How to Reignite Your Motivation

Explicit communication is saying it straight and positively to another person in a way they can tangibly enact. Meaning saying I need loving and respectful language and tone from you is different than saying I need support. I need support isn't even explicit. Just because you sounded it out doesn't make it explicit. If you have been needing some motivation, some fire, some understanding, some new ways of coping and dealing and reigniting your life, your mission, your purpose, you're in the right place. If that sounds too motivational and too highfalutin. Omg. We have the opportunity to talk about some big topics today. How do you recognize the opportunities and how do you deal with the threats? How do you deal with if you're losing focus, motivation, drive? What do you do if you don't have the support that you need? What do you do if you've kind of lost that productive edge? What do you do if this is some time that you know, you actually need to turn on right now, but you've been struggling. So I am here to be that voice of coaching for you today to help you look within, find the strength within, connect with others. I'm honored to be here with you. So here's the deal. What we're gonna do today is, man, if you were up in my studio right now, you'd see it's like arts and crafts time. Because I've got all your key topics on these cute little cards. We're gonna work through them in a framework driven, curriculum powered first hour. How do I get you into, you know, back into frameworks of high performance so you can kind of rekindle that and go, oh, right, right, right. I know I'm getting along right here. But there's this other level, right? Hpx, High performance experience. There is another level in which you are capable of coping, of being strong, of leading, of serving others. And we're going to tap into that today really strongly. And so I always like to do that. And the first time that we have together, it's curriculum based. It's the only place I teach this, it's the only place I do this type of work. It's with you guys right here. And then we'll jump into some coaching for those who are totally new. You've never been here before. Get ready for an awesome session. Your willingness and your allowance of the reality of this situation right now has completely dictated how you're feeling. And you can be like, okay, I don't have to control all of that. I'm not in charge of the universe right now. You're not in charge of everybody. You're not in charge of every situation. You're not in charge of what the politicians are doing. So stop getting mad. You're not in charge of lots of things. What you're in charge of is your own consciousness, your own awareness. The way that you are showing up, the way that you are coping, you're in charge of that. You get to be the person who sets the frame for how you're going to deal with this situation. That's you. You get to choose that. And that's a beautiful thing. But if you wake up every day and go, wow, this is an opportunity. Even if you don't like that language of opportunity, maybe it's just, it's a gift of a chance to appreciate life once more, to appreciate the things that we had to appreciate. Your lovers, your spouse, your partners, your teams who are continuing on to recognize the power of choice. To be thankful that you have breath. What I would love to do with you is today give you some very tactical things that you can do with yourself, with your family, with your team. So we are going to start with that first promise today. And, and I'm gonna do a little card showing here with you guys. If you wanna look, this will be the way I'm gonna guide you through your curriculum today. And that is how do you lead your family, your team, your clients and yourself? So this first conversation, we're gonna jump right in because we don't mess around in high performance. We go right to leadership. I always want you to have that mindset. Right to leadership. Right to leadership. Right to leadership. It's why my number one point to people has been adopt the role model mindset. When you wake up each day and you recognize an opportunity to live and you adopt the role model mindset, it sets the frame to show up as your best self. It sets the frame to recognize you have an opportunity to serve. It sets the frame to realize that other people are looking at you, counting on you, available for your service. And that's exciting. So what do you got to do? I'm going to give you three points in each things we're going to teach today. So we're talking about leading others, including yourself right now. Three big points. Number one, if you're going to lead other people right now, you need to have what I call perspective points. Perspective points. Go ahead and write this down in your notes because I'll come back to this a lot today. Perspective points. What's a perspective point? A perspective point is you need to have let's say, three points in mind that help give people perspective that you're going to come back to as a leader over and over and over again with your family, with yourself, with your team, with your clients. So in leadership, you might just call these talking points, right? You need your talking points, right? If you're going to be a leader up on the media, you're going to say the same three things over and over and over again. I've had the blessing of interviewing, advising, and coaching two different presidents. And I'll share with you. One of them famously said, I never realized that part of my job would be saying the same thing over and over and over and over and over again. And many of you who's tired of saying the same thing over and over your kids yet, I mean, come on, you're like, do I really have to tell you this again? Yes, you do. Until they're gone out of the house, and then probably until you. Well, until they're taking care of you pretty much. And then that's it. That's what you got to do. Like, it's not going to stop. What I mean by perspective points specifically is I want you to choose three things you're going to say to your family or your clients or your audiences or your team over and over and over and over again. That conscious messaging right now is important. And the reason I don't call it just talking points, I'm calling it specifically perspective points. Because the points you should be giving to your family, to yourself, to others are perspective checks. We get to choose our attitude through this. That's a perspective point, right? What most people are doing right now with everybody else around them is they're talking about the problems. It's about the problem, the problem, the problem, the problem, the problem, or complaint about the problem, problem or blame about the problem, problem or problem. Or oh my gosh, can you believe this also happened? And it's the stacking of problems. So it's either complaint about the problems, blame about the problems, or stacking about the problems. And when that happens every single day, it poisons, it's toxic. It drowns people in pools of pessimism right when they most need positivity and optimism. And so instead of going to the problem, we're going to perspective about the context. See, great leaders are always setting things in context. And that's what I mean by perspective points. I'll give you some specific examples to help this come to mind. And you might have different perspective points for your kids. And another separate three. I don't want. You have three. You might have three for the kids, you might have three for your audience, the clients that you serve. As an example, you might have three with your spouse that you just keep coming back to over and over and over and over again. So I'll give you some things that you probably recognize from me and then I'll jump into, like, overall how this is happening in my life. If you've been watching anything I've done online or any of my podcasts. Number one, adopt a role model mindset. Number two, optimize your health and wellbeing. Number three, skill up. Skill up. Develop skills. Learn right now, adapt right now. Ask questions right now, train right now. Watch those courses, read those books, test, try. But skill up. Over and over and over. I'm saying that to my audience over and over and over and over. And I can't tell you that the feedback that's come back has been so incredible. Like, oh my gosh, thank you so much for that. Reminding me that I can adopt the role model mindset because if I approach this as a role model, I'll