From Stagnation to Sustainability: The Mindset Shift Every Entrepreneur Needs

[0:00]  a lot of times we don't want to be honest with ourselves we will lie to ourselves and um and so I my my metaphor in this all of this was is truth is a bit like whiskey or red wine or cigars it's an acquired taste if you're new to it and you try to consume it in volume you're not going to like it at all at all so you have to incrementally you know and and I will tell you if if there's shame or guilt or condemnation or ego or Pride Associated that is going to be that's going to mess it all up you know you you have to to be able to um to cut yourself some slack you know give yourself some Grace and to not let somebody else push their their guilt or

[0:50]  shame on you so that when you tell yourself that truth that is ugly and is unpalatable and really doesn't align with this image that you want to create for yourself sweeping another rug doesn't make it not real it's still there all right guys welcome back to a brand new episode of the heart and hustle podcast now I'm incredibly excited to share another Amazing Story of this leader who sits across this digital table with me today I've got Jay Lucas the president of reputable recruiting here on the show Jay welcome

[1:37]  to the show man yeah thanks I'm glad to be here appreciate you including me I know it's the one thing about the name I can't stand is is what a mouthful it is reputable recruiting is that's what we're talking about here today man well Jay I can't thank you enough for coming on the show man I'm really excited to be able to highlight your heart and hustle you know one of the things that you said to me um in our previous conversation was know often people don't go to school for executive recruiting we all find ourselves in different paths that lead us kind of to this opportunity so before we kind of dive into that how's your heart feeling today Jay yeah it's great yeah feeling good physically and uh metaphorically good I love it man but how about uh what's what's the highlight of your 2024 as the time we record this it's what

[2:23]  December 5th December 5th today so what's been your 2024 highlight well you you know I it's funny because I can separate life into buckets there's my spiritual bucket there's my professional bucket there's my family bucket and you know to try to narrow it down into one specific thing uh would be tough since we're talking about work and and you know the hustle um I I would say the the thing that probably resonates with me most is just to to have a plan and stick with it it's not been our best year we it's it's been clunky and and inefficient the metaphor I like to to sort of use is it's like having a little

[3:10]  bit of water in your gas tank it just sputters you know I can't quite we haven't just been able this year to get it off the ground but this is the first year I've probably had that experience where I've not been worried or stressed out about it because I know we've got the right plan and we're executing that plan um and and it it will be the work we put in today that brings in the business and the opportunities tomorrow so I'm I'm feeling good about that how does somebody come to that realization right because every year is not going to be a great year when we try and think about being successful in a year's time we make certain types of decisions when we try and be successful on a decades path we give ourselves a little bit more grace and flexibility but that mindset is tough to come to it is uh it's funny

[3:59]  my sister's a psychiatrist um and you know we we've had this discussion recently she's come up with this idea uh that there are types that are if you can imagine a four square and on you know sort of the vertical axis you have uh not hard to hard and then on the horizontal axis you have um not fun and fun and there are people that like hard and not fun fun and there are some people that all they want is fun and not hard uh I like a good challenge so part of it is probably my genetic just sort of predisposition to want to like wrestle with something um but the reality is I think you know I've been at this for 20 years self-employed anyway

[4:46]  I've been recruiting for 30 and for 20 years you know my pride has gotten in my way my ego's gotten in my way I've made many mistakes and I've and I think I've come to this place of of maturity where you know we've we've got good planning in place I've got good people that surround me we're all rowing in the same direction at the same Pace um and I think that makes it much easier when you have your sight set on a tenure Target that you can stay focused before my pride my ego is like oh I don't need that I'm got this squared away and and you know those are those are lies that I think entrepreneurs will tell themselves when they just really are trying to Sher

[5:33]  responsibility and I had to decide at some point was I willing to sacrifice my sort of visionary freedom for some control so that I could actually execute on that Vision could I sort of find things to ballast myself so that I'm not floating off into space without any you know strings attached you know and so our planning is probably it we use traction which is um the entrepreneurial operating system it's a methodology we've been on it for eight years and and it's really helped us to stay focused to have a real clear long range plan and to stay focused on executing against that I mean this is the biggest challenge of building businesses that sustain time I want to talk about a little bit of an interesting framework that I heard um somebody online talking about they said

[6:20]  you know it's interesting to think about the mind of an entrepreneur because when you think about our journey often we found ourselves in a space working a 9 to5 where we unhappy we said okay I'm going to change paths or pivot to become happy I'm going to start my own business this is exciting things are going on everything's exciting everything's ramping up which is great but if you think about that over a longer time Horizon you extrapolate that out any other time where we come across stagnation or we're unhappy the entrepreneurial mind goes back to that original experience that brought us so much fulfillment and joy and pivoting and so when things get difficult and things get boring those are the times when you really hunker down because we're on a path toward sustainability but that's the opposite of the entrepreneurial mindset which is really interesting to think about I I think I think uh so for me I there's a distinction between a Visionary so

