Discover Your Unique Ability and Transform Your Life Forever

The goal, even though people think it's unrealistic, is to spend not only your day, but your whole life within your unique ability. Make it tangible. Like, I. I believe that thoughts are things. You think something, you can make it reality. Everything starts with our thoughts. Everything starts with, like, making it tangible and then putting it in paper and putting it writing. In writing, it solidifies it. You actually say to yourself, I'm going to figure out how to fill my life doing the things that I love and that I'm really good at so that I can be motivated to wake up every day and love what I do. While, wow, is my unique ability going to be wrapped up and taken over by a robot? The smart one, the outliers are saying, how am I going to get that to enhance what I'm doing? How am I going to get that to make what I'm doing even better? You have to be obsessed and you have to have an intensity about, like, I want to figure out what my unique ability is. Like, I'm tired of being drained at work. It's not normal. Like, we're not designed to like, to do things that we don't like. We're designed to actually do things that we are good at. I believe that every person has a set of unique abilities and skills that nobody else has. You just have to uncover it. Happiness is not chasing money and it's not chasing anything. It's being happy with what you have. And you have gifts, you have skills, you have unique abilities. And so it's like, it's on you. Like, do the hard work, figure it out. Stop your complaining. If you really want something, if you really want it, you go get it. You know how you know when you know when you say f. Yeah. Welcome. Welcome to the Fireside Chat. We're so excited to have you here. So the cool thing about unique ability is, like, literally for me, when I learned about it originally, I paid a lot of money and I flew out to Toronto and I worked with a leadership coach to figure out what my unique ability is. And we define that as something that, you know, you love to do. It's your best self, right? It's something that you love to do and you're great at it, right? So it's basically using your natural talents. You know, that the things and the activities that fuel you to contribute and add value and it motivates you. So, like it. It best describes your best version of you, right? It makes you who you are. And when you can fill your life with activities that allow you to do that. You're living a wholesome life. You're excited, you're. You can't wait to get up in the, you know, in the, you know, at the start of the day to get going. And when we perform at our best, it's usually when we feel that way because that sort of encourages us to put our best foot forward if obviously other, other things are in play, like working with people that we like to work with and working for a company that we like to work with. But the most important thing about, you know, learning about unique ability and the whole process is that when you don't know what your unique ability is and you don't have any clarity on it, you set yourself up for failure because you get stuck saying yes to doing things that you don't like to do. You feel absolutely drained by the end of the day just simply because you're stuck doing things you're not good at and, or think you have to do. And there are ways that strong core leaders know how to walk through their career path as they grow as leaders and they shed away all the things that they hate doing. And, and they don't get stuck hating their job and hating their activities. They change things so that they're stuck figuring out ways to. I call them the four Ds. You either delegate something to someone else or some other entity. You either delete it and say, I'm not doing it. You can delay it and say, I need to do this, but just not right now. Or you do it and you just suck it up and do it right. So I like using the four Ds because I talk about it quadrants when it comes to the unique ability. And it's always very eye opening when people go through the unique ability exercise, which is, and I'll just share what it is. It's taking an inventory of all the things that you do throughout the day. Everything from answering emails to getting on meetings with people, to training people to, for you, developing things, coming up with new ideas, solving problems. Every single thing that you do from the minute you sit down at your desk until the end of the day, if you were to take an inventory of that. And when I did this exercise, I had to do that. And my list was very long, you know, because at the time I was going to the post office to pick up mail, I was taking phone calls and doing customer service and talking to clients. So if you think about your day at first, sometimes people don't think of all the little things they get stuck doing. But when you Add those things up, you end up spending a lot of your time. Something like emails is a great example. Right. You know, most people don't love doing emails, but it's part of your day and you have to do it. And I think most people who are miserable, their jobs are stuck doing those sorts of things. Whether they're big, you know, to dos or behaviors or responsibilities or not, it doesn't make a difference. It's just those things that kind of are a drag you just kind of have to do, like going to meetings. For some people, it's just a drag. They don't want to go to meetings. And when you're in what we call flow, it's because you're getting to be. And you know, for someone like you, because I know you, you can be creative and you can be solving problems and coming up with new ideas and learning. And I love. I love to learn. I know you love to learn. So when you and I are learning something and we're coming up and we come up with a new idea, we're excited, we're jacked up, and we're ready to go attack that problem. So it's knowing where. Where it starts and knowing where it cuts off. And the goal, even though people think it's unrealistic, is. Is to spend not only your day, but your whole life within your unique ability. And it's very hard. It's a process. You don't just wake up and have your unique ability written down. And so I like to start off just by sharing a little bit about how I found mine, which is going through that activity inventory and really getting clear on what it is and where I'm spending all my time. And then I bucketed all of my activities within those four quadrants that I love to kind of just look at as a silo. So I look at my top left corner is always going to be the things that I love that I'm great at, that I feel like I'm really strong at. And that's what I call my unique ability. It's those things that are up in that corner that I really get jacked up about. It doesn't drain me. I get good feedback from people and I love doing it. And if I could spend all my day in that quadrant up there, beautiful. But the reality is I can't. And so there are a lot of things that are in my right top quadrant which