4 Lessons Learned in 2018

Hey, my friends, it's brendon, and we're doing a special episode of the brendon show right now to give a little bit of recap of this rocking and rolling, crazy 2018. I've got some notes here because y' all been asking, like, hey, what are your big resolutions for 2019? I'm gonna do that in another episode. In this one, I want to talk about what were my four greatest lessons personally and professionally in 2018? Because you all saw me out there. It was a crazy year. It was an incredibly difficult year. Some challenges I've never faced in my career, in my life and luckily survived them all and also feel like 2018 was such a great year of growth and learning. I don't know how you feel about it. Whether you're, like, stressed out about 2018 or you're, like, happy and fulfilled or you're frustrated wherever you are. I hope that you'll take a little bit of practice at the end of the year and say, okay, what were the biggest, like, punch me in the head kind of lessons that I learned so that you can carry those lessons into 2019 and accelerate your success in 2019 even faster. So I've got four big ideas here, and I'll give a little context for those of you who didn't, like, maybe you're new to the community or haven't seen all the crazy stuff we did this year. It was bananas. First, I was on the road this year more than I've been in my entire life. More travel days than I've ever had before, which was kind of strategic because this was the first year of my life since I was 19 years old that I wasn't writing, researching, or launching a brand new book. So I've been writing a book since I was 19 years old. I'm in my 40s now. I wasn't writing anything this year. Like, I was doing a lot of other things. So I chose to travel more to be out with you all, which we'll talk about. To be out on the road, I mean, it was just. It was really intense. I spoke to over 55,000 people live this year. That's in, like, convention centers and arenas and hotel ballrooms. That's at other people's seminars. That's at my seminars. It was super intense. And I know many of you all want to, you know, be influencers or you're public speakers or want to be that or you're just in a place where you're like, hey, you know, I really want to communicate and share My message and change the world. And I'm telling you, when you have the blessing of reaching that many people, it's incredible and it's very taxing and difficult, but a beautiful experience along the way. This was a year we also really pushed and pushed out. Many of you guys got and supported high performance habits. So I thank you for that. Last year in 2017, this launched as became Amazon's top three business and leadership books of the entire year. Just smashed it on the bestseller list. We had a great run with that book and it still amazingly at the end of 2018 is kind of sound, just pretty much as strong as it did a year ago. So we're really excited that message penetrated the marketplace this year. You also saw me launch the High Performance Planner. This was a new product. I've been working on this for three years. Kind of like a two in one day scheduler and productivity journal. So working on that. Just launched that for the holidays. If you haven't got that link somewhere in this post, but I'm not really here to like pitch you on anything I'm talking about like it was just a lot of stuff, right? Pushing a book, talking to 55,000 people on the road. This year also saw me relaunch and refilm Total Product Blueprint, which is my course for online thought leaders. That's just a monster of a course to film. Takes weeks and weeks and weeks to film it, to produce it, to put that new course out there. We reacquired some of my online course program from the Oprah Winfrey Network so that we could put it out there in larger audiences. And that's been an amazing piece. We launched All Access in a way that really pushed it out there. So I've. Let's see. Last week I finished filming my 24th online course. I'm blessed. A lot of people recognize like, hey, we were the first ones to bring comprehensive online courses to the personal development world. And you know, it's been 24 courses since then. So I just finished filming that last week. That was big. This year we also hired another, I think 10, 13 people in my personal brand for Brendan.com and then in our other companies we passed our thousandth employee, which was crazy. Those are companies I invest in, lead or advise quarterly. Gosh. My wife sold her exercise studios. That happened this year where she was fully transitioned out of it. So that gave her more time and allowed us to travel and have more fun together. You know, all that was happening. So to say it was a busy year would be crazy. And along the way though, some of the. I share all that context, not to say, hey, look at me, because trust me, that was the hardest stuff on my plate that's ever happened. We also, I lost some friends this year. You know, I had some friends who were very, very sick right now, as we head into the final part of this year, it was a really transitionary year, if that's a word, transitionary. Who knows? It was a lot of transition in one year and a lot of big goals and a lot of big team and a lot of people involved. So I thought I'd share all that context just to say, okay, out of all that insanity, here's the four things that I learned. That they were like the knock to my head that I had to figure out. Number one, which many of you know, because you're along with the journey with me is health is like, I've always really worked extremely hard to maintain an incredible level of energy in my mental body. My. I'm sorry, in my, you know, mental, emotional, physical, spiritual being. Just