[7:08]  entrepreneur is is a is a term um you you can be an entrepreneur in that you have a business uh you may not be a Visionary uh there are Visionaries and then there are what I call hyper Visionaries and the hyperv Visionary is the guy who is who is guy or gal whose ideas are so voluminous that they don't have a way to harness those and they flp like a butterfly from one idea to the next and they don't hold themselves accountable to a sort of longer range plan or Vision or goal um and so uh and so it depends I think there are some they get bored easy and perhaps that's the hyperv Visionary and they're constantly trying to just make things new and fresh and exciting um if they're

[7:57]  not surrounded by someone that and um you know keep them from floating off into space or their next idea best idea and can't be honest with them that that this idea might sound good in theory but is Impractical it'll be too costly to make um you know or or the the market isn't there or whatever you know so um but yeah I mean I think it's probably very common for entrepreneurs to be Visionary and for a good chunk of them to be hyper Visionary and to to to do exactly what you just laid out which is to be constantly in a state of dissatisfaction because of too much routine I mean there's also a cycle right in which this goes through we go through uninformed optimism right where

[8:45]  it's like this is going to be great this is going to change my life and then we get informed pessimism where it's like oh man this is going to be a lot tougher than I thought it was then we have some of those wins it's like okay now I have informed optimism as well and it kind of waivers right which is really interesting it's funny today on LinkedIn I saw a post and actually for two days I've seen this same post but it's different so the image or the graphic is different and it shows uh a picture on the top graph of of like uh um I can't remember what the term was but but basically discipline was like you know just slow and steady constantly just executing like very boring nothing really exciting whereas the the the other graphic was more like this real heavy investment up front you get to a point where you realize wow how much work is that and slowly that thing begins to Trail off into nothing and uh so the real the real probably um success

[9:36]  attribute is discipline it's it's just daily execution against a plan and it's not always sexy it's it's a lot of just you know basic blocking and tackling but it's so necessary I can tell from everybody who's watching this episode today I'm making an assumption right about you Jay looks like you're in pretty good shape it looks like you've been able to maybe this is from what I'm seeing on the screen okay uh I I do like to stay in shape um you know there's a physically I'd say uh you know it probably looks that way it's funny because uh recently 18 months ago I had a stroke and was was completely surprised by that I didn't know it was a stroke when it was happening but I knew something was really wrong um and so uh so in some ways you could say well and I look like

[10:26]  I'm in shape but but internally not you know obviously there were some some some issues so it's really set me on a path of some Discovery around health and wellness and you know metabolic health and um you know genetic sort of understanding my genetic makeup and uh so it's been it's been fun and interesting to pick up on some of this stuff but but yeah I mean I think I'm in better shape now than I've been in a long time as a result of of what I've learned huge surprise to me because you know first of all I'm incredibly sorry that that happened to you I'm glad that you been able to kind of position that in your mind as saying this has been a fun adventure that I've been on sure how do you mind talking about like were you stressed ahead of this because like this is the health of an entrepreneur right somebody who's doing stuff every single day if we don't have our health we don't

[11:13]  have our business we don't have the ability to show upt what was going on before you kind of had your your stroke um you know I think um you know I mentioned earlier you know you kind of have these aspects of life and business is just one of those and so if you really want to try to live this Balanced Life you have a certain amount of time and how do you allocate that time to the things that are most important to you and you know oftentimes what happens my servant nature is that I will I will take my personal time and give it to everybody else so it leaves you with very little and so I found myself you know with a business you know feeling a sense of responsibility to uh to invest I want my team to make sure that they knew that I was as invested in the business as they were not spend my time time in prayer and study things that are

[12:02]  I start my day with and so I you know and then I'm I'm in a job where you know I spend easy 20 hours of of uh time a week on the phone so I'm in front of a computer you know a good chunk of my time is in front of a screen it left me very little time to get out I was more of the mindset of man if I'm going to work out I need to feel exhausted by the end of it and so the idea of going on a 30 minute walk was nonsense to me yeah I had no idea how good that is for me and so um and so anyway I I think uh I wasn't necessarily my wife would say otherwise you know there was something going on the day before that kind of stressed me out but there was actually quite a bit of of other things going on with me that um that contributed to this unbeknownst to

