Mashup: 6 Leadership Lessons That Will Make You Unstoppable!

Empowerment means we give people the decision making authority and the trust to be able to work towards this vision, to allow them the autonomy, the strength, the input to equip them with the knowledge, the skills, the abilities, the technologies, the tools, the training to allow them to succeed as they march with us to achieving something extraordinary and phenomenal. That's vital. That's what empowerment is about.

Hello, my friends.

I'm Brendon Burchard, host of the Brendon show and founder of growthday.com and I'm honored to be your high performance coach today.

I believe that every day he can be inspired.

Inspired. We can live with intention and purpose. We can bring the joy and honor.

The struggles of each day to push.

Ourselves to grow, to serve, to be a role model, to lead extraordinary lives. I believe that every day is a great day to grow. Your breakthrough awaits you@growthday.com now let's get to today's episode. My friends, Share this with three friends just like you who are committed to their personal growth. And also be sure to tag me or DM me on Instagram Brendon Burchard so I can say hi. Thanks again for listening. Now let's begin.

People always ask me, brendan, what do leaders actually do? Maybe you're leading a team or you're in charge of a large organization or you're just trying to even lead your own life. I mean, what is it that leaders actually do? Many of you know, this was my graduate school work in 2001. I wrote a book called the Student Leadership Guide and I never had any clue that thing would blow up. The way that it has this framework for leadership, it's called E6 is from that book and it's been used at, I think 40 of the top 100 schools in the world. Major corporations from around the world associations have called me in to speak on this topic because it's a great framework for leadership. It answers that question, what are the major practices of leadership that we must enact on a continual basis to be able to have the amount of influence and impact we desire in our work lives or in any role in which we're leading other people? So let's get right into it. The first E of these six E's is envisioned. Great leaders envision a compelling and different and vibrant future than what is here. They have an alternative, clear view of what the world could be like tomorrow than it is today. Right. They have a shared purpose. They believe that they and others would be compelled by, interested, inspired by and want to work towards and that's a big deal. And you always read about it in leadership, right? You have to have vision. I mean, it's biblical. Where there is no vision, people perish. Right? We know the power of having that vision. So you have to sit down though, and actually do it. The reason we say envision versus just have a vision is you have to sit. It's a practice of envisioning what should tomorrow look like for my team? What should tomorrow be like for my business, for my organization? What should tomorrow be like for my life? And not just tomorrow. A long term mindset and view the dream, right? That magnificent obsession, that bold desire, the moonshot goals and purposes and missions of life, the bigger picture that's envisioning a different reality in the future than we experience today. And that's what everybody gets excited about in leadership. Where there's no vision, there's no leadership. Where there's no vision, people perish. So you have to envision, and I say that these are six practices of leadership and not six steps. Because it's not like you do envisioning once and then you move on in the process. We always have to continually sit down and envision where are we, where can we be going? It's an active process. If you set a vision one time and you forget about it, it's not going to help you accomplish the influence or the impact you want in your lifetime or in those that you lead. The second e here is enlist. As you're developing this vision, it's not just your vision. You're enlisting other people to share their voices, their perspective, their dream, their desires for where you could be going. You know, I think that the most important leadership lesson in the world is that people support what they create. If people are involved in the ideation of a vision, they're involved in creating ideas of brainstorming, of figuring out what is it we are about, what do we stand for, where are we going? Great leaders enlist that from other people. They're constantly asking people what they think, how they feel, what feels, what things they desire and need. And it's that enlistment that is always going on. A great leader is always enlisting other people to believe in the dream, to shape the dream, to stay dedicated to the dream. It's an honest and authentic and a genuine desire to see other people be involved in the process and to enjoy that process. I mean, it's so vital. And that methodology of what you know, how do you get people involved in it? You're asking questions, you're paying Attention to their needs. You're reflecting back to things that you're hearing. You're always enlisting others to support and to build this vision, this ideal future together. The third thing that great leaders are always doing is embodying their message. They stand for something. There's a congruence between who they are, the behaviors that they're enacting into the world, how they treat people, what they're working towards and what they say is important, right? It's just basic line, it's integrity. You know, it's a congruence between what we say we're after and how we are behaving. There's nothing more important, is there? You know, it's like it's that old message. It's like you don't believe the message unless you believe the messenger. So as leaders, we have to stand for and demonstrate and show and portray what we are really believing in. I mean, are we really, is our team and people around us seeing us work for it, sweat for it, sacrifice for it, champion it, over and over and over again, Even when it's hard, even when there's conflict, even when people are pissed, even when people want to quit, are you still there? Do you still stand for it? If you do, you become a legend. Third, fourth, what we have to move on to is now empowering people. Empowerment means we give people the decision making authority and the trust to be able to work towards this vision, to allow them the autonomy, the strength, the input to equip them with the knowledge, the skills, the abilities, the technologies, the tools, the training to allow them to succeed as they march with us to achieving something extraordinary and phenomenal. That's vital. That's what empowerment is about. And a lot of leaders who come in with a big vision, they get everyone excited. You know, they seem like they want everybody involved and they do a great job of standing for it. But they don't equip their teams to kick some butt. They never get to that place of real stride, of real momentum. And that happens all the time. Training other people and equipping them with everything they need to succeed has to be a vital practice of every great leader. And again, it doesn't happen just once. That's a huge failure. In the working world, especially in corporate America, great leaders come in, they nail the vision, they get people around it, they stand for something, but they only empower people at the beginning. They give some training and then they just disappear. Training has to be consistent. Coaching has to be consistent. Equipping people to deal with the New challenges, the new tools, new technologies, the new competitive realities. That's vital. We have to have that in place, right? So we've been doing this practice. We envision a better future. We enlist other people to help shape that vision, to believe in that vision, to support that vision. We stand for something. By embodying our own message. We empower other people to be able to support and to be able to win. Then we have to evaluate some of the hardest things that we do in all of leadership, to evaluate the key people who are with us, their contributions, evaluate their skills, evaluate their needs, and evaluate the ethics that are going on in our organization, in our team. Are we being excellent and are we being ethical? Is the questions that we're evaluating on, right? Are we being excellent and ethical as we are progressing? Which I guess would be the third question. Are we progressing? If not, why are we being ethical? If not, why? If our people are not being excellent, if not, why? These are the questions that we have to ask as this practice and evaluation. It's like every day as a leader, you know, you gotta keep your thumb on the pulse to see, hey, how are we doing? Are we alive? Are we moving forward? That evaluation also brings up the incredible challenge that we face as leaders, which is to give honest, direct, immediate, constructive feedback to those people who are trying to influence and lead. You know, to our collaborators, to our friends, to our followers, whatever word that you use for them. I mean, it's vital. It's vital that we are paying attention and seeing when things are going off the rails, you know, that we never check out. I mean, it's a consistent process of checking in, seeing how we're doing, and paying attention to really evaluating the progress of our mission. And that final thing, that sixth thing, that thing that makes the magic encourage. To encourage, to be the champion, to be the cheerleader, to be the person always motivating, inspiring, uplifting people. To never just have. You know, a lot of leaders, they get their pet projects, they get excited about it, and they disappear. No, man, you need to encourage on a continual basis. You need to light people up. You need to have it in your heart and in your soul, that desire to want to lift people up, you know, to lift them up and lift them off their butts, to get them excited about things. You know, if you can't motivate them with your passion and your example, then.

