Predict Your Dream's Chances of Success

Foreign. Hey, my friends, it's Brendon Burchard and welcome to the Brendan Show. This is a podcast about helping you reach high performance in your life, in every area of your life. It's about staying more motivated, more confident, more disciplined and on purpose. You know, the high performance experience is really about feeling more vibrant, more connected, more excellent, more fulfilled in your life. But it's also challenging you because you and I both know it's difficult to reach those levels of high performance without support, without ongoing commitment and dedication to your own personal development. So welcome to our HPX community. Thank you for joining us here on the Brendon Show. I'm super pumped for today's episode. Before we begin, I want to let you know that we have specials right now on our HPX nutrition line. If you didn't know it, I rolled out three specific products to help you with your performance. These are three specific supplements that will really give you the edge. Now don't worry, I'm not starting an MLM or a downline. I'm not asking you to promote any of my products. And frankly, just like you, there's a lot of different companies and a lot of different products that I love and I enjoy and I'm not trying to compete with. It was specifically, I could not find three world class supplements that specifically helped me in these areas. So we've got HPX Optimize, which is a mental focus and energy product for your brain health. Then we've got Essentials, which is a functional multivitamin which we've basically enhanced for longevity, for joint health and for vitality and digestion. But what we did, instead of like making a multivitamin where they sprinkled a million different things in there that actually have no effect, we put in dosages here that you'll be amazed by. And then finally we've got HPX Organic Boost, which is the energy drink mix that I take because it's 100% organic. Organic. It's actually delicious too, I have to tell you that. So go check it out. Hpxwellness.com, everything you need to know is right there. And if you've ever wanted to know how to reach the high performance experience in terms of your biology and physiology, these products can really support you. Go to hpxwellness.com and without further ado onto today's episode.

Productivity conversations. Because without a tie to your dreams is useless. And you trying to live a fully charged or high performing life without reconnecting your day, reconnecting your activities, reconnecting your tasks to your dreams. If you don't do that, it's going to be hard to really enjoy life. So let's dig down into the psychology of productivity and discover why is it sometimes you go after your goals with so much confidence and engagement and joy, and other days you get sucked into that distraction or that avoidance. Sometimes that reason is doubt as we covered right before. But I feel like the day before we covered fear and you're ready to go beyond fear. Is that true, ladies and gentlemen? So let's go into the future. Let's talk about this conversation of why you may or may not actually reach those dreams you wrote down. Because did you know there's an entire science behind that? It's called goal attainment theory in psychological studies, and it's pretty straightforward. Over the last 50 years, it's become a fairly predictable reason why people achieve their goals and why some don't. And once you know these things, you can re engineer them to make damn sure you're gonna achieve those dreams. Cause isn't that what we all want? Yes. It's like it's your time to achieve the dreams. So you have to check in 10 reasons that you're dogging it or won't try, or will fail chasing your dreams. Now, these reasons again can be reverse engineered. So while I'll present them as somewhat of the negative, I'll say, cause you don't do this, you don't achieve your dreams. You can also flip it. If you do this, you'll achieve your dreams. And what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna give you 10 categories to think about and evaluate your cell phone as we try to achieve our dreams. And I know you'll like this framework because if you ever wake up on Wednesday and you're like, ugh, why am I not doing anything either? It's because of the double order of pad thai and the bottle of wine last night. Just me once in a while. Just me or one of these things you weren't considering. And so let's jump into it. Okay? If you got those dreams, I want you to out of those dreams you wrote down, what's the biggest one you have? Like the thing, the goal, or the biggest dream you really want to achieve? That one. What is that thing for you? Let's have that in mind as we work our way through because it's gonna explain a lot about productivity. First thing, first thing, people need to be able to see their future identity. Doing the dream, enjoying the dream, experiencing the dream. The first category that dictates whether or not you do something or don't do something is future identity. If you can't actually imagine yourself doing that thing or achieving that thing, you won't, because you'll make excuses to stop. You'll say, I can see myself doing that. I want to. But if that future identity keeps going away, meaning once in a while, maybe at New Year's, yeah, New Year's, we can all dream up something. We can imagine great things at New Year's. But if by February 1, March 1, April 1, June, July, August, September, you can't see it no more, you'll stop chasing