trying to do everything I can. From the way that I work out to what I consume, to what I don't consume, to how I rest, to how I meditate, to how I recover. Like everything in my life has always been about how do I bring the joy and if I'm going to generate the energy I want to create for you guys, how do I do that specifically? Well, I've always got these routines and everything else, but what happened this year, I was kind of had my health taken away a little bit in mid October. I got pneumonia and tonsillitis at the same time while I was on the road doing multiple four day and multiple five day events where I'm kind of the lead trainer. And that kicked my butt. And I'm still honestly recovering from it. Like, I'm, I'm still feeling it. I'm still feeling. Heading into the final part of this year. I'm still recovering, don't worry. Clean bill of health. Doctors like, you're good to go. They're just, your body's going to be recovering, you'll be tired for a while. And I made it 41, 42 years without feeling fatigue. Outside of times of injury, you know. You know, I don't think I've ever had the flu. I don't really ever get sick. When I get sick, it's like sniffles. But this one was something. It just smacked me. I mean, I was down and out. It's why I feel like I'm way behind on my episodes. For you all. It's why I feel like we're launching a few things in January that I'd hoped to launch in October. So taking care of my health always been a priority. This year, I learned what it feels like when it's gone, and many have been with me for a long time. That happened in 2011 when I had my brain injury and I snapped my wrist and my ribs and my hip. So I'm not, you know, new to pain. I'm not new to being sick. But this was the first time where I also, with the sickness, lost motivation. You know, where it was, like, even when I had, like, when I was really sick in the past of my life, I would still, like, wake up in the day and I'd prime my mind, get excited about what's to come, and just go. This year, there was about the last two months. I really had to work on that. And there were plenty of days I was just like, ugh. Not because I didn't love my life or I wasn't grateful or present. You've been there before. Like, when you just. You physically feel terrible, it is hard to get your mind right. So heading into 2019 is an absolute focus on getting my overall health back up to the level I want. Recovering from the pneumonia episode. So that's a big, big takeaway. Health. So I ask you, what could you do to dramatically advance your health in 2019 if you were going to make it your best year of health ever, what would you have to stop eating? Stop doing and start eating and start doing? What would be your recovery practice? What would be your sleep practice? What would be your workout practice? What would you eat in the morning? What would you eat in the afternoon? What would you eat in the evening? What types of diets or exercise routines would you go into? But also, what about mental health? Like, how are you going to stay motivated? How are you going to stay focused and present throughout the year? These are questions on my mind right now. I hope they're on your mind as well. The second big takeaway I got from the year 2018 is to hire your team faster. So many of you have been hearing about this for the last two years. I'm like, I'm going to hire all these people, and I'm very happy with the folks that we have. We've got a great new team on board. For a decade of my life, I did all of my marketing, and now I have a team and a support for that, and I really love it. And that's awesome. And, you know, there Were so many delays in other parts of my life that prevented me from hiring as many people as I wanted to. So the big lesson was set up a structure and a system where I can hire faster and get me out of the way. Because I feel like where we've hired, I think 10, 11, 13. I can't remember the numbers, actually. Do you know, is it 13? I feel like 13 is real, but it could be totally. It is. Okay. I would love to have 30. So we're less than half where I need to be. And part of that's because some big news I'll be announcing to y' all soon. But it's also like, hey, why did it take 10 years to get the full marketing team that I really needed? Partially was it was my passion to do all the marketing for you all. So if you ever saw my Facebook page grow into 5 million fans, all those pictures. I took those pictures. All those quote cards, I took the picture behind the quote card. All those quote cards I personally scheduled, I created. I did all that literally until the end of this year. And I enjoyed that process, and it was part of my art. But in order to serve more people, I need to create a greater balance. So I brought in a bigger marketing team for that, and I really believe hire soon. Many of you, you've been waiting to hire that first virtual assistant or that person to help you at the house so you can focus on your business, so you can support you with the kids or somebody who can, you know, come in and help just clean the house. Some even waiting to hire that manager, that CEO, that CEO. And I'm here to tell you, do it, like, set your quarter one goals of 2019 to hire the team that you need. Don't finish quarter one without the team that you need in place, trained and going. For some of you, that might be 100 employees. Some of you, that's 10. I don't know what your situation is, but I'm here to tell you, hire sooner, hire better. Third big lesson I got this year, which has been a really great joy, is involve your spouse or your partner, your significant other more in your brand, in your career. And I've always had this great blessing of having a spouse who, if you've