What are we doing?

You have to encourage people. When this gets hard, you know, when you're working towards a mission, it gets hard. Longer term, the more people Involved. The bigger the organization, the bigger the vision, the bigger the dream. The longer the duration to accomplish it. The more struggle, the more challenge, the more conflict, the more discord, the more disappointment, the more frustration, the more doubt, the more delay. All those things happen. Leaders have to deal with them. And the way they have to deal with it is always being that encouraging voice. When the chips are down, when it looks most bleak, you're still that beam of light. And when it gets dark, when it gets challenging, when there's conflict and turmoil and turbulent seas, you're solid. You're somebody that they know they can go to. Because you're always going to turn a negative into a positive. You're always going to help them see the alternative view the next step. You're going to champion people. You're going to champion the mission of the cause. That's leadership. That's the six E's of leadership. Envision, enlist, embody, empower, evaluate and encourage. And I'll say, what overlays all this is a philosophy about what we're doing, that it's important to us that there's a purpose, there's a mission to it, that we feel that deeply within us is so powerful. And we honor, we respect, and we love those we work with. Last thought. You know, I try never to use the word follower. People aren't following you. They're actively engaged. They are collaborators. When you get people to collaborate with you in all areas of these six E's, you're building leaders, you're building collaborators within the organization, within the team with those who you are serving. A magic happens. It's now it's not just you the leader. It's a group of us. We are a pure set of leaders. We are the movers and shakers who are shaping and making this mission happen every single day. We love to work together. We have fun. People are standing up. They now are helping come up with vision. They now are championing and cheering on, bringing in, enlisting other people. They now are doing all they're standing for something. They're living that value and the truth. They now are empowering other people and championing the cause. They're your eyes and your ears, evaluating how the organization, how the mission is going. They now are encouraging it so it doesn't just ride on your shoulders. When we do that right then we have this thing called leadership.

I'll give you three principles for greater discipline, and then I'll tell you the actual three things to do to generate more discipline in such a way that your Personal growth grows, that you feel like alive and connected and meaningful and joyous on this journey because that's what really matters. I mean, discipline sucks unless in some ways the outcome is progress, greater engagement and aliveness of life and greater success in whatever way you measure that. So the three principles of all of, like discipline comes down to number one, mastering your schedule. I know that sounds so boring, but it is so absolutely fundamental to your focus, to your progress, to your health. It doesn't matter if you say, okay, I only want to. I only want to schedule one thing today. That's fine with me. I'm not trying to own every hour of your life. But that one thing better be awesome and it better be a needle mover. So scheduling, show up when it's scheduled and then the third thing, which is most important as a principle or all of discipline? No discipline happens on a real consistent basis unless you have social connection. All of the research shows the most productive people, the most focused people, the people who are most fulfilled in doing meaningful work have attached a meaningful that their focus, intention, their hard work is attached to social connection. Meaning I'm going to show up for this because it's going to make me a better mom or parent. I'm going to get healthy so I have more energy for the kids. I am going to do this project so my team and company grows. So we serve more people and we make an impact. It's like the hard work must be attached to impact, but the impact isn't just self like, oh, I'll get this. It has to have a social connection. Like you have to have a reason to show up over and over and over for others. It's why we always teach in high performance.

You have to have a little card.

That says, who needs me on my A game today? I am disciplined because I would be less disciplined doing a morning show.

I'm more disciplined doing a morning show.

Because Jamie's there, she's waiting on the other end. If I don't get there, I feel like a chump. So that's important. There's three principles, right? Schedule it, show up, attach social connection.

But now here's the things I would.

