Entrepreneur’s Drown, They Don’t Starve

align your practice podcast with Dr. Cliff Fisher where your best practice and life awaits you. Are you tired of running a practice on your own? We want to come alongside you with experts to help you create your dream practice in your dream life. Here is your host

alright tribe Welcome back to align your practice with Dr. Clifton, Dr. Joe brought to you by line life where we want to give you the tools to find and create your online life. We're kind of diving in, we've been talking about time management today, I think is one of the hardest things and the things I've heard the most, especially as a dating teenager, like I've heard know, a lot. But I never know. So Joe, what do you think?

Yeah, so we're gonna break down with this cycle is about utilizing your time to honor your core values in life, right, that's what we're going over last time we did. Time management is a lie, you can't manage or stop or control time. But we are trying to Innocence manage our utilization or how we value our time and what we do with that limited time. So today's about outcomes is how to create more last time was about productivity. But tell me cliff, you know, we've read so much from productivity, how to do your schedule, which we talked about last time, how to how to manage your day, but very productive people may not be creating good outcomes. So I want to separate the conversation of more and more and more and more productivity to creating better outcomes. And it's not just working more as we said last time busy is not is lazy, busy is weakness busy is not really the mindset you want to dive in that we grew up in, right? That's what we talked about. So it's about outcomes. So you you had that phrase, but entrepreneurs let's let's dive into that. I think that's a good start.

All right, entrepreneurs, I learned this from Dr. France. And it was like, entrepreneurs don't drown they starve. And so we don't, or sorry, entrepreneurs drown not starve. So we don't, there's not a lack of opportunity. There's so much opportunity. And I feel like sometimes I have FOMO I have this fear of missing out that I'll start taking on too many things that are out of alignment with either my core values or my goals for that year. And so I just I see that a lot. And you were telling me, like doctors, you know, they're not doing well. So then they tried to bring on something else that they can't do well at. And so I love that like that was such a great example.

Yeah, so when we Satch winners drowned, they drowned from doing too much. So like the day before an entrepreneur goes bankrupt, they're not starving, they're not sitting alone not doing anything. entrepreneurs do a lot, they work. They're very busy, but they drown because they're over committed to too many things are not producing outcome. So what I was saying with Kairos, is I see Cairo's that are, you know, they're not making it. So they add laser and decompression nutrition and maybe aesthetics and like nine things because they're thinking more services going to create outcome. And really more is not better an outcome. So I think we can start breaking this down by going into the, one of the found the founding fathers of productivity and outcome Covey and talking, you know, the concept of rocks that is embraced by the EOS group. But how did that all start? So the video that you could look at that Covey, how he talks about rocks, he sat in front of a room, and he had a big glass container on a table. And he had a bunch of big rocks, a bunch of small rocks, a bunch of pebbles, a bunch of sand and water. And he had two glass jars. So he says one way we can do this is we can put all the sand in first. So visualize this, if you may know this already, but it's still a good visual, if you haven't heard it. Definitely a good lesson. To put all the sand in first it sits at the bottom, then you put all the pebbles in, then you put the smaller rocks, then you put the water and then you try to put the big rocks in. And only one big rock fits the three that you had, you can't get him in. So you go the other way for the three big rocks in the other jar. Then you put the smaller rocks and they they work around the big rocks and fall in little crevices and holes. Then you put the the pebbles in and they go all around the small rocks and you put the sand in and they trickle all around everything and then you put the water on top and everything fits in. So the purpose is the big rocks and the big rocks in your life. So whether it be your family, your your outcome at work, your productivity, your health. Those are the big rocks and the small rocks, maybe certain meetings in the sand maybe your emails and social media. So and then adversity, maybe the water and it's like you want to put it in in that basis. I did that. Did I explain that? Well, Cliff that's the that's kind of the overall mindset.

Yeah, no, I think and it's such a huge thing because I think what we do is we let things that are less than boredom gets in the way of things that are more important. And we do it unconsciously rather than consciously because we're just trying to go around and we're just going through life, we're not being intentional with our life. And so as you were talking, I was writing some notes down. Like, we have four resources, we have time, money, energy and focus. And really this part of like, time management, or time utilization is really about focus. And energy like we have, we have a limited amount of energy, and we have a limited amount of focus. And so how do we utilize it.