are going to be all the things that I'm really good at. And there are things that I don't necessarily love But I'm pretty good at it and I don't mind doing them, but I'm better suited, better, you know, in the left quadrant, which is the things that I love that I'm great at. And so anything above the line is good because you're doing things that you're good at that, that, that you're, you're okay with. You just may not love them, but you're okay with it. It's where people live, the bottom quadrants, where they're miserable and, and sometimes it's because you have to. In our cases, we have a startup company, we're stuck. I mean, I'm in, I'm doing responsibilities and I'm stuck doing things that I just have to do. But in the bottom left quadrant, those are the things that I'm not that great at. In my case, something like maybe design work, but I don't have anyone else to do it, so I have to do it right. So that, you know, in a case where you are stuck doing something that you're not that great at and you're not even motivated to go learn to go do it, because it just doesn't, it doesn't pump you up, but you have to do it. And that might be part of your job, it may be a big majority of your job. And I think every person has to really kind of self assess themselves. And using a system like this really helps you clarify it. Because if you don't take an inventory of all your activities and if you don't bucket them into like these quadrants or whatever process people want to use, you end up just in a rat race every single day going through motions and everything just feels like Groundhog's Day where you're just, you know, you wake up, you repeat, you go to sleep, you wake up, you repeat, you go to sleep. And you're not finding much motivation out of your work and your life. And the worst part is when you're stuck in the bottom right quadrant. And I have a lot of examples of this myself, but these are the things that you're just, you're incapable of doing. You're, you're just, you're not good at them. And not only do you not enjoy them, but you really shouldn't even be going near them. For me, it's like reading contracts. I hate contracts. I don't like to, I don't like to, you know, get 18 pay contract and have to go through it. People tend to love to be fact finders and they like all the little details. It's a great thing for them. But for me I'm just, I'm more high level and I just want to know the bottom line. And so that tends to really drain me. I can do those things, but I don't want to. And because I don't want to, I usually make a lot of mistakes and I'm not really good at it. And so usually you're trying to use your 4Ds on those bottom quadrants. So after you take an inventory of all your activities and you see all the things you're doing, all the things you have to do, all the things you maybe don't get to do that often, but you still do them once in a while and you start bucketing them. All of a sudden you've got this chart, all your activities on this chart. And you can kind of start to see like a layout of like where you're spending your life. Because the Average person spends 90 hours, 90,000 hours in their life working. And so if you're working day in and day out, whether it be 6, 8, 10, 12 hour days, and you think about all the activities that you're doing and you see them visually on a chart, it is a very powerful exercise. Most people are lazy, they'll never do this. And again, they'll just complain about their jobs and they don't do anything about it. And that's why people are stuck in jobs they don't like and they don't do anything about it because they don't even think they can. But being realistic and saying I want to be within my unique ability all the time, you know, to a lot of people, again, may be unrealistic. And I think for me, one of the learnings that I like, one of the things I like to share with people when I talk about unique ability is that it changes, you know. You know, in my case, I had gotten to a point where 95% of my activities were in my unique ability. But then we grew, we broke through a ceiling and then I was stuck doing other things and I went through transition. And the next thing I know I'm stuck in startup mode again and I'm at like 30% of my unique abilities. And my, my good partner knows this about me, that when I'm not my unique ability, I can be cranky, I can be testy, I can be just in a, in a bad way. And it's just, it's not healthy. And I think the more you can self assess yourself and know where you're spending your time, the better you can communicate that to people that you're working with so that they don't take things personally. They know that you're stuck doing things and activities that may be temporary, but the reason why you're not in a good way, you're not your best version of yourself. And I think if you're working with people, most people can tell when someone's at their best and when someone's not at their best. So one of the things we'll do, and I'm going to ask you to do it right now, and I'll. And I'll do it, and we'll just spend maybe like two minutes doing it just to get it going. Because I'm curious to know, especially since we work together, I'd like to see what yours will look like. And it's a fun exercise, and I think I've shared it with you before. But for people who are watching this, they can participate in this as well on their own. And it's something I learned from Rabbi Tats. And it's an exercise that allows you. And I like to start it off by saying it allows you to not necessarily identify all the things you're good at, because it's really hard for people. When you talk about your unique ability, it's kind of like I would compare it to trying to write a vision statement. People just want to write it. They just want to have it down. The problem is it's not meaningful if you actually don't spend the time and do the hard work that's required in order to, like, craft an author, something for your life that's so important. But it is easy to figure out what you don't like. It is easy to figure out what you're not. And I think for some people that. That part of the exercise is much easier. So just take a piece of paper, draw a circle, and just start with writing things outside the circle that you're not, things that you know you're not good at, things that either apply to your work or things that apply to your life that. That maybe, you know, would go hand in hand with. With a skill of yours or a lack of, and just write as many things you can. We'll do it in, like, 60 seconds just to get our pen going, just to get something done on paper. The first things that pops your head that you know you're not, you know, skills that you don't have, things you don't like to do, it may be things that you're doing right now. And. And then we'll Kind of just take it from there. But let's just take a minute and we'll just write it down. I'll do the same thing with you, and then we'll share it real quick and then we'll see where it goes from there. So just take about a minute to do it.