[12:54]  me was was I have a fully blocked artery in my brain no idea it exists I have no calcium or plaque buildup in my my arteries anywhere else in my body um and and oddly enough I've just got this one thing what caused it how it got there why I have no idea so you know I look at it and say well this was a blessing I'm walked away I have no real physical um you know side effects from it um it has opened my mind to new and different things um and and to learning and it's got me thinking differently and and that's all good so it's been it's actually been a really good thing would you consider yourself a high achiever Jay yeah yeah I think so I mean for

[13:42]  myself I mean you look we could always compare ourselves and and certainly compared to some I'm nothing I'm I'm I'm a simpleton um I like to push myself I like to see how fast I can go at a sustainable pace like I I don't necessarily want to reach a top speed I I want to reach my highest speed for as long as I can and so that's just sort of my nature I like to just see what's where's the point of failure in a lot of things which makes me annoying in a lot of ways to some people my wife in particular I was I was going to say I'm sure that your wife wants you to slow down a little bit sometimes you know um there's an interesting perspective and I read a book um back on my shelf over here it's called The Gap in the gain by an author named Dan Sullivan and he said

[14:29]  you know one of the biggest problems that high Achievers often have our Executives our leaders our Founders we find ourselves in the Gap the Gap is where we are right now and where we're trying to get to our next goal the Finish Line the check mark the destination the accomplishment when we find ourselves always looking from where we're at to where we're going it's very difficult because when we accomplish that goal the first thing we do is look up for the next one and if you're not careful those goals turn into a horizon meaning we take one step towards them they take one step further away from us do you ever get time to to slow down maybe because of your incident that you had with your health to appreciate how far you've come in this journey instead of the Gap we're talking about the gain on the other side yeah for sure well okay so we go back to that strategic planning um and you in 2017 we implemented uh EOS and and and so you

[15:18]  start with a 10-year Target and you know it's funny because for me there was some internal discussion we had to decide on what that was going to be well you know for a lot of people the the ultimate measure of success is money and that was going to be sort of the the goal like we were going to be this much in Revenue I I don't necessarily like that I feel like revenue is a byproduct and so um so we pivoted not long after setting a financial goal of of hitting a certain number to Five Star reviews that's our that's our deal we wanted a thousand festar reviews in 10 years we didn't have any way of tracking that we didn't know if people would give us that uh but we that's everything we do is centered around achieving that and so we can now us into Jay take us into the cockpit

[16:05]  where you say hey we're going to hit this financial goal then you come back and say we want a thousand five stars how does that differentiation and decision and priority kind of happen well it's uh man I I think for me I have a really high sense of responsibility I I want for my my reputation is really important and so I work really hard I we like the whole you know sort of DNA of of our organization is built around like we have got to be above reproach that doesn't mean we have to be perfect but it's it means we have to strive for that every day and so it's not about perfection it's about perfect trying and so that's that's where we are in perfect

[16:52]  trying all the time I want to double click on that yeah okay Perfection and perfect trying never heard anybody create framework on the podcast break down the difference those for the audience well so Perfection is a state you know it's a it's an ideal you know it's it's it's um oftentimes you know it's either it is or it isn't uh it really is centered around per you know giving yourself some Grace if you're a football team or a tennis player or you're you're competing in some way sometimes our best isn't good enough to win and that's okay it's not okay though to lose because you didn't give it your all that's where the perfect try comes in like you've got at some point to be able to appreciate that you've really

[17:41]  given it all you've got and then your job is to do a postmortem on that and figure out okay if I could do this all over again what would I do differently and that's where learning and growth takes place and so for me um a lot of people I see even people I know outside side of work even my family my kids like it's really easy to um to shame ourselves to feel guilt about not reaching Perfection to totally melt down at the loss of a game you know because we've set our sight on on an end and not on the process and so you know um to me it's a lot easier there's a lot less baggage in the perfect try

[18:29]  because you give yourself Grace it's an opportunity to learn it's that that's creates the inflection point for growth and that's good in my opinion you know as opposed to yeah go ahead yeah no just just you know that to me is is a whole lot lighter it's a whole lot more fun you know it's not that's why I was saying earlier about the pace like I want to how how far and fast can I run sustained you reach these points of failure they're not they're not failure in a sense of of being a a negative term uh it is failure in a sense of of it's the beginning of some new growth and and that's really what it should be which is exciting to me because now you get to figure out how you can engineer your thing to go faster

[19:17]  because you've learned where the breaking point is you know you create this new iteration of yourself Jay you got me [ __ ] excuse my language for everybody's listening you got me [ __ ] jacked up I love love these type of conversations because the the relationship that we have with self-improvement and failure specifically is incredibly important so many times this is my personal perspectiv you're going to hear a little bit of my jaded um upbringing is I was never a good student right and one of the things why I feel like I'm a successful entrepreneur is because at a very young age second grade I came home to my mom and said how long am I have to do this and she said Keenan you've got a long time going through school so just hold into it and I said I just don't understand why if I don't do good on a test I'm not as good as the other students in my class and I said I feel like there's something else on the other