Do if you said, Brendan, if you could only be disciplined about three things, what would you do? And it's not what you all think. It's totally not what you all think. And this is very much that makes me happy and progressive in life. So they're not sexy. The number one thing, if I could give anyone a discipline to always do on the first of every Single month, you do a whole life review. When that calendar hits one, as in the first of the month, you look at every major area of your life. You score yourself, you ask how you'd like to improve that and what could you do this month? Because most people never improve their life because they never face their life. Yeah, you have to look at it. So every first of the month. That's why. That's for those who are new to us. Growth Day began with Growth Day actually began because I said, let's do it on the. Let's do our personal development on the first of the month. So I go live for two hours in Growth Day. So if you're not a member, go to growthday.com because I do a full personal development seminar on the first of every single month. Because I feel like if we start.

The month off, we nail that.

We start it with good attitude, energy. But also you're looking into the month and asking is the way I've scheduled this month going to help me move towards the lifestyle I want or the accomplishment of the major three projects I'm working on in my life?

And also, if we don't do this, I feel like it is so easy and how many people can relate to this where if you don't do this, all of a sudden you blink and you're like, oh, it's halfway through the month or oh, three months have gone by. I don't even know what's. How did this even happen? Right? How many times have we done that? Like, wait a minute, it's Thanksgiving. Like, wait a minute, it's spring break. And it's like your life flies by in a blur.

This is the. For those who have the High Performance Planner, you know this page super well. This is your monthly review section in the High Performance Planner. And what it does is it makes you look at the 10 major areas of your life, from health to mental, emotional partner or love, family, friends, mission, experiences, spirit, finances, learning, growth. It helps you reflect on the things you learned in the last month, learn about others, learn about yourself, what you're grateful for, the main priorities coming up, the decisions you needed to make or could make, your monthly review and orienting yourself to your year goals and three year goals.

Like, if I don't do that on.

The first of the month, what happens? Is the middle of the month, I don't what am I doing? I might be showing up, but I'm showing up in a hot mess all.

The time because I don't have direction.

So if I could give you Anything. Start the first of the month super clear about that month. If that's all you did, I promise you'd be more engaged with your life. Second thing I do, I believe another review is needed every Sunday. So Sunday, do your weekly review and your weekly planning. I don't care if it takes 10 minutes, an hour. I think it's important to go okay on Sunday. Is this upcoming week. Am I clear about what I want of that? Am I clear about how I can serve? Am I clear about these little slots of time? Do they make sense to me?

I mean, just that it can take so fast.

So, third thing. Yeah, all right, listen. If I could give you three things to move the needle in your life. Number one is a month through on the 1st of the month, look out. And Lois, please don't think that this or the Sunday review, which is the second point, is just about your schedule. You are reviewing the major parts of your life. You're connecting with them, you're scoring them. You're asking what more you desire there and what's something simple you can do to improve that area of your life each month? It doesn't have to be huge life transformation because, look, transformation takes time. You might just like, little this little thing, this little this thing. But being aware of it, that's important. So the monthly, then the Sunday, and then you have. I just, I know everyone's already wrote this in their things and they just know it to be true. You've got to win your mornings again and bring intention for, I think, two things every day. If we can bring intention for two things every day, we win that day. To me, the first one is I'm going to bring the joy to this day. I'm going to choose my attitude. I'm going to. I'm going to develop a mindset that is unshakable, that is joyful, that is, I'm going to be in every room. It doesn't matter if I'm the loudest. I'm going to be try to be the most generous and grateful person in that room. I'm just going to bring good energy. Be responsible for the energy you are projecting onto others and into this world. So I think for me, that intention of I have an intention to have joy each day. I'm going to have some fun.

I'm going to make that happen.

Because sometimes life doesn't do it for you. They just hasn't. So I'm going to bring the joy. So that's my. That's an intention. So what I'm Saying is the third discipline is every day you have intentions for feeling life.

Yeah.

For me, feeling life means bring the joy. That's number one, I'm going to bring the joy. And number two, I'm going to make a moment with somebody today. Maybe I send them an audio. Maybe it's the way I look at my wife. Maybe it's the thing I call up my mom or I sense a beautiful appreciation email or text to somebody. But every day I'm going to bring the joy into the day and I'm going to make a moment. Because at the end of your life, I learned this face my death twice in my life. You remember these moments and scenes with other people. It's so important to realize that. And so you have to ask, are you going to have enough of those moments and scenes?

Are you. Are they going to be at the end of your life?

You kind of. It's true. If it's true. You see a movie, what are the scenes that movie going to be? You get to direct that. And I promise, the scenes in the movie almost always have these beautiful connections with others. It's like most people don't realize the ending movie of their life is love scenes and connection scenes with other people where like these, like, meaningful moments, if you will, let's just call them meaningful moments. That's what you see at the end, meaningful moments. So if that is true.

If it's true, then you have to.

Purposely structure and build in meaningful moments. So you love the movie at the end. You know that you love the movie, that you want to watch the movie again, that you appreciate that you're going to bust out the good wine and.

Have that good popcorn with that meaningful movie.

And so every day, that's. Now that's mine. I'm going to bring joy to this day and I'm going to make moments.

Yeah, that's so good.

You might have different intentions. Maybe your intention is like, I'm going to do this thing as a mom or as a leader or as a whatever.

Doesn't matter to me.

But if you don't have the intention, the days just blaze by. Nothing. You can be working hard. You can show. You can get your schedule down. You can have your calendar prioritized with all the tabs and all the different marker colors and everything else.

But if there's no intention for feeling.

You were a good robot today.

Yep.

But you didn't.

We've all had days like that where we feel like a human doing right, not a human being. That's. That's so good, Brendan. That's so good. And a moment, a meaningful moment can be different for every single person. But how many days do we go through and we forget and a meaningful moment is free? You know what I mean? It's like how many days do we forget to do that? That's so powerful. I love that.