it. Raise your hand if you follow. That's why in the mornings again, you gotta reconnect to your dreams. And you have to constantly visualize yourself experiencing what you want. Constantly, more often than you think you need to. Because psychologically, the less your future vision is comprising of seeing yourself actually do it, actually experiencing, really truly doing it, you'll back away because you'll imagine yourself doing other things. And so that is important. So think about any dreams you haven't achieved yet. Isn't it true sometimes with those dreams you really couldn't see it? Like, you heard about other people having it, but you couldn't see yourself there? I was that way when I was thinking about money. Cause where I came from, there wasn't a lot of money. And so this whole idea of a millionaire, I said, I wanna be a millionaire one day. That was the dream, I'll be a millionaire. But I actually couldn't see myself as that. Raise your hand if you follow. Like you kinda, you hear it and you're like, good idea. But what happens is you see other people and you go, well, I'm not like her, or I'm not like him, or I don't have those same skill sets. I don't know those same things. And so as much as you wish for it, and as much as you believe it's a good thing, your mind tells you to stop. Isn't that a bummer? Your mind says, I want that. I wish for it. Your mind logically says, this would be a good thing for me. But if your mind can't also imagine it, true for you, it says, stop, delay, do something else. Try something else. Grab on this other idea. So you've got to put yourself into the future. Put yourself into the future. I had to do that in tons of areas of my dreams, including this one at the stage I could not see myself up here for many years. I wanted to be up on this stage, I think about it. Wouldn't it be great if I could impact people with my message? What a wonderful thing. Gosh, I wish that. I wish one day I have people who I can help, and they come from all around the world. I wish that I believe it could happen because I've seen it for other people. But I couldn't see me up there yet. That was a far away and scary dream for me at this. I couldn't see it. I couldn't see it, but I knew that was a problem. So I'd lay awake in bed and I'd dream of being up on stage, and it would make me awfully uncomfortable. You ever have that? I would just. I would imagine myself having the worst and the most terrible situations up on stage. I'd lay awake in bed. I would literally, as I imagined myself speaking, laying in bed, I'd start sweating. Like, literally, my hands would get all clammy. Like, I'd get short of breath. I would literally just lay and I'd just stay on it. I'd just keep watching it and watching it and seeing it and seeing it. I was like, I got it. I gotta. I gotta see myself there, and I gotta see myself through the hardest situations. Like, what would happen if I was walking, I fell off the stage? What would I do? Oh, I'd get back up and I'd keep talking. I make fun of myself. Okay, what would happen if I threw up on myself? What would I do? Okay, what would happen if my just, you know, something terrible? If I, you know, and I just imagine all these scenarios and they were terrible, but I would also see myself recovering from them over and over and over. And I would make myself visualize that. And it was scary, but I do that in every single situation that I can. Your visualization game is so important to your goals. The second big area that matters is intrinsic value. What it means is, is working towards that dream. Doing the things that you're doing. Your activities, your tasks, your checklists. Is it something you know you will take intrinsic value from? If you don't know the word intrinsic value, think of it like internal reward. Meaning. Intrinsic value is you would do it no matter what because you have personal meaning or joy from it. Even if you didn't get paid, even if no one recognized or rewarded you, you would just. You would do it because you're passionate about it. You would do it because you. Because you like it. You do it because you would enjoy it. A lot of people never. I have a lot of friends who, like, jump into something like, let's say a very tangible dream, like real estate. Very tangible dream, right. Buying, selling homes. Super tangible. And they'll say, I want to own. I can see myself being wealthy. I want to do it. And yet they don't make any progress towards it. Because there's actually, for them, for that person, there might not be any intrinsic value. Yes, they want the future identity of wealth, but they don't actually enjoy or have passion for real estate. How many Understand, it's why you've heard this thing before. You got to find your own thing, you know, you got to find something that you really enjoy because you can see yourself doing lots of things in the future and your mind can fool yourself. This will be great. I can see myself doing this. And then if it's not something you have intrinsic value for, your brain will say, let's do something else. And you'll search through tons of other wrong things. Cause your body and your brain just going, I need to find something I'm passionate about. I can engage, I can enjoy. So think about your big dream. Intrinsically doing the work to get it. Do you actually enjoy doing the work to get it? On a scale of 1 to 10? 1. I just don't enjoy that. Brendan. 