And the term I liked that I heard years ago, probably two decades ago, is the concept of units of attention. And it's an arbitrary thought, but it makes complete sense to me that you only have so many units of attention, you are bound attention and Unbound, attention bound attention, there are things that you remember to get up and brush your teeth and ritual rituals are bound. It's just, it's thought that's kind of held unbounded tension is creative thought, where you can think and create and do. So the other part of bound attention is all the tasks that you have to do that day, all the unfinished projects that you have that are still in your you think you're not thinking about it. And I brought up the example, I took a Tony Robbins course, and they talked about I think that's where I may have heard this concept, it may have been Tony Robbins, but he had said, Write down a list of all the things you didn't do or that are in your mind right now. And I had like three or four projects, I was in college chiropractic school at the time, I had like 60 magazines that I wanted to read. And I'd read one and then I get three more, and I just couldn't keep up. But I felt guilty if I don't read them. They're on my desk. And then my motorcycle battery was dead for last two months, and I never charged it. So I never wrote it. And there was some other issue, I forgot what it was. And he's like, just, if you're not going to do it, get rid of it, take it off the list, just get rid of it. So he made a list, people usually have five projects in their garage, two projects, in their basement, things in your storage room, all this stuff, you're gonna do that death throughout all 60 magazines theater off my desk, if fried. Every time I walked by had guilt that I didn't read these magazines, I went outside charge a motorcycle and whatever. The third thing is, I fixed it. I did all that in like 2530 minutes. And it's odd that we have these unfinished projects that we just allow to take space and attention and remind whether it's conscious or subconscious. And we need to free that up. So we have creative thoughts. So I like that in this conversation, Cliff, because freeing up that attention is gonna allow you to focus on the big rocks that we talked about.

Absolutely. As you're talking, I'm looking over at my desk. And I'm like, that's literally like 20 minutes of work that I walked by. And I think about for, I don't know how many hours, ultimately, that if I just cleaned up that little bit of a mess that I would have clarity. And as soon as I do my to do list, like, my cool I need to do this, this and this, I clean all that stuff up. Like I can't tell you how much weight feels like it's lifted off of my shoulders.

It's so true. And it's just a conscious awareness. We all know it. But when someone else questions you want it you will make a list of 10 things that you have opened. So what I urge you to do, if you want to scale the business, if you want to take it to the next level, take a moment this weekend, and make a list of all the unfinished projects. And then what you're going to do with those, you take about a half of them, and don't finish them, cross them off, cross them literally crossed them off. So your brain knows they're done. It's over. It's so refreshing. When I throw out those 60 magazines, it's not that I never read a Health magazine again. It was just I couldn't read all the ones I didn't read. So it's okay. You don't need I'm an input guy like you cliff. So every piece of that I have to consume.

So it's critter quit again, like we're talking about like this, do you know to Two episodes ago, where it's like, do we grit or do we quit? And you're 100%? Right. And, you know, kind of as we're getting ready for this, it's like, the couple of things is like really saying no to certain things. I think that's the critical thing, because I do have that FOMO and so Warren Buffett said it said the difference between successful people and really successful people, is that really successful people say no to almost everything. And so

yeah, matches the story we told last time about the poker players they fold, I think it was 70 or 80% of the time on the before they take a hit on the you know the firsthand. So that's a lesson learned. So if you want to scale, make the list, cross off half the other half, schedule it, get it done. If you don't have it done in 30 days to 90 days max, then cross those off and free your mind for opportunity. Because what I feel is we always as entrepreneurs like we say starving we do Just keep adding and adding and adding, adding, we don't stop. So I feel we need to create space, create a vacuum for opportunity, like compressing your meetings, compressing everything, your production time, your workouts, everything compressed to free up space for creative thought for opportunities in your life. You don't just want to keep adding more and more, because that's not going to gain the leverage that you want to create more outcome that you want in life. And outcomes should be measurable, like what are you looking to create, document it, free up the space, create focus, like you said, focus your energy, your attention, your money, your your investments, into things that are going to create the outcome you're looking for in life.

