Self Improvement Daily Podcast

I want to take this one back to an early lesson I learned in life from my mom. Since then, it’s taken a few different forms, but it remains sound advice.

It is not a race.

Now, my mom said this to slow me and my older brother down from competing against each other in everything and anything we did growing up. When the competition got to dangerous levels, either from a safety or relationship standpoint, my mom would get in between us and shout "I.N.A.R.", which stood for  it’s not a race. Her words would immediately moderate the situation. My mom was helped us reflect on the state of our effort, and bring us down back to a more reasonable and sustainable level.

As I said that out loud, I heard just how true that is today also. We expect such big things from ourselves which causes us to stretch ourselves thin and push ourselves to what could be considered dangerous levels. I’m guilty of this too, but I try to remind myself that it’s not a race! In order to do great things, we need to be patient and understand that there is a process and incremental progress. If we ramp up too quickly, and don’t incorporate sustainable practices, we won’t make it to that future pay off because we will feel invalidated, burn out, and lose motivation.

Now, having said that, yes, ambition is good. Dream Big is one my personal core values, and there are ways to improve our productivity while catering to baseline sustainability. But that doesn’t mean we should expect immediate results. It is not a race, and we’re all on our own trajectory and path. It’s not the difference between a marathon and a sprint, it’s understanding that the core objective is to finish to the best of your capabilities.

lex Sheen is the founder of the non-profit “Because I Said I Would”. The mission of the charity is to give people the resources and accountability they need to live with courage and honor. Let’s learn an important lesson central to Alex’s mission. Promises are heavy and they shouldn’t be taken lightly. We need to make promises only when we mean them.

In the interview, we go on to talk about how we make promises everyday just by saying yes, and how dangerous that is for the relationships and expectations around us.

This positivity quote is a poetic little quip. It’s something you should keep in your back pocket so that when others question your methods you can pull this quote out and effectively explain your reasons.

“When you summon the courage to do what others won’t, you will have in life that others don’t". If you want to be average, then go ahead and follow the crowd. I can guarantee you it will take you where everyone else is going. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, and there’s plenty of fulfillment to be found in that kind of life. However, the fact that you’re listening to this self improvement podcast means that you know you are destined for more.

That’s why I challenge you to “summon the courage to do what others won’t”.

This will take courage. Courage is defined as “the strength to venture, persevere, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty”. In the face of doing something different, you’re going to face challenges and you’re going to have to work through them. Failure is a real possibility. Nothing good comes easy, and in order to have a life that others don’t, you have to draw outside the lines where doubt and uncertainty lie.

A life like that is subjective. It could be a life of personal happiness and joy, it could be growing a business and getting results, or it could be a life of impact and service. In any case, it takes the courage to be extra-ordinary.

I want to talk about this idea called Stewardship delegation.

“Delegation” has an interesting reputation. Some people think of it as a guaranteed reduction in quality, others as a necessary part of scaling any operation, and most people probably believe elements of both. Well stewardship delegation addresses both of those components the best.

Stewardship delegation is all about results. When it comes to managing someone in this capacity, you are only to evaluate their performance based on the final outcome. What this does is it empowers the person who is doing the work to attack the task in a way that best aligns with their skill set and mode of operation. This means the quality will remain as high as possible to leverage strengths, while still being able to offload the brunt of the work on someone else. Sounds easy enough!

Well, the reason this form of management or delegation isn’t more common is because it requires trust. You need to be fully confident that someone else, and their means of executing, can deliver the results that you need to report to. It’s stressful to have your reputation and livelihood dependent on someone else’s competency, especially when their methods don’t meet the conventional milestones you believe to be fundamental to the process.

While this example is very work and leadership related, the core of it can be related to all ways that you work in a team setting, in a relationship, and in your family. Surround yourself with people you trust and who can trust you to get more high quality results in your life.