10. OMG. Love it. Where are you at? Intrinsic value, that means internal reward. Where are you at in your numbers? Other big category that economists and psychologists like to look at is what's called utility value. Utility value, that means if you go for that dream or that goal, do you tangible rewards? Like, do you actually. Is it utilitarian? Meaning, does it make sense to do it because you actually get something tangible in return? Like if I'm going to put 50 bucks into it, will I make 50 bucks back and maybe reward with a trophy or something? Meaning, is there something tangible that comes from this activity that I can see? Sense, smell, taste, touch? It's a tangible reality. Here's why a lot of people never become millionaires when they say, I want to be a millionaire. Even though they're doing something, they can see themselves doing it. Even though they think they would enjoy it, they don't recognize what would be the point. What's the utility value? So they're dreaming conceptually of being a millionaire, but they haven't said, what would I actually do with it? Right. What would the utility of that million dollars be? Right, I'd like to be a millionaire. Okay, if I gave you the million, what specifically would you do with it? Specifically not. I'd buy a new car. Cause guess what? Cars Cost less than a million dollars. How many follow? Well, I'd buy a new car, new house for myself. Okay, what are you going to do with the next $800,000? Right? You got to know this utilitarian value of what you're doing, meaning can you see the tangible outcome and you get excited about it? Okay, so score of 1 to 10. When you've been thinking about that big dream, could you see what you would actually get from it? Do you know what you would get? Do you know what you would get from having done that or achieved that? That's utility value. Our next up is called opportunity cost. This is why tons of people don't chase their dream. Well, I want to chase this opportunity, but it would come at a cost. Well, that would cost my well being. I'd have to sacrifice my health or my time with my family, or, you know what? If I pursue that, I won't get to do this thing I enjoy so much. I'd have to stop my hobby or my relationships. Lots of you mess up the wiring of your brain by constantly thinking about all the things you'll miss out on if you actually go after what you really want. How many understand it's like a terrible version of sitting and thinking about, oh, I got. I know I want that thing, but you know, I'll miss out on these other things. It's that old thing where if we don't believe we can have both, we just won't go. If you feel like you have to sacrifice something, so have you felt like you had to sacrifice something to have your dream that you really like, that you're not willing to pay that quote, unquote, opportunity cost. So if you have a high level of opportunity cost where you're like, I don't wanna chase this dream, this is gonna cost me way too much. That would be like a one and an opportunity to cost. If it's not gonna cost you too much, you think I can do this? That might be a 10 if I'm sitting down. Doesn't matter the level of person. If I'm trying to predict if they'll actually do something, I take them through this. Next up, delay time. Basically, delay time is how long is it gonna take for you to get it. If you think it's gonna take you 30 years to get it, you won't start on Monday. Raise your hand if you follow. Humans, despite having tremendous vision, are actually short term thinkers. It's one of our challenges that we face, one of our ethical dilemmas. Do things that we know are Good for us for long term or sacrifice, because the short term can bring pleasure. And a lot of people say, well, that's gonna take so long. So they don't begin. I had a woman come to my studio one time and interview me for, I can't remember, Forbes or Fast Company, one of the two magazines. And she came to the studio and she's sharing with me. My husband and I are really gonna do this. I said, what? She says this, go and interview influencers. That's what I want to do. I want to interview influencers and we want to build a company doing that. Right now this magazine is paying me, but we really think in like five or six years I can be out doing it by myself and really build a brand. Interviewing influencers. I said, oh, that's great, but it's not going to take five or six years. She goes, what do you mean? I said, if you think it's going to take five or six years, you won't ever begin. I think you could actually achieve that in the next six to nine months. What would you do now? If you could realize your dream in the next year or two is a much better conceptual thought than what would I do if that dream is going to take 10 years, 15 or 20? The longer delay time you see to experiencing your dream, the less work you'll do right now. So a really long delay time is a problem, but if you can see it happening, sooner the better. That's why I always tell people, take whatever time you think it's going to take to achieve your dream. Cut it in half and ask, if I could have it that fast, what would I do on Monday? Doesn't mean I'm saying everyone can achieve their dream twice as fast. But I'm saying, hell, it's worth trying because otherwise you'll just wait forever. So however long you think it's gonna take your dream, if you really own your dream, say, I own my dream. If you own that dream, cut the accomplishment time in half and ask, what would I do on Monday if I could have it that much faster? What would be the decisions? What would be the actions? What would be the projects? Let's go.