Yeah, I think it's really easy, especially as we went through this whole, like what I saw with practices, as we went through COVID was like people either got distracted or focused. The people who got distracted, their practices didn't do very well, the people who were focused and on purpose and on mission, their practices grew faster than they had any other year before that.

Yes, so true, because they had to focus and they created a great outcome and it was just very monomaniacal, I am going to focus on this. And that's it. Because they, they saw adversity, sometimes adversity is a great tool to use to free up a lot of the things that aren't important in life. Adversity guides focus, actually. So it's interesting. So embrace adversity, and get that neurological focus that you have a lot of these synapses have all these other things that are not meaningful, productive. To me, one of the meaningful books I read was essentialism, they talked about 80% of what we do has no real value in your life. So like 80%, your meetings, 80% of your work 80% of your thoughts. 80%. I'm like, and I'm like, come on, really. And after the end of the book, I'm like, You know what, I gotta say, I would say either close or he's right. I don't know. But it was dissecting my meetings, or my week or my thoughts throughout the weekend, it's like, essentialism is such a great, great tool. And it's different than you've heard of minimalism. And it's a good mindset for like an entrepreneur to think of essentialism, minimalism is like, I have one pair of pants, one shirt, and I put in a backpack, and I can live. Like, I have basically almost nothing, I don't own anything. And I live as a minimalist, and I don't need to make a lot of money, I need to spend a lot of money. essentialism means you may have one Lamborghini, that's okay. You may have 10 $300 shirts, $500 shirts, but you don't have 60, you don't have 90 pairs of jeans, you don't have dressers full, you can have high quality, awesome things. But it's it's a set just the essentials. It's just what you need. And that helps an entrepreneur and your business, you just have so many deliverables, just what's essential. It doesn't mean you can't be ultra successful. So I really embrace the essentialism versus the minimalism personally, the mindset of but

I don't know, my head's still stuck on that thing of like, not adding things. And, you know, when you know, you're not doing well, it's like, do well at that or decide to get, get, you know, either commit or don't commit, like if that's the thing you want to do if you want to be a chiropractor, and you want to do that do the adjusting part first before you start adding in all these other things. Like

much of psychology behind that, do you think like why? When when a human is struggling, let's say chiropractor struggling in practice, why is it add more things? Are you as a business person and you you grab a new thing? Why do you think I have a hypothesis, in my mind? Why do you grab new stuff?

I think it's almost like you're falling like you feel like you're failing. So you're just kind of grabbing, like, I feel like I'm grabbing it like, oh, maybe this will be the thing, maybe it's this thing. And I think, like for me, it's like we think all the success is on the outside of us versus the inside. And so we start grabbing things on the outside, like, oh, maybe this shiny object or maybe this shiny object versus like, what's broken inside of me. And how can I deliver value in a different ways? What my thought processes Yeah,

so I think it's, it's paranoia and fear that makes us grab anything as if we're falling. Like you said, we're just like, buying new things. But really, we're trying to convert the fear, the cortisol, the adrenaline, we're looking for some dopamine, we're looking for, like, serotonin or oxy. Tosun looking at these comfort hormones, like the neurotransmitters that give us comfort. So a new project. What does it do? Wow, you can't get that one. I'm feeling of like, it's exciting. And it gives our brain that peace, although we're causing more destruction, just like the bear hug adjustment from behind that your neighbor can do for you and you release all these endorphins and like, oh my god, it feels great. It's the same thing, our brain is starving. Why do we eat sugar not because we're hungry is because we're looking at the rush of neurotransmitter release that makes our brain feel good. So whether you're read sugar, but you get the bear hug adjustment, or whether you add six more projects this week that are new, and you had six last week, it gives you that little bit of a dopamine rush, where you feel good in the brain, that's what I do is I'd like new projects, stimulates mentally stimulates me, but it's destructive. And that's the thing we fight as entrepreneurs is we're looking for stimulation. And when I learned it, I have to change my stimulation from newness, to creation of revenue, profit, using the money to donate to help others to help my team to help the mission, to help my family to help, whatever it is, and I look at the fruit of that in a different way versus the opportunity of new things. Is yours to for me to actually learn that. But I realized where it's the same thing as a nutritionist, I understand the physiology of why we eat sugar. It's not because we're hungry. It's because the brain, same thing as an entrepreneur. So a human eating sugar and getting fat as an entrepreneur or doing more tasks and going through the same thing.