I love that you have so to me, that's funny that the discipline is to have the intention right? Every day when you have the intention or every moment or every experience when you have the intention, it turns out better. Like this morning we talked about Jamie and I before we started, we talked about like, what do we, what's this the show about today?

What's our theme for the week?

Our theme for this week is focus and discipline. Our theme for the week, the month in growth day is confidence. And if you're not a growth day member yet, please sign up@growthday.com because last week I taught two hours on confidence. Jonathan Fields from the good life project taught, you know, over an hour and a half on confidence and so did Dave Hollis and they took questions and did coaching. And upcoming we've got Mel Robbins, Jenna Kutcher, Jamie, oh, my gosh, David Bach is this week. I mean, it's going to be epic, guys. So go to growthday.com because you can get live coaching twice a week with us and you get the replays for less than a dollar a friggin day for the year. I mean, it's unbelievable. So go to growth day.com is my favorite thing. And my favorite thing.

Yeah, it's amazing what you're doing.

My favorite thing.

Glow aton mo princey. I'm trying to. There's so many incredible people in there. So super excited.

Coming up.

He's just fire.

I can listen to him all day long. Like I know, it's, it's insane.

Like, oh, okay, we're overtime. I love you guys. Listen, I want to remind you every day you can choose a new attitude. You can improve. You can take that step. You can show up for your schedule. Just show up. Remember, remember to do the things we talked about today. But remember, you're stronger than you think. Future holds good things for you. And every day is a good day to grow.

Hey, my friends, it's Brendon Burchard. Thanks for joining me this morning for a very important topic as we discuss some of difficult, difficult topics of life. Those topics of loss, of grief, of dealing with tragedy, difficulty, struggle, loneliness. Of how do we carry on when bad things happen? How do we find Strength and grace and peace in some of the most difficult situations and moments of our lives. That's a big topic today. I encourage you today to enter and frame this conversation in your own mind, to develop your own mindset and attitude towards these conversations before we even have them. Because that is one secret, in fact, to dealing with difficulties of life. To set our minds in advance, to set our intentions in advance, to think through and contemplate. How will I cope with that? How will I face that? How will I endure that? That ultimately is one of the great strengths of consciousness, of presence, of intention, of anticipation that allows us to deal with some of the worst issues of life. So let's enter this as a community positive to have a beautiful conversation. Let's do it from a perspective of knowing that we are going to deal with some unpleasant emotions that might come up. And let's face that willingly, with trust and faith and gratitude, because I will share one thing that is beautiful about loss and grief, and that is you only experience those things and feel those things. If you had something and you were connected to something that you enjoyed, something that you felt was important, something that was beautiful, something that was meaningful to you, and so you had a sense of meaningful connection and something maybe shifted or changed, but that was a beautiful gift. I do want to set the stage a little bit more too, because I probably have a different perspective about this conversation. And many of you have heard about, you know, and I know I got a lot of questions in advance. Are you going to talk about the five stages of grief? And. No, I'm not. If you've studied Elizabeth Kubler Ross or the work or the ideals behind the five stages of grief, if you don't, if you haven't heard of that work before, the idea that there's these five stages, denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. I'm more of the mind of which of Elizabeth's who came up with that idea and wrote about that so compellingly towards the end of her life, she mentioned that she wished that it had never been framed as stages. Because as she wrote about and spoke about towards the end of her life, as a theorist and a person who had given hospice care, she thought, you know, I wish everyone didn't think there were these stages you're supposed to go through. You know, some of you, you feel like you're supposed to feel great by now. You feel like, well, I should have.

Moved through these stages.

I should be okay by now. And some of the greatest, you know, moments of grace that you ever allow yourself in Life is the grace of time, the grace of allowing. Like every single person here, if you look at what we're doing here, these zoom tiles, every person here will cope with grief differently, right?

Everything I'm going to share with you.

Today is just, by nature, going to be a generic nature. Everyone will cope differently. And if you're still struggling through and you think, jeez, I should be in the stage of acceptance by now, I want to let you know the person who literally came up with the idea of the five stages of grief wished.

It wasn't called stages because she thought.

Everyone deals with it differently. It's not sequential. These things become circular in time. And not everybody feels all of these emotions either, right? The people who I've lost in my life, I've never yet had the sense of anger toward. I didn't have a sense of anger that that thing happened. I didn't have anger towards my father dying. And I know that might sound completely crazy to people, but that was an emotion that I experienced with death, partially because the way that I have faced mortality throughout my life, not everyone goes.

Through all these stages.