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Next, personal control. If we don't feel we can personally control a situation or personally bring things into fruition, meaning you don't have personal power over it to be able to do something, you won't try it, you won't try it. A lot of people don't try to get things like they want. They like, you know, where they have to get qualified for something or have to apply for something, or they have to, you know, go through so many years and some board has to approve of them. They don't try those things because they think I don't like that because I can't control the outcome. So they don't try for some things that might be good for them. But we all do that in some ways or another. If you think, well, I can't influence the situation, you don't even try. You don't even try. So if you have high personal control, you're like, I'm in it, I can do it. But if you say I don't have the ability to shape this, I don't have what psychologists sometimes call self efficacy, then why even try? Too geeky or you're geeking with me. You geeking with me. Because if you just go home and you reverse engineer this, everything's great. If you start saying, okay, I can see myself doing this, I'm gonna make sure I do it in a way that I personally enjoy for intrinsic value. I can see the tangible outcomes I'll get from that. I know I won't have to sacrifice these things. I can do them both and it will happen shorter amount of time than I think and I can handle it. Then you're in the game. Because can you handle it, my friends? Yes or no? Turn the person left, right, shake them, say you can handle it.

Next up.

Oh, the number of unhappy spouses who don't chase dreams. Dot com. The number of unhappy spouses who don't chase dreams because they use this one. This is a monster in goal attainment that this kills you. If you don't believe you'll have the social support to chase and enjoy your dreams. You won't try or you'll sabotage, or you'll make excuses or you'll blame someone else. But one thing you won't do is take action. If you don't believe you'll have social support. And many of us, we get so myopic in social support, we'll just say, well, my spouse won't support me, so I won't do it. I'm like, oh, well, I think your spouse is great. But did you know it's one person. There's six plus billion of us. And this is a really important topic in high performance. Having a positive, supportive environment is everything. So for those who are like, but I don't have that, Brendan. I'm like, no, no, no, you're lacking one or two. Stop making stories. Because what we do is like, he or she doesn't support me, so I won't go. I'm like, come on, one person. And so what we say is, well, look, this is really important for your next level. Not everybody has to believe in you, cheer you on, support you, praise you, give you the trophies, cheerlead you every day. It's your dream. If it was also their dream, they would have it. If you own your dream, then you don't start feeling like everybody else has to approve your dream. I feel like maybe the spirit sewed up that dream in your heart for a reason. They gave you that. Maybe they sewed up a different one in this person. Not everybody has to come along the ride with you. And in fact, most won't because there's this success tax. Most people are going to think you're crazy and not understand your dream because they got their own dream. They got their own future identity, their own benefits and intrinsic values. They got their own way of looking at things. So why are you trying to convince everybody or thinking that one somebody has to approve? I never thought anybody had to approve of me ever. It was never even on my radar. I never thought anybody had to support me wanting to get on a stage or turn on a video camera. I never thought. In fact, I anticipated the success tax. I thought, you know what, if you stick your neck out, someone's going to try to hit it. But I don't need anybody to support my dream. I was gifted this dream. I am the caretaker of this dream. It is my job to carry this dream over the finish line and hand it back to the creator who gave it to me. To know that I took care of was my gift. I don't think anyone else has to have it. I'm fine when people don't wanna do what I do or believe in what I say. I'm cool with the critics. That's cool. Your spouse doesn't have to 100 just support your crazy ideas. How many times did you think your spouse or your partners were nutso, Right? It's not their job to support you. It's your job to believe in you. It's not their job. It isn't. Don't feel like you gotta convince 100% of the people you interact with to believe you. Cause if you do that, you'll be less likely to take action. Cause isn't it true there'll be lots of people who don't believe in you. There'll be so many people who don't believe in you. I went back to my high school reunion. Which one was it? It was my 20, 25, 20, 20 year reunion. A couple back years back, I went to my 20 year reunion and one of the popular girls came up to me and she goes, I just don't get it. And at this point, so many people have