Man, holy cow, like just rewind that last like, two, three minutes and listen to that, again, I'm like, writing all these notes down, like, you know, it's really the discipline of life. Like I think the new things are like, Oh, that's like new relationships versus the discipline and the depth you can create in a long term relationship. And the grid or quit

time on that, because you really hadn't been taken notes last time. I'm like, I gotta go up some meat here.

He definitely brought it. So I think in that, like, I think it's, again, back to the grid or quit, like, you know, what are the three or four things that are most important your life, make that list like spend that time this is that prep time that planning time? And, you know, because so often, you know, we just like being busy to be busy. But it's just like, we'll spend, like, we're just using up resources to go nowhere. And so look that grid or quit, like I would create a grid or quit list, and you know, Mark all those things down, whatever, you're, you're

gonna commit to these three, and I'm not letting go right now. Because you asked this no longer serves me. Well, it's that true. I haven't succeeded yet. But it's not that it doesn't serve me to quit is this isn't meaningful, it's not going to do anything for me. I don't want to do it just to do it. I like that. So you can look at what am I committing to what am I quitting this week? Yeah, I think I'm gonna do that write down what it is. Our good friend Joe Karina was talking about deals that he had one was his, he was trying to buy a garage to do his work. He had an opportunity. And it wasn't, it was good. But it wasn't great that he would have took it three years ago in a second. He's like, You know what, the terms just aren't fit. So he let it go, another opportunity didn't work out. Then he finally got it, and he's winning and so happy. But it's not like you give up it's that you're just really refined on what you'll accept? Yeah, it's not gonna say quit every year, say no to everything. It's, it's no to that arrangement or no to that framework, or no to that style, or that opportunity with that person or that business or that time. You know what I mean? So, because it is deflating when you say no, like, it's hard, right? Let these things go, isn't it? Oh, yeah.

Like FOMO fear of missing out, you're like, Oh, what am I gonna miss out on? If I say no, but man, once we say yes, we are literally saying no to 1000. Other things.

Another good book trade off, it will teach you. If you say yes, you're just saying no, like Cliff just said to so many other things. You're just saying no to so many things. So realize the yes means no, anyway, whether you say it or not, you're saying no to other things. So that's a great way of looking at it. A great way of looking at.

So that's the hard easy. So do you want to you know, a lot of times it's like easier to say yes, like, yeah, versus the hardest to say no, no, I can't do that. I can't commit to that. I don't have that bandwidth. And so really the courage to do that will make your yeses more powerful.

And another way of doing it that I learned years ago was if you can't say no, say, You know what, Cliff I I just can't say yes, right now. The same thing, obviously, but people just can't say, Cliff No, I can't do that. Cliff. I can't say I can't So yes, right now. It's a softer way of approach. Some time to think and maybe 90 days. Yeah, let's revisit this. I unfortunate can't see us right now. But let's revisit a 90 days. And that gives you a time to think because the other thing is our timing of saying, yes. Cliff says Joey, would you like to this? Yes. It's like, you don't even say, Well, let me let me think about that. And let's discuss it. It's Yes. And that's the problem is the quick yes to write.

And then we when we miss out to like when we say yes, and then we miss out on the things like we don't plan or interferes, or we're not able to, like fulfill the commitments that we previously made. I think that's the hardest part. When we say yes, like quickly like that, or we don't consciously process what's going on.

