The Ryan Hanley Show - The Most Undervalued Concept in Success

Episode Date: April 17, 2024

Became a Master of the Close: https://masteroftheclose.comUnlock the transformative potential of the 'empty cup' philosophy to revolutionize your approach to success and happiness. ✅ Join over 10,000 newsletter subscribers: https://go.ryanhanley.com/ ✅ For daily insights and ideas on peak performance: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryanhanley ✅ Subscribe to the YouTube show: https://youtube.com/ryanmhanleyOur enlightening discussion on the value of maintaining an open mind will challenge you to listen more, judge less, and find the hidden gems in everyday interactions. With Bruce Lee's wisdom guiding us, we delve into how an empty cup symbolizes humility and a desire to learn and serves as a strategic tool in leadership and personal development. By embracing this mindset, we make room for growth, understanding, and serendipitous discoveries that can only emerge from a place of receptivity.Embrace the liberating concept of detaching from outcomes as I share insights from my 18 years in sales and leadership. This episode is not just a testament to the power of focusing on the journey rather than the destination but also an invitation to find fulfillment in our efforts, be it in business or on the baseball field. Through anecdotes and personal experiences, we discuss how prioritizing process over result enhances performance and satisfaction across various facets of life, from professional aspirations to the roles we play in our families. Tune in to redefine success and learn how to foster a sense of achievement that goes beyond mere outcomes.

I recently got a question from one of my newsletter subscribers, which didn't give a lot of context, but said, you know, Ryan, what is the most undervalued concept in success? Now, this reader did not say personal success, business success. And frankly, the first two things that came to my mind, and I'm sure there are more, but these were the first two that came to my mind. They felt very powerful. I believe strongly in them. They apply across every instance of our life, whether personal, our relationships with our children, with our spouses, how we relate to our friends, how we relate to people that we engage with out in communities, our business world, our vendors, our employees. If we are an employee or have superiors in our

organization, how we relate upstream as well. This is two concepts that I think about almost every single day. And in every situation in which they apply, I try to embrace them and approach those situations in which I know they're going to be useful and use them. This is active. These are active concepts. They are not things that just kind of like are nice to read about or put in your journal once in a while. These are active concepts that I use every day in which they apply. So what are those two concepts? The first actually comes from Bruce Lee. And this is something that I've been using for a while, not as concisely as I would like, and certainly not as refined as how I'm about to give it to you. It wasn't until about, what's it called, six months ago

that I read Bruce Lee's Striking Thoughts, and he articulated this concept in a way that immediately hit home. Bruce Lee talks, and everyone knows his famous "'Be Like Water." Well, he has another quote that is of the same vein and in the same section of the book, which is the value of the cup is its emptiness. It actually comes from an old Chinese anecdote around a philosopher and a student in which a philosopher and the Chinese philosopher and his student sit down for tea and the entire time the student is just babbling

on about all the things he knows all the things he believes all his experiences etc etc and at certain point the philosopher the master becomes kind of fed up with this or just has had enough and leans forward and begins pouring tea for the student and he pours and continues pouring the tea and continues pouring tea until the tea overflows the teacup and starts you tea for the student. And he pours and continues pouring the tea and continues pouring tea until the tea overflows the teacup and starts hitting the table and hitting the floor. And the student immediately lurches forward

and says, stop, stop. And asks, why would you do that? And the master leans back in his chair and he says, the value of the cup is in its emptiness. And the point of that anecdote and of what Bruce Lee is trying to articulate in when he says the value of the cup is in its emptiness is that when we approach situations with a full mind, as if we already know the answer, then there is no way for us to learn. 60%, 50% being a leader is being able to listen, right? Is being able to listen to the problems, being able to listen to our people,

listen to the scenarios, the situations, the facts, the data, and apply what we listen to, our life experience, knowledge, expertise, et cetera, right? If we're not open, if our cup isn't empty, then we're not hearing what people are saying. We're walking into meetings believing that we already know the answer before we know all the facts and think about the last time that you did that right this happens all the time i find this happening when i approach my children right