experience it differently. I'll demand more of myself. And so over and over and over and over and over again, I've said those perspective points. Adopt the role model mindset. Optimize your health and wellness right now. Skill up. Okay, what else with team? One of the greatest leaders I've ever had and many of you guys have met him, Ethan Willis. At one of my events, Ethan will get up on stage. He's my co owner in growth.com and Ethan has been telling the team over and over and over, the world needs us now. We're going to adapt. We're going to win together. Something like that might not get exactly right, but over and over and over and over and over again. He's saying that to the teams, right? Denise and I out on our walks, which I'll talk to you about later on every single day. Every single day. Our perspective points are appreciate you, honey. We've always gotten through difficulty together. Appreciate you, honey. We've always gotten through difficulty together. I am so proud of how you are dealing with this. So proud of how you are dealing with this. We are so lucky. We're so grateful. We're so blessed. Over and over and over again we're talking about that. We've got through things together again. You're doing such a good job. We're so blessed. Over and, I mean, I've said that to her like 30 times today. You know what I'm saying? You better be positive. You better be the cheerleader. You better be beautiful with your spouse and partners now. Because if you aren't now, oh, guess what the problem is. My. There's this thing called neuroscience. And neuroscience tells us that our memories are most abundantly tied and triggered to high points. So please think about that just for one moment. Please think about that for one moment. How absolutely critical that is. That as we walk each day. Appreciate you, we're getting through this together. I'm proud of you and we are so blessed. So you hear how these are again, I call them perspective points. They're not in the problem, they're above the problem. There's three things, and you say them over and over and over. Whether you call them perspective points or talking points or key messages, I want you to make sure you have those. You got to have three, and you gotta have three for different areas of your life. Maybe for your clients, maybe for your industry, maybe for your leaders, maybe for your students, maybe for your kids. Without that, let me tell you, what you're not leading consciously doesn't mean you're not getting by, and it doesn't mean you're not doing a good job. It just means there's another level for you. That's why you joined our program. That's why you're in this community. There's always that other level. We're always going to another level of consciousness together, another level of intentionality together, another level of congruent optimism and action together, because we do that together. You see so many people in this community doing extraordinary things in this world. Giving, serving, donating, even when it's hard. That's why I love you all and I'm so proud of what this community does together. Right? This is about that extra level of intentionality. I don't want you to finish without having your three perspective points and making sure you're hitting those every single day. There's literally nothing. We're going to spend a lot of time together today. But this thing right here is incredibly important, ok? Incredibly important. I can't even share you how important this is. So please, please, please, please keep this in mind, okay? This is so important. Perspective points. Three in each area. What else do you have to do as a leader right now? Well, you've got to recalibrate your priorities. You got to recalibrate your priorities. This means, guess what? Some of your projects are paused. Have you communicated that yet? That recalibrating of priorities? But the question is not, did your priorities change? The whole world had its Priorities shift in such a significant and fast ways that caused panic. When you take people's priorities, which is their known world, and you yank it and change it, people freak out if they're not conscious. But my question isn't, did your priorities change? My question is, did you intentionally reset your priorities yet for the next 30, 60 and 90 days? And did you communicate them to the key people you need to, that might just be your spouse? Like for me it's Denise and I are constantly talking through our priorities, constantly talking through it. Like, what's this day about, what's this week about, what's this month about? And because we have that shared understanding, we tend not to flip out on each other. If you think about your partner or your spouse, sometimes you flip out on them because you're upset they didn't understand. You're going through so much and you're like, you don't understand. Who screamed at your spouse and said you don't understand in the last 90 days at all? But I think it's really important that you communicate the changes in priorities to those that must, right? Most importantly, you need to know it. Because sometimes you just need to adapt and you need to change and that's just real. You just got to do it because you're in charge. Many of you are leaders, many of you are the solopreneurs, many of you drive the key revenue, success or abundance for your family. And when you're in that position, sometimes you just gotta go. But if you change and you adapt and you make something happen, soon as you get it done, or even if you had to roll it out or even it's an emergency situation, then the priority becomes communicating it. Communicating it, Communicating it. And I'll come back to that perspective points again, right? A lot of changes in priorities. Sometimes because it's a major shift in priority, you just do it and you don't have time to involve lots of other people. Make sure you communicate it afterwards, detail it afterwards, write the process afterwards, roll that out to your team or your families afterwards. I'll give you an example. For me, in the last, call it seven days, I've filmed and edited more than 50 videos by myself without a team. Just here, right? Same ugly ass background. I think those plants are fake. Not sure. I'll ask Denise later. I have no idea if those are real or not. Zero clue. Maybe some of you can tell. I don't even know. But I think that one is. But I don't even know. I don't know. But I'll tell You, this same background, shot 50 videos by myself, edited them, created three or four new campaigns, detailed them, and then sent them to the team. Because so much is going on. I didn't have time to overly communicate that in advance. But it was a priority shift that I knew I had to make, and I had to do it real fast because I could tell the market was changing. And so what does that mean? It means if you're at that high performance level right now, you sat down and you recalibrated your priorities. And here's what I have to tell you. If you didn't recalibrate your priorities, that means write down what's important to you this month and next month. At least that's near term stuff, right? If you didn't do that right now I know why. And you know why, too. It's because you're good, right? Things are good, Brendan. I'm comfortable. I'm not affected. Things are fine in my life. Then here's what I have to urge you as a leader. I know that you might be good. I know that you might be comfortable, and you didn't feel like you had to recalibrate your priorities. But I'm also here to say, if that's true for you, what that means is you're missing the opportunity. Let me show the demonstration for you, okay? Imagine this is your performance line, y'. All, since we're in high performance together, this is your performance line, okay? If in moments of crises, when there is a diploma, then there's a growth. If your performance right now significantly dips and stays dipping, and the growth line goes like this, watch what happens. Okay? World goes like this. You kind of go like this. Everything comes down, the world starts readjusting and it starts growing, but you keep a downward trend. You see how that gap significantly grows. That gap is what I'm telling my leaders to be attentive to right now. And I'm just here to say, be aware of that performance growth gap, that if your performance dips down too much, look, even if your performance goes down and everything stays the same, there's that gap. But when it starts to recover, that gap becomes insurmountable for people. And now it takes them 3, 