So here's what I'd recommend. If you're listening right now to do something comes up in an opportunity. And the first thing you say, is, I love that thought, let me write down a bunch of questions. And let's visit that opportunity together. Then it gives you time to write the questions for yourself and for whatever the opportunity is, in your life. Opportunity, buy a new house opportunity for business, a venture, JV opportunity, a new service in your office, you're going to bring in decompression or nutrition or something. Let me get a list of questions. Because you never know the questions. You can't say yes, yeah. So first, ask the questions, and then get the answers and then say, let me make a plan. And let me forecast some outcomes, and see if it's reasonable. And then kind of decide what kind of time energy focus and money it's going to take to create the outcomes that I projected. So first, you got to answer questions, then you got to forecast outcomes, then you got to have a meeting to see if it's realistic, and decide how much time energy focus and money to create that outcome is. And then you can decide, right? X for X. But I didn't even know the answers to the questions that I'm already saying, Yes, we all do that. So ask the questions. Create the forecast and the outcome of what you're going to drive. And then in your mind, figure out the time, energy, focus and money. We never look at the budget of what we have to spend, do it spend not only money, but time energy focus. And you got to quantify that. And then the last piece before you actually stay that three letter word dangerous. is you got to decide what you have to stop. You can't just add more, if you add that, what are you saying no to? You got to I would write that down and say I'm saying no to the walk with my wife every morning. Because now I need another hour. I'm saying no to go in to see my son's soccer practice. I'm saying no to my my nap at lunchtime. I'm saying no to a meeting. I'm saying there's something but you want to consciously say no to adverse, be totally not self aware that you're exchanging it's a trade off. And that will bring so much power meaningful if you follow that kind of process. And then No, I don't know. I wish I did that every time. And I but I did start doing that kind of framework is really just not saying yes, at the exact time you're asked because my instinct is I get excited. And I'll say yes. So if I ask questions, do the forecast, allocate resource and then decide if I want to, but I didn't do is the fourth step, which is what am I going to stop? Because that's uncomfortable? You know, and all transparency. That's the piece that I need to add more often. What am I gonna stop?

And the one question that comes up for me is you're asking yourself the question, Does this align with my core values? And does this align with my Three Things for the year? If you have for like,

huge been getting like a party? You're gonna ask yourself, like you have questions for whatever opportunity that is brought to you. By like a clip said you add questions to yourself? does it align my core values? And is it going to interfere with the three majors things I'm going to do this year? That's, that's huge.

Because that could be like your first question. And that will save you so much time because as I'm going through that process with you, I'm like, holy cow. If I'm doing that on all my decisions, big decisions, that's totally valuable. But if you just ask that one question, does this align with my core values? Then you're done with that you're like, No 80%

of the stuff before you have to do that. That's huge. I would say that would be a smart first step. And then and then proceed down the line of these other steps, especially something big. We're not talking like, should I have a protein shake or below me, oh, you're not going to go through okay, well questions. Just like something that affects your life, your career, your income, your business, your family, you know, you want to spend a moment on. Awesome. I think that's good insight. Hopefully, guys take away some juice there. And we'd love to hear some impact on reach out to one of us, if you if it makes an impact your life, I love to hear stories around implementation of these types of behaviors, because they know they changed my life in many ways. And I hope it impacts your life as well.

Yeah, they definitely. It's super important. And I think one of the things is, and Joe and I talked about it. So the two big things like for me takeaways on this, it's either a hell yes, or a no or not yet. And so that's kind of my process. Like if I'm like, oh, yeah, hell yes. Then I go through the process, like you talked about Joe, like this, and this and this. And then if it's a no, then it's just a no. And then if it's not yet, I have a parking lot where I put all my cool ideas that are just not ready yet. And so and then the other thing is the 8020 rule, which we'll dive into next time, we'll dive into the 8020 rule a bit more, as far as we talked a little bit about that. But we'll dive into that next time, the three types of work, and then how to create and how to utilize time most effectively that aligns and creates your line life because that's really why Joe and I are doing this is we want to help you create an aligned practice that then leads to an aligned life. So

Right. All right.

Thanks, Joe. Appreciate you appreciate your genius great session.