was 11 years old, I started working. My parents bought a grocery store. They put me to work. They said, if you want to buy anything that isn't food or water or, you know, like a necessity, you make your own money now. It's on you. So like every year my friends would get, you know, like Nike, you know, Air Jordans for school and whatever. And I got pay less shoes. And if I wanted Jordans, I had to pay the difference, right?

Starting point is 00:03:56 So it was kind of cool, though. I hated it. I didn't like that I was like, I had to work for everything. But obviously it instilled a really valuable lesson for me at a young age. And then at 15, I started my first business. I started a mobile disc jockey service where I started making $75 an hour. and I usually work like four hours on a Friday and or a Saturday night, but I would, you know, I'd work four hours and make as much as my friends that were working,

Starting point is 00:04:19 you know, 20, 30 hours a week. And I was doing something I loved. So that's where a real seed was planned. I'm like, wait a minute, you can make way more money than what's considered normal and you could do it playing music, right? I love this. It's not even work. Wow. So that really set the stage of kind of my life today.

Starting point is 00:04:36 It's always focused on doing work that I love and that's scalable. I could earn a, you know, large income, right? Yeah. So fast forward, 19 years old, gave up my dream of being a DJ to start selling knives. And I got hired to sell Cutco Cutlery, never had any ambition. I wasn't a successful person. Like, I wasn't a disciplined guy. I got bad grades in school.

Starting point is 00:04:58 I wasn't an athlete. You know, I really never did anything other than the DJ thing was kind of cool, but it wasn't, didn't require discipline or work ethic. And on my second day of my Cutco training, I decided to draw my line. in the sand and I was like, you know what? I'm no longer willing to accept mediocrity for myself. Like what would happen if I really committed to a goal at a level I've never committed before in my entire life? Ten days later, I broke the all-time company record where I sold more in my first 10 days than almost anyone had in the 50-year history of the company. And I think there's

Starting point is 00:05:32 one guy back east that sold more than me or whatever. But anyway, so that was like, again, important lesson for people. It was like, your past doesn't matter. Where you are in your life right now is a result of who you were, but where you go depends on who you choose to be. And in that moment, I decided I'm going to choose to be, you know, like the guy that I really could be if I stopped being lazy and making excuses and settling for mediocrity. And then the story gets kind of interesting and we'll wrap up the first phase here and we can dive further and later. But a year and a half after I was in sales, I broke all sorts of company records and I was asked to speak at almost all of the company conferences. One night I gave a speech. I got a standing ovation. I was 20 years old. First standing ovation, really fired up. Left that meeting, got in my brand new 1999 Ford Mustang, and it was literally three weeks old. I just bought it. And driving home that night, I was hit head on by a drunk driver at 80 miles an hour, hit by another car in my door of my car at 70 miles an hour, crushing my car in half, crushing my body in half. I broke 11 bones and I bled to death. I died for six minutes. I was in a coma for six days.

Starting point is 00:06:43 And when I came out of the coma, I was told I would never walk again at 20 years old. So that was really the first kind of rock bottom or extreme adversity that I faced in my life. Wow. Incredible, man. So what happened from there? So, you know, it's like anything. We all face adversity, right? That's one promise that we all have is that life will bring adversity, right?

Starting point is 00:07:05 Or that we will generate our own adversity. Sometimes adversities are doing. sometimes it comes out of nowhere. Sometimes, like, you know, I obviously the, you know, the drunk driver, he was, I'd say that was his fault, right? He did that. I didn't have anything to do with it of being in the wrong place the wrong time. But the point is adversity is inevitable and how you respond to it is not inevitable. How you respond to it is everything.

Starting point is 00:07:27 It's your choice. And, you know, one of my mentors, John Reese says every result, good or bad is an asset. Think about that. Every result good or bad is an asset. So for me, I come out of the coma. I'm lost and confused, dazed and confused, you know what? Why am I in a hospital bed? Why don't my limbs work?

Starting point is 00:07:45 Why is my arm in a cast and my leg in a cast? And why does my brain damage have no memory? And basically, I was faced with a choice. How am I going to respond to this? The doctors are saying that I may never walk again. My body is scarred for life. And I ultimately just, you know, decided, well, I can't change this. So the only logical choice I have is to get better as fast as humanly possible, you know, do whatever they doctors tell me to do and do it with the most positive attitude I can possibly have.

Starting point is 00:08:21 And rather than focusing on the problem or feeling sorry for myself or being angry, I'm just going to accept it. And I told my dad, I told my dad, I said, dad, look, because my parents were really concerned because I was actually, this is a funny part, Ryan, I was so happy the doctors thought I was in denial. They thought I was delusional because I was always smiling and laughing. And they told my parents, they actually called my parents in one night. They said, if we think Hal's in denial, we need you to talk to him, find out how he's really feeling. You know, he's supposed to be sad and depressed and angry. Like, you know, get him to admit how he's really feeling. And my dad came in that night and he's like, Hal, you know, the doctors are concerned,

Starting point is 00:08:58 or are you sad, or are you depressed, or you angry? I said, dad, I thought you knew me better than that. You know, I learned in my cut code training, I learned the five-minute rule, which says it's okay to be negative when things go wrong, but not for more than five minutes. Like there's no point in spending days or weeks or months or even hours, like dwelling on something that you can't go back in time and change. And the only choice we have if we want to be successful and happy, you accept all things that are out of your control, which news flash, that's everything that's ever happened to you. You should never ever feel emotional pain unless you want to, but you should never feel emotional pain over something that's already happened in the past because, that doesn't serve you.