6, 9 months to catch up. So as I've said from day one, I'm okay if your priority is self care, because we're going to talk about that today. If your priority is self care and you needed to take a week or two to just deal and your way of coping was detaching and distracting, that's your way. And there's no judgment to that. There is a warning, though, that if that continues too long without also healthy action, that gap will grow. And that's why I'm here to tell you, be very, very, very conscious of your priorities over these next 30 or 60 days. Yes, recover, yes, self care. But don't make the false dichotomy that self care and rest and recovery is separate than productive action. If we stop productive action as well, not only will that bite us in three months, but it will have conditioned our mind not to challenge ourselves. Like, you guys know, I toured with Wayne Dyer and was one of my great mentors. I know we got a lot of Wayne Dyer fans here, I hope. And Wayne was a great mentor to me and an incredibly kind soul to me. And, you know, he always said it. He says, you know, squeeze an orange. Whatever is in it comes out. And what he means by that is their character and conditioning. And mostly right now, people's conditioning are coming up. And what I'm fearful of is the number one conditioning pattern that's going to hurt people is what I call a motivation manifesto, Defiance. That's doubt, delay and division, right? I call them the three devils. Doubt, delay, and division. And what doubt does, what delay does, and what divisiveness does with others is it causes pause, it causes constriction, it causes withdrawal, it causes safety, it causes self protection in which we stop. And that means we stop looking at our priorities and recalibrating our priorities so we can adapt. When you see the word priorities, you got to think, adapt. You've got to recalibrate these right now for the next 30, 60, 90 days. We'll talk about that some more. And I'm sorry to belabor this point so much, but I swear, if you got these two understandings down right now with your family, with your team, with yourself, this is going to give you a sense of greater certainty, greater control. Oh, this is how we're going to deal with it. And this is what we are doing. This is our mindset. This is our mindset. This is what we're doing. This is our mindset. This is what we're doing. This is our mindset. This is what we're doing. You tell somebody that enough and they find a greater level of certainty. Okay, last point on this topic of leading your family, team, clients and self, then the last piece is you need to lock in and communicate the new structure and the new processes with people. Without knowing the boundaries of action, we don't know safety. And so Structure gives a sense of not just certainty, but safety when they know something's off. Structure is really important. Your new structure, your new process. And listen, if you can shore up some structure, you can give yourself some certainty. Shoring up the structure means lock in that daily morning routine. It means try to get a little more consistent with what meal time looks like. When is that going to happen? A little more consistent with your workout time. Just those little simple adjustments in your own structure and sticking to them can be profoundly powerful, profoundly powerful in your sense of wellbeing right now. A higher level of intentionality, a higher level of consciousness and discipline, A higher level of proactivity. What does that mean? It means, oh, what other things could I get structured here or communicate to people that will make a difference? Your team needs you to either keep the structure you had or participate in it more or stick to it more. I'm a great example of that. I'm a terrible, terrible, consistent team communicator with my overall team because I spend most of my team communicating with my leads, right? And then the leads lead the rest of the organization. But I've had to, like, force myself to cancel tons of things and make sure I'm making these specific things for them. Even though, is it better that I do this or better that I do that? You're always going to have competing interests. Your job is to support the structure, set it, communicate it, support it, set it, communicate it, support it, set it, communicate it, support it. That's your job as a leader. That's a job for you to do for yourself, for your family, for your team. And I promise it will make this whole experience. If you understand these three things and you do them intentionally, you create your key messages, your three main points for you, your family, your team, whatever it is. You recalibrate your priorities, communicate them, and then you reset the structure, communicate it, and stick to it. It's a completely different experience. The chaos doesn't seem to take over anymore. Now you're back in command because guess what you did. You stepped into the captain of the ship. The waters just got rougher. You're still at the helm. The storm came in, you're still at the helm. Your friends got sick, some of your team, or the economy mutinied, you're still at the helm. And when you wake up each day and you own the responsibility, instead of running from it, you find true personal power. And what are we going to do to get that control and that personal power? We are going to set our mindset and communicate the Mindsets with our perspective points. We are going to recalibrate our priorities and communicate them so everyone knows what we are doing, how we are marching and we are going to structure things so that there is a little order to the chaos and a little bit of strength and certainty when the rest of the seas are so choppy. Okay, for those who have never read Shackleton's famous story, Ernest Shackleton, I hope that you'll read the biography or watch the documentary on Shackleton's journey. Shackleton was a famous explorer who was stranded in Antarctica with his crew and the way that he led is literally one of the greatest leadership stories in the history of the world. I would put it as number one. And literally below that you've got things like Gandhi and Martin Luther King and Mandela. That's how amazing Shackleton's journey was. Considering the life defying odds that they faced, the challenges that he faced, the people that he faced, the conditions that he faced. If you've never studied that, that's a critical book I'm recommending to everyone. And I'm sorry, I'm forgetting the name of the book. I think it's just called Shackleton's Journey or you'll see. I think it won a Pulitzer Prize. There's also a documentary. For those who'd rather watch a documentary, just Google it up. Shackleton's Journey or Shackleton, Shackleton's Adventure, Shackleton's Survival, stuff like that. Shackleton's Leadership Man's Search for Meaning from Viktor Frankl. Most of the people in my industry have named that the number one self help personal development book in the history of the world. Like literally, if you take out spirituality texts, so take out the Bible or Talmud, take out spiritual texts and just go straight to best self help book of all time. It's Viktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning. He was a psychologist, a psychiatrist who was trapped in the Holocaust and shares his journey and perspective about it. And he says the last of our human freedoms is the ability to choose one's own attitude. It's incredibly powerful. You can take away everything from a person and from a soul, but not his choice of attitude. And that's one of the most inspiring lines in the history of our industry. So with that, I hope that helps with this leadership perspective. This was the number one question submitted probably from this community that I've seen out there or wrote in was, hey, I lost my motivation or the people around me have lost my motivation. The question was either I've lost some motivation or My team has lost some motivation or my spouse is being a bum, which. Listen, it happens. It happens. So this is a big huge question. And for those who think I'm teasing too much, this has happened to me. I wrote a book called the Motivation Manifesto. I spent my whole career studying the singular topic plus high performance. I have had the same dealing. People are like, you lose your motivation sometimes. I'm like, I have breath. I am alive. Yes, of course. Just like anybody else. Okay, we can all lose our motivation. The question is, do we regain it? The question is, do we show up when it really