i'll sit down with them i will believe that i know what they should be doing before listening to what they actually want or what experience they've actually had or what they're being told by other people of authority in their lives, right? And until I have that data, I can't actually give them good reference or good guidance. Now, this is especially true for leaders or managers inside of organizations who are trying to make the best decision. If you sit down in a meeting and you believe you already know the answer before you've heard the pertinent or relevant stakeholders give their reports, address you, give their opinions, lay down the facts for you, lay down what's happening situationally, then you have absolutely no idea or no ability to make a relevant and accurate decision. You are flying by the seat of your

pants. You're shooting from your hip. You're using what some people call intuition. And intuition is a huge part of making great decisions in anything that we do. However, your intuition is only a part of the equation that goes into ultimately making that decision. And if we're not listening, if our cup isn't empty when we approach situations then we don't know should we trust our intuition should we use our intuition and apply it on top of data do we you know it doesn't mean what someone says you have to take as fact it just means engage in the situation with an empty cup. Listen to what they have to say. You could listen to one of your direct reports, give you their feelings,

facts, experiences on a situation, and having maybe been in the field for 10, 15, 20 years, know that what they're seeing is maybe not what they believe or that they're experiencing a very common scenario in which their lived truth is not actually the best path for the company etc right it doesn't mean you have to agree with somebody it doesn't mean you have to take their path it doesn't mean just because someone gets to sit in a meeting and share their thoughts that you have to do what they say it It simply means listen to them. Now, what you may get out of that has multiple layers. The second level thinking on that is not just that particular decision,

but by opening yourself up to actually listening to someone, maybe you find a diamond in the rough, right? Maybe there's an employee that when you actually slow down, approach situations with an empty cup and listen with an open mind to what all the various people in a meeting are reporting on and talking on, you may find someone who is coming up with particularly articulate conclusions that maybe other team members aren't seeing. Maybe there's someone who you didn't necessarily know had an ability that all sudden you figure out they have because you're now approaching these conversations with an empty cup. And this works incredibly well with your spouse, partner, with your loved ones, with your friends. There is

no sense. Just think about your own life. When do you enjoy sitting down with someone and them having all the answers to every question? Like the people that come back at you all the time have to one-up you or have to, you know, just tell you the way it is. And look, I know I can be guilty of this. That's why I'm working on it. That's why I'm sharing this with you. That this isn't a natural skill set for me. It's something I've had to develop over time. And while on this podcast and sometimes in my content, I love to talk in hyperbole and talk fast. And I do think about these things at a deep level quite often. So I do have certain

framework structures, filter mechanisms that I use on a day-to-day basis and feel strongly about. I do try in all scenarios in which someone wants to share information with me to engage in that conversation or that interaction with an empty cup. And I believe that if you start to practice this, right? And so how does this look practically? When I would have a meeting, right? Especially a meeting I know where there was going to be a big data dump. It wasn't just like a check-in meeting. It was like we need to make a decision.

We're going to deliver information, experiences, client testimony, whatever it was. Five minutes before that meeting, I would literally take a deep breath and literally say to myself, open up. I didn't have until recently the language of the empty cup, right? I just read the book six months ago. So I did not have that language beforehand. But what I would say prior to that was just like, open up your brain, listen to everyone, slow down, right? I tend to work very fast. I tend to, my brain works very fast. So I would, you know, slow down, open up, listen, slow down, open up, listen. I would repeat this to myself and then log into the Zoom or walk into the meeting or whatever. And that would help a lot, right? Now I'm consciously, I have on my