So I want to set that frame off the bat. Everybody copes differently. There is no right or wrong way to experience loss. There is, however, a healthy way to re engage life. We know from 50 years of psychological study, and you all know inherently and innately that there are ways that we cope that are healthy and there are ways that don't make us feel good. There are things that we do that can lead to less ability to continue on with life in a happy way. One of the most important and powerful frames I can give you for loss and grief above all else and above everything else, is conscious anticipation. Conscious anticipation. Consciousness or awareness in life is so important if we are going to cope well. And what we usually mean when we speak about that, especially with loss and grief, is having the ability to anticipate that it will happen, okay? That it will happen. That if you haven't faced your own mortality and your own death yet, I deeply invite you to do that at some point. Face your mortality, your own personal mortality. Most people have never had a conversation about death in their own mind with themselves, let alone contemplating that maybe they would lose a parent one day, or a sibling one day, or a job one day. In other words, in a spiritual practice, we would talk about this as a concept of awareness to impermanence. You've heard that phrase before, awareness to impermanence, that nothing is permanent. That in a lot of spiritual principles you might think of, well, what is permanent maybe is if. If it's God or if it's universe or it's the dao or the way that there might be something, spirit that is permanent, but in the human experience, in our natural world, things are impermanent. Can you face that? Can you face that? Can you anticipate that? Let me switch metaphors for you real quickly. As many of you know, I do this for a living. I talk to groups of people all the time. I'm out on social media all the time. And I talk with so many influencers, so many people who want to be leaders and who are building up their brands and their careers, and they're shocked, shocked when someone judges them on the Internet. They're amazed when someone posts a negative just mean comment. They can't believe it. Can you believe this person posted this mean thing on my video? I spent months on, on my life's work, I posted a message that's beautiful about my family, and this person attacked me. Can you believe it? I'm like, yes. Why are you surprised it's called the Internet. Anyone ever been surprised you got a mean attack on the Internet? Well, I tell my peers all the time. I'm like, please don't be surprised that some. That it's something that I guarantee that will happen. If you are commuting, if you are driving to work or you are driving somewhere and you are cut off by somebody in traffic and you go into a rage about it, I'm like, you were surprised. And I know these are simple and simplistic and almost silly metaphors here, but I just want to switch your mind into that anticipatory power that we all have, that when we actually anticipate, oh, this is going to happen, we are way more capable of being centered than when we don't anticipate it. I'm not saying there will not be shock. I am not saying there won't be heartache. I am not saying there won't be incredible like fear or denial or regret or sadness. But what I'm suggesting to you now is find peace with the inevitable. If we can find peace with the inevitable in advance, we are more able to cope. Hey, it's Brandon jumping back in here again. Are you looking to go to the next level in your life right now? The next level of joy, abundance, success? Then you already know that you need to journal about your lessons learned in your life. You got to track your moods and your habits. You have to learn from the best personal development coaches and teachers in the world. And you Got to stay inspired and accountable so that you can be more focused, disciplined, joyous and keep growing. That's what the Growth Day app is going to help you to do, my friend. It's the world's first all in one personal development app. It has all of the tools you need, all the coaching and the community that you need to level up to progress every week, to track your breakthroughs, and to keep growing in every area of your life consistently over the long term. So go start your transformation right now at Growth Day or just download the Growth Day app on your phone right now. Every day. You can keep improving every day. We are here for you and every day is truly a great day to grow together. So let's make self improvement a way of life. Let's make that self improvement stick. Go to growthday.com right now. As you know, I've been blessed to coach some of the highest level groups in the military across all branches. And the way that they deal with what is about to come, when it is just like one of the most difficult missions or projects or tours of their lifetime, is they rehearse it over and over and over and over again in their mind and in practice and in the field. They get comfortable with what is going to be an uncomfortable, unpleasant, potentially terrorizing situation. I don't pretend that's easy. And that's one reason I love the military. Their willingness to do what is incredibly difficult to protect the freedoms that we all enjoy.

But I will share.

There's some kind of power in that and I had that when I was a 19 year old kid and I had my car accident. It forced me to face death. Any fans here of philosophy? Anyone ever read philosophy? Well, if you've never really gotten to the study of philosophy, I hope you will and you'll know. Chapter one in all of philosophy, almost across all philosophers in the history of the world. Chapter one, if we could generalize, says you're going to die. Now let's talk about life. That's like the fundamental of philosophy. So I read so much, I got comfortable with the fact that I was.

Going to lose people.

There was going to be loss in life anticipation. Now, I know this does not sound really like motivating, but that's not the point here. The point is to say, can we anticipate it? When I received the call from my dad letting me know that he had been just diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia, out of nowhere he woke up, was lacking some balance as he walked down the hallway. It was Mother's Day. Of 2009. So he woke up on Mother's Day, didn't feel good. Mom said, what's wrong with you? So I don't feel good. He's kind of unbalanced. The weeks before, he's playing golf and racquetball and bowling. He's healthy. All of a sudden, something's wrong, doesn't get better. They go to the hospital. Within a few hours, he's sitting with two doctors who is look who are looking at his blood work, and then do some more tests. And they let him know he has seven days to live. And they say, you have aml, acute myeloid leukemia. There's two types of leukemia. AML is the one that usually takes the person quickly. And they said, you have seven days because what happens is your stem cells. I don't want to go to the whole thing about leukemia, but essentially you're creating blood that's not good, and ultimately it shuts down your organs. I know I could go deeper into that. But those who know what I'm talking about, leukemia, it strikes fast. So he had seven days. And soon as he told me that, I said, okay. And I was in shock, and I wanted to deny it, and I had fear. And that comes from shock. You know, when you hear news that you didn't anticipate or something happens you didn't anticipate, you're going to have a shock reaction. And for me, I was shocked about it at first, and those emotions come in. And by the end of the conversation, though, as I felt those emotions come up, I also was releasing them because I'd already contemplated my father's passing years earlier in journaling activities of how I would think of the passing of people. And I know that sounds almost fatalistic, but, you know, have you ever heard that saying, you don't want to leave things unsaid? I was reading a book one time and said, you know what? Contemplate the passing of people who are important in your life so that you don't leave things unsaid, so that you think of, like, wow, what if this person. What if this is my last moment with this person? If this was my last moment with this person, what would I love to say to them and communicate to them, and don't leave those things unsaid. Now, I know that's difficult because all of us have had situations where someone has passed or know someone who's passed and things were unsaid. And that is incredibly unsettling. It brings up shock, and it brings up regret, and it Brings up sadness, which we'll talk about those emotions. But also in this moment, in the here and now. Listen, none of us can take back whatever's happened in our lives, right? Whatever's happened has happened. It is as it was, as it is. We are here, we are here now. And all we can do moving forward together as a group is anticipate moving forward. We can't. Like, this is not a thing where I'm going to try to be on a healing journey of the things of the decades past for any of us, because we all heal in our own time, in our own ways. But I'm here to say it's incredibly powerful if we can contemplate mortality and anticipate it and go, wow, what should I say to my kids? What should I say to my loved ones? Let me make sure I take care of people and treat people in ways that I don't regret and that things are said. One reason I was at peace, because my father had already said everything he needed to say to me. I was lucky on that. I'd already said everything I needed to say. Now we just had to go through the process with honor and integrity and respect and love of end of life and not deny it. Face it, my dad faced it with a positive attitude. He knew it was coming. They told him, you have seven days. He's a Marine, so he made it 59 days. Good job, dad. And he fought with great, great attitude. I just couldn't believe it. I kept waiting for his attitude to sour. Never did. Couldn't believe it. He anticipated the end and he anticipated how he wanted to face it. And it was incredible. And I was lucky to witness that. And I want to let you know I've also witnessed the complete opposite in care before, been with families where it was the opposite. And that wasn't right or wrong either. It is. People cope with the end of life is the way that they can. And for those of you who've cared for someone at the end of their lives, I want to let you know that caregiver guilt is something that if you are facing it or you've ever.

Faced it, that's okay.

That's entirely normal. And that you need to grant yourself the peace of knowing you did the best you could at the time with what you knew. You know, I've had the blessing of working with a lot of medical professionals, doctors and hospice care workers who talk about this.

Gosh, I wish I could.

You know, we all wish we could take back time and go change things. We can't and so today, grant yourself the peace and the gift of knowing you did the best that you could at the time that you knew how to do. They did the best they knew that they could. I wish, you know, that was the first time I've ever cared for somebody personally for months on end with leukemia. I wish I knew more about leukemia. At the time, I didn't know. I didn't know. So some things I would have done differently and dad would have done differently and my family would have done differently. We did the best we could, and so did dad. And I want to let you know that no matter what you've dealt with in grief in the past, your family or others loss, losing a job, your divorce, your breakup, your loss of job, listen, you were as conscious as you were at that moment. You did what you could, and you need to give yourself grace because please listen to me, my friends. At that time, you were in shock and you were coping. And if you just need a little science from, you know, Brendan right now, let me drop some science on you. A stunning fact that when people are in shock or coping, they don't always perform at their highest level. Best. Oh, my gosh. Did the performance guy just tell us that and say it's okay?

Yes.

I'm letting you know it's okay that you weren't absolutely phenomenal and perfect and other people around you weren't absolutely and phenomenal and perfect. It's okay if you were getting divorced, the two of you fought. It's okay if you're getting fired and you screamed at your boss, it's okay. Whatever happened, you now must go. I accept it as it was. I'm at peace with what it was. I did the best I knew how at the time. And even if you don't believe you did the best as you could at the time, it doesn't matter. Because yesterday's darkness didn't rise with the sun today. You're in a new moment. You're in a new moment. Your cells are new right now. This spirit, this energy, if you take a deep breath in that air you're breathing, that's fresh. But I want to let you know, we are in the here and now. Take grace and connection with the moment for yourself. We've all had pain. We've all had sadness. We can allow the moment now to refresh us. A moment now to have a new feeling, a new emotion, a new sense about ourselves, a new belief about ourselves, a new faith in ourselves, a new faith in the world. Right now. This is a new moment. And with new moments, there's second chances. And with new second chances, there's new abilities to begin anew. But even if we don't begin anew to allow ourselves the peace and the grace of the moment. So important, you know, if you think about anticipation being something that's really powerful.

I also want to share.

Acceptance is really powerful. To accept ourselves as we are now, no matter what has happened to us. To accept life as it is now, even if it's not perfect. To be in a ready state of acceptance is really powerful. To be accepting when your kids act out and they're freaking out and they're angry. To be accepting when your team doesn't get it right. To be accepting when the project falls apart. To be accepting when the video doesn't get the likes you want just to be allowing and surrendering to the outcomes of life. Face them as they are. Identifying what are the controllable variables here, what's not controllable, and asking for the grace of the wisdom to know the difference between the two. There's a lot of things you can't control. Let them go. The things that you can control, you can only control in this moment. So if you didn't control it right in the past, let it go. It's now uncontrollable now. What are the controllable factors? Living in the now will always be.

Always be.

The first sort of gate to enter, to free yourself from pain, to step back into this moment of now, to accept, to realize this is what is. Even if I didn't want it this.

Way, this is what is.

And what is is here. Okay, now, how would I like to interpret it? What would I like to do next? These are the power you think of. If you can anticipate things will happen and you can accept as is what the world is, while you also accept your power to shift and shape and control and move things around that you can. That's an uncommon perspective to come into things with, to anticipate them and to accept those two things are so powerful.

How do you turn the feeling of defeat into a success mindset? Those days you get disappointed, you get sad, you get upset, someone makes fun of you, and all of a sudden all. All of your motivation and your focus and your drive drains out with the disappointment. How do you turn it around? You know, if you went for that big project and you failed, it didn't work out. You put the video out, nobody watched it. You know, you did what you've been trying to do, but you just didn't get the accolades or the rewards, and now you feel defeated and like, tomorrow you're kind of like, screw it. Why even try?

We've got to learn how to change.