counts? The question is, are we aware when it is lost and what do we do to get back? And so what does losing motivation look like usually? Let's talk through a few things. First, recognize almost all lost motivation is actually fatigue, burnout, overwhelm and stress has nothing to do with motivation itself. It has to do with the conditions around it. Jacking up your motivation. So fatigue. That's why we're going to talk about self care real fast. And I know you all know this, being in our community, but if this hasn't moved up on your priority list, you're not even in the game yet. Because you know one way you cope with things, Judgment goes up. Because if you could be sure of your opinion right now, at least that's some kind of certainty. So a lot of people, certainty comes through their sense of self righteousness, their sense of I'm going through this and other people are not. Which again is the devil of division, separateness. Oh, I'm dealing with this better than them. Suckers, idiots. And you know what happens if you start thinking the world is full of idiots? Lost motivation. Because you know what? You don't want to deal with those people anymore. And when you don't want to deal with those people anymore, you withdraw and unconsciously you lose motivation. When judgment goes up, motivation goes down. Why do you think the Dalai Lama is such an extraordinarily motivated man, especially for his age and health conditions? Because he's so accepting and loving of people. When you are accepting and loving of people as where they're at, as an opportunity to serve, your motivation is different. So how does this come back to self care? Brennan, what the heck are you talking about? Your self care should be a plus right now. And for most people it's not. Most people just double listen in an listen to this. And this by the way, is historical. This is in economic recessions and depressions, household budgets for alcohol. Double do you know that it's already happened here in North America. Just like, oh, let's just spend more on alcohol, it immediately happens. No, what's happening is people are in their number. One way that they're stealing from their self care is they're turning to addictions. Please be aware of that. Be aware of what you are turning to that is making you more tired. Because guess what? A hangover is fatigue. No matter how good your hangover is, the more you consume, drink, eat things that are unhealthy right now. And listen, I am not here to be a preacher of your health. I am just here to say it has effects. And since we are talking about lost motivation, please realize a hangover in any capacity is going to hurt the molecules that we know activate motivation. Dopamine, vasopressin, oxytocin, serotonin are all negatively impacted by any drug use and any alcohol. All of them are negatively impacted. So please realize that motivation is neurobiological as well. Right? You can take a group of soldiers and over a 16 week period measure their sleep patterns and their perceived sense of motivation and drive and watch it crater. You mess with people's sleep, you feed them bad things, you make them consume drugs and alcohol and their motivation will drop. And I'm not here to preach because you do what you want. If you love a glass of wine with your meal, I'm not here to preach about that. I'll have a glass of wine, no problem. I love a glass of wine, but I'm not likely in times of crises to have a bunch of them. And that's what's really important because I know I already have a compromised brain. Many of you guys know I had a brain injury in 2011 and that brain injury doesn't go away. So I'm always mitigating. And for me I know if I over consume bad food or alcohol the next day I just don't feel good. And that slows down my ability to serve or be there for my family when it counts. And right now it counts. So please do your self care. That means for those who need a convenient acronym to check your self care, do this. Take your meds. M E D S meds. What does meds stand for? Meds stands for meditation, exercise, diet, sleep. That's your meds. Every day. Meditate, exercise, diet, sleep, get those down. Then I like to add the Rx on it. Rx. What's Rx stands for? R stands for relationships. Deepen your appreciation and your presence in your relationship. X is the X factor which is to me supplementation. Finding what your body needs biologically to optimize its performance. You might know you need that morning cup of coffee. That's a supplement. If you didn't know that, you might know that you're somebody who needs a little extra magnesium, iron, and B vitamins during times of stress. Great. Pump those up. You might realize during times of stress, it's time for you to take your adaptogens, your rhodiola, your ginseng. That might be a time, might be a time to boost your immunity. Take your mushrooms, your chaga, your reishi, your maki. Right? You got to know the X factor is always supplementation, but the R factor is relationships. So meds, Rx, meditation, exercise, diet, sleep, nail those. Rx, relationship, presence and energy. X the supplementation to keep you going. Ok, I won't belabor that point because I think you all know it. Next up, and I'll move a little faster some of these. Ok, remember, we're on lost motivation. So let's come back to this big key topic, and this is make sure you are listening to motivating voices. If you got a friend or a spouse who's constantly complaining, immediately stop exposure to that or let them know of its effect and don't blame them. Say, you know what? I noticed we use the language we. I noticed we've been really talking about the problems and the complaints about that. Let's talk about what we're appreciative of. Fire off five things you're grateful for. Just help me change my mindset. Acknowledge it's we, because all conversations are we. And then say, help me. Give me five things you're thankful for. Tell me five reasons you love me. Say three things that are going good and take control of that conversation. Another big idea behind this is, you know, if you're not listening to positive podcasts or participating in communities like this, up that ante. For those who have funny friends, I have two friends, Dave and Adam, who are literally the funniest human beings on the planet. I'm convinced there is no funnier human beings. And I know you probably have friends like that, too. You're like, no, no, no, Brendon, my friends are funnier than your friends. If you have that, let me suggest to you, you should be FaceTiming with them way more often. It will change your levity. It will make you motivated. I laughed for like two hours the other night on a call with these two friends. My wife and I were literally in tears for two hours talking to these idiots. And it was fantastic. So you got to have those motivating voices, those people who are upbeat for those who, you know, you just now engaging in personal development. Go listen to those positive podcasts. For those who are in spirituality, Listen to your favorite pastor, whoever that might be like, get consumed into that. Put that literally in your ears as a podcast or a replay of what we're doing here. It will serve you, it will help rewire the brain and it will take over the internal voices of strife and worry and implant positivity and better mindsets. So for me, as many of you know, I don't consume a lot. I just don't. I don't consume a lot of social media, I don't consume a lot of television, I don't consume a lot. I'm just not a consumption guy. Except for books to be fair. But recently I'm like, okay, I got to up my podcast game, I got to up my faith game. So I'm listening to more podcasts from my peers in my industry. I'm listening to more podcasts of faith that are really helping me. That's really important. Two other big ideas. One, remember motivation is triggered by ambition and action. These are the two triggers of motivation. And not everyone likes the word. You know, not everyone loves the word ambition. But these are the two scientific backed triggers of motivation. Remove these, motivation doesn't last. Amplify these, motivation grows. Not my opinion. All of psychology points to this, all of philosophy for over a thousand years. Ambition, if you don't like that word, because that has a connotation from the 80s. But ambition just means desire for more. That more can be more depth, more connection, more joy, more abundance, more success in any area, more peace, more harmony, more anything. People think ambition