These are, sorry, all things and that you might have to do at a job or just in the day.

Yeah, it's anything you're not that good at. And it may be things that you like, you know, like, I'm not a scientist and I'm not that great in math. So, like, you could put those things there's. It doesn't have to be an activity. It's things that you just know they're not your unique ability. You're just not good at that stuff. Right. Like, you're a good teacher, and I know you're a good teacher. So, like, you may not love it, but if you do or don't, doesn't. It's the things that you know you're not. So if you think about all the different professions that are out there, and, you know, that's definitely not me, just go ahead and brainstorm some of those out because again, it's easier to identify those things. These also can be traits, you know, if you think you're funny or if you think you don't have a good sense of humor, you know. You know, I'll give you some examples. Public speaking. Right.

I literally just wrote that down.

It's an easy one. Because some people, you know, they say that people would rather die. Right. Than speak in public. It's.

I. As long as I'm prepared, I guess I'm okay with public speaking. But just going off the top of the head, I can't do that.

So that's something you put on the outside. So it's like, you know, almost impromptu being put on the spot, you know, if that's not a skill of yours. Right. Because some jobs require you to be on the spot. If you're a speaker and talking to an audience, you know, like, I hate putting things together. If I have to put things together and redirections, I literally lose my mind. So what were some of the first things you put down?

Networking, Working with my hands, like any sort of, like fixing things around the house. I'm brutal at just. I guess keeping organized generally is not a. Not a strong suit of mine. And then being put on the spot, I think, so sales, I also wrote down.

And so when you really, like, facilitate this exercise and we don't have enough time to do it. But you start to exhaust all your efforts when you start thinking. And that's when the exercise actually gets good. And that's when people usually quit because they can't think, they can't think anymore. And it requires you to like literally use your brain to like uncover other things that you're not because again, you're trying to strip away all the things that you're not so that you can start to zone in on the things that you are. So let's just take another minute. Just really quick brainstorm things in the circle. These are things that you feel like your strengths of yours. These are things that you're good at. Again, these can be traits that would describe you right. So examples like for teaching or you know, for things like you're a developer. Right. So I like to problem solve. So just go ahead and brainstorm just a few that off the top of your head that you know are obvious strengths or traits of yours with the first ones that came to your head.

Creativity I guess just like coming up with, with novel solutions to different problems. I wrote down learning fast, working with other people on a team and adjusting to things quickly. Slash dealing with uncertainty. Teachings on there too. And yeah, just general problem solving.