brain, right? The terminology that I would use today is, you know, the value of the cup is its emptiness, right? Be empty, be an empty cup in this meeting. Listen to what other people say. Don't talk over the top of people. Don't assume you understand where someone is going when they walk down a certain path, right? Let them finish their thoughts, listen to them, take them in, make sure they understand and feel heard, right? Huge, huge, huge, hugely undervalued. The value of the cup is its emptiness. The other idea that I feel like is extremely undervalued. It's given a tremendous amount of lip service. It's in almost every sales book, but I feel like it is never pounded on. No one stands on this mountain, but to me, it is a linchpin for success in every aspect of your life, right? Every aspect of my life, of our lives

is this simple idea, detach from the outcome. Detach from the outcome, right? You want your kid to be great at some instrument. You can help them. You can play with them. You can take them to lessons. You can help them, you can play with them, you can take them to lessons, you can encourage them, you can play music that that instrument is a big part of, they could be terrible, right?

All you can do is set your children up for success and hope that they figure out what they wanna be successful at. But whether they are or they aren't, you have to detach from that outcome. You can't do anything about it. They're a separate human, right? This goes for sales immensely, right? You can do all the prospecting, ask all the right questions, present the perfect proposal, and the

client or prospect could say no for 10 million reasons that have literally nothing to do with anything that you could possibly control. You cannot allow that to break you. You cannot allow the expectation of that outcome to not allow you to perform at your best or not engage at all to begin with. This goes for our relationships with our friends, our spouses, our partners, the other people. Putting expectations on other people and and the outcomes of their work the outcome of that relationship the outcome of that interaction hanging on the outcome is only going to hinder your process it's only going to hinder your

growth it will only hinder your success And whatever success looks like in that relationship, I absolutely, positively promise you that. I have been selling for more than 18 years. I have been an executive now for 10 plus years, founded multiple businesses. I've built three different podcasts to now over five figures of downloads a month and multiple six figures in downloads a year, keynote speeches, I've invested in tons of businesses.

Like I've had all these different experiences in personal life, you know, sports in college, sports in high school, you know, all these different things. And in every scenario where the outcome was more valuable than the work or the, I shouldn't say more valuable, where the outcome, where the value in that thing was over-indexed towards the outcome than it was the work, I was never actually satisfied in the outcome.

The outcome was always not what I hoped it would be. It never made me fulfilled. It always left me wanting more in a bad way. Because even in scenarios where you might hit that target, you were expecting to hit it. You were demanding that outcome and you're not satisfied with that, right? It doesn't end up being what you hoped it would be. And plus it's fleeting, even if you get the outcome. I mean, athletes talk about this all the time. They win a championship. It's amazing in the locker room.

Maybe the next week or two, they're on a high as they're doing interviews and everyone's congratulating them and they feel great. And then all of a sudden, two, three weeks later, their life is the same again, right? Detach from the outcome. The outcome is amazing. Don't get me wrong. I love to win and I hate to lose. But you cannot hang on the outcome. The outcome is amazing. Don't get me wrong. I love to win and I hate to lose, but you cannot hang on the outcome. You cannot hang on the outcome. And this is particularly true for sales. It's particularly true for high outcome driven roles inside of companies or in

our lives, right? If you, if you have a young athlete in your household, teaching them how to detach from the outcome is one of the best gifts you can possibly give them. And an example of this would be my senior season of college baseball. I had had an up and down career in college hitting. I'd had an okay freshman year, a really good sophomore year. My junior year was kind of an average down year. Just wasn't as good as I could be. And my coach pulled me aside and I would get very upset if I were to strike out or if I didn't hit the ball hard or even when I would hit the ball hard and still get out. I mean, in baseball, you have no control of what happens after you hit the baseball, right? All

you can do is put good wood on it. And I would get very upset. Like, you know, I just didn't know how to emotionally control my reaction to the outcome. And in the offseason that year, my coach pulled me aside and had this talk that I'm talking to you about like this. He used a few of his own personal anecdotes, but he literally said, your goal for this year is to not, and these are his words, not give a shit about what happens after you make contact. He said, if I see you react, I'm going to pull you out of the game. And he wasn't doing it because my reactions weren't disrespectful and it wasn't like I was throwing a bat or helmet.