is separate than peace or harmony. No, if you want more harmony, that's ambition, right? If you want a better meditative practice, that's an ambition for better meditation. Ambition is not separate from yoga or spirituality. The Dalai Lama wants to deepen his spirituality practice. That's ambition. It's attachment to the end result of ambition that cause suffering. But the desire for greater or more or new, that's okay. It's when you are attached to how it has to go that can ruin your motivation. So let me talk about these two things. Number one, ambition. The most important thing for those who want motivation again, you must get back into a first 30 minute morning routine in which you connect with your ambitions. What does that mean? You better look at your goals every single day. And don't just look at them, look at them, feel them. Visualize them, talk through them, think about them. I need you to obsess about your goals and your ambitions and your dreams again. Instead of laying awake worrying about what's going to happen tomorrow, lay awake trying to force your mind to visualize the ideal future. Your mental time towards visualizing feeling and self. Talking about your ambitions and your goals are driving your motivation up or down more time. See, most people say, well, it's not realistic now Brendan, I'm like, I know, it's just required now. I'm okay, it's not realistic for you to achieve all your things, but if you lose touch with your idealistic future, you will lose your motivation. What else do we know? Well, we know that in all of psychology that motivation often follows momentum, action, action. And this is a real sticking point for people right now in that people think, oh well, you know, I'll just pause all these things until and see how this goes through. You need to make positive progress every single day. So what I want you to do in the morning, I do this with my high performance planner. You guys can do it, whatever tools you have. I want you to write down your goals, your dreams and not just for today, but listen, some people fill it out in the morning, I fill it out in the morning, my goals. I think about my long term dreams and then I just sit with it and I visualize it, I think through it. How can I do that with excellence? How can I make that fun? How can I do that in uncommon ways that I'll enjoy and let your mind stew on creating ways to achieve your dream. Let your mind stew on creative ways to enjoy the day. You need to be visualizing more than you ever have before if you want motivation to sustain. That is a simple action everybody can do. Get really close every morning to your ambitions and then also just to get action, say what are three things that I absolutely will do today that are not just household or health tasks? Meaning get your workout in big achievement, Feed the kids big achievement. I still need you to do three things beyond surviving. Three things. What it be? You know, I'll send that one email for me lately it's been I'm going to shoot this set of videos or I'm going to create that webpage or I'm going to send out this prospect email for me and my business, right? I just need something from you every day beyond surviving that your brain goes, oh, I'm not just surviving. I'm not just listen. It has to be beyond self care too. Yes, do your self care. But I want you to go beyond self care because here's what your mind listen, please think and I want you to all really tune into this. Be very attentive to what I'm about to say. If the mind only feels like it's doing the things that are necessary for self care and survival, it will lose motivation still. That's the trick of the human brain. So let me say it another way. If all you think about is just self care, which is powerful and you must, and survival stuff powerful and must, but your mind doesn't feel like it's engaging something that is going to help you thrive, not just survive. Motivation will go down unconsciously and you won't even know. You're like, I'm doing all the things, Brendan. And I hear this from people all the time, Brendan. I'm doing all the things I yoga, I get a massage once in a while, I eat green things, I run, I exercise. And I still have no motivation. Oh, because if the mind doesn't touch the rim of the future, if the mind doesn't every day touch the rim, do something that reaches for an idyllic future state, motivation will wane. It is one of the very unique things of the human species. When we study animalistic, outside the human species, animalistic drive versus human drive. The human drive for connection to the future is innately tied to our sense of motivation. And what's happening is many people are obsessing and ruminating on the inconveniences of now, the threats of now and the fear of now. And they're giving more time to consuming what is in front of them than they are to visualizing what could be. I'm here to say if you lost motivation, you didn't lose motivation. You lost your touch with the future, babe. You didn't lose motivation, you lost the time spent touching the helm of the future by doing something simple today that has a positive impact in the future. That's why I need you to. I need three things from you every morning. These are three things beyond self care and beyond survival. Even if, look, one of those things can be sending an email. People say, well Brendan, you're asking too much for people. You're asking to take care of themselves and feed the kids and send an email. You're right, I'm a bastard. I need you to do something beyond just survival and self care. I need you three things every day. It could be one email, one video, one something, one project that touches the helm or touches the hem or the rim of the future. If you'll get three of those every day. That to the brain will say, I'm touching ambition. I've got some action, I've got some momentum. And those little pieces of momentum, no matter how big a deal, momentum sparks motivation. Everything will change for you. Last big idea to get motivation. And this one a lot of people aren't understanding. So for those who are married, in a significant relationship or with kids, I want you to zoom in, be really tight on this topic. I'm going to tell you right now and put it up in your face. People need daily acknowledgement. You need daily acknowledgment. More now than you have in months past. People don't understand that for the human species, acknowledgement fuels motivation. As many of you guys know, the number one reason people leave jobs worldwide is lack of appreciation and connection with their first line manager. If you don't feel appreciated, you're seven times more likely to leave your job in the next six months. Seven times. So if you've ever been done divorce mediation or been in divorce court or done that as a professional, as a counselor and listen to what people say, 90% of it sounds like appreciation problems. And right now, our motivation as a human species is tied to acknowledgement so much. Because the more uncertainty we have, listen to this very closely and write this down for those who coach. The more uncertainty people face, the more validation they need. Because I know this is out of control. So I need to know that I'm okay, I'm right, I'm, you know, safe. I got my, you know, my stuff together. More uncertainty you face, more validation you need. So what I need you to do is you need to be an acknowledgement machine. I am like the cheapest PEZ dispenser on the planet right now. You know what I do every day? Every day I pick up this phone, I choose five people in my favorites and I send them an audio or a video specifically to my, especially my long, long term friends and my family, I send them a video just cheering them on, acknowledging them, thanking for their role in my life, thanking them for working so hard, thanking them for being a good mom, thanking them for being a good caregiver, thanking them for being whatever. And I just give some kind of specific appreciation five times a day, every day. And for those who don't know me or just join this community, I've done that since 2014. Every day it makes me more motivated. Every day I remember, oh, I got to say those nice things to people. And by saying nice things to people, it makes me a nice person. When I feel like a nice person, I feel better about myself. And when you feel better about yourself, motivation is accessed easier. Acts of generosity, appreciation and acknowledgement makes you feel better about yourself too. And when you feel