bought me a beer and if you don't know anything about it, I can handle about one beer. And I'm like, woo hoo. So I'm like, I'm like, I'm sorry, I know what you're talking about. She says, I just don't get it. How did we not see it? And I said, see what? She goes, you became you. We didn't see it. I'm like, who didn't see it? She goes, we just, we didn't see it. I'm like, oh no, no, you didn't see it. We had 400 kids in that school. I had a couple friends, not many, but I had a couple out of the 400, I had two or three people who thought I was okay. I thought that was pretty good. Two or three out of 400, I'll take it all day long. Give me, give me, give me, give me, give me, give me. I thought it was great. I thought they were nuts for believing this dork kid, you know? So I had two or three. I said no. And remember I was on the school newspaper? Oh yeah, that's right. Yeah. And remember, I mean, they made me the managing editor of it. I mean that was some potential. I'm just saying like, hey, you didn't have to believe in me and it's okay. And I think that's important that. Listen, there's gonna be hundreds of people who don't believe in you. It's that old thing. I always tell people, it's like, if rejection is your issue or if social support is your issue, you just gotta first own your own dream. Know everyone else got their own too. And instead of being Mad at the people who don't support you and kicking them out of your life and saying, I don't want any negative people in my life. That's what the social media stars say today. Get rid of 100% of those negative people in your life. I'm like, what if that's your family or your spouse or the kids? Oh, you teenager who doubts me, get out. We're really supposed to kick everybody out who gives us a hard time and who is negative? Sometimes those people are people who you actually love or you are put into a family with. I would say, look, don't think of life as this all or nothing game. You can have negative people and without kicking them out, dismissing them, being rude to them, you can also go build the network and the social community you need over here to have your dream. Not everybody over here has to agree. So you go build two or three or four or five friends and followers or team who do believe. And sometimes those negative people, they're just in a tough time of their life. Who in this room has ever been negative towards somebody else's dream? Be honest. And you're so mad that they're doing it to you. Like, realize that just happens. But you have to believe you'll have some social support. And I tell people all the time, if you don't think you're gonna have any social support, get really good at what you do, get some success and then hire some social support. You know what I'm saying? You know, that's the entrepreneur. That's the American way right there. Hire into it. You don't look, everyone thinks you're nuts. Become Henry Ford. Everyone thinks you're nuts. Become Elon Musk. Everyone thinks you're nuts. Become Sarah Blakely. If everyone thinks you're nuts, you know what? That's okay. Do your thing and get so good at it that you build some wealth behind it and then hire the people. Next up, bandwidth, belief. Bandwidth belief. If you believe that you won't have the bandwidth to be able to pursue the dream consistently.

You'Ll stop.

Bandwidth means you feel like you have room on your plate, right? If you have a full plate, you feel like, I, I'm already too busy, I can't chase my dream up, my plate is too full. But if you feel like you have bandwidth, there's a little bit of a white space in your time and you have the ability to move forward, you're much more likely to schedule things, block things, and start moving forward. Now here's the thing. As you're Hearing this framework, don't just think about yourself and your dream. Maybe you think about your spouse's dream, your kid's dream, your team's dream. And if they're not getting ahead, the reasons are on this slide. Raise your hand and follow. There's a switch in our seminar about to happen in which I'm not just gonna talk to you as you as high performers, but I'm gonna talk to you as leaders as well. The people you're trying to influence or coach or lead if they're not doing something. Somewhere on this slide is the answer. Somewhere on this slide explains your teenager's issues, explains why your team isn't going for it, explains why you aren't going for it fully. Next up, resources. Well, I don't have the time or the materials or the equipment or whatever. I don't have something, so I'm not gonna be able to do it right. It's like back to Dale Carnegie and Napoleon Hill and later Jim Rohn, who would say, look, you don't have to have the resources. You have to be resourceful. And that's where it really begins. And that resourcefulness has to come from not worrying about the resources, but also, hey, if you want to reverse engineer this, go borrow or build the resources that you need. Don't think that they're just supposed to be there. Go start triangulating and building them and forming relationships that can give you the resources to do things. And last big piece is