That mindset around so can we can have some more resiliency and motivation so that we can keep at it in our dreams. But the question is how? That's what this episode is about. The first thing you have to remember, as soon as defeat strikes, and it will. If you're chasing big missions, big purposes, things that really matter to you, you're going to have down days, you're going to have bad days. Allow that everybody wants to be so Pollyannish or super positive and say, oh, there is no defeat. There is no failure. Oh, no, there's failure. I mean, there really is. And we should stop pretending that people don't fall on their face and feel bad and have bad days.

Allow it. When you have a bad day, allow.

That moment to say, you know what? Yeah, this isn't the way I wanted it to go. And then immediately shift into learning. Disappointment immediately goes away. Soon you shift into learning.

Learning.

So your question is, first, allow it. Say, okay, I am disappointed. I have higher standards. I wanted it to go better. But instead of now, keep focusing on those things where you beat yourself up and beat yourself and beat yourself up. You say to yourself, okay, what's three things I learned?

Go and start focusing on what you learned.

Specifically, when you get defeated in your life, I want you to start analyzing what defeated you. But instead of saying, I did bad here and bad here and bad here, turn it into a question about. First, what did I learn about myself?

Second, what did I learn about other people? Third, what did I learn about the world? Fourth, what can I do about it?

That's how you deal with the disappointments. What did I learn about myself? What did I learn about other people? What did I learn about the world and what can I do? Now, that focus to those four questions from any disappointment or defeat will help charge you up because you'll be focused more on the lessons and what you can do next. The second big idea when you have a defeat is this. Immediately that day that you got defeated, I want you to take three action steps. No matter what those are, sometimes the three action steps are. Okay, that didn't work out well. Send an email to my team explaining or apologizing. Sometimes the action step is to call somebody, send a note to somebody, send a text. Sometimes the action step can simply be stop at the grocery store.

Get my favorite meal. So tonight I feel better about myself.

Whatever it is, just make sure, soon as the disappointment happens, you set three goals that very day and do them. One of those goals can be meditate and think about it. Another goal can be take a long walk. Another goal can be, let's exercise. Another goal can be, call a friend, go out to coffee. I don't care what it is, my friend. But you need those goals and you need to do them immediate. Because here's the thing, the more momentum you have, doesn't matter toward what goal. The more momentum you have, the more motivation you'll feel. And that motivation can often wipe out that feeling of disappointment and move you forward. And then the third big idea, when you get defeated, stop focusing so much on yourself. I know it's easy to stew in.

Your own hurt or your anger, your.

Disappointment, but instead start thinking about that very next day. How can I rise to another level of service? That's the question I want you ask the next day. When you wake up that next day after disappointment, say, you know what? Today I have the opportunity to serve. Let me do it with full joy and heart.

Let me challenge myself this day.

Yes, yesterday wasn't what I wanted to.

Be, but this day I'm going to.

Challenge myself again to serve with full joy and full heart. If you can do these simple things, I know they're just internal dialogues I'm talking about, you're really just looking at the disappointment or the defeat and saying, okay, what did I learn about myself.

Other people and the world and what can I do?

You're really just saying, okay, what is the three steps I can take today to get some more momentum back? And you're really just waking up the next day and saying, hey, how can I serve even better today? That might sound so simplistic, but most people don't do those things. They keep stewing over and over and over on the hurt and the angst and the stress, and so they never break free. If you ask a different quality of question, you can live a different quality of life and overcome those disappointments.

Today I get to share some ideas with you on health that I have learned in my own personal journey, but also as a high performance coach for 16 years. One of the fundamental, most important things that we all want in our life is a sense of vitality. And that vitality is we want to feel mentally engaged, alert, focused, enthusiastic. We want to feel energetically, like physically energized.

Right? Physically.

We want to feel a sense of that health. And it is one of really the only Four things that we all deeply desire. We talk a lot about it here at Growth Day, that you can give anybody anything. But what we all really, truly want is aliveness. That is what I mean by vibrancy. Connection with others and with ourselves. Meaningful pursuits, things that we're doing that we enjoy or see as important or contributing, and growth, like growing as persons. So all of that is really important. But that sense of aliveness, I always.

Put that at the top of that.

Little diagram because it's so important to us when we don't have a sense of aliveness. Even if we have amazing relationships, when we are fatigued and wiped out, we can have the greatest marriage or partner or spouse or intimate relationship, but the.

Zest is not there.

We can have a great job, we can have incredible opportunities to serve. We can love our passions and our hobbies. But if we are wiped out, it.

Doesn'T feel as good.

I know you all know this. That is why it is so important that we focus on our health. Now, I want to do full disclaimers with you. I am not a doctor. I am not a psychiatrist. I am not a neuroscientist. I am not a health advisor, coach, or medical professional in any capacity. I am a high performance coach. This means I work with people primarily on their mindset and their habits and their relationships. And today, what I would like to share is a couple ideas. And I will remind you, as a high performance coach, one of my fundamental jobs is to challenge my clients to a higher level. So in doing that, I will of course share my own journey and my own struggles, but I'll mostly focus on.

What we've learned in the science.

I will also share with you the idea that I'll be empathetic about it, but also I want to be that person who challenges you in this area of your life. For 15 years, every audience I've stood in front of in my life, I have said, if this has not been the year that you have made the decision as an adult to get in the best health of your life ever, make that this year. I have said this for 16 years in front of every audience I can get in front of, because I believe most of us, we look back, I.

Was healthier when I was a kid.

Or maybe I was healthier when I was in my 20s or whatever. And we just don't say, you know what, this is going to be that year. But I know some of you have you said, maybe this is the year I am going to eat healthier, I am going to Sleep better. I am going to work out more. I am going to pay attention to my nutrition or my supplementation. I am going to run a marathon. I mean, what you all do as strivers and achievers always blows my mind and it raises my aspiration. But I want to do the same.

Thing for you today.

I want you to raise your aspiration and your vision in your health. Even if you are struggling right now, which you can hear, we all do. Even if it has been a challenge in the past, okay, but at some point we have to take dramatic personal responsibility for our health. If it is true that we all want a sense of aliveness, mental energy, physical vitality that pop and zest in our lives. And if that is true, then accept the challenge today. And please be aware I'm offering this today in that context, knowing as we, you know, we can have the empathetic conversation, but we also must have the personal accountability and personal vision conversation in personal growth. And that is my job for you today. My job is to raise that level up. That is what I do as a high performance coach. Those are my disclaimers for you today. Because as I jump into my points, some of them will feel like I am pushing. And I know sometimes people say, oh, you know what? He doesn't understand or he thinks everybody. I am like, no, no, no, I understand, but it is still my job. It is my job as a high performance coach to lift that higher level, to be that kind but demanding force in our lives. In my life. In your lives. If I didn't demand more from myself than how I naturally felt all the time, trust me, there would be no growth day. There would be no half billion views of my videos or 100 million downloads of my podcasts. There would be no impact. We would have never met. Because it is very easy for me not to do my daily job or my health routines.

Just like you.

It is an easy choice not to do the things we know that are good for us. How do we get us there? We have got to set a higher standard. We have got to demand it of ourselves. So forgive me, that will be my framing today. It is not always popular, especially in the health category, to say these things. Especially in the mental health category to say these things. So please understand my framing, not a doctor high performance coach going to challenge you. And you will know that with this very first point. So here we go. My first point today is health is lucky and self respect.

Woo.

The first time I ever said that was by accident on stage and I heard myself ooh and the audience kind.

Of hushed out a little bit.

I thought, oh, I'm in trouble. But here's what I mean by that.

Health.

We have to understand there is a evolutionary and a biological reason that you feel the way that you do. It's very important to understand in both, I really believe, mental health and physical health. It is that kind of 50, 50 kind of thing when we blend it together, by the way. But there's no question that some people biologically feel more fatigued or more depressed or more anxious. We have to understand that you and me are not the same biologically and how our energy might be. I hope that that always introduces empathy and compassion, that there's a big luck card that we get. I have friends, literally who are born without limbs. I have friends who are born with conditions in which their brain functions in very unhealthy ways. I have friends who have died so early of cancer. I have friends who have struggled with mental health. I have friends who've committed suicide. I have friends and family who struggle constantly with all sorts of biological health issues that is not their fault. And it's important to realize that some of you, you feel terrible biologically, even though you're drinking all your water, you're eating all your greens, you do move and you do exercise. And so I'm here to say there is no preaching. We all have to take the cards we've been dealt and figure out how to care for ourselves, how to optimize the best that we can, how to improve, even if it's little bit incremental by incremental, but it starts with a biological understanding of where we are at. And this is why again, as a person who's not a medical professional, I'm like, listen, if you don't understand closely how you feel and why you feel the way that you do, please, please, please, if you've never done it, go get a full workup of every friggin health test you can as an adult, as somebody who is accountable for your health. Go get the blood tests, go see the nutritionist or the dietitians, go work out with a trainer, go literally do all the genetic testing that you can do to understand what is up with you. I always tell the story of a friend of mine who is one of my partners in one of my businesses, one of my best friends in the world, who discovered at the age of 40 that, you know, every morning he always had the sniffles and his nose was running and he's clearing his throat and everything, and found at the age of 40 that he was allergic to eggs at the age of 40. Didn't know. Spent 40 years having these reactions that made him fatigued and blowing his nose because he was allergic to eggs. And I think that's a sad thing about our society is that we're not taught or trained or honestly empowered or equipped or served with some simple health support when we were young that says, hey, look, seems like you're allergic to this thing. Don't eat it. I mean, how is that not part of our educational process or our healthcare system? That of course, we would all find out very early on and be tested multiple stages of our life, including every new decade. What are we allergic to? What preconditions might we have? What's our genetic makeup leading us towards? So this is where I say health is luck, right? Health might be luck, but it's your job to be aware. Your job, no one else's, no one's going to come and save you here. You've got to do the testing and see the medical professionals and dietitians and people who can help you optimize and care for your body. I believe that has to be something we demand of ourselves. It is not served to us, at least not in the society I live in. So we have to take accountability for that. So health is luck. But here is the thing, it is also self respect and self love.

Okay, my friend, I hope you enjoyed.

This episode of the Brendon Show. Tell some people about this episode if.

It'S on each of us to spread.

Positivity and empowerment during these times of chaos and negativity. Right? So I'm asking you to be the dealer of hope and personal growth and education in your tribe. So take a screenshot right now and share the screenshot and this link to this episode with three of your friends today.

Post it on social media, use the hashtag growthday.

That's growthday because that's the name of my company and we're always giving away.

Prizes to our community.

If you'd like to help me personally, then please rate and review the podcasts on Apple Podcasts. Give us some stars, cheer us on, leave a review. Because believe it or not, that stuff actually really does help and I read all of them. So my last thought for today, please remember you are stronger than you think and the future holds good things for you. Tomorrow is can be an inspired day. Every new morning is a second chance. Every day is a great day to grow. We're thankful to have you here in the growth day community. So be sure to go deeper with us@growthday.com.

Sa.