A Lesson from My Friend Ray Dalio | Ray Dalio's Three Phases

Thank you for joining me today. It's Brian Gubernick, and welcome to the No Days Off podcast, where we believe that every single day brings a new opportunity to get better. Better at business, better at health, better at relationships, and just better at life. So let's get into it. Today I want to be discussing or talking about my friend Ray Dalio's approach to your business career, the 3 phases to your business career. And, and Ray Dalio is not really my friend. I wish he was, but I feel like I know him because I've read virtually everything he's ever put out and watched pretty much every video on YouTube I could find. If you don't know Ray Dalio, Look him up. My favorite work that he does though is in his book Principles of Life and Work. A fantastic long read that everyone should probably take on. If you're listening to it on Audible, his thick Bronx accent might make it a little challenging, but I'll tell you what, it's well worth the time. Ray Dalio in his book Principles talks about so many great things, but one thing that he discusses that I'm going to do my best to paraphrase. And this is my interpretation of what he had shared. So maybe if you read it, you might hear it or see it a little differently than me, but it's, it's one of my biggest takeaways, maybe my biggest takeaway from that book at the time I read it. And it's probably one I need to go revisit because I'm sure at this phase of my life, just a few years later or so, uh, I probably have a different take on a variety of things within that book. But let's talk about specifically these three phases that Ray discusses. Ray says in your business career, most of us in our business career, or maybe just any— maybe it's not business specifically, maybe it's just throughout your life— Ray says we go through really 3 distinct phases, or we should aim or strive to go through 3 phases. Phase number 1 is when you spend your time proving to yourself that you can do it. Showing or proving to yourself that you in fact can do it. So if I reflect on my personal life, not to go too deep into this, I'm an open book, I just don't want to go too long today. I want to make sure we honor our 10 minutes or less, no days off pledge. But in my career, you know, I came out of college and I was very lost. I had had, you know, up to that point, you know, a fair amount of success or wins or whatever it may be. Like, you know, I had a good experience in upbringing and had some wins, and, you know, I was fairly confident in my abilities. And in college, I got good grades and all that and got a good job. And I came out of school and had a real difficult time adapting to the real world. I went into the accounting profession, and I was very average. At what I was doing. I started to have a lot of self-doubt, like, man, am I as good as I think I am? And then I moved into the real estate space, became an investor, because that's what we do in Phoenix when we don't know what we want to do with our life, we become a real estate investor. And, you know, I had some early success there, but then the real estate market crashed, and I definitely crashed with it. So if I had self-doubt before I got into real estate, I had a tremendous amount of self-doubt after that. And I was really wondering, like, do I have what it takes? Like, am I nearly as good as I once thought I was? And so after the market crashed, I really spent the next 6 years truly proving to myself— I mean, it's funny to reflect on it now, I don't know if I thought about it this way in the moment, but I was proving to myself that I actually was half decent. I actually could be successful. That I wasn't, dare I say, a failure. I don't think I thought of myself as a failure just yet, but that I did have what it takes to be successful. And I worked my ass off for years, head down, just proving it to myself. And I think many of you can relate. The first phase of your career or maybe a career path, I should say, is proving to yourself that you can do it. Phase number 2, Ray describes, is hopefully a phase that's rather short-lived. I think for some of us, it might be longer than it should be. I think we may even know people who are still living in this phase for far past the time they should have spent in it. But phase 2 is proving to others that you did it. Proving to others that you did it. Now, again, I hope that this phase is short-lived. I hope that it was relatively short-lived for me. But the truth of the matter is, after you work your ass off for years and years and finally prove to yourself that you can do it, we all like a little accolade. We all like a little applause. Some of us like a lot of accolade and a lot of applause. But we all want to be recognized. That's human. There's nothing wrong with that. And we spend phase 2, you know, craving or looking for maybe that recognition for— from our peers. Again, you're human. There's nothing wrong with admitting that. Where there might be challenges if that phase goes on for a long time, and, and Ray talks around that. But phase 2, again, which is hopefully short-lived, is showing others that you did it. Now phase 3, and what we should all be striving to get to, Phase 3 is when you show others, when you start to show others how, how, how to do what it is you did, when you start to show others how to accomplish what it is you've accomplished, when you start mentoring and coaching. Ray calls this passing the baton, passing the baton to the next generation. By showing others what it is you did, you help them achieve their own success and call it what it is, you start to create a legacy. You start to create a much more positive impact on your industry or on society at large. Now, this can be done in a lot of different ways. Maybe it's mentoring, maybe it's teaching, maybe it's writing your experiences, maybe it's a podcast, whatever it may be. But Dalio believes that sharing your knowledge and your experience, by the way, it doesn't just benefit others, but it also helps you kind of deepen your own understanding. Like we've talked about this on a previous episode about if you want to learn something, teach it. Well, if you want to learn even more, if you want to go deeper in your career in this phase 3, I would say spend time showing others how to do what it is you did, and then it improves your own understanding and improves your own thinking. In addition, passing your knowledge and experience going to what I was saying earlier, really does help you create a legacy that extends well beyond just your own lifetime. Helping others achieve their goals and contribute to a better future for generations to come, I mean, it is— it can be the most rewarding time you ever spend, right? So I'm sharing with you these 3 phases. Phase 1, prove to yourself that you can do it. Phase 2, hopefully short-lived, show others that you achieved it. And Phase 3, the most rewarding phase, help others get to where it is you've gotten. Show others how to do what it is you did. I share with those— I share those 3 phases because I think it's a great path for all of us to check ourselves against. Where are you at today? Are you in Phase 1? Okay, cool. Keep your head down, work your ass off, prove to yourself, show you, show yourself, like look in the mirror and say, am I doing it? Am I getting there? What kind of success am I having? Am I making progress? Am I taking no days off and getting better every single day? Keep your head down and do the work. Steven Pressfield says, just show up. Or am I in phase 2? You know, am I not driving maybe as hard? And I'm, I'm, I, I like, I like the spotlight. Now, not saying you're a bad guy or girl for that. I'm just saying recognize the phase you're in and you may want to consider moving on. And Phase 3, are you in Phase 3? Are you showing others how to do what it is you did? That's the most rewarding phase. So where are you at right now? The focusing question, where are you at in your life, in your career? And by the way, what you may find is you're at phase 3 in certain areas of your life and you're at phase 1 in others. I'll tell you, for me personally, in my business career right now, I probably am in phase 3 in a lot of different areas. I mean, hell, I mean, I teach, I train, I try to do my best to show others, you know, their path and give them my list of failures and things that worked. I mean, I like to think I'm in phase 3, but let's be clear, as a father, I'm phase 1, man. I aspire to be in phase 2 and phase 3, but I'm still trying to figure that out. I've got a ways to go, right? So I'm phase 1 as a dad, I'm phase 3 in business, and I think you can figure out phases in other areas. But where are you at right now? Where do you aspire to be? And what are the steps that you have to take to get get there? Just something to think around today. That's all I have for you. Thank you so much for spending time with me today. Remember the No Days Off podcast. Keep in mind, if you're liking what we're talking about, it would mean a lot to me if you shared on social or with your friends in whatever way you do. It would mean a lot to get it out there and spread the No Days Off movement. So please, please, please help me out. No Days Off podcast. Keep in mind, every single day brings a new opportunity to get better. So let's get after it. Thank you.