If I had chat GBT when I first did this exercise, yeah, it'd be amazing how much time I would have saved. Although I would say that because it would have spoon fed me the answer. I don't know how beneficial it would have been. But you can imagine taking after you flush out a lot of the things that you are and a lot of things that you're not and then throwing that into AI to really have it spit something out to you. You could probably come up with something pretty quick that makes you feel pretty motivated or exc about what you do. But because our time's limited, we're not going to get too, too deep into that. But you could start to see that as you kind of flush out outside your circle, inside your circle. Your goal is to kind of like develop that, stick it up, you know where you're staring at it. Like make it nice. Like make it an exercise that you don't just do and then throw away. You know, I used to joke with all my, all my employees. So I'm a big goal setter and I like to write things down and they say the statistics are incredible. 3% of the country sets goals and writes them down. And I just think that's so crazy because goal setting is such a, like a, a Novel thing that everybody talks about and everyone has goals. And you always hear all our sports figures and all these people on TV that are real successful, they have goals and entrepreneurs have goals. And to think about three line up 100 people and you have three people that write down their goals. That is unbelievable to me. And they say the power behind that, just simply writing down the goal makes you like, I don't know what the numbers are. I don't know what the percentages are. I know. I just know from my personal experience that I look back at my goals and I look back at my vision charts and I've accomplished like, a lot of the things. And I think it's because you actually make it real. You actually, like, you make it tangible. Like, I believe that thoughts are things. You think something you can make a reality. And I always used to use the example of, like when people smoke cigarettes and then they quit smoking cigarettes. If someone wants a cigarette so bad and they think about it and they stop, they quit and they think about it and they have none in their hands. They have none of their possession, they'll figure out a way to have one in their possession within a certain amount of time. Whether that's because they got up in the middle of the night to go drive to the gas station, or they, whatever the case is, they made it real by thinking about it. And then the next step is they do something that gets what they want. And so everything starts with our thoughts. Everything starts with, like, making it tangible. And then putting it in paper and putting it in writing. It solidifies it. It actually makes it real, and it was even more powerful. And I would guess, because I don't know the numbers, But I'd say 1% of the people who set goals out of the 3% share it with people. And when you share it with people, you create accountability. And so this exercise with accountability is really powerful because when you work with other people and you're working in either in a group setting or with a coach, you actually make it tangible. You actually say to yourself, I'm going to figure out how to fill my life doing the things that I love and that I'm really good at so that I can be motivated to wake up every day and love what I do. And that in itself is powerful. Putting it down on paper multiplies it. It's like a 10x figure. Working with other people on it and then getting coached and being held accountable to it, you can just, you almost can see how it unfolds. And it, like, it can it can. You can literally design a life around doing things you love with people that you love doing it with. And so I always encourage people to find someone. I call it an accountability partner, mentor, someone that you're someone you love. And what's really cool about trying to figure out what your unique ability is. One of the things that you can do, and it's part of the exercise that I did, was you can start getting feedback from people that are close to you. And what's really cool about getting feedback from people close to you is that every person that you're close to, they experience you in a different way for you. Your example, your brother experiences you different than I experienced you. Right? And Himanshu, our developer, he experiences you from a different capacity because you're more teaching him, you know, and your friends and your fiance. Everybody has a different perspective of who you are. And so when you craft a request and what I did was I crafted an email. I told people I'm trying to figure out what my unique ability is. I said, I'm doing a leadership exercise. I sent out that email to about. I think it was about 12 people that I was close to in my life. And I asked them for specific feedback on what they feel my strengths are. What they feel is what they see from me, that when I'm at my best. What does that look like? What's that sound like? What is it? How do you. How would you explain that? And I got back all that information from all the people that I would call my truth tellers in my life, and I was able to throw that onto a page. And it's a very powerful exercise because now you're getting a perspective that's not yours. You're getting a perspective that's outside of you, which you have to do because we get so stuck in our head. And when you start down this path, you're trying to figure out, like, something that's so hard to figure out, it doesn't happen overnight. And it's really hard to do it by yourself because we're so consumed within our own head that sometimes it's hard to get out of your head. And so when you can incorporate feedback from other people, and I think we called it synergize it, you synergize the feedback that you're getting from