ever seen Denise at my events with me on stage, like, we're the craziest, sweet, you know, couple, because she's my whole life, and I wouldn't get to do this today if she hadn't supported me from the very beginning. Never doubted, cheered me on, bought me groceries when I Went bankrupt doing the first gig. I mean, just literally has had my back the whole time. But one of the reasons that I love her and one of the reasons I married her was because I was like, this is an independent woman. I've got my passion, she's got hers. She can do her own thing. She's never gonna be like worried about what I'm up to. She's like, we both had this tremendous freedom and trust and cheering on of each other, but a little bit from afar. Like, she ran exercise studios and I did my thing. And a lot of what I would do in the major moves in my life, of course we talk about it at dinner or at night or on our walks every day, but there was still a removal because she was running an entire business that had her. She had her own 30 plus employees, she was building her own brand and a mega successful one. So she was just like doing her thing, right. And a traditional sort of franchise workout type business where mine was all influencer based, thought leader based, expert based. So we didn't have a lot of overlap. I didn't help her that much with hers, she didn't help me that much with mine, frankly. We loved that. And then this beautiful thing happened. She became so wildly successful at it, she was able to sell her two studios and in selling her two studios, she consulted them and then ended up with time. And with that time, like I was trying not to get her involved in anything I was doing because I wanted her find her own thing and her stepping into my business, not something she really wants to do. And I think we're good with our team. And yet we also found a great deep passion for a new lifestyle brand that we want to start, that we want to do together, that kind of aligns perfectly with our passions. And so I'll be announcing that in January. But just the process of going through that and brainstorming with her about what does that look like, what does that sound like, what's the aesthetic, what is the brand, what are the values and the mission? And what are we really after here? How do we want to impact people here? And having somebody who isn't an employee, who isn't on the team, who isn't in my industry directly, who isn't a promotional partner, who isn't paying me, who just to brainstorming have that with, who knows me so intimately well, that's been everything. So how can you involve your partner, your spouse, your friends, your family in some of the big things you have coming up in 2019? Because what I've always seen is that too many people don't share enough about what they're working on. Too many people are disconnected. Like their family doesn't really know what they think, feel, want, or desire. Their extended group around them aren't really familiar with what they really desire of life. And one big thing that we learned about this book and this research study, as many of you know, was listen. The highest performing people in the world are courageous. But the way that they practice that courage is in a very simple, elegant way. They share their true thoughts, feelings, needs, desires, requests with others. More often than under performers, underperformers kind of keep it all in. They're embarrassed about what they want. They fear judgment, so they don't share. And if they share and they get judgment or pushback, they shut down. Where high performers, they share. They also get judgment and pushback, but they keep going. And that's a critical difference of success in life. So I'm encouraging you in 2019, be more open, more consistent, more honest, more courageous and sharing. What's up? What do you want? What do you need this year? Where could you some help? What are those big ambitions? What's that big mountain you want to climb that other people might make fun of you for doing? If you're not sharing that with the immediate people around you, including your spouse, your partner, significant other, your wife, your husband, your family, the kids, then what's up with that silence? And where else in 2018 did that silence hurt your progress or your sense of connection or the ability for you to be really fulfilled? Last big idea. My fourth big lesson of 2018. And this really comes back to what I was telling you earlier, why I've been on the road so much, talking to 55,000 people live. You can imagine after a lot of those stage presentations, it was like signing books, signing books, signing books, signing books. It was like, oh my gosh, I've read your stuff, or thank you for that speech, or I just heard of you for the first time today. Omg, you're amazing. Hopefully it was a lot of that. And so what I would encourage you, especially for those who are entrepreneurs, business owners, go have meetups with your customers. Go have scheduled time to sit down with real life customers to talk about their experience, how your product helps them, what they think of your brand, what they think of your message, what they think of you. Cause what happens is a lot of times, especially in this world, the real engagement that influencers or people of celebrity or big businesses have is here. And you know, they're talking, they're dming, they're looking at the comments, you know, they're replying to the emails. But this is no substitute for someone looking you in the eye and saying, hey, thank you for creating that product. Thank you for all the team and all the work and all the things that I don't even know about that must take for you to make the difference in the world because there's not