I just didn't know how to emotionally handle it. And sometimes I would take it to the field and my brain would still be on my at bat. And I'd be standing in, you know, either most of the time in the outfield is where I played, you know, and then it would impact at bats later on in the game. So like if I struck out my first at bat,

now I'm pressing in my second at bat, my third at bat. And oftentimes, you know, if I didn't start well, then I would finish even poorer. So he told me, if I see you react, I'm going to take you out of the game. So if you want to play, you're a senior, you're a captain, which I was. He goes, if the captain,

and if a senior captain on this team doesn't want to be sitting on the bench, you need to learn how to not react to the outcome of your at-bats. And it was difficult. It was really difficult. I cared so much. I wanted to be good. I wanted to contribute for my team. I wanted to help my teammates. I was, you know, I hit, you know, either three, four or five, my senior season, depending on how the lineup was made up. I was a, it was a fairly, you know, it was a fairly important part of our lineup and of our offense. And, you know, anytime I didn't have a good day at the plate, I felt like I was letting the team down and I had to let that go.

I had to just think about my approach. I had to think about my setup. I had to prepare for what I saw in the, you know, when I was in the on deck circle, watching the pitcher, watching the pitcher warm up, et cetera. I had to prepare my mind for what I thought was coming, put myself in the best mental state to hit, go through my process for getting set up in the box, and then execute the best swing I could. And whatever happened, I had to get rid of it. And it was a lot of work. But I'll tell you, I hit over 400 my senior season in my senior year. I had one of the best offensive seasons I've ever had in my life. I, you know, I just was a different kind of hitter. And truthfully, that's what allowed me to play

semi-pro ball down in Washington, DC after my senior season. If I had had the same season my senior year that I had my junior year, that wouldn't have been an opportunity for me. So being able to play some additional high-level baseball into my mid-20s was only a possibility because my coach sat me down and forced me to detach from the outcome. And I have applied that thought process or tried to apply as often as possible that thought process through my less than the rest of my life forever through you know every business I've ever been a part of through every sale that I've ever been a part of obviously you want to make these sales and it's important and you have to track your numbers for sure but

emotionally we have to detach from the outcome and if you can approach every situation as an empty cup and detach from the outcome. And if you can approach every situation as an empty cup and detach from the outcome of that situation, your probability of success will go up exponentially. I love you guys for listening to this show. I love you for listening to this podcast. If you enjoy these type of episodes, these solo episodes where we dive deep on success principles,

guys, leave a rating and review of the show. Share the show. If you're not a subscriber and review of the show. Share the show. If you're not a subscriber, subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. And if you want more exclusive content, just go to ryanhanley.com. You'll find a way to subscribe to my newsletter there. Subscribe to the newsletter.

Tons of exclusive original content goes out to that newsletter. You can ask me any questions you want. You can just reply to those emails. Or if you just want to hit me up at ryan at findingpeak.com, I answer as many of these questions as I can get. A lot of times I do them in DMs. I'm going to start sharing them as was recommended by a few other subscribers.

I'm going to start sharing my answers here publicly for everybody because I'm going to assume that if one subscriber has that question, then many more of you do. So appreciate the hell out of you guys. I'm going to get out of here. I never switched up, no change in me. The only thing changing this season, you got me. Close twice as many deals by this time next week. Sound impossible? It's not. With the one-call- call close system, you'll stop chasing leads and start closing deals in one call. This is the exact method we use to close 1200

clients under three years during the pandemic. No fluff, no endless follow-ups, just results fast. Based in behavioral psychology and battle tested, the one call close system eliminates excuses and gets the prospect saying yes more than you ever thought possible. If you're ready to stop losing opportunities and start winning, visit masteroftheclosed.com. That's masteroftheclosed.com. Do it today.