other people, and then you integrate it with the things that you've put down, you start to get a holistic picture of who you are as not as an employee or an entrepreneur, but as a person. And I like to say that you don't separate that from your work. A lot of people will say that they do. They, you know, I used to have people in my office, you know, I leave it at the door and I'd say, no, you don't. Like, this is you're here and this is you. You don't leave it at the door. And you try, you try your best. Some people put on a fake face and they're more professional at work. You know, for me, I like to be as transparent and genuine as I can, and I like to just be myself because I do believe that the hardest thing in the world to do is to not only discover who you are, but then to be your true self. We're so consume with trying to be someone for someone else, and we're trying to impress other people. And when you, when you start to get comfortable with what your unique ability is, one of the results of having a good, strong unique ability statement along with the other traits that are who you are, it allows you to do something very powerful. I used to do this. I don't do it as much anymore, but I think I just, I'm living it. So I think, I think people get this from me when they, when they work with me. And it's. I used to be able to give people my unique ability statement, my sheet that had all my core values. And I'll show you what it looks like at the end of the, of our hour. And basically, here's what you get with me. If we're going to work together, this is what you get. This is me at my best self. And it was very powerful, especially with my employees because, like, there were no surprises. Like, you knew what you were going to get with me. I know who I am. I know what I'm good at. I certainly know what I'm not good at. I'm not going to hide it because that's why I'm hiring and trying to work with other people around me so that they can fill in the gap of whatever's going to make our efforts and our initiatives successful, but it allows me to not only share with you what I've zoned in and lasered in on, what I'm great at, what I love to do, and what I want to add value and contribute to our relationship or to whatever it is we're working on, but here's also what you get with me. And when you're able to, like, have a picture like that, one, it's very rare, very rare. Two, you will gain strength in whatever it is that you're doing. And if that's your job or if that's a project or if that's building relationships. And then through your best, your best, you're performing at your highest level because you've, you've shut it away, things you don't want through using four Ds and again, delegating it or deleting it or delaying it, or you're just getting it done. And now we have the ability to delegate in ways that we've never been able to delegate before, which is a really, really big deal for the unique ability process. Because when you're stuck doing things that you hate doing, but now you have an outlet like AI, and you have tools that can do things that you've never been able to do before. I hated copywriting. I mean, I hated it so much, I'd spend hours trying to figure it out. And being able to now delegate that, but not have to go hire someone, pay someone, wait for someone. That is a very powerful, very powerful tool that I think today people have at their fingertips and they're not even using it. And not only is is AI coming into the process of being able to figure out people's skills, it enhances people's skills. So as people are getting scared about like, wow, is my unique ability going to be wrapped up and taken over by a robot? You know, the smart ones, the, the outliers are saying, how am I going to get that to enhance what I'm doing? How am I going to get that to make what I'm doing even better? Because the human component of whatever it is you do is always going to bring a nuance that AI can always. And so if a robot AI takes over a bunch of jobs in your office or a bunch of responsibilities, they're still going to need someone. And you hope that that's you because you figured out how to enhance your job with it, not get scared and paralyzed because it's going to take your job, in a lot of cases it will. But when you have a very strong statement and you've able to use that to kind of complement your skills, really what it does is it doesn't replace you. It makes your skills even stronger. Right? Because you're using those to make whatever you're doing better. And the cool thing is, is that if it does replace any of your skills, you most likely can find something else that you weren't able to do before that you love, that you never had time for and didn't fit to now incorporate new and new things. And that's why having a growth mindset with a unique ability is key, because you constantly want to evolve yourself over time to not only make your strengths and your skills better, but you want to add to it. And I call those nuances. You want to nuance your unique ability. So, you know, my unique ability is to. Is to take things that have been done the same way that people are always saying, that's how we've always done it. And I like to find better ways to do things that have been done the same way. So in our case, in our company, the process to find a job has been so broke for so long and it's never been fixed. And people keep doing the same thing over and over. So we've tried to create and use creativity to come up with a new process and find new ways that people can do something that has been broken for a long time. And here's what's really cool about unique ability. When you really, you really zone in on it and you start to kind of figure out and play with it in your head because you're thinking about it, because you have to really want it. This process means nothing unless you are like, hate saying it