[20:03]  side and I became very comfortable with hoping that someday there was going to be an iterative process where on the other side of an a to an f scale the objective was to continue to get better and then I discovered the growth mindset from Carol DW at University of Stanford and she says the only objective is to continue to turn the wheel so we can improve fail learn move forward how do you develop that mindset and that perspective of not being perfect but only trying yeah man I I I don't know I think you know there's probably my sister the psychiatrist could probably help me figure some of that out uh you know I think um probably a lot like you you know this all goes back to Childhood

[20:49]  it goes back to not being good enough despite our best effort and feeling shitty about that like man I just don't like feeling shitty I don't I don't like it I don't like guilt I don't like shame I don't like condemnation I don't want any of that stuff um so for me it it was easier once I decided that not being perfect was okay um as long as I was making progress towards Improvement I'm I'm okay with that um does it get tiring I mean I don't really think about it like that it's uh it's it's just I don't know it's just something that that I guess I find enough joy in progress that it's okay for me to have a little bit of Blood Sweat and Tears along the way goes back to that hard not hard fun not fun

[21:38]  concept you know and I'm I'm okay with hard and not fun now do I want to do that forever no I don't um you know I've I've got to feel like there's some opportunity to uh to overcome to achieve so I'm not going to just continue to run into the cement wall um and till I can break through I I'm I'm probably going to decide after that hurts bad enough there's got to be a better way to do this you know and and so and when you figure it out it's kind of fun because the question that you asked at first was do you stop can you look back and see how far you've come and it's it's rewarding to me I don't know if I'm unique that way or if there's just a certain breed of people genetically predisposed to you know getting geeked

[22:27]  out over minor incremental improvements but if there is I've got that Gene it's just part of me the thing that the thing I love about this is it's not the destination right it's the journey I was going through a an exercise with a mentor probably five months ago and she said Keenan let's let's think about when this is all done let's put ourselves in the frame of 85-year-old Keenan what is his biggest regret gonna be and I was like well probably not accomplishing more and she was like let's really be serious if you're 85 years old you really going to be tripping about not accomplishing more and I said um well I mean the other thing I would be upset about is not is getting to the end accomplishing all your goals right having it all everything that you set out for yourself that 10 year 20 50 year goal Horizon accomplishing those things and then looking back and not enjoying the process yeah because so often we get

[23:16]  caught up in oh that didn't go right that iterative process is so difficult and when you get to the end you find yourself stressing so much but you still accomplish your goals it's like everything happens for a reason it all works itself out yeah you know what I mean yeah totally 100% and I think I think there are there we are as as a people particularly Western Society very much geared towards this this um you know it it's gonna it's GNA come it's GNA come and and it's not until after you look back and you've left all these these important things in the wake of these Pursuits that maybe didn't even you didn't even achieve or maybe you did either way how many bodies have to be left in your wake you know before you say was it

[24:03]  really worth it you know and so uh Stephen cvy is early in my career I was a sales guy I mean I'm still a sales guy I can't help it but uh back in the day of cassette tapes I had the seven habits of highly effective people and I was driving around on my little Honda Accord going from one meeting to the next and I saw that because I'm an efficiency freak I like efficiency so I would use that time in between my meetings to educate myself so I'd listen to this well inevitably you know that was a pretty deep content you'd listen to one part of it and it would trigger this thought and I would be lost in space meanwhile the cassette tape is still running and I'm not listening to a thing it's saying because I'm lost in my own thoughts I listen to that cassette tape probably 60 or 70 times over and over and over because I'd

[24:52]  have to start over again and it just you know kind of just drilled down into my my DNA uh one of the things that he talks about in his book when you is begin with the end in mind and he takes you through this exercise of imagine yourself close your eyes and imagine yourself and you're in a room and in this room you're surrounded by all these people these are family and neighbors and people you knew from your childhood and people you work with and and and and you can literally see yourself in this room and then he e goes now you realize that you're at your own funeral and somebody is going to get up and these people all representing the people in your life are all going to

[25:39]  have to get up and give your your eulogy what are they going to say about you and what do they want what do you want them to say about you and if you got a gap between those two you got to figure out how to close it because otherwise I think like you said you you end up going man I got this but did I really enjoy it is this really the Legacy I wanted to for myself and that you know at an early point in my life I mean I listen to that and I cannot deny the truth of that like that is real and and I and so I use that like you're constantly sort of calibrating who you are how you behave how you act what you do to be able to say at the end of you know to have these people in your life say at the end of your days all these great things to have them lined up out the door a mile long to standing room only to have the highway shut down like