I had the pleasure of meeting Chris Ducker, a multifaceted entrepreneur and the author of the book "Youpreneur". He is busy hustling all over the world for speaking gigs, events, meetings, conferences, and when I was asking him about work-life balance he had something really interesting to say. He said that in his calendar, he blocks out half an hour, three times a day, every day, at the same time of day, to do whatever he wants.

I couldn’t believe it. Someone with the schedule and productivity of 3 people combined takes an hour and a half, during work hours, to do whatever he wants.

Although he often spends his time doing work, it’s the intent behind it. He listens to his needs. If he’s behind on work, or knows something could use a little extra attention, he spends time there. If he notices that he has been neglecting his self-care, then he recenters and rests. He even talked about his favorite iPhone game that he enjoys playing when he needs a mental reset!

But what’s ironic is, he schedules time to do nothing.

This was all born out of his experience going through corporate burnout, working long hours, sacrificing in ways he didn’t want to, and ultimately affecting his life in unacceptable ways. What he has found is that he performs so much better now since he started prioritizing the individual before the work.

In the hustle of life we lose sight of our humanity, and Chris Ducker’s story goes to show us that we don’t need to push beyond our means to accomplish great things.

I want to share a story, but I’m going to let David Meltzer do the talking. I have a few things to say about this, but I’ll save it for the end.

I think David makes a really interesting point. We’ve been trained to find answers and explore areas that are comfortable to us, without even considering the idea that our answer can be found where we can’t see. I strongly believe that we each have everything we need inside of us. We just need to get out of our own way in discovering it to let it shine. Don’t be afraid to do the inner work. While it might not be immediately apparent, everything you need is already within you. It’s time we tap into it.

Are you the kind of person that rejects when someone offers to share a bite of their food, or makes a well-intentioned gesture that you would find valuable? 

A major factor in our subconscious processing and decision making is reciprocity. Evolutionarily, we evolved to be predisposed to reciprocate because of kin selection and a “strength in numbers” survival mentality.  However, in today’s society, we see it more as a favor for a favor and therefore we are less likely to act and be indebted to others.  But, it is very important to be willing to receive, and not only because of what it does for yourself, but what it does for others.

First, when you accept help or resources from someone else, know that you are going to benefit. If you want to truly accelerate your growth and potential you need to rely on the contribution of others. At the end of the day, we are better together.

But the second part is what accepting an offer does for someone else. They offered because they want you to have it, and sometimes rejecting that offer is even disrespectful. By accepting you support the other person and acknowledge the value they have to offer, which is a really important piece of a relationship.  Whether it’s a high-potential introduction or a few chips from their plate, try to overcome your distaste for forced reciprocity and receive the gifts someone wants to share with you.

Everything in life comes back to value. You teach someone a lesson, that’s value shared. You do an errand for someone, that’s value added. Even when you pay for a coffee, that’s value exchanged, because money is just potential value. The difficult part is, value is subjective and it gets confusing when we try to use it to measure and compare things directly.

I wanted to hit you with Zig Ziglar’s quote that speaks to this problem. “Your value doesn’t decrease based on someone else’s inability to see your worth”.

Now think about that. Just because someone sees something differently does not mean you need to adjust the way you perceive yourself. Who knows why that judgment might be different. It could be because you have different points of reference, varying experiences, or incongruent expectations. In fact, no two people see things the same, so there’s always going to be a conflict. But speaking to the problem at hand here, this new found information should not make you less confident in the value you offer.

Do you know why? Because we approach life from our own lens, with our own points of reference, our own experiences, built out of our own expectations. It’s not practical to think that someone else knows how much value you add through your life because they didn’t live it! But you did, and that’s worth everything.

Besides, What if the opposite was true? What if someone said that you were worth more than you believed to be true? You’d probably resort to your own interpretation, because they don’t see the full picture. Well, that’s true on the negative feedback side, and it shouldn’t be any different.

“Your value doesn’t decrease based on someone else’s inability to see your worth”.