Starting point is 00:09:38 The only way to respond, in my opinion, you accept it. You go, you know what? You can't change it. But what do I want moving forward? And what can I do? What can I control? And so for me, the only thing I could control was maintaining a positive attitude and going to therapy every day and, you know,

Starting point is 00:09:55 visualizing that I would walk again and, you know, call it a miracle, call it whatever you call it, the power of visualization or whatever you want. But it was one week after my parents came in and, said I thought I was in denial. It was three weeks after I was found dead, and my femur, the biggest bone in human body, broke in half, my pelvis broke in three places on and on, that the doctors came in and they said, we took your x-rays yesterday, as you know, we don't know how to explain this, but your body is healing at such an incredible rate that we're going to let you take your

Starting point is 00:10:27 first step tomorrow in therapy. Wow. So went from never walking again to three weeks later, and then that was it. I left the hospital a couple weeks after that, took my first step, got back to work, you know, went on to be Cutco Hall of Fame and just kind of, I started a coaching business, speaking, writing, et cetera. And that's where I kind of got my start in my life's work now, you know, as an author and a speaker and a coach, all those things. It's such an inspiring story, man. I mean, I just love hearing it. I really appreciate you sharing it.

Starting point is 00:10:56 And I want to dive in a little bit to your story now, specifically the moment when, you're, you know, specifically the moment when, you know, you said, okay, you get hired by Cutco, and you made the decision, the conscious decision, to say, I'm not going to be lazy anymore, and you go and break a record in 10 days. Now, a lot of people, I think, they find that hard to grasp. What was that specific decision that you made? And then how did you tactically go and actually do it? Because it's one thing to say, man, I'm jacked up. I'm excited.

Starting point is 00:11:28 I just heard how Elrod speak, and I'm going to go out there and do great things. but it's a whole other thing to actually go out there and do it, to execute on that mindset. How did you do that? How did you execute on that? I'll say if I had to sum it up in one word in terms of how I executed and then I'll back up to the decision actually. But it's accountability. I had a mentor, my manager, and I gave him my word that I would give everything I had to achieve that goal and that I would talk to him every single day, that I would literally call him in the morning when I woke up.

Starting point is 00:12:02 tell him what I was committed to do for the day. And then I would call him as needed throughout the day. And then at the end of the day, and I literally talked to him every day. And if it wasn't for him, I would have quit my first day. My very first day, I went out three appointments. I'm going to break a record. I got to average $1,300 a day in sales. And my first day, I'd go 0 for three and I sell nothing.

Starting point is 00:12:21 And I called him to quit. I called him, I mean, I don't know if I was calling him to quit, but I basically, I wanted to quit. I called him with my tail between my legs, embarrassed thinking, man, I talked to real big game and I'm going to go and break a record and then I can't even sell a single knife. And I called him to quit. And he said, how there's one of two ways you can respond. You can either do what most people would do, which is given to your negative emotions right now. You could quit. You could give up. And I'm like, yeah, that's what I'm, that's how I feel. And he said, or you could do, he goes, do you want to be like most people or do you want to be

Starting point is 00:12:53 successful? I said, I want to be successful. He said, all right, then that's not going to make you successfully. He said the second option is you do the only thing that a successful person would do, which is you stay committed to the goal until the very last moment. You give it everything you have. He said, get on the phone, make some calls, you know, call me back. And when you set some appointments, and the next day I went out and sold $2,768. So I ended, I basically kept my average up, right? I made up for the first day and then kept the average for the second day. And, you know, eight days later, I did 61 appointments or 62 appointments, which, which if you do the math, these were two-hour appointments, and I'm doing six a day.

Starting point is 00:13:32 So I'm doing 12 hours a day of appointments, and I wasn't sleeping. I was committed. I was like, whatever it took. But if it wasn't for my mentor, I wouldn't have done it. Now, to back up to the decision, I'm going out of order here, but how, like, the decision was this. I think, and in my new book, The Miracle Morning, like, I write a whole chapter on this, It's on like the media.

Starting point is 00:13:56 I think it's called the mediocrity intervention, but it's on, I haven't looked in my book in a long time. I should know that better. But anyway, the point is I talk about like the seven causes of mediocrity and what like seven solutions, how you overcome them. So what I mean by that is when I say mediocrity, I think we all suffer from mediocrity. It's not like an insult like, oh, you're mediocre. It's like, dude, we're all mediocre because mediocrity, the way that I view it, it has nothing

Starting point is 00:14:22 to do with how you compare to someone. It's not like you're mediocre and I'm not. It's every single one of us is mediocre in relation to our full potential, right? So in relation to our full potential, most of us, we settle for far less. And by the way, I'm looking at my book right now. The chapter is not called the Mediocry Intervention. It's called the 95% Reality Check. So FYI, Chapter 3, the 95% Reality Check.

Starting point is 00:14:50 And by the way, I think I did a podcast on this. So if anybody is listening, if you want to listen to a podcast, podcast. Yeah, I think I actually read the whole chapter because I didn't have a podcast for any one week. And I'm like, crap, what am I going to do? So I just read a chapter out of my book. It's my, because it's my favorite chapter. So if you Google Hal Elrod, 95% reality check, I'm pretty sure you'll find that podcast. But the point is this, this was the big epiphany for me. So this happened in my training. And I think this, for some people on this on this call or this podcast, this may be the most, this might be the most powerful thing you get from the podcast. I don't know. For some it may. And here's what it was. My mentor had this conversation. I was 19 years old and it was it was in training. So he said this to everybody. So not everybody resonated. I mean, I was the only one that went out there and did what I did. Right. So the other 19 people in the training class, you know, they let it go in one ear and out the other. So you got to decide how you're going to take this on and interpret it. But he said this. He goes, look,

Starting point is 00:15:48 you guys, roughly 95% of our society, he said in the numbers arbitrary, it might be 92.8% might be 94 point, who knows. But he said, if you just take the people that you know, roughly 95% of our society, nine out of 10 people, if not more, settle for far less than they really want in their lives and far less than they're capable of. Would you say that's true? What would you say that, Ryan? Yeah, absolutely. It's true. Right. Yeah, it's a given. You look at the average person in America, they're struggling for like the word average and the word struggle to me in America are synonyms, right? To be average in America means that you're not making enough money, you're spending more than you make, you're divorced, right? You're, you're, you know, you're either

Starting point is 00:16:31 on depression medication or you're thinking about it. You know what I mean? You're asking your friends to borrow theirs. Yeah. You're overweight. You don't have any energy. Like, holy shit, that's average. Yeah. One thing I would add to that, Howl, too, is, and this is part of the reason for this whole podcast, is not following a sincere passion in your life to create something and that could either both your passion about and that could potentially help a lot of people because at heart I do believe people in general and this is how I am so I don't like to speak for everybody but I think people get immense joy out of seeing that something they did helped another person or helped other people and the only way you can really

Starting point is 00:17:19 truly do that, and you know this better than anybody, is by following something that you're truly, truly passionate about, something you care about, something you do for no money, but you care about it because you know it could leave a lasting impression, it could leave a legacy of yourself and maybe even your children, things like that. So I think that's part of when I, when you ask me that question, I think settling for less is not doing what you're passionate about, is not creating something special, is, you know, working just in a job, just to get a paycheck that probably isn't enough. You know what I mean?

Starting point is 00:17:54 So that's what I think about when I say is people aren't nine out and a ten people aren't doing what they're truly capable of or their average. Yeah. No, that's a great. I think that's a great perspective on it. And you're right. If you're, if you hate your work and you're spending a third of your life there, like, what do you

Starting point is 00:18:08 do it? Exactly. You got to start getting clear. So for me, but here was the wake-up call. He said, look, if you live your life the way that 95% of your friends and family live their life, which is how most people live their life. They look at their friends. They look at their peers, right? I mean, you know, on a micro scale, you're like, hey, what do you do? You know, you're in college going, hey, what are you doing tonight?

Starting point is 00:18:31 Oh, we're going to a party. Well, I'll go then, right? We literally, it's like this big herd of mediocrity where we all just go and we do what's easy, we do what's fun, without really getting clear on what we want and what we have to sacrifice, what we have to do every day to ensure that what we want becomes a reality. And he said, here's what he said. He goes, this job, selling not isn't about selling knives. And you can apply that to whatever you do. If you're, you know, I speak, you know, for corporations now, but I used to speak for mostly high schools and colleges.

Starting point is 00:19:00 And that's really where my passion is because I said, look, school isn't about school. It's about who you're becoming. Selling knives isn't about selling knives. He said it's about who you become while you're here. And if you can succeed here at the highest level, you will become someone who can succeed at the highest level. anything that you do. And that's what got me. I realized that up until that point

Starting point is 00:19:24 for the first 19 years of my life, I had settled for mediocrity from myself. And if I didn't change that from that day forward, when did I think it was going to change? And that's it. It's for everybody listening, right?

Starting point is 00:19:39 Is that what you really want for your life? It's not about what you're doing as much as it is who you're becoming. You know, most people, their strategy to achieve more is they think they have to do more. And a lot of people, because they're lazy or their identity, if they don't see themselves as discipline,

Starting point is 00:19:54 they just like, they don't even try because they're like, I don't want to do more, you know, I don't want to do more. Well, here's the big wake-up call I had is that when you focus not so much on doing but on becoming, instead of doing more, focus on becoming more. And then what you find is you can achieve more by doing less, right? When you become more, life gets easier, work gets easier, generating income gets easier, achieving your goals gets easier, right? Become more, and you find that you can achieve more by doing less. It doesn't mean that you're going to do less because obviously if you become more

Starting point is 00:20:26 and you do more, then the amount of people you can impact, the amount of income you can generate, the amount of joy that you can experience is amplified that many times over. But it's not about just becoming. I mean, it's not about just doing. It's about becoming. And that was it. So I decided I'm going to dedicate 10 days of my life to become the person that I need to be. to create anything I want for my life. And I'm so glad I did because if I didn't take those 10 days and make them the most important 10 days of my life, which for anybody listening can be the next 10 days of your life, I don't know where I'd be today.

Starting point is 00:20:59 With that, though, it's great to, obviously you need to have that type of mindset. And that mindset is as powerful as anything in the world. You also, to break a sales record, you need to have some sales ability, some sales skill. Where did that come from? Yeah, so, well, first of all, I'm going to beg to differ. No, you don't think so? Because I didn't. Here's what I had.

Starting point is 00:21:22 Well, you might have naturally had it. I got to believe you had some type of skill. Well, here's what I had. So you could call it a skill. I mean, it can be developed. So I guess if anything can be developed, it's a skill and probably some people have it more naturally. So I guess you could say that.

Starting point is 00:21:34 I just, so here's what it was. The two attributes that I attribute this to are enthusiasm and work ethic. And then accountability. again, I think that was the lynch period. Without the accountability, I wouldn't have had the work ethic because the work ethic was really, it wasn't inborn. Like I didn't, I never had work ethic in my life. But the thing that we have access to, every human being on the planet has access to enthusiasm and work ethic. Now, enthusiasm, by the way, that word you could use a synonym. You could say, well, how about passion? How about conviction? Right. It really doesn't have to be, if you go, I'm not an enthusiastic person like how.

Starting point is 00:22:11 Okay. Right. Can you be passionate? Can you be convicted? And if you're not, you can generate it. I don't care who you are. If I said, if I, you know, somebody gunned your head and they go, hey, be enthusiastic for the next five minutes or I'm going to pull the trigger. You're like, okay, okay, woohoo. You can be enthusiastic, right? Yeah.

Starting point is 00:22:26 So for me, I always look, I look back and analyzed it. I had two things. I had enthusiasm. I had access to enthusiasm, which for me comes naturally, right? If I'm, if I believe in something, I get excited, like you're talking right now. The second, though, was work ethic. That was not in, that was not. part of me. I had to

Starting point is 00:22:45 dig very deep. I had to literally create that out of thin air because I had never really shown work ethic in my life. I had always done like most people. One of the causes of mediocrity is minimalism, right? We do the minimum that we have to do to get by.

Starting point is 00:23:02 And that's definitely who I had become the first 19 years of my life and I had to flip a switch and become someone else for those 10 days. So was there a big training leading up to that because you had to have an understanding of the problem. I guess I'm curious because I'm, you know, I'm in the world of professional selling

Starting point is 00:23:19 and I've hired a lot of those people. So I've done a lot of these interviews where I'm trying to gauge whether somebody can sell or not, whether they're going to be a high performer. And a lot of times during these interviews, I will ask that to hear their, there's some sort of a pitch, whatever company they work for or product they sell. And I know you can't do your pitch because it takes two hours. I am curious, though, can, would you, would you do some of it, maybe even, just your cold open when you're knocking on doors or when you're at the very beginning of an

Starting point is 00:23:48 appointment of take me back to those days when you were selling cutco knives. Yeah, actually, that's a cool question because I'll share something with you that I made up on my own and integrated and it's actually for referrals, which I think every salesperson, if you can master referrals, man, you just got unlimited access to income, right? Yeah. But so you asked about the training and that, yeah, that is an important component that I left out and I shouldn't have because we do go through a three-day very extensive training and we literally, we role play our pitch over and over and over and over and over again.

Starting point is 00:24:22 And then to take it one step further, we actually, when we start, we tell the prospect, hey, I'm new. I just started last week. So I want you to focus on the product, not how good I am at presenting. I'm actually going to read my presentation word for word from this training manual so that I don't miss anything and you get the best explanation of the product. Is that okay? And it was beautiful because, A, it made sure you didn't miss anything. And B, there any sales resistance that they had was like out the way. They're like, dude, you don't even know what the hell you're doing.

Starting point is 00:24:54 Sure, bring it on, right? Yeah. But it was great. And so they like, they really dropped that resistance or any skepticism. And they just like really focused in on the product, right? And you did that, you know, you did that for a month or so. And then all of a sudden you didn't need the training manual anymore. So that's really key.

Starting point is 00:25:08 And I actually know a lot of sales professions where there isn't a three-day training. The training is, hey, go on a day of appointments with Bob, you know, today. And then we're going to give you your presentation materials and you go out tomorrow and just kind of wing it. You know what I mean? Like it's really nothing's left a chance with cut code. Everything is scripted and the scripts are always refined and improved and everything else. So referrals was no different. So at the end of the presentation, there was an approach that said, I haven't said it for like 10 years.

Starting point is 00:25:37 Let me try here. basically said, hey, Ms. Jones, there's one more important part of my job. I almost forgot. This is where you can really help me out. I get paid every time I show Kukko, but I can only show people that I've been personally referred to. And so what I really appreciated, you could jot down just 10 to 15 people that you know, that are nice. They don't necessarily have to buy the product because, again, I get paid whether or not people buy. But just people that are nice like you that you think would appreciate it and that I could, you know, that I could show it to. So here's a pen and notebook.

Starting point is 00:26:04 If you can jot down 10 to 15 people, I really appreciate it so much. So that was the end present. That was pretty close to what they taught us. Now, here's the deal. The problem is, if you go into the cycle, like, the average person in the company would get referrals from, like, I don't know, 70% of the people, and they would average, like, three to five referrals, right? So I always felt like it had enough of people to call. So I really thought this through, and I thought, how could I improve this? And first, I'll tell you the end result, and then I'll tell you how I got it.

Starting point is 00:26:34 I went from, instead of averaging three to five referrals on 50 to 70% of my appointments, I started averaging 15 to 20 referrals on 90 to like 95% of my appointments, almost everyone. Wow. Which is a game changer, right? So instead of doing 10 appointments and having, you know, seven people give me an average of four and I have 28 referrals, I would do 10 appointments, average 15 and have 150 people to call, right? Wow. 20 people to call goes away in an hour and you're out of people to call, right?

Starting point is 00:27:06 A hundred will last you a few days. So here's what I did. I realize that when you're waiting until the end to ask for referrals, that you're catching them off guard, right? Like they're watching the clock wind down. They know that you're getting toward the end. And then you ask them if they want to buy something and let's say they do buy something or they don't.

Starting point is 00:27:26 Either way, emotionally, they kind of check out because they're like, all right, I'm done. Like I got to pick up my dry cleaning. I got to cook dinner. I got to pick up the kids, right? So, you know, I got other stuff. So they start literally almost they're emotionally disengaged and they're emotionally invested into what's happening after you leave. Then you come out of nowhere and you're like, oh, by the way, you know, I need you to write down, you know, your friend's names and numbers and refer me. And I put myself in their shoes.

Starting point is 00:27:54 And I'm thinking, I'd be like, oh, I thought I was done, you know. And then you'd get objections like, I don't feel comfortable. I don't really know anyone, but those are what a smoke screen objection is really just saying, I don't want to do that. I get stuff to do. Get the out of here. Right. So what I did is I decided to set, plant the seed in a positive way in the very beginning.

Starting point is 00:28:17 So I would open up my presentation and I would actually share my goals, which there's very, there's differing opinions on that, right? Some salespeople, and it also depends on your business to business. It's probably a little different. When I was business and consumer, I was seeing, you know, housewives. So it's a little more, little less like, you know, you don't have to be so businessy and kind of more friendly. Right.

Starting point is 00:28:37 So I would actually, Mrs. Jones, is it, I would open up my book and I would, I use what I call plan spontaneity, right, which is where you're flipping through and you go, oh, oh, by the way, like, you, you, you know, you don't come across like it's like, it's, it's, like, it's like robotic. It's kind of like, I call plan spontaneity because I would, I would say certain things almost every time, but it would be, it would be, it would come across as kind of spontaneous, right? Yeah.

Starting point is 00:29:02 And for when you do that, people more, they're open to it. They don't go, wait, he's, he's, this is methodical. Like, he knows what he's going to say, right? Right. So I would say, I would share my goals. I, right? I'd open my book, I'd go, Ms. Jones. Oh, do you mind if I share my goals with you?

Starting point is 00:29:14 I'm like, I don't want to bore you, but I just, I set him in this really cool way this year where I have, I have eight different categories. And, you know, I just thought it was, I've shared with customers and they've actually appreciated it and they've kind of learned from it. So would that be okay? would you be open to that? And they're like, yeah, sure, right? So I asked permission.

Starting point is 00:29:28 So they give me permission. I give them a reason why other than selfishly I want to share my goals. It's, I wrote them in a way that actually some who are finding valuable, right? So then I would go and they would give me permission. I would share the goals, right? And in a real, you know, and not, I mean, just I would share the goals. And I would say, Ms. Jones, my number one goal, though, isn't to sell you anything today. And here's where it goes into my kind of my script that I created.

Starting point is 00:29:50 My number one goal isn't to sell you anything today, Ms. Jones. My number one goal, believe it or not. I know this might sound funny, which if you look at, I call that priming, by the way. I know this might sound funny and I get a smile on my face. Instantly, their emotional state, their expectancy goes to, oh, he's about to say something kind of funny. And it's almost like they start to smile with me. You follow?

Starting point is 00:30:08 Yeah. And I go, Mr. Jones, I know this might sound funny, but my only, my number one goal is that you like me. And like I said, I know that's kind of funny. But I'm being sincere because I don't, I don't cold call anyone. I only every single person that I see Cutco is a personal referral of someone I've already shown it to. So it means that I've shown Kaku to someone that they, you know, they see the value in the product. They like me, hopefully, right?

Starting point is 00:30:36 They trust me. And then they refer me to, you know, their friends or family. And it's really low key because I never pressure anybody to buy anything. So Ms. Jones, the point is I just want to make sure that you like me. That's more important to me because what matters most is whether or not you buy, if you want to buy something, that's totally up to you. Like, it's not up to me. Totally up to you.

Starting point is 00:30:57 Your call, if you want to buy something, which, again, right, I'm diving in right now, that's removing pressure, right? Yeah. They're like, oh, that's cool. You're not, you know, you let me know. It's like, it's up to you. If you don't want to buy, great, if you want to buy, that's fine, right? I say, but I really, all I really care about is that you enjoy the presentation and

Starting point is 00:31:12 that you like me so that you're totally comfortable referring me to some of your friends. Does that sound fair? And I would smile and I would nod. And they would smile and nod. And the beauty of it is psychologically, they've just essentially agreed that as long as they like me at the by the end that they're going to refer their friends right yeah and now it's not a surprise i go min jones remember i was telling you my favorite part of the job was i get to meet a lot of new people that are referred to me and they're

Starting point is 00:31:37 like yeah oh yeah yeah of course i go well that's the part right now here's a notebook blah and then i went through the same approach i gave in the beginning that the company gave us pretty much the same but again my i averaged 15 to 20 referrals instead of three to five because i set that expectation in the very beginning and made them comfortable and also made them kind of laugh and smile and created that emotional anchor toward the idea of referring me to their friends. And they liked you. So what was your clothes ratio? Sales-wise.

Starting point is 00:32:03 Yeah. It was, so the company clothes ratio is, it was like a $150 average sale and it was like a 75% close, give or take. Okay. My clothes was not, it was like 78%. It was not much higher than company average. but my average order instead of 150 it was like 780 so so you when you got somebody you just got them for so much more than the average yeah yeah yeah and it's it's just you know um yeah yeah

Starting point is 00:32:34 yeah i mean there's i mean we could spend an hour yeah i didn't mean to go off track on the sales thing but i love it because i've i've had my mom's bought cut co and the same probably same type of thing she told me he's like oh the guy was so convincing you know and then i had a kirby vacuum salesman guy come to my house. I don't know if you know any of those guys, but it's very, very similar. A three-hour demo. They basically do whatever they can. And I just appreciate the process of selling and professional selling that I felt terrible.

Starting point is 00:33:02 I didn't buy one because the price is very, it's really, really high for Kirby vacuum. But I appreciate the selling. And the guy was just crushed though, and I didn't buy. He showed me his goals. He showed me the trip he was going to win. He did all that similar stuff. He was really, really good. And I did give him a bunch of referrals because I felt terrible that I wasn't buying.

Starting point is 00:33:19 But I told him when he's at the door, I'm like, dude, no matter what you do, I'm not going to buy. However, if you want to come inside, I'll let you in. It was pure cold call. Just because I respected it, you know, I'm like, well, that's cool. You know, good for him. And I did learn throughout the process, but I did feel bad at the end of when I didn't buy. Got it. It's cool, though.

Starting point is 00:33:33 So I do want to talk about the miracle morning, though, man, because I'm huge, huge on morning rituals. I'm huge on waking up extremely early before children and working out and writing and thinking about being, you know, intentional. your time and your day. And I want you, you're the expert on this stuff. You wrote the book on it. Obviously, number one bestselling author. What is it? Over 600, five-star reviews on Amazon.

Starting point is 00:33:59 Just a lot of... 700 hours of this morning. 700. Incredible, dude. I mean, insane. I want you to get into some of the nuts and bolts of the miracle morning that you've written about. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:34:10 So, yeah, first thing I'll say is that this was never intended to be a book. Like, I never intended to write any book. Both of the books I've written, I guess, three now. But really the first two, and Miracle Morning especially, were written out of a sense of responsibility where I just kind of came up with something that radically and quickly changed my life. And I felt, I thought I have to share this with other people. You know, ever since I had my car accident and was like my life was spared, I kind of felt like a debt of service, you know, that like, I've been given a second chance. I'm not going to waste my life.

Starting point is 00:34:41 I'm going to impact other people as much as I can. And for the last, you know, 15 years, that's kind of been my focus. as well. So what happened was I had the U.S. economy crashed in 2008 and my life was great at that time for me. I had just bought my first house. I was making six figures. I launched my speaking business, wrote a bestselling book. Like life was great and very quickly the economy crashed and everything in my life crashed with it. I lost my over half my income. I couldn't afford to pay my mortgage. I lost my house. I stopped exercising completely. I canceled my gym membership. I was physically, mentally, emotionally, and financially at the lowest point of my life. And I was deeply

Starting point is 00:35:16 depressed and keep a long story short a series of events and conversations led me to the epiphany that if I want to change my life, the fastest way and the most effective way to do it is I have to create a morning success ritual. I have to start every day at a level 10 so that I can become a level 10 person and then create level 10 success in every area. And I basically went home. I created this morning success ritual. It didn't have a name. It was actually, all it was called personal development at 5 a.m. You know? And I woke up the first day, and I'm not a more, I wasn't a morning person. Like, it was like a struggle. I thought it'd be a struggle. That's a funny part. I'm like,

Starting point is 00:35:58 because I had to wake him an hour earlier now to do this morning routine that I created. And it was basically made up of the best personal development practices known to man. And I woke up the next morning and by, you know, I woke up at 5 a.m. And surprisingly, it wasn't hard. It was actually, I felt like a kid on Christmas morning. Because I was waking up, not to my, you know, same old, same old. It was like, I was waking up to this new, empowering morning routine that could potentially change my life. And in less than two months of doing the miracle morning, I almost tripled my income from $4,000 a month to $12,000 a month, give or take. I went from being in the worst shape of my life physically to training for a 52-mile ultramarathon, where I ran 52 miles in one day, five months after my first miracle morning.

Starting point is 00:36:46 never having run before. And maybe most importantly, my mental and emotional state, you know, I went from being depressed to, it didn't even take two months. It was like the first day I felt inspired, empowered, energized, motivated, happy because I had this new lease on life because at 6 a.m. that first day, I was like, holy, you know, crap, I feel amazing. Like, my life is still in shambles, but I feel amazing.

Starting point is 00:37:10 And if I start every day feeling this confident and motivated, empowered, inspired, It's only a matter of time before my life turns around, and I didn't know how fast it would be. And that, you know, two months into it, I started calling it my Miracle Morning. Again, never going to be a book. I shared it with one coaching client. She came back with Hal, I'm not a morning person, but I pay you a lot of money to coach. So I guess I'll at least give it a try for a week. And a week later, she goes, Hal.

Starting point is 00:37:37 Remember I told you I'm not a morning person last week? I said, yeah, she goes, it's only been a week, but I feel like I'm a morning person. Like, this is easy. I wake up every day. I follow your little steps, and it's easy. Like, I'm up. I'm energized. I don't even want to snooze button anymore.

Starting point is 00:37:51 And in that moment, I realized, wow, this is more than just my little morning routine. And again, that sense of response. I've got to share this with the world. And, you know, I mean, now it's the miracle morning is we just crossed 50,000 copies sold. There are, you know, tens of thousands of people that do it every day. And the crazy part, and it really holds true with the title I gave it based on my own, you know, miraculous results, if you will, is the results people get. In the last month, I've had two people tell me that they completely got off their depression, one got off their depression medication, one got off both their depression and anxiety medication in less than a month of doing the Miracle Morning. I mean, that's crazy, right?

Starting point is 00:38:37 It was either one or two gals that told me the Miracle Morning saved their marriage. That was in the last couple of months. Like, people, they lost 20 pounds in the first two months. Like, it's such a universal thing where it's like, it's not just about waking up early. It's about waking up better. And it's not early. It's better. And you can do it in as little six minutes.

Starting point is 00:38:57 But the point is, whatever you, this is the essence. And I'll turn it over to you after I say this. The essence of the Miracle Morning, and I really believe this is the one thing that will change everything for you, no matter whether you're a CEO that's making a million dollars a year or you're where I was, you're in debt, you're struggling, or somewhere in the middle. It's about dedicating time every single day to start your day, the time where you have a routine in place that enables you to become a better version of who you were when you went to bed the night before, to become the person that you need to be to create anything and

Starting point is 00:39:32 everything you want for your life. That's what the miracle morning is. I love it, man. What is your specific morning routine as of this morning? So I wake. So I'm kind of crazy. Anybody that goes, I'm not a morning person, I'd say probably 60 to 70% of people that wake up or that do the miracle morning. Weren't a miracle, weren't a morning person when they started like my, you know, my client Katie. And then, but I teach you this like five really easy steps to beat the snood button.

Starting point is 00:39:58 So for me, I wake up at 3.30 a.m. seven days a week unless I'm like, you know, traveling or on a date night or whatever with my wife. but seven days a week, 3.30, again, for most of you listening, that's not, you know, you don't have to wake up at 3.30, you can wake up at 6 or 7 or 5 or whatever. For me, it's 3.30 a.m. I drink a full glass of water to hydrate first thing, which is really important. I then make a cup of bulletproof coffee. And then I get kind of make sure I got my book, my journal, my affirmations, everything that constant the miracle morning laid out for me. And then at 4 a.m., I engage in what is really the miracle morning, which is these six practices called the life, savers. And savers is an acronym that makes this memorable, gives you structure and organization.

Starting point is 00:40:44 And they're the six most, you know, there's nothing, it's nothing new really. It's just the way it's done and the way it's simplified. But the S in savers is silence. So that's starting the day with meditation or prayer. Now, if you've never done meditation before, it's a game changer. Do any research on it. And you'll find that based on the benefits, you'd be crazy not to at least give it a shot for 30 days, you know. So the S is for silence. The A is for affirmations, written statements that clarify who you need to become, remember it's about becoming, not just doing, and what you need to do to become that to achieve everything you want for your life. Every day you've got to re-condition your subconscious mind

Starting point is 00:41:23 with those affirmations. The V is for visualization. The E is for exercise. The R is for reading, not like Harry Potter or 50 Shades of Gray, but reading self-help books. And the final S is for Scribing, which is a fancy.

Starting point is 00:41:36 word for writing or what I would call it journaling, if you will. So those are the six practices in the Miracle Morning. And then for me, at 5 a.m., I dive into a period of either extended reading or I'll write. I write pro-entrepreneur.com. So if I have articles due, I'll write an article. I'll work on my book. 6 a.m. I usually check email. 7 a.m.

Starting point is 00:41:56 My kids are awake. They usually wake up, and I give my wife some time to sleep. And I make them, you know, smoothies and we do yoga together. sometimes we'll do a little mini miracle morning. I'm just getting them on to that, which is kind of fun. We do yoga and affirmations together. How I love it, man. And I really, really appreciate the time you spent.

Starting point is 00:42:16 I love to have you on again maybe in like six months or something when you write maybe your next book or something else is going on. But for the listeners here, where can they find you and where do you want to send them? You can find me at halel-l-l-R-O-D, H-L-L-R-O-D, H-L-L-R-R-O-D, H-L-L-R-R-R-R-R-com. probably the best place to come and connect and get the most value. Like you're going to get a lot more value here than anywhere. It's the Miracle Morning community on Facebook. And you go to Facebook and you just search for the Miracle Morning community,

Starting point is 00:42:45 trust me, it has become the most inspired, engaged online community that I've ever seen. Ryan, are you in there yet? I'm going to be. No. It's going to blow your mind. I can't wait. People are so freaking positive and so supportive. and so supportive of each other, like people will post that they're having a challenge, and by the end of the day, they'll have 70 comments.

Starting point is 00:43:07 Dude, that's awesome. Like, 70 comments. Like, yeah. That's got to make you feel incredible, man. It does. It makes me feel so many, so many mixed emotions. Yeah. Like, you know, gratitude and I'm humbled and I'm in awe and I'm like, and I feel great.

Starting point is 00:43:24 I mean, yeah. It's like your tribe, dude. I love it. That's awesome. It is. I also feel really relieved because it used to depend on my leadership. And now it's a self-sustaining community where I just, I just check in a few times a week. That's awesome, man.

Starting point is 00:43:37 Well, again, man, Howe, I really, really appreciate it. I love to keep talking to you. I get inspired listening to you when I hear you another podcast. And it's even cooler now to be able to talk to myself or for everybody here to listen to you, man. So really, really appreciate it. Thank you so much, man. Right. You're welcome.

Starting point is 00:43:52 And also, do you do show notes on your podcast? Absolutely. So if you want to put this in your show notes and if anybody listening, you can do this now. But kind of a free gift, if you're not ready to buy it. the Miracle Morning, you know, which it's on Amazon.com, that's supposed to buy it. But if you're like, eh, I'm not sold, or if you're like, dude, how, money's really tight right now? Like, I don't have a 15 bucks.

Starting point is 00:44:10 Okay. Go to Miraclemorning.com, and that's where you can get the Miracle Morning fast start kit. You'll get a couple free chapters of the book. You'll get a 17-minute training video and a 60-minute, an hour-long training audio, all in the Miracle Morning. And that way you can literally get started and actually doing it and have a deep understanding of how to do it, how it works before you've been. invest in the book.

Starting point is 00:44:32 So that's a gift if you want, Miraclemorningorgon.com. That will definitely be in the show notes. LearningLeadershow.com. I will talk about that intro and outro. So again, Hal, man, that's awesome. Great, great content. So much of it for free too, which is really cool.

Starting point is 00:44:45 So thank you so much, man. Absolutely right. I appreciate you, brother. Thanks having me on. And thanks for everybody for listening. And I hope to connect with you soon. Cool. Sounds good.

Starting point is 00:44:52 Thanks, man. Take care. All right. Bye. Thank you for listening to this episode of The Learning Leader Show. I absolutely love doing this show. doing this show, as I hope you can tell by the passion that I bring to it on a daily basis. If you enjoy this episode, I'd like to ask one thing of you, you could go to ryanhawk.net.

Starting point is 00:45:16 It will launch the show in iTunes. iTunes is the best way to grow the show organically, and a couple things that you need to do once you're in iTunes. It's to subscribe to it. Just simply click on the subscribe button. To rate the show, obviously five stars are the best, and to write a review. I promise I will read every single review. I will listen to your coaching and feedback,

Starting point is 00:45:40 and I will implement that end of the show to make it even better. Thank you so much for being a friend of the Learning Leader Show. I greatly appreciate each and every one of you, and I cannot wait for the next one.

The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 006: Hal Elrod Tells You How To Be Insanely Productive Before 8:00 AM

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