[26:29]  that to me is is something that is worth striving for you know now do will I care if I only have 20 people in there no because I will have tried I would have given it my best and that's that is cool with me I'm fine with that how do we find the balance Jay between being that amazing human right that has the time and the intentionality to invest into the relationships in our lives while also balancing our competitiveness to be great and self-improve how do you do that I guess you just have to want uh the the reputation more you know you have to think about these things like man I don't want to be a phony I I don't want to be a fake I

[27:17]  don't want for anybody in my life to be able to to poke holes in my my my Persona my who I am to say oh yeah he's great but I I just don't like that and that means enough to me to govern myself to do the things that sometimes are hard some people they may not care as much and that's fine I mean the world's needs all kinds of people I mean would the world be a better place if we were all thoughtful and mindful about that yeah I think so you know would it be nice that while I'm climbing that that that instead of climbing all over people to get to the top that I'm I'm actually bringing some people alongside me that were doing it together like man I imagine myself being part of that team

[28:05]  and I can tell you which of those roles I don't want I want to be the guy either bringing somebody up or being brought up I don't want to be the guy being stepped on and so to think about my life as a parent as a as a husband as a brother as a neighbor I just don't want for people to to have that feeling like it's like I'm not trying you know it's why it goes back to the perfect try and and it's it's hard it is hard you know it is you have to Stephen cubby also talks about the enemy of great is good if we overload our lives with too many good things then the really important things they will be sacrificed and so you have to be real careful not to

[28:53]  overload yourself so how do you decide what those big rocks are in your life what are the things that are worth your time that are that are you know worth fighting for and do those and and don't let the other stuff interfere how do you find your time being prioritized now between business right you guys have had some incredible growth in the organization I know because of my notes Here in 2018 you guys acquired a 40-year-old agency um which really helped you guys expand the business right seems like a ton of responsibility a ton of Jay's mind being everywhere so how do you balance the element of like work life balance work life integration what is your kind of schedule and prioritization look like uh typical day for me I mean I'm an early morning I

[29:41]  mean I I don't gener if I set an alarm which I do I have alarm set for 5:30 but I'm usually up before that sometimes not by choice but just because um it's harder for me at times when there's a lot going on because as soon as my eyes open whether that's to go to the bathroom or move myself as soon as my brain kicks into gear I can't go back to sleep and so I just get up and I and I start my routine typical day uh I am in the the word so I I'm a Christian so I I spend time in scripture um or Bible study um and and and during that time when it's quiet uh there's more opportunity for me to meditate like what am I reading here I'm not just reading

[30:28]  it but I'm like you can almost have this spiritual conversation with god while you're trying to tease out what exactly does that word mean what does that mean exactly like you start thinking about it so it starts there um I mean if I'm going to be real I actually don't start that I hate that this is true but when email became available on my phone and social media became available on my phone I clean all that stuff out first so I start with that like I feel like I'm better able to focus if I don't feel like there's something over here nagging at me get all the red all the little greed things the little uh you know push notifications like cleared out off my phone yeah I do that and then and then I can do it so I can do that pretty

[31:17]  quickly then there's usually some form of study outside of the spiritual side I'm reading a book or I'm consuming information on topics that are of interest to me give them my struggle broke it's been a lot of stuff around Healthcare and metabolic health and metabolic dysfunction uh you know researching certain uh doctors research doctors and and um practitioners which are two different types of doctors and you can be both actually and uh and just trying to seek information from these people that have real deep knowledge in a particular subject matter that I find interesting and that generally leads to you know a bunch of different rabbit holes but uh it's interesting to me so that or it's a you know lately the books that I've read one called halim um and it's the idea of of in life you get to a

[32:08]  certain point 35 40 45 50 years old the first part of your life is Success the second half of your life should be about significance so what does that look like and and how do you make this transition From Success to significance I'm reading uh another book um on that now different author same concept and and and so uh so that's interesting to me again all this sort of aligns with this end in mind philosophy of am I you know do am I am I going to give good reason for people at the end of my day to give me a double thumbs up five stars you know like if my epith is five stars that's it a five star rating that was would be awesome no

[32:59]  words just five stars you imagine Jay Lucas five stars on his Tombstone I mean that they would be painted yellow yeah right yellow exactly when so here I want to double click on the you know the success to significance right part of why I love having these conversations is when we have the ability to talk about why these are priorities at our chapters or seasons in our career it gives the people who are behind us who are just getting started kind of an opportunity to see where their mind will be focusing so what's the difference between success and significance for you uh success is generally um to me it it is like you know achievement in your career it's it's possessions it's money it's house it's cars it's kids to school and all of