better about yourself too, you take better actions for and from your better self. I know you know what I'm talking about. So please give some love to the people in your life today. Purposefully think about this. Parents especially, I love you. You might not understand it, but whatever structure or encouragement you've given to your kids recently, they need double that in acknowledgement and validation. Right now. They need double that. A lot of parents are good at the structure of things and they're missing validation things. They're good at the new process things and getting people orderly, but they're missing acknowledgement. And for those who are struggling in your marriage, there's no question that acknowledgement plays a role with that for you. And so please up your level of presence with people. I've got this new rule and I've been working super hard on it. If Denise walks in the room, I close the laptop or put the phone down. So the trigger is she comes in, boom, shut it down. Because if there's a trailing response, who's ever had that where like you start talking to your spouse and they see you, acknowledge you, you're talking at them, they're still on their phone, so they're listening. And on the phone, does that tick anyone off, drive anyone nuts? Be conscious of that because there's so much fascinating stuff. They can be talking to you, but you're really here. And that's going to poison their sense of acknowledgement and presence with you. It will not serve you. Okay. Boy, those first two points I went way long on, huh? So here we go. Review. Loss, motivation. What are you going to do? Amp up your self care. What are you going to do? You are going to listen to more motivating voices. What are you going to do? You are going to touch the helm of your ambition every day and move to three things, even as simple things every day that have to do with your future. That's ambition and action. What are you going to do? You're going to up the daily acknowledgement that you are giving to other people. You're going to be a PEZ machine of happiness, joy, validation, acknowledgement to other people. And I know some of you are going to say, but what about me? I need that, Brendan. Ha ha. I got the next card ready for you. What happens if you have conflict or lack of support at home? Or on your team. Hey, seems like the kid thought of curriculum today. Let's go in that topic. Conflict, support. If you're not getting what you need at home, if you're not getting what you need from your team members, Listen, I don't pretend that's an easy situation, but it's happening and it's real, and so we got to deal with it. So some simple reminders, high performers as who you are. Remember, I will always encourage you. I will always empower you, but I will never enable victimhood. And so what I want to remind you from, that's not my job as a coach. Other people can do that. My job for you is to remind you first and foremost, don't match others energy. Lead it. Don't match others energy, Lead it. Okay, Your spouse is negative. Don't get pulled into their pool of pessimism. Have your own mental pool of mindset that you stick to and don't drown in theirs. You got a complainer and a blamer at work you got to deal with every day on zoom now. Now it's worth, you know, at least at work they were like seven feet away and you could talk to them now you got to see their head like this in your face every day. You're like, oh, my God, please do it. It's like, I get it now. It's like, but hey, you gotta hide their tile if you have to do it. You know what I'm saying? Mute them a little bit. I mean, here's the thing, Bing, seriously, don't match lead. You be the generator of energy that you want to experience. You own your emotional center. I'm not saying it's really difficult because people will pull you into their world. I get that, believe me. But I'm just here to say, try to note, like, oh, am I matching them right now? I want you to be in control of your own center. Don't match lead. And that comes from that first point today. Keep in perspective. What emotional energy are you going to hold throughout this process? Doesn't mean that you don't have a down day or down hour or frustrating moment. But choose that consciously going in. Remind yourself of that consciously going in each day. Now, what can we do to help with this situation? Number one, if you're not getting the support you need right now, the number one question is, have you had an explicit conversation where you explicitly set expectations? And please let me qualify this. If you're not getting the support you need, have you explicitly set expectations? Listen, married people, have you explicitly set expectations in the last three weeks. Let me tell you something. When the ground shifts, you don't get to say to your spouse, well, you should know this by now. You don't get to do that. Uh, that doesn't work. I'm sorry. You might want that to work. It doesn't work. So my only question, if you don't have the support you have, my number one question would be, are you matching them? Beware of that. My number two question is, have you had a clear, sit down, explicit communication in the last three weeks? That is where you sit down and say, you know what? What I could really use some help with right now. What I really need in our relationship right now, what would really support us as a couple right now are these things, 1, 2, and 3. Tying back to your perspective points, what you don't get to do. I know you want to, but what you don't get to do is ask for 50 things because they're overwhelmed already. You get to ask for three things, so choose them wisely. You get three requests from a spouse right now in how they can support you. If that's true, you get three. I need to know, in the last three weeks, have you had that explicit communication? It's really challenging. I'm really unsettled by it. Honey, I have to ask one thing from you. When we're having a conversation, can you make sure that your tone is loving and respectful? If I can have loving and respectful from you, our intimacy won't be affected. We can be joyful. We'll be good with the kids. But that's my one. I need that. And I'm going to come back to that over and over and over again. I'll probably ask for it twice today, three times tomorrow, three times the next day. Because that's your talking point, right? Your talking point is, I need loving and respectful communication right now. Notice it's not. You're being a bastard. Notice it's not. You're a condescending mule. No, no, no, no, you don't. No, no, no. Labeling and name calling, super not going to work. Just totally not going to. Not you. I think it's really important have that explicit communication with those that you love. And by the way, for those who, hey, it's going really good for you, and your relationship is rock solid. You want extra points? Ask them for this. Be like, if I could be even more supportive and our relationship could even be better, what could I do? What can I do for you? And here's why I'm saying this. We know from communication studies, which most of you know, that's where my master's degree is from. I spent a tremendous amount of time studying this area and I had the blessing of doing a lot of peer mediation and unfortunately divorce mediation in my life. And what I learned from that conversation, not that I've been divorced, I was the mediator for divorces, which is super hard. What I learned is most people have never had explicit communication. They dropped a lot of hints and then made a lot of complaints. But let me say this, hints and complaints is not explicit communication. Neither of them are explicit. Explicit communication is the ability to describe what one needs. Explicit communication is saying it straight and positively to another person in a way they can tangibly enact. Meaning saying I need loving and respectful language and tone from you is different than saying I need support. I need support isn't even explicit. Just because you sounded it out doesn't make it explicit. Explicit also has to have a realm of implementation for the other for them to feel like it's explicit. Right? By definition, we could say it's explicit because you said it. But explicit and impactful, you have to specifically say what you need and specifically say how. Because remember your how is different than their how. Their way of validating you is they kissed you on the cheek this morning. That communicated everything they need to communicate. They don't know