health. If I don't have the energy, I could have all those other things, and I won't go for it. I could have all the other things, but I just won't go for it. And that's why yesterday and today, it's so important what we are doing here together. Because if we can't manage our energy, then everything could literally line up perfectly for us. So your job with other people, sometimes as you're trying to get them to be more productive, is also monitor and be aware of their own energy. Cause when people don't have a lot, the breakthroughs don't happen, the change doesn't happen. Y' all like this framework. It explains it all. So what might be useful for you is to create a Sunday review where every Sunday you think about how well you're advancing and producing, how your productivity has been, and you sit down and go, okay, did I do as much as I want? Let me go revisit these 10 things Brendan just shared. Because if you had any concerns in those areas or weren't aware of those areas, you would, of course, be thinking, well, I'm just unconsciously sabotaging myself. No, you just don't know the things that help you achieve two different things. Everyone thinks, oh, I'm sabotaging myself. Most of the time when someone says, I'm sabotaging myself, what they mean is, I don't really know what to do. And I haven't been sticking to it because I don't know why I should be doing. Doing it. So the easiest excuse ever is like, no, I'm sabotaging myself. Oh, you know, Brendan, I'm sabotaging myself. Oh, you don't. I'm sabotaging myself. Oh, let's sabotage. What a great story. I'm sabotage. What you're doing is lacking clarity or competency or confidence in what to do. That's all. Very rarely, very rarely are people actually sabotaging themselves. Certainly not consciously. And if it's unconscious, it can be overridden by helping them achieve greater clarity, greater competence, and greater confidence. Not always. But look, if it's not that case, then if it is the other case and it's unconscious, then get yourself a great therapist. And I mean that. I think we have too much stigma about therapy. I'm like, man, who's had a great experience with a therapist in your life? Yeah, absolutely. In our culture, we need to be. I think we should just not worry about if that's cool or not cool. Like, therapy is great. If you're unconsciously just year over year or stuck somewhere, go get help. That's what therapy's for. I'm a huge, huge, huge, huge fan. Huge advocate. We have therapists come through HPA all the time. I cheer them on. Their work is super and supremely important. It's awesome. And we need to lose the stigma of mental health issues in the. In the United States of America. You gotta lose it. Gotta lose it. All right.

Hey, it's Brendan. I hope you enjoyed that episode, and I hope it helped you reach another level of high performance in your life, whether it's just a shift in your mindset or shift in your habits or a shift in your intention for the day. I really honor you for listening to the Brendon show, and I'm deeply thankful. So could you do me a favor? Could you just go onto itunes or Apple Podcasts and rate and review this episode or any of our episodes? And also, while you're there to help me, just download the last five episodes, too, onto your phone, because, you know, Apple really cares about the downloads and the rating and reviews and I've never really asked for that in six years of podcasting and finally my friends convinced me to ask you to do that for me. I've never asked anything where my podcast convinced ever, but I'd really, really appreciate if you could do that. Also, if you would like some more in depth training, please don't forget that every single month I go live for two hours and teach new and original personal development research new frameworks to my entire virtual community in our HPX coaching program. And you can just go to hpxcoaching.com that's hpxcoaching.com to learn all about the different options there. But listen, I'm live two hours every single month with literally thousands of high achievers from around the world who tune in to get these new frameworks for reaching high performance in their life. Sometimes we talk about relationships, sometimes we talk about breaking bad habits. Sometimes we talk about achieving another level of confidence or discipline or goal attainment. But we are there every single month and I'd love for you to join us. Just go to hpxcoaching.com to see all of your options and really join us. Dedicate yourself to personal mastery. Dedicate yourself to this journey. Not just once in a while with an episode here or there or a book there, but literally a program that could change your Life. It's called HPX Coaching and you can go to hpxcoaching.com until next time, my friends, please remember every single day you can choose to be average or ordinary or just kind of go through the motions. Or you can be more intentional, more disciplined, more excellence driven what you do because you know you need to serve those you love and those that you lead. You can choose to be extraordinary. So my friends, go out there today and be extraordinary. Sa.