because so few people have it. But you have to be obsessed and you have to have an intensity about like, I want to figure out what my unique ability is. Like, I'm tired of being drained at work. If that means I need to figure out something else that I need to do, well, you know, thank God you figured that out now. So you're not stuck for five more years doing a job that you hate and you're miserable. And I always say it's like dying a slow death. So going down this path is not easy because sometimes it requires you to make some really hard decisions to say, you know what, I'm going to put my foot down. I'm not doing this anymore. And that either means you have to put yourself up against an authority figure to say, you need to find someone else to do this job. And by the way, this happens to people across America. Every day they get hired for something they didn't get a clear job description. And what ends up happening? The boss, the manager says, hey, I need you to do this, I need you to do that. And then you're stuck doing things that is outside your description. It's not what you were brought in for. And this is why I used to hear from people who used to come in and apply. You know, I got stuck doing a job that I was doing other people's jobs. Right. It happens for a number of reasons. People quit, the company grows, new technology is incorporated, but you get stuck doing things. And you have to be very clear that with whoever it is that you're, you're reporting to, that look, you know that, that, that's not what I was hired to do. And that's why having something in writing, I don't want to get too off, off course. But having something in writing about what your responsibilities are is very important from the beginning of the process so that you can determine if it aligns with your unique abilities so you're not stuck doing things you don't like, but also so that you can know what you're not going to be responsible for and that when they come up and they're thrown on your plate, that's a great time to negotiate increases in your pay. That's a great time, you know, to, to be able to demand whatever it is that you've been waiting and too scared to talk to your boss about. And I think most people around the country do it at the wrong time. I've been here five years, I should get a raise. You know, I mean, I love when people think that they're entitled to something because of time. Meanwhile, you've been paid for that time and you don't get money forward looking back at what you've done. So anytime you're asking for more, it should be for a very good specific reason. Honing in on your unique ability, enhancing your skills should make you more valuable at a company. So knowing what your unique ability is, figuring that out by creating your inventory, knowing what quadrant your things are, shedding off the things on the bottom so you can be more in flow and performing high level in the top quadrants, getting feedback from people that are going to tell you the truth so that you can enhance your overall unique ability. Because you're going to see things that we call blind spots that you didn't necessarily see, but I saw in you and I know you and I can help you craft that. And when you synergize all of that and you start to get some clarity on where you're going and what you're doing, it is so easy to say to people, I can't do that, I can't help you with that project. No, I'm not going to get involved with that. Because you're able to filter through all the opportunities coming to you and say, is that my unique ability? No. Yeah. No. And I have to tell you, like, I, I have been blessed to be able to get To. To that where I can identify that I'm not that great at saying no, but I can certainly know and I could be upfront with someone and say, you know, I might be able to take that on, but you're not going to get the result maybe that you want. But. And then I have to. I have to make that decision. I have to live with it. Because if I say yes to it, that means it's going to take me time, and that means I'm going to be pouring my energy into that. And I have to be okay with the fact that if I'm not happy doing what I'm doing, that's on me and that's not anyone else's responsibility. So, that being said, I want to just take quick two minutes because I flooded you with information and I want you to just write down whatever you're thinking and I want you to apply it to you personally. So be selfish. Take this time to invest in yourself, and I want you to think about whatever comes to your mind with it. Come when it comes with regard to anything I spoke about or anything you were thinking about and just kind of get some clarity on putting some pen to paper and write down what it is you're thinking.

Well, here's. Here's one that came to mind just right when you were speaking there at the end, you mentioned saying no to things. And one of my strengths and also a weakness, I think, when I think about myself is like I said earlier when we were talking about what I think my strengths are creative and I love doing a lot of different things. And I feel like when I'm at my best, I am kind of not multitasking, but I'm stimulated in a number of different areas, whether that's development or, like, making videos or whatever it is. And so I think as a consequence, I have a really hard time saying no to things because it's not. So, like, the thing can be very. The things that I'm being asked to do can be very different, but if I say yes to them, I find that I actually do. Once I apply myself and get to be creative in that thing, I actually do enjoy the thing. The problem is it, like, takes. It usually takes away from that main thing I'm trying to do. I guess, really speaking out loud now, it's just a lack of, like, focus on. On one thing. But when I spend all of my time focusing on one thing, that's also.

Very hard for me.

So it's kