The Nick Bare Podcast - 057: Current Obsessions: The Fuel That Drives Me

Episode Date: March 11, 2024

In today's podcast, I am kicking off a new series. The "Current Obsessions" series is all about what is fueling me and my passions for this moment in time. I'm talking about life updates, what I'm eating, reading, and listening to, and most importantly, what is inspiring me. This has been a massive season of growth and learning for me. I am especially excited to share the thoughts and ideas shaping my perspective on business, relationships, and the world. Enjoy! Save 10% at BPN Supps: https://bit.ly/nickbare10audio Follow for more:  IG: https://www.instagram.com/nickbarefitness/ YT: https://www.youtube.com/@nickbarefitness Topics: 0:00 Intro 0:32 Welcome 1:29 Life update 8:20 What I’m reading and listening to 18:40 What I’m eating 28:46 Writing my next book 35:09 Winning isn’t the ultimate purpose 41:03 Learning is a personal responsibility 48:11 Mastering the basics57:12 Setting boundaries 1:02:00 Courage is required

In today's episode of the podcast, I am trying something new that I'm very passionate about. I want to share with you guys what I'm currently reading, listening to, what I'm eating, where my mind has been, what I'm working on, all the things that are very relevant to my life right now in the moment, what I'm learning, experiencing, and trying. And I want to share that with you today. Hello everyone and welcome back to the podcast. Today I'm kicking off a new series for the podcast. And it's pretty much just me talking about what I'm listening to, what I'm reading, what I've been thinking about, what I'm eating, just sharing a lot of the things that are on my mind that I have found beneficial and useful that I want to share with you guys. And a lot of this actually was sparked by a new podcast that I recently came across that I'm about to share with you guys.

But this is the first installment of this new series that I will record and release every once in a while because it's fun. And I want to share what I'm experiencing with you so you guys can gain what I'm gaining through these resources that I'm enjoying. So the first life update that I want to share with you guys is that we are moving. Like I mentioned a few episodes ago, I moved back into the CEO role of the business. Me and my family and the small creative team we had here in Nashville, we were moving back to Texas next month in April. We just closed on our house in Nashville yesterday. So we sold that house. We've been in Nashville now for about six months.

Bought a house. Didn't think we were going to be moving back to Texas at least this soon. Sold the house. Closed yesterday. We have a few weeks that we can stay in that house until we have to be out officially. We found a home in Texas. It's not going to be done for a few months. So now we're looking for a rental to rent until we're moving to the house that we're going to buy.

And I'm hoping to have all this done. before the baby is born. So Steph is pregnant. Baby boy bear is due mid end of August. So I'm hoping that we move into our next house that we are finishing off and buying before that baby is born. We found a really cool house that was started by someone else actually a few years ago. and then they just stopped working on the project altogether. So this house that is, I'd say, 50% done,

has just been sitting, abandoned. So there's a builder, a new builder that ended up buying this house, is going to finish it. And we had a friend that found this whole situation going on, introduced us to the builder, and here we are moving into, this house and luckily we can finish off some of the build over these next couple months while we're in Texas close to the project.

So that's what's going on in my life, in our life right now. But one of the things I've learned these last six months since being in Nashville and really what I've learned these last couple weeks is that, It's reinforced by this quote. It's a famous quote, but I first heard about it from Sal DeStefano from Mind Pump Media when he was on my podcast a few years ago. And he said, the man who loves walking will go further than the man who loves the destination. The man who loves walking will go further than the man who loves the destination. And what I found myself doing earlier this year, being 2003, or I guess last year, early last year, is that I started hoping for the destination.

I reached a point where I was exhausted and I could not see the forest through the trees. And I was caught up in the day to day and just burnt out for lack of. better term. I was burnt out. And I was just focused on the destination. And I called myself saying things like, if I can just do X, Y, and Z, I will then be able to relax. If I can achieve this, I will then be able to live and be present. If I can just make this much money, I will be able to take a step back. And I realized, as I got closer, to what I thought was the destination, which in this case was the move to Nashville. Again, as I mentioned in a previous episode, I was planning on bringing on a private equity

partner selling a minority share in the business. And I thought for me that was step one to get to the destination. And through that process, through that experience, even though we didn't get there, it wasn't a successful outcome, I started to see and feel what that was going to be like, that destination wasn't going to bring me any more happiness. It most likely actually would have probably done the opposite. It would have brought less fulfillment, less happiness.

Because what I've realized over these last couple weeks and months and years, just all the things compounding leading to this moment is, It's very cliche, and it sounds boilerplate and cookie cutter. I know it does. But the destination is not where you find true happiness and fulfillment and contentment and satisfaction. It is the journey. It is the walk. It is the build.

I love building. That's what I love doing. In this case right now, I love building. BPN. That is my purpose. That is my passion. That is where I get joy and fulfillment. I love leading a team.

Love building a team. Love connecting with people through story and content and products and mission. That right there is the walk. I can do that forever. I will walk forever if that's the way that I get to walk. That is the path. That is the mission I get to walk on and towards. But the closer I get to the destination, the finish line, the more I realize I don't want

that finish line to be there yet. I don't want that destination to come any day soon because I love the build. I love the walk. So I no longer am catching myself saying, if I can just do X, Y, and Z, I will then be happy. If I can just make this much money, I can then relax. If I just accomplish this in my life, I can hang my hat up, put my feet up, and chill. Because the reality is, I don't want to get there yet. I don't. So that's the life update for you guys. What I'm reading and listening to at the moment, these are some golden nuggets that I'm obsessed with.

First off, a new podcast that I recently found. It's called Founders. And it's hosted by David Senra. Founders is the summary and breakdown of entrepreneurs, athletes, high-level individuals. and David Senra reads all these biographies and autobiographies and studies people and the greats and he breaks down what makes them unique. What traits and characteristics do they have and share that have led them to success?

It's a great podcast. Right now all the things I'm sharing I listen to on Audible when I'm getting ready in the morning, when I'm running in the morning, when I'm driving to work in the morning. Most of my reading or listening happens before 9 a.m. So the summary or the description of the Founders podcast, which I cannot recommend enough, is something I'm about to read you right now.

I've listened to a few episodes so far, when I say a few, probably a dozen. I listened to an episode on the Founders, founder of Trader Joe's, the founder of Red Bull, Steve Jobs, Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan, Sam Walton. All those episodes were incredible. And what I'm learning about some of these greats is that they share very similar traits and characteristics. There's a common denominator amongst many of them that have led them to success. And it's not necessarily that they are smarter than anyone else,

but they have the courage to do things that others aren't. So the Founders podcast description, this is a quote from Mark Andresen, there are thousands of years of history in which lots and lots of very smart people worked very hard and ran all types of experiments on how to create new businesses, invent new technology, new ways to manage, etc. They ran these experiments throughout their entire lives. At some point, somebody put these lessons down in a book.

For very little money, in a few hours of time, you can learn from someone's accumulated experience. There is so much more to learn from the past than we often read. realize. You could productively spend your time reading experiences of great people who have come before and you learn every time.

I want to learn from people's real experience. Not necessarily the theory and the study, but experience. I want to learn what has worked for people. I want to learn what hasn't worked for people. I want to learn why people have succeeded and why they have failed. Because experience is real.

It is role, and there's so much we can take away from that. So the Founders podcast is my number one recommendation for podcasts right now as of March 5th, 2004. There's two books that I want to share. The last couple months I've been obsessed with Erwin McManus, his podcast that he does with his son, Aaron. his books, all of his books, and his newest book called Mind Shift

has been incredible. It's all these mind shifts that you can do. I believe there's 12 in the book that he recommends and breaks down. That is make you think different ways about different things to shift your mind, to position it, to achieve greatness,

achieve your goals, build character, show up for your responsibilities. It's been great. Great book. I've actually, I was so obsessed with this book so far. Two days ago, I started it. And I started listening to it on a morning run. And I ran, I think, 10 miles that morning.

And I made a big dent in the book. And then when I worked out in the afternoon, lifting weights, usually when I lift weights, I listen to music. But I wanted to continue reading or listening to this book. So I listened to Mind Shift while I was strength training, which is very rare for me. But it's one of those books that I want to know what's next. The third read or the third recommendation right now, it's his book called The Effortless Experience by Matthew Dixon, Nick Tommon, and Rick Delal.

Lissy. And the reason I picked up this book is because now that I'm back in the CEO role of the business, I've been diving back into different departments. I am a big brand guy, branding creative. So naturally I'm drawn towards the brand and creative department, marketing department, working with the teams around storytelling, content creation, partnerships. paid ad content and assets, not really diving into like paid ad strategy. That's led by our VP of marketing, uh,

Maury Matrani. But I like leading and leaning into more creative brand stuff. But now that I'm back in the CEO role, I'm diving into all these different parts of the business. And where a lot of my, not a lot of my, but my current focus is at, is with our customer experience team.