you need these other things said or to be held this way or to be told this too or to be shown it in this way. They don't know that. Just assume like you've always wanted to. Your coach. Today. Your coach, Brendon Burchard gave you permission today. You've wanted it your whole life with your partner or spouse. I'm granting you it. You've always wanted the ability and the freedom to assume that they are dumb. And I am letting you today let yourself assume they're dumb. They're uninformed, they are ignorant to what you need. So start over set, explicit conversation with them. Sit them down and say, hey, let's talk about the next three weeks and start with them. If I could be an even better spouse or partner for you in the next three weeks, as we're going through all this turbulence and chaos, what are three things I could do? Start with them, then after they talk and whatever they ask for, you don't get to debate. Whatever they ask for, you don't get to be the wounded little child for whatever they ask for. That's their truth, that's their need. And some of you, you're going to get A passive aggressive comment. And you know what you do with passive aggressive comments? You let them pass. So when that passive aggressive comment, let it go right over your shoulder. Don't get hooked. Instead, let them air their laundry, let them ask for their three things and then. Okay, honey, thank you. I'm going to work on those things. I appreciate you sharing them. Okay, my three. And then you share your three. Without that specific sit down communication, please don't feel think that you have communicated. If it didn't go like that, you haven't done it yet. Because a demand or a complaint or implicit it does not get through the brain in chaos. What I want you to think about this, my friends, is what has happened in everyone's brain is two new layers went above their brain and through their ears. And people are only hearing now through extra layers, extra layers of fear, extra layer of selfish concern. Because of that, you need to have pointed conversation to pop through those layers. Pointed, explicit conversation. Same thing for those who are struggling with team. You don't get to say leaders. Well, she should just do her job. You don't get to do that. You need to sit with her on Zoom and say, here's what the roles and responsibilities are. Here's what you have agreed to. Here's the impact on the team. Here's specifically the three things we need from you right now. Without that, you didn't communicate. And that's what's really important. I'm always telling people, unless it was explicit and intentional, collaborative, you didn't communicate. You talked. You might have demanded, maybe you complained, maybe you did. A good hint. Explicit, collaborative, implementable conversation. Specific collaborative, implementable conversation is going to save your bacon in this crisis. Do people still say save the bacon? I have no idea. We said that in Montana. Anyone say save the bacon? Is that it? No. Does anyone even know what that means? Last big idea. If you have a supportive or non supportive spouse, this will be an easy one. I need you to take a healing walk and talk every day. A healing walk and talk. So what does that mean? Well, what that means is go on a walk with your significant other, even if you have to leave the kids for a moment. If you got to take the kids, that's okay too, but let them kind of charge ahead a little bit and have a healing talk. And a healing talk. Sounds like this. How you doing? Need anything? Anything I can do for you? Ended by acknowledgment and validation. We say it again for those note takers in the room. How you doing? Opens the gate. Need Anything generality opens the gate. Anything I can do specifically end with acknowledgement, appreciation. Well, you're doing a good job, honey. I appreciate you. I love you. If you knock out these four points every day through a crisis, through when someone's lost a job, when you're losing clients, when there's a bankruptcy, when there's fear, when everyone is unsettled, if you do that, I promise that little framework I just gave you will be priceless in your relationship. And that's the whole point of the walk and talk. It's healing, it's just asking and listening. Notice it didn't say communicate your five things. It didn't say talk about your to do's. Just do that. Just open the gate for them to discuss how they're feeling and what they need and validating them. If you can do that and you can wrap some humor in it and make it fun and make it joyful and drop some jokes and have your inside stories together as a couple, that will really solidify it. So circle that sucker with humor. But never, ever in crises, humor directed at another ever self deprecating humor. Okay, pot shots at your spouse or your kids, not okay, don't do it. Same thing for those leaders on teams. Be humorous in what's going on in your life. Do not point fun or make fun of anybody on your team in any way right now or you will not survive. It's important. Humor has to be dealt with a very deft hand in times of crisis because people are simply and easily outraged. And once you know that, because they're easily hooked. Remember, when people are in crisis, they're listening through protective gear. So anything that sounds like it could be offensive, anything that can make me feel offensive, I'm going to go there, right? So here's the rule in your communication. If you think it's going to be sensitive, if you think it might be controversial, say that up front. Say that up front. That's explicit communication. Explicit communication is, you know what, I think this might be a little off color or I think this might be a little too light for the situation, or I think this might be controversial and then be delicate about it. If you have to do it in general, I tell people, completely avoid it right now. But listen, the point here was the healing. Walk and talk. Go out with your spouse, your partner, your kids, ask, ask them how they're doing, what they need, what you can do for them, and then validate and appreciate them. Let's move on because I know I'm going a little bit on the teaching today. But I hope this is serving everybody. Now. This is important. How do you stay focused and productive? How do you stay focused and productive throughout this time? Obviously I've talked about some big ideas, being back in touch with your ambition and taking action each day. So let me add on to that. How do you stay focused and productive? Number one, this is critical. I cannot survive without this one. You have to schedule consumption time. You have to schedule consumption time. And here's what I mean by that. I mean that in two ways. Schedule meal time, consumption, schedule entertainment, social media or news time. Those literally are scheduled obsessively right now. Obsessively. So many of you know I only check social media and the news twice per day now. That's it. Twice per day. I check it after my first time block of work in the morning. So I get up, I do my morning routines. Then when I go to work, I work for one hour. Then after a full hour of just knocking stuff, done, then I'll check the news to see if anything is going to impact my day. And I'll check social media and voice message and texts. But here's the deal. I only give myself 15 minutes for that. That's it. So I literally the first thing I do when I pick up my phone in that moment is I grab my phone and then what I do is I set the timer for 15 minutes. Then I start consuming. When that 15 minutes hits, it's done, it's down, and I'm back to doing what's important to me. That same routine happens for me before dinner. Right before dinner. Whatever time we're going to have dinner, I'll grab the phone again, set the 15 minute clock, consume all the news or social media that I need to consume down and done. So in the course of every day, there's only 30 minutes of social media and news in my life. That's it. Otherwise, I don't know about you, but I could go, I mean, I could go right through this thing into the drama machine. This would be a terrible thing for me if I didn't set a timer on it. Anyone else? And here's the thing. If you pick up this thing and you go into Instagram or Facebook and you don't first set your timer, I just changed your life. This one tactic, I just gave back your life. Why? Because if it goes into an hour, let me show you the difference. Most people on social media and news consume well over 90 minutes. So let's just say you consume an hour. Watch what happens one hour per day is seven hours per week on average, 28 to 29 hours a month on average. Over the year, over 365 hours. That equates to 42 eight hour workdays. 