[33:48]  that kind of stuff a significance is more a legacy what are you really leaving behind for Generations how will you be remembered who's life are you going to impact not how much money I have in my bank account not what title I have it's not about accolades it's it's it is that you are going to uh impact the world um in some way because of your commitment to selfless service to other people and that that to me is probably how I would describe that can I ask you a personal question yeah so um one of the scariest experiences give a little context for everybody here on the podcast when I was uh 25 26 years old uh my business partner now guy named Dante

[34:38]  mlan was running an online marketing business right we was helping gyms acquire customers in their local markets brick and mortar right micro CrossFit Gyms my buddy was doing like $350,000 a month right at in his mid-20s incredibly successful at the point in time we were young so he was buying all this crazy stuff brand new Tesla Model X with the doors that go up back in 20171 1220 plus thousand when I was younger I always saw my peers who were super successful acquiring items and I put a lot of self- validation on when I get there I'm going to feel just like these guys but I'll tell you what the scariest experience is when I was able to purchase some of those things I was so excited and as soon as I got them I put them into that dark hole inside me expecting it to fill

[35:25]  it and it disappeared have youever had the scary experience of putting priority on the accolades the accomplishments the money the bank account revenue and then you get it and it's not as fulfilling as you thought it was going to be yeah I think there's I I I think there's even for somebody who's super aware of it there's always this tension between th those two spaces um I mean I like nice things I do I don't I I wrestled with guilt about that for a a while for a period and and I might not be done wrestling with that guilt but right now I'm I'm okay with that I I'm in a a good place around that um but uh but yeah I mean I ask myself sometimes in my

[36:12]  mind would having a Ferrari or a a you know airplane or you know a yacht or like would that really move the needle on where my personal Joy is and I know the answer to that so the the question really is okay well um I don't know I mean it really just comes down to our our willingness to want to be honest with ourselves you know and and I think there are some people the truth I've I've I've come to this this is sort of my I like to speak in metaphor um I hear a lot from people that I'm close to like man you're the king of metaphors it's just how my brain

[37:00]  works uh but um I'm losing my train of thought what was I talking about so we were talking about the realization we talked about tension between items right as we get older right we think that there's oh truth so being honest with ourselves so Truth uh so honesty and truth they're they're the same thing um honesty perhaps is just truth spoken truth manifest like like seen a lot of times we don't want to be honest with ourselves we will lie to ourselves and um and so I my my metaphor in this all of this was is truth is a bit like whiskey or red wine or cigars it's an acquired taste if you're new to it and you try to consume it in volume you're not going to like it at

[37:49]  all at all so you have to incrementally you know and and I will tell you uh if if there's shame or guilt or condemnation or ego or Pride Associated that is going to be that's going to mess it all up you know you you have to to be able to um to cut yourself some slack you know give yourself some Grace and to not let somebody else push their their guilt or shame on you so that when you tell yourself that truth that is ugly and is unpalatable and really doesn't align with this image that you want to create for yourself sweeping

[38:38]  another rug doesn't make it not real it's still there you know and so it's way better to just bring it out in the open and and and just address it but if you try to do it or have someone facilitate doing it before you're ready to take it in the volume that that you might be getting it you're either going to shut down and and you're going to shut it out and you'll never want to hear truth again um but hopefully you've got people in your life and you yourself get to a point where you look forward to the truth like a cigar or a glass of wine or a fine whiskey not because you're going to drink it up in volume but you look forward to it you know it's something that you relish it's something that you can enjoy um and so for me you know I mean I think just getting to a

[39:27]  point where you can be honest with yourself not feel shame or guilt about it because again that's where that that progress begins um but you also we also especially with people we have to be careful to understand where people are in their appetite for the truth because if if I try to give it to them in a volume that they're not ready for the results are never going to be good ever even if your intentions are good it's not going to come out so great how have you learned to address team members people of your organization in different ways that hit on their specific chords to get a point across I want to give a little context again yesterday I was having a conversation with another CEO and we were talking about our favorite leaders right now right my favorite leader right now is in the space of sports college football Deion Sanders at the University of

[40:15]  Colorado gave this amazing um little snippet interview on one of their Vlogs he did somebody said Dion you got men coming from all across the country coming from different socioeconomic backgrounds different cultures different races everything how do you get everyone so motivated and he said well I'll tell you what I don't do I don't take the same message and try and cast it across all of my men what I have to do is spend enough time with people to recognize what is going to be the button that I can push to get you motivated sometimes I might have to keep take Keenan by the collar and yell in his face to get him jacked up I might have to have a private conversation with Jay and say hey man listen like this is what's going on you can do better I know that the other person I can say hey I'm going to give your mom a call and tell her what you're doing out here messing around the class room how have you been able to adopt that patience to be able to engage with your different team members because that