Customer service, customer experience, customer support. This probably deserves its own podcast alone because my thoughts and perspective and opinions around customer experience has changed significantly over these last four or five years. And we've tried a bunch of different stuff. Some has worked, some hasn't. And what I'm learning about the effortless experience, this is really shaping the way that we're rebuilding our customer experience team,

is that we want to create a seamless experience for the consumer on our website to get all the information they need, all the problems resolved through a self-service platform. on our website without having to hop on a chat or pick up their phone and call our service number or email in to our team. The goal is to create a very simple approach on our website that gives the consumer everything they need from returns and exchanges to product information to FAQs about the business and our shipping processes, fulfillment, manufacturing, everything.

That's currently something we're exploring and building upon right now. And what I'm learning from the effortless experience, and I think this is where I got a lot of things wrong, is I used to think that people wanted to have a one-on-one conversation with our team. So I was going to, and we were going to create this. opportunity for people to call in, have a conversation, talk about the brand, talk about products.

And the reality is like a lot of people don't want that. A lot of people want information as fast as possible so that we can meet their expectations with satisfaction and they can go on throughout their day and do all the other things they have to do. I used to think that people wanted to stop what they were doing, interact with our team for endless amounts of time, time. And then I also thought they wanted to talk to us through chat on our website,

over the phone, through email, all these different channels. And one thing this book has taught me is create an effortless experience for the consumer, primarily driven through self-service on your website, and reduce the need for channel switching. Channel switching, for example, was when you have a question you want answered, you own the website of that company that sold you the product that you need answers to. You try to find the answer on the website,

you can't find it. So you find a phone number. You call the phone number. The phone number sends you to a voicemail which directs you to an email. So now you've channel switched three different times to get what you need. The goal is to reduce,

channel switching to improve satisfaction from the consumer, ultimately creating this amazing experience. So that's something we're trying to implement into our business and our website right now and building upon that principle. So that's what I'm listening and reading to right now. Founders podcast, Mind Shift, the effortless experience, I recommend all, especially to entrepreneurs. I also want to talk about what I'm eating right now.

I'm eating some new things. I come across brands. I come across foods, different foods all the time. And I want to share some of those things. Now, I will caveat to that. Steph and I love going for dinner. We love going to dinner with friends. And this past year, I've always loved Suf's.

But this past year, these past two years maybe, I discovered Nagiri. I didn't know Nagiri was a thing before these last two years. I thought sushi, and when you went to a sushi restaurant, you always got just like a sushi roll, like these crazy, extravagant sushi rolls that were packed with a million different things. I thought that was sushi. and from my entire life, that was what sushi was to me. And then we went to this one sushi restaurant,

which is my favorite in Austin, Texas, called Neighborhood Sushi. It's on South Congress. If you guys are ever in Austin, Texas, go to Neighborhood Sushi and get the hand rules. The hand rules are essentially like a sushi taco. It's this layer of seaweed or normal. I think it's called.

And then some rice, some sushi rice in there, and then the fish, the meat, a little bit of toppings, and you eat it like a taco. Bomb.com.

It is so good. Neighborhood sushi is my favorite. But that's where I discovered nigeri. And now whenever I go for sushi, we order a bunch of nigeri. And if you're like me, I never know what I'm ordering when I go down the menu.

So I just start at the top. I work my way down. I don't keep track in my head. I just say, I'll take one of these, two of these, three of these, two of these, four of those. If there's Wagyu steak, nagiri on the menu, I'm getting like eight of those because they're always so good. And I'm always surprised when my food comes out because I'm not really sure how much I ordered. I just go down the list. And it comes out, I have, say, 18 to 22 pieces of nighiri, and I dip it in Ponzu.

Also, a graduation lesson in my sushi consumption. I don't use soy sauce anymore. I use Ponzu, which is like a sweeter type soy sauce. But the reason I share that is because Steph and I went to this sushi spot in Nashville last week called Oku, which was good. It was really good, but it didn't compare to neighborhood sushi in Austin. So one of the things that I've been obsessed with, not just right now in this moment of time, but the last year is Nagiri when we go and get sushi. Other things that are, I'd say, more accessible.

One, I discovered this hummus brand that I'm obsessed with. And I'm not sponsored by any of these brands I'm talking about. Another thing I did this past year, side note, is that I stopped all of my brand partnerships. I never really worked with many brands or I never did many sponsored deals. The one brand that I worked with up until a few months ago for years was Helix mattresses. I loved, and I still love Helix mattresses. I think they're great mattresses. I think it's a great brand.

that's the one brand that I would do paid advertising deals with. And I worked with them, like I said, for years. But I made the decision this past year that I'm not going to work with any brands moving forward. I'm just going to focus on BPN, not going to do any paid post, anything like that. So if I ever talk about a food or a brand or a product or a book or anything that I like, it's because I actually like it and I recommend it and I'm not getting paid to say that. Like this podcast, for example, will never do paid ads. This is not a paid ad podcast.

And if you want to support me and the content and the brand and the mission and everything we do, I would ask that you go to bearperformancenutrition.com and you support BPN because that is I put all my time and energy and resources. It's what I'm passionate about. It's my purpose. It's what I love. And it not only supports me, but it supports the team that works on and alongside BPN with me.

So these two foods that I'm a share. There's a long way of saying, I'm not getting paid to say this. I found this hummus brand called Ithaca hummus. I think I discovered them in Whole Foods and I get their traditional hummus and their lemon dill hummus.

They also have a red pepper hummus which is pretty good but I like the lemon dill and the regular traditional hummus. I personally, I'm a big hummus fan if we ever go to a restaurant and for appetizers, they have hummus and pita, I'm going to order the hummus for sure.

I'm going to get like four extra servings of pita, especially if it's good pita. I'm going to ask for more and more and more and more throughout the dinner. But I recommend checking out Ithaca hummus. I find it at Whole Foods. The flavors I've tried are absolutely incredible. And I add it to my lunch every day. My lunch right now has been eight ounces of meat,

whether chicken or beef, 250 to 300 grams of rice depending on the day, some pickled beets, and some hummus. My pickled beet consumption has still been out of control since we got to Nashville. I go through a jar every two to three days still. It's pretty wild. But Ithaca hummus is something I've been obsessed with. And then another brand that I found is called Just Meets. And the way I found Just Meets was actually I got served a Instagram ad for this prepped meat company.

And I've tried a bunch of these meal prep companies before. And I'll be honest, I've been disappointed in just about all of them because I like creating my own meals. typically if this whole typically what I found with a lot of these meal prep companies is like if I'm doing meal prep I just want like my proteins, my carbs and maybe a vegetable

together. But when they make it into like this healthy you know cheeseburger or cassidia it sounds great but when you ended up getting it it like it's tiny

it's just small portion and it's like 800 calories. It just doesn't add up for me and doesn't make sense. And I've also found that with a lot of these meal prep companies, like the food just doesn't taste really good once you heat it up and you thaw it out. But what is always inconvenient for me, even though I make time to do it, is pre-prepping all the meat that I consume on a daily basis. So I just thought it could be really nice just to have pre-prepped meats that I could keep in

the freezer, move from the freezer to the fridge when I need them, add my carb, which is easy. And I always have rice that's made or I can make potatoes really quickly. So I got served this ad by just meats, which is literally just a meal prep, prepped, cooked meat company. So I figured I'd try it. Like, what's the worst it could happen? I at least try it. So I ordered a bunch of their meats. And they're incredible.

I've been impressed. My favorite one right now is the the teriyaki Hawaiian beef. I mix that with some rice, coconut aminos, buffalo sauce, hummus, beets, and that meal, I mean,

I look forward to it as soon as I wake up. I think, man, I have to go run, eat breakfast, work before I get to have my beef, rice, hummus, and beats. I could switch out that second meal for the first meal,

but I love my first meal too. But yeah, if you're looking for like a solid prepped meat meal prep company, just meats is one that I found is reliable. It tastes really good. It's quality meat. I've tried the chicken, the brisket, the beef.

They have like turkey, a bunch of different types and in flavor. and the pricing is reasonable for what you get. Each meal that I get or each pack of prepped meat for me makes two meals. And I do about eight ounces of meat in each meal. So that's what I'm eating right now. A lot of hummus, a lot of meat. And when we have time, nagiri.

So now I'm just going to riff on some topics that I've been really passionate about recently. I'm thinking a lot about, especially, because I'm in the process of writing my book, which at the moment is called Go One More. And we've been working on this book for almost a year now. And I signed a publishing deal for this book. So I'm working with a publishing agency, an editor, and we're putting this book together.

So a lot of the things that have been on my mind have been things that I'm intentionally trying to break down and put back together because I'm adding them into this book. And the whole concept behind Go and More the book is based off this lesson that I learned earlier this year that Go On More is not just an action. It's actually an outcome. And I used to think when I first founded Go One More, I thought it was just an action. It was doing one more rep, running one more mile, working one more hour.

But what I found is, and rediscovered, is that go one more is actually an outcome. It's not just an action. And that's the premise, the foundation of this book and all these different lessons that I've learned through experience that have created clarity for me to be more intentional with what I'm working on so that I could achieve the outcome of go one more. And as I'm writing this book, I'm diving into a lot of topics. I'm doing a lot of reading around a lot of these topics. So I thought it would be a good opportunity to just break down what I've been thinking about and some quotes that are applicable to what I've been thinking about and working on. And the first is one that I've talked about previously, but it is a chapter in the book.

and it's called, if it matters to you, you will make time. If it matters to you, you will make time. And actually, as I was driving over to the studio to record this episode, I was just thinking about

this topic and the book that I'm writing right now and just some things that I want to make sure I'd articulate in a very clear and concise way. And it was for, funny, I was trying to pull out of this intersection and I could not pull out because it was absolutely just like jam packed. It's Gale Road in Nashville and I was trying to pull out on 8th Avenue

and there's just like traffic going everywhere. And I had to sit there for 10 minutes before I could pull out happens every time this intersection. Because what just happens to be a hundred guards up the street from this intersection is a Chick-fil-A. I'm going somewhere with this, I promise. And as I finally pull out, I had to speed out, and I'm driving by a Chick-fil-A,

I mean, I'm sure you guys know, if you drive by a Chick-fil-A any day but Sunday, there is the most wild and crazy line going to Chick-fil-A. Any time of the day. But this just happened to be lunchtime.

It was 12 p.m. as I was passing. And this road, it has two lanes going one direction, two lanes going the opposite direction, and then there's emerging lane in the middle. So there's five lanes on 8th Avenue where I was at. And as I'm pulling out and driving up 8th Avenue towards the office, I'm passing Chick-fil-A, there was this carol. It was like a Toyota Corolla. It flew across all five lanes going so fast.

and uncontrollably to pull into the Chick-fil-A drive-thru, which was backed up by probably, no exaggeration, 30 cars. I'm like slamming my brakes, trying out to hit this guy as he's making his way across traffic, surprisingly didn't get hit by anyone, didn't cause an accident. And I'm thinking, wow, Chick-fil-A matters a lot to this guy right now. And he's going to make sure he makes sure he makes a lot. makes time for Chick-fil-A, and he's going to take risks, and he's going to make potential

sacrifices with his body and his life in his vehicle to get that crispy chicken sandwich into his body with some Chick-fil-A sauce. Because if it matters to you, you will make time. It can be a good thing. It can be a bad thing. So there's two quotes. I want to share with you before we kind of dive into some of this. The first one is from Erwin McManus. This is from one of his podcasts. I think winning is a wonderful

outcome. It's just not a great purpose. Your purpose for life should be rooted in who you are. So if your purpose is who you are becoming, it can't be shaken by wins or losses, failure or success.

You should want to win. You should want to be the best. these are great aspirations but they should be outcomes of the person that you are committed to becoming Irwin McManus

second quote by him if you are required to be anyone except yourself to be accepted the price is too high I love that so I'm going to read it again if you are required to be anyone except yourself

to be accepted the price is too high. I love both of those quotes from Irwin. First off, talking about winning. If it matters to you, you will make time. I have found that a lot of people, and I've probably been here at some point as well, a lot of people want to win just a win. It doesn't matter what they're going to win at or how they're going to get there. They just want to win to stand on top of the podium and receive the award or the medal or the big check to be above everyone else,

hands held high beating their chest saying, I won. And they don't care what they won, how they won, why they won, but winning is the outcome that they desire. Their purpose is to win. And I agree with, Erwin here that your purpose shouldn't be to win, but it should be an outcome of pursuing your

purpose, your mission, and doing your absolute best. And by doing your absolute best at it, becoming the best at what you do, you end up winning as a byproduct because you are so invested in bought into the journey, the walk, the build. The win, is potentially the destination. It's the finish line. It's the outcome. It's not a great purpose. Just to win is not a great purpose.

But the journey, the why, the reason is. I found that very fascinating. If becoming the best at what you do, whether that is a mom, a dad,

a CEO, an athlete, marathon runner, carpenter, podcaster, teacher, whatever it is. If being the best

reaching your full potential is what truly matters to you, you will make time to make that happen. But if it really doesn't matter to you, you will not find the time. If your parents want you to be

the best surgeon in the world, but you could care less. You are not going to make time to become the best surgeon in the world. Your parents will make time for you potentially and come up with the means and the funds to make that happen and provide you with the resources and the tools

and the skills. But unless it really matters to you, you will not make time for it. That's the reality of it. And if you're pursuing something, and you're having a really hard time making time for it. You know, like, you know that you need to lose weight. You need to get in shape to save your life so you can live another 20 to 30 years with your family.

If that doesn't matter to you truly, if it doesn't, you're not going to make the time to wake up early and work out. You're not going to make the time to prep your food. you're not going to make the time to educate yourself on proper nutrition and training techniques and recovery. You're not going to make time to get the sleep that you need to perform at your highest level. If it doesn't really matter to you, you're not going to make time. It's an honest conversation you have to have with yourself and acknowledge that. That is self-awareness. If you are not self-aware enough to show and tell yourself that the reason you're, you're not getting to where you want to be is because it doesn't matter enough to you so you're not

willing to make time for it, that is self-awareness. A lot of people lack self-awareness. They're not getting to where they want to be because they're not willing to make time for it. So they find excuses and they point the finger at everyone and anyone else to blame for why they're not getting to where they want to be. But the reality is it's because they're not willing to make time. And the second quote, If you are required to be anyone, accept yourself to be accepted, the price is too high. I cannot relate to this enough

because there is truly nothing like being authentically and unapologetically you. One of my favorite parts from one of my favorite books, the courage to be disliked, talks about that the ultimate level of freedom

is when you truly stop caring what other people think about you. Because when you truly care about what other people think about you and you're not confident in yourself and who you are, you will mold yourself into someone else. You will become a chameleon based off of what you think other people want you to be so that you are accepted. but the price is that you are then unhappy. You're not you.

You are just a reflection, a mere image of what everyone else thinks you should be, wants you to be, and is. That price is way too high. The journey is way too short to be anyone else except yourself. The next thing I want to talk about is that learning is a personal responsibility. And I think we always must be prepared in life from a bunch of different angles.

Physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. There's a lot of jokes and memes around like preppers, you know, people who are preparing for the next World War or chaos and destruction. So they have bunkers below their homes. I don't have you as I've ever seen the movie Blast from the past. Whenever I think of Preppers, I think of that movie.

Blast from the past is when they thought a, I think they thought an asteroid or a, a bomb was coming down to where they were living. So they ran down and lived in this bunker and they set the timer and they were in this bunker for decades. I don't remember how long it was.

And then when they came out of the bunker, the world obviously progressed and technology advanced. They didn't recognize the world in its present form compared to when they went down into the bunker. very interesting movie. But people always joke around about these preppers and the reality is that these preppers are prepared to be resilient

when faced with adversity in extreme cases. But we all need to be prepared for different situations in life that allow us to be adaptable and resilient and strong. And a lot of being prepared

is having the ability and the skills to be able to learn. One of the things that I really resonated with in Erwin McManus' book was how he was talking about the way that

the education system fails us and has failed us. And it's because it's stopped focusing on teaching us how to learn. And it's taught us how to regurgitate, memorize, and guess to be correct. But the most educated people, the smartest people, are those who learn how to learn. Learning is a personal responsibility. All of the answers that we want and need in the world are literally, at our fingertips.

If there's anything you want to do, accomplish, learn, be good at, that is a personal responsibility that we have the ability to achieve and gain. It's wild. If I want to start a business, I can go online,

I can spend 24 hours researching how to build a business, and I can go build a business with limited amount of capital to start and launch it, and if I do it the right way, I can make millions of dollars. If I want to run a faster marathon, I can go online and watch a bunch of YouTube videos and learn how to run a faster marathon in the next three months. If I want to learn how to be a gourmet chef, I can download master class and learn from the greatest

chefs in the world how to make these amazing dishes that will blow people's minds away. Learning in its greatest form is literally within inches from our bodies at any given moment in time. But it's a personal responsibility. It's no one else's responsibility to tell us go learn X, Y, and Z, Yes, when we are young and we are children and we are in school, we have to be taught how to learn, or at least encouraged to learn how to learn. But when you reach a certain age and get older, it is a personal responsibility. One of the things I wrote down here that would encourage everyone to not do is to be a headliner.

I wrote down here, don't be a headliner. A headliner is someone who, who watches the news in the morning or picks up the newspaper or goes on social media and sees this headline that is meant to grab your attention as fast as possible,

which is typically some sort of clickbait or a hook or something false, fake a narrative that is being pushed. And what happens is you see this headline. That headline could say something like new discovery

uh meat is killing you and someone who is a headliner will see that headline and not take any personal responsibility to go learn more or research

or study well they will take that headline as face value and then create context and a narrative behind that to go spread that to all the people they know and before you know it, all these people are saying meat is killing you.

Well, based off what? The studies. What studies? Did you actually read the studies? I've also found that most of the time when people reference studies or research, they actually haven't gone and read the studies or the research. They're just referencing someone who told them there are studies and research behind the headline. Don't be a headliner.

Use the headline to spark your curiosity and interest and then go learn about that headline. Find out if it's true, if it's false, if it's real or fake, learn more about it. Go beyond the headline. It is our responsibility to learn, then do, then relearn, and redo. That is the process of improving, getting better, and working towards success. Learning is a personal responsibility.

So as I've been listening to founders, the podcast, you know, it references and summarizes the lives of these great entrepreneurs and athletes and individuals. and leaders. And there's these common denominators amongst the greatest in the world

of what they do. And the best in the world at what they do have learned how to master the basics. They do the simple things flawlessly. If you look at Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, I've recently only started trying to learn more about Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant and what has made them so unique.

You know, growing up, I was born in 1990. Jordan and Bryant were, you know, athletes who were highly praised and recognized in the sport of basketball. But when I was younger, their mindset wasn't really studied or talked about. and I don't think it's been until recently that more people have talked about what has made

Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant so unique. If you haven't watched the documentary on Netflix yet, the last dance, highly recommend it. Absolutely incredible to see just like how intense and intentional Michael Jordan was. But there was something that was talked about in this Founders episode about people like Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant.

And people of that caliber, they set this standard for them personally of how they are going to live their lives. And when they want to compete with someone or if someone wants to compete with them, if you want to compete with a Michael Jordan or Kobe Bryant, you have to go to their level of standard to compete with them. because they hold themselves there. So if you want to compete with Jordan or Brian, you have to go to their level to compete. You will never find them coming down to someone else's level to compete with them. They hold that standard.

They've created that standard and they hold that standard. And if you want to compete with the greats, you have to go to their level of standard to actually compete at a level with them. people like Jordan and Bryant have done the fundamentals like I said flawlessly I was a big fan and am a big fan of Tim Grover's

books Relentless and Winning he coached both Jordan and Bryant and he talks about how they would practice the fundamentals for hours and hours and hours a week they would line up on the court and make the same shot over and over and over again, which was a basic shot,

but they would master it. They would master those skills because they knew that in order to be the best, in order to be the greatest that ever lived, and have massive success in life, you have to hyper-focus on this one thing. And if you become the best at one thing and you do it with your full effort

and reach your greatest potential, that will open up other opportunities for you in life. life. Same thing with the military. If you look at like special operations, special forces, Ranger Regiment, what makes those units so special and so unique and so good, isn't that they go and try to do these crazy innovative drills

and new techniques and battle drills that no one else is allowed to do. No, they do the basics, flawlessly. They have mastered skill level one tactics. And when you master the basics and the fundamentals and skill level one stuff, you then can go do the more complex operations. You can operate at a higher level. You can get creative with what you're doing, but you can't graduate to phase two until you master phase one. I briefly talked about this, but you look at

Kobe Bryant or Michael Jordan. And if you guys haven't watched the documentary or not documentary, the movie, Air, which is, I believe it's called Air. Air, which is the documentary

on Nike and Michael Jordan and when Nike created the Air Jordan shoe, and what that meant for Nike, but also what that meant for Michael Jordan, not just financially, but from a branding perspective, it's a great movie that truly inspired me.

I highly recommend if you haven't seen it. And in that movie, it showcases how, because Michael Jordan was such a good basketball player, and he hyper-focused and obsessed on being the best at what he did. He didn't try to be a tinkerer or a generalist in all of these things, but he hyper-focused on being the best basketball player of all time.

Because he did that, with such great intention and repetition, it opened up all these other doors for him. He would have never gotten a deal like he did with Nike if he wasn't the best at what he did. he wouldn't have had all these upper opportunities in life if he wasn't that amazing, skilled, highly valued basketball player. Same with Kobe. Kobe focused on being the best basketball player he possibly could be, and he hyper-focused

on that. And because he was so good at it, it opened up all these upper opportunities for him. one of the things that people ask all the time that work at BPN is they come to me all the time, they say, what is my next two to five years look like at BPN? When people first get started working at BPN, too, they say, okay, I'm moving into this role when I get started. If I do a good job, what's next? How much more can I get paid?

what are the other opportunities that will present themselves to me if I do a good job? And I've always thought that was backwards thinking. I could be completely off base and wrong, but it's the way that I run my business and it's the way that I think. My response and my thought process is, you're coming into this new role. First off, just focus on being the best at what you do. Don't think about that next phase yet.

focus on being the best at what you do. Master those skills. Do the fundamentals and the skill level one stuff flawlessly. And after you master that, I guarantee there will be opportunities that present themselves to you. The business in two to five years is probably going to be in a completely different place and space

in different roles and responsibilities are going to be required. I can't create those on a thin air right now. But if you do the best job you possibly can in your role right now, I can guarantee you opportunities will open up in the future. So just do the best you can in the role you're at right now. That's a way that I think. Because I've been able to learn and study and hear the stories of how people like Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant have gotten to where they are.

It's because they have mastered the skills and something they are passionate about in and want to pursue and have become great in that process. Another clear common denominator of the greatest in the world of what they do is they know how to set boundaries. They know how to say no and they know how to simplify. They do more by working on less. Again, they're not trying to be a generalist or a tinker in everything.

they want to be the best at one or a few things. I heard Jesse Itzler. He posted this on Instagram a few days ago, and it's when he was on Joe Rogan's podcast. Jesse Itzler is a very impressive entrepreneur. He's built and sold multiple businesses. He's married to Sarah Blakely, who's the founder of Spanx.

Jesse has a very big. very unique, humble, and ambitious, wildly ambitious personality. It's probably the only way I can describe. I've never met Jesse personally, but I follow a lot of the stuff he produces and talks about. And when he was on Rogan's podcast, Joe asked, what's one of the first things you eliminated? And I believe it was around the context of setting boundaries and simplifying effort towards success. And Jesse responded with just saying no to the request for my time. Someone may ask, do you think you can meet me for lunch?

I want to talk to you about a business idea I have in the beverage space. I know that you had your coconut water business, which he sold. Jesse sold a coconut water business. Jesse's response is no, because it is cumulative. And I'm going to quote this, but Jesse wrote this on his Instagram. caption. He said that time is capped and we can't get it back. If you just take three 15 minute meetings a week that don't move the needle towards where you want to go, that's 39 hours a year. That's basically an entire work week wasted. Since the average American works close to 46 weeks per year,

that's over 2% of your total annual work time wasted. It's a lot. Imagine what you get done with an extra week this year. The best in the world at what they do knew how to say no to certain things. Now, I want to caveat this. That's not to say, and I don't think Jesse is saying this either, but it's not to say that you should

decline or request to mentor people or spend time with individuals or groups of people who need help and assistance and are just getting started because your time is so valuable that no one else deserves it. That's not what this is saying. That's not what I am saying. What I believe this is saying, Jesse is saying, what I'm trying to say is, if you say yes to everything, nothing matters. When everything matters, nothing matters. You have to have respect for your time, You have to have respect for your energy, and you have to have respect for what matters to you. Because if you say yes to everyone and everything, you will not have time to work on the things that matter.

And you're not going to make progress. It sounds selfish, but you have to take care of yourself first in order to help others. It's like when you get on an airplane. And the first thing that happens Once you get on an airplane Everyone's loaded Luggage is stored The crew gets on the announcement speaker

And says In the event of an emergency Please make sure to Don your oxygen mask first Before helping others Well why That sounds like it's pretty selfish Well if you don't put your oxygen mask on first

What's going to happen is You're going to pass out and you're going to die. And you can't help anyone. You can only help people if you can first help yourself. Saying no is a skill, which is hard for a lot of people,

but it's absolutely necessary to simplify what you are working on so you can put more effort into less things, but create greater outcomes, not just for yourself, but for the other people in your lives too. And the last thing I'm going to leave you guys with,

as I was writing the book, or working on the book this past week. I followed this little quote and I wrote it down and it's going to be, as it right now, the title of one of the sections in one of the chapters. And it says that theory is great, action is better, courage is required.

Courage is required. A few years ago now when I had Badros Kulian on the podcast, I asked him this one question, and we posted this small clip on Instagram and it went wild. It blew up. I asked them the question, what's one thing that holds most people back from achieving greatness or reaching their full potential? And he said, it's the story. It's the story that people tell themselves. People will use the past to define their present and the future.

If you had a really rough upbringing of poverty and abuse, and if you were in a family that didn't show love or love you or care for you, take you to baseball games growing up, feed you good food, all of the things, I feel bad. I do feel bad because I was fortunate and grateful enough to have a really strong upbringing with a great family

in a great neighborhood of a great city and a great state. And I'm very grateful and appreciative of that. And I always will be. And not everyone had that opportunity to grow up in a family I was loving and caring and all of those things. If you didn't have that, again, I feel bad.

But that does not define who you are today and who you're going to be in the future. Your story in the past does not affect who you are going to become today and who you are going to become eventually because that is a decision you have to make right now and have courage to make that decision. understanding the theory of why and how things work is super important. The action you take on that theory is more important. It produces greater outcomes and adaptations, and you learn from the successes and failures of testing that theory. But in order to take that action, you have to have courage.

And if you lack courage, you will never act on the things that you want to accomplish, the things that you are curious about, the things that you want to do in your life. Real experience is worth more than gold, not just for you, but also the people around you. Theory is great, action is better,

courage is required. Thanks for tuning in, guys, and we'll see you in the next episode.