just validation there, which is nice, there's real connection there and you'll learn a lot. You know, I have customers telling me about things that products and programs we put out five, six, seven years ago and they're really excited about and they're like, are you going to bring that back? Or hey, you know what? I have this one thing. I mean, part of the genesis of the High Performance Planner. This is what I used in my life to organize my life and to organize me. And it was something that I've been doing for years and years and years. I didn't really have the full vision of doing it the way that we ultimately launched it until I talked to a curb billion people who had read this and were looking to operationalize the mindsets and habits that successful people have. And it really put a fire under my butt. I was kind of put this off a little bit more to finish another project. But I talked to so many people who had this that made me launch this early and on time. So I think sometimes your customers can be your motivating factor, they can be your validating factor. They can help you see what's working, what's not working. And you know, I have the blessing that that's been built into my company for 10 years because you know, we do eight live events of our own every year. Right. So I'm with people all the time but some of our events are really big and I might not get to meet a lot of people out there because I'm protecting my voice and I'm doing four days of training and you know, it's pretty intense. I hope you've all been to one of our events. If you haven't, we've got High Performance Academy coming up right at the beginning of the year in March in our only North American event of 2019. So check out the link in this post somewhere if you would like to attend a four day transformational event with me. I feel like people need to really skill up for 2019 and that would be my last point, is determine the major skills you're going to need to win in 2019 and start developing them now. Like, for me, I'm starting to learn Spanish. For me, I'm starting to learn how to manage more teams virtually. For me, I'm learning how to hire faster. For me, I'm learning how to change an aesthetic in our graphic design. Like, I'm trying to skill up, but I also know that many people aren't ready for what might happen in 2019, which is the economy not being as awesome as it could. We might really experience the beginning of a downturn in 2019. So in your business, what do you need to shore up? What do you need to launch? What do you need to get out there in that first quarter of 2019? I really believe that whatever you have learned in 2018, I would apply it and hit the ground running fast. Like, make January, February, March, like, stunning. Like, be a SWAT team. Don't be the person who goes, I, I'm gonna do something this year, and you don't do anything until April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December. Oops, I didn't do it. Let's make it out 2020. Like, make it now. Like, really get in the game. Like, I want you to hustle so hard, January, February, March, that you're like, okay, 2019 is off to a great start. So. And we hit that mid year cycle, or the end of that, you know, third quarter, and the economy starts struggling. You're already in a great place. And I really believe that what most people are projecting for 2019 will happen. I think it might hit some tough times. And so if you already struggle in 2018, learn those lessons, get ready to crush it in 2019. I hope this served you, my friends. I know I don't usually do videos like this for the Brennan show, but I really wanted just connect with you, share with you kind of what I've learned. It's also been an opportunity doing the video like this to also look ya in the eye and, you know, talk in your ear and say, thank you. This was a rocking and rolling year. I mean, the. In every way, our business is growing in every way, our team's growing in every way, the brand's growing in every way. Just, you know, things I've been doing in my career for 12 years are catching fire in different segments, and it's really fun to have that. But I also know, you know, my community and my teaching and my students are really not mine anymore. Maybe they were the first couple years, but now they're yours. That y' all are ones who are sharing this. You're the ones who are building, you know, the following by sharing the quote cards, sharing these videos, going to the blog, you know, buying the products, enrolling in our courses, coming to our seminars. We've kind of caught this new wind and. And I think it's my new haircut. I think that's what's really driving it. I think it's because you all have been so awesome. And I can't tell you how much it meant to me when I had pneumonia this year to hear how many of you gave the shout outs, the kindness, the just, I think, patience in, you know, releasing some of the things we wanted to release earlier. And I'm here to tell you in 2019, some huge things are coming. So make sure you're also following me on Instagram. We're gonna make a bunch of huge announcements this year. Make sure that you get to our seminars soon because these will be sold out events. This more than ever, we're kind of getting that vibe. And make sure you take care of your health. You hire up soon, you involve the people in your life with your major goals and ambitions, and you meet the end users, the customers who are using your stuff or who you are impacting. Even if it's just people who you're impacting through your nonprofit or through your daily work. Talk with the people whose lives you're impacting. It will motivate you. It will fire you up, because that's exactly what it's done for me at the end of 2018.