[41:02]  leadership style is a skill set that we have to be able to adopt well okay so um let's go back to Dion for just a second I venture to guess that's not a tactic I think he genuinely cares about these guys so if it doesn't start with that none of that other [ __ ] matters it doesn't matter you know if somebody feels like you're manipulating them because you know what it is that that you know motivates them if if that motivation is coming from a place of manipulation no bueno if it's coming from a place of I want to see you realize your true potential I care about you I think that if if I if you could if you could suffer enough to see what it's like on the other side of this challenge it'll be worth it to you that's a different animal a totally different animal that

[41:49]  feels different when I hear you say it right I think about a loving High compassion conversation of like Jay listen we just need to get through this because I know you can do more I know you can be better that is a different conversation than saying Jay go this way because it's going to be good for you you know what I mean so so I would I would probably add to his story to say it it before it's even getting to know those people it is the fact that he actually genuinely cares about those people he does I think and and I'm not I'm not a huge fan myself because I'm more of the walk softly carry a big stick guy uh he's a little loud for my taste um and and I don't mean that in a derogatory way he's just boisterous in a way I I I like I that's not my style you know I don't like attention called to me he's a different guy that way he loves

[42:38]  the attention I I don't so stylistically we're very different but I think our hearts very similar so I can relate in that way and I see that you know um so uh so for me if you imagine you know any business owner any executive who's got an organization and they're they're busy executing and capitalizing on the opportunities um and they know you for the simple reason of manipulating you to their end game um I think people will put up with that like revenue is the greatest deodorant you know like if everybody wants to be on a winning team Terell Owens back on the Cowboys like when everybody's winning like you'll put up with some [ __ ] you know when everybody's winning as soon as as soon

[43:26]  as stop stop winning that that stuff the stink is so bad you like I can't tolerate this anymore so the only thing that will keep people playing for a losing team is when you know that the person who or the or the people that you're shouldered up with and you're locked arms with are in it with you 100% And that what you're trying to achieve isn't some vain you know Accolade or achievement but greatness not because you want to be in the Limelight but because you want it to motivate other people you want for people to see what is possible and and that I think people will stick around for Jay I first of all I feel like you need your own podcast

[44:13]  because you've been dropping knowledge bombs throughout this entire conversation which has been amazing I appreciate that you know here's a question for you you know I've been messing around with this this terminology or framework called um self-development TR trory okay when I was younger right I moved to Las Vegas in 2012 I was a 21-year-old kid I got surrounded by a whole bunch of kids here that love to party and go to all the clubs right so that became a part of my life and then one day I realized that me going to the club on a Wednesday and being drunk on a Thursday morning not a good look for my overall success so I had to really start focusing on personal development one of the things that I found was as I was continuously focusing on improving myself that message often didn't align with those friends that I had had and my self-improvement trajectory took me away from that group

[45:00]  for a lot of people they said Keenan you've changed and I said of course I have because I'm not trying to be the same kid as I was when I was 24 have you been through the process of that self-improvement trajectory caused you to lose friends change your Social Circle changed the way in which you supported people around you man that's a good question um I feel like I've always known who I am um I don't like the feeling of hangovers uh I much prefer the high of the perfect try um have I have I you know have I lost friends or chosen different friends because I felt some would influence me in ways that again I go back to that end in mind like man

[45:48]  you're going to tarnish what I'm trying to achieve no offense to you more power to you if that's what you want to do but I I don't reconcile what I have in my mind for my end to to with what with with this lifestyle that that that you guys yeah it's fun and cool and everything but man this thing is way more important to me and so um and so yeah I mean I've I've I've you know I mean friend the word friend is man that's a Loosely used word today so to me um maybe they're they're better known as uh social acquaintances you know people that you have have fun with and yeah I've I've cut ties from that because I thought man I can't I can't I'm going to be a phony and being a

[46:34]  phony is the pain of being a phony or the thought of being identified as a phony or tarnishing you know my story uh that was more significant to me than the fun and enjoyment of of party all day and party all night kind of thing you know so that was an easy decision uh but yeah I mean I put my toe in the water I mean it's it's a tough struggle for a lot of people you know a lot of the younger entrepreneurs people who are starting to create their own businesses find themselves like not being like other people a black sheep if you will and that's a really tough process and we have to struggle right with that that intuition that recognizes where we're going is not the same place and sometimes people have a tough time being able to limit those relationships in their lives and you end up carrying

[47:21]  anchors around which is really tough yeah well no I I agree I think um um if being associated with a group of people is is your you know wubby your you know sort of comfort blanket whatever you want to call it um you're probably masking something there's a truth that that that you need to tell yourself or you need to hear about yourself even if it's just between your own ears um like I said some people they don't like that truth it's very uncomfortable for them because whatever in their life has caused them to receive this truth because the people who are supposed to

[48:09]  care for them in their life instead of giving them the truth as a form of protection they've used it as a weapon and so they don't they don't want to hear that because what they hear is I'm not good enough I can't do this which is the voice of the enemy in my opinion because shame and guilt condemnation that's the weapons of the enemy um but uh but so what they do is they mask that it's still there that truth is still there that thing that they don't want to recognize about themsel is still there it's just covered up with stuff yeah you know whether that's money or

[48:57]  that's friends or that's alcohol or that's drugs or that's a you know um um what's the word I'm looking for it's common for parents of addicts uh I don't know enabling you know it's not it's not it's not enabling but it's it's a uh codependency is the word I'm looking for like a codependent relationship like these are distractions from you really working on your stuff so you got to ask yourself why am I so afraid to to look at that what's what's really keeping me from because I promise you spending more nights at the at the bar is not going to make you a better whatever it's not gonna it's not gonna

[49:44]  maybe for some maybe at the end of their days they they want people to say about them nobody partied harder than that dude that's not what I want I think there are probably fewer people that say that uh but maybe there are some I don't know I don't know any of those people myself yeah I just I'm really interested in this conversation because I had a guy on the podcast before his name was Jason yusi and his whole like Mantra was live 100 he said Keen let me explain what this means he said in different areas of your life you have the potential to live at 100 being a better partner being a better friend being a better brother being a better sister whatever that looks like being a better business partner being a better leader you have 100% in all those different categories often we live at 86 74 91 74 96 whatever that looks like and you never really

[50:33]  recognize or you might recognize subconsciously that you're not living up to that 100 level when we get to the end of our days that Delta between 86 91 and 100 whatever it is is where our dreams come true and if you hold yourself accountable to being the best version of yourself everything else really takes care of itself but you have to have that tough conversation to recognize kenan's not living at 100 in that category of his life and not just that but then you have to make the choice do I really want to make that better do I really want to move the needle so I was in a peer Advisory Group for eight years uh C12 group this is Christian CEO peer Advisory Board they've got um boards all over the the the world now or in multiple countries and um every month we would sit down there was you know 10 or

[51:21]  12 of us on a on a specific board and there's multiple boards but my board was you know it range from Bri 8 to 12 people we would start our morning after a devotion with what they call the balance wheel and the balance wheel was you know how's my marriage how's my health how's how's my you know personal finances how's and you'd go around and so you imagine this circle and at the center of this you know you got basically slices pies and 10 is on the outside and so you you color in okay well I'm personal finance I'm here business finance I'm here marriage I'm here you know uh fun relaxation is here you go around all these important components of your life and you you're looking not necessarily that they're all at 10 but is there is there a Broken Spoke in

[52:09]  there somewhere am I sacrificing some critical component for others and how do I get Balan because it's like having a flat tire now you get sevens all the way around that that wheel will roll pretty smooth you know if you're at had a 10 on one and a four and a and zeros on a few you're like well that's a bumpy wheel that's not a fun ride exactly exactly and so uh so the idea then creates this accountability we'd go around and review everybody's and and you'd say okay well all do you have some sort of takeaway like if you're constantly low on personal health what are you gonna do because next month when when you're low on personal health again like something's got to give you know or or

[52:56]  you're just saying I'm not serious I'm not a serious person about this which takes me back to my Ending game that is not something I want somebody to say about me at the end of my days he was not a serious person you know Jay we have a a tradition here on the podcast um our previous guest wanted to ask you a blind question as we put the wheels down to kind of land this year who is your favorite superhero and why favorite superhero ah man okay so I can't help but uh but think about you know cartoons when I think superhero so I'm not going to go

[53:42]  Jesus because he's obviously my favorite superhero uh but uh if I was gonna I would say Batman um and I don't know that I have a real reason why other than his costume was cool I loved his costume and that's probably why you know then he had a cool car in a cool car in a cool life you know and a cool cave he's a cool dude yeah yeah and he was rich and as a like he had it was he was like the big the full picture although I I I say all these things and they're all coming to me right now it's not necessarily why uh but I and I probably say that because if I was going to dress up for Halloween like Batman was was the costume I wanted that was my costume Spider-man was a close second

[54:31]  but but Batman was probably number one for sure well brother it's easy to understand why you are the definition of heart and hustle this conversation has been incredibly insightful so valuable and once again you Dro so many knowledge bombs and amazing metaphors here right Perfection vers the perfect try right we also talk about um wine whiskey and cigars just like truth or an acquired taste man I've got so many nuggets I'm going to pull up from this episode share with other people so going to continue your name in the Etho of the uh the podcast for a long time I apprciate you coming on the show all right thanks for having me