42 eight hour workdays are lost. Now those are not gonna be workdays. It could be days doing your art or connecting with your family or doing whatever, but it's 40 to eight hour blocks of time gone if you spend an hour of distraction on this thing. So if you want Brendon Burchard to change your life, when you log into Instagram or Facebook or start consuming news, set your timer for 15 minutes. Make sure you type in caps as the alarm. Brendon says, shut the effing thing off. And then every 15 minutes when you're in your news, Brendan says, oh, right. Because this, if I go longer than this, it's going to cost me 40 hour, 40 workdays. That's a month and a half of loss productivity. So that's a must for me. Second, big idea. Outside of the things I've shared with you. Do outbound first. Outbound first. Outbound first. What does outbound first mean? Outbound first means do the like. Don't react, create and send first. So don't check your inbox in the morning. No, first think, what are the emails I need to send today? First action. Send the emails you need to send before replying to everybody else's. So I would go, what are the emails I need to send today? And if one of them requires me to check in on something, I might look back for that person's specific email to see if I got the intel I need before I send something out. But I always outbound first. Always before consuming and taking in outbound first. That's playing offense. That's playing offense each day. That's being proactive versus reactive. You all know that. But your first hour of any work, efforts to stay productive should be outbound, not inbound. That way when you finish the day, you don't go, oh, I forgot to send. Oh, I forgot to. No, you already did. Will change your whole workflow. Just as a philosophy, put this next to your computer here. Screenshot this. Real fast. Screenshot that, guys, so you have it, put it on your desktop, print it out, put it on your phone. Outbound first. It will change your life. Outbound, outbound first. And I know some of you think you do that, but now the fun thing is track it and see are you really doing it. I'm always outbound first, even at the Frustration of my team. I wish he checked email more. No, I'm doing work. I'm doing stuff that matters the most in order to move the ball forward. Okay, last big idea. Stay focused and productive. So as always in coaching, I always try to do one thing that is super tactical for you, that also bust your chops a little bit just to show you the difference between normal performance and high performance. And so here is a little bust in the chops. And I love you. Before I say it, I know it was a tough week. So my question is, did you have an understanding of what had to be done by Friday? We call it Friday finishers, meaning did you already know what had to be done by Friday at 5pm? Most people don't. Most people just finish the week, but they didn't finish the week. And what do I mean by that? I mean on Monday or on Sunday night or on Monday. What I want you to do is I want you to have your full list of what needs to happen by Friday at 5pm and why do I love that? Because it makes you enlarge. Your view goes, oh, what has to happen this week? Oh, right, I'm in the context of a month, right, what must happen this week? See, most people are trying, you know, in their New Year's resolutions, they just want to win the year. I'm like, no, no, win the week, Win the week. Start on Monday because listen, in times of crisis, you might lose half of a Tuesday afternoon to a bag of Doritos and Netflix because your coping mechanisms went out the door and you killed six jugs of Ben and Jerry's and half a bottle of vodka and you're like, what happened to Tuesday? So some people in crisis, in your coping mechanism, you're going to lose half a day here, two hours there. But if you lose the week, that's different than coping. That's bad habits. So what I want to tell you is start Monday with a week long plan, do your weekly planner and high performance planner and just go, okay, what has to happen this week? What am I going to do this week? And that's what I call your Friday finisher list. I have a list next to my computer of all this is what's going to happen by Friday, by 5pm because sometimes I hope it happens Tuesday. And then, you know, Kevin and I get on a, we get rapping on some stuff and we come up with some brilliant genius ideas and that whacked out my Wednesday or Mitch on my team and Kevin tell me this thing got derailed or Customer service says this or another lead says someone on my team, and I got to pivot my afternoon. But that Friday finisher list is going to get done. Even if I had to move my Tuesday to my Wednesday, my Wednesday to my Monday, if I got to move things, doesn't matter. Friday finishers right next to my computer. There it is. That's going to happen by Friday at 5. And that allows me to have some flexibility in the week, but it allows me to win the week. And so the test and the busting on your chops right now is, if it's Friday and you didn't already have that list, don't pretend you live this week as intentionally productive or as focused as you could. That's just your coach being honest and real and loving on you and showing you there is a different way for next week. There's a different way for next week. And I understand that when your life gets turned upside down, if you got sick or you got laid off, you're like, I don't even know what that should be. You still need to be intentional about the week. You can still say, okay, by the end of the week, I applied for five more jobs. By the end of the week, I sent out seven prospect emails. By the end of the week, I made my new resume. By the end of the week, I went and bought the cat food. Whatever you got to do, you got to do by the end of the week. And if you have that Friday finisher, that will super help. Okay, last big idea that I promised to talk with you about today is how do you reignite everything right now? On top of everything I just shared, what is the next level? What's the next level? Ok, a couple things. Number one, how do you really reignite right now? I think if you want to really feel a deep, spiritual, psychological, philosophical recharge, this is a good time to write out your story or your life philosophy. You're gaining wisdom right now, whether you wanted to or not. You're learning what's important, what matters, how people should live, how you want to experience life. And sometimes that was unconscious. Now we're going to make it intentional. So maybe this is the time for you. That might mean right now you're going to write out your purpose statement, put it on the wall. Maybe right now you're going to write five pages about how you feel that you want to live your life and what's important to you. But writing it and memorializing it right now will give you that certainty. Because, like, oh, I made some decisions here this is what it's about. And the act of writing and printing it out and posting it, there's strength in that. Whether that means you post on the Mirror or you post on the Internet, I don't care. Another big idea. Do more FaceTime or Zooms with leaders. Leaders. Get on conversation with leaders. If that means your best leads on your team, the most aspirational people in your community, I want you to look them in the eye on FaceTime or on Zoom. I want you to be able to see them on Skype, whatever it is. I want you to be in conversation with leaders right now because they'll ask you to be a role model. They'll know to ask you how you're doing. They'll know how important it is to seize this moment. And that is my last big idea, is I started with this one, too. You got to see the opportunity you want to reignite right now. Recognize the opportunity. Recognize the opportunity. This is an opportunity to redefine yourselves, Recalibrate your priorities. Be better spouse, be better parent, get your health back in order. This is actually the greatest opportunity in the history of the world that you will ever be granted to. Now build the life that you wanted. Take this moment as an opportunity to recalibrate and redefine what matters to you. Not what matters to me. Not my preaching, not my sharing what matters to you right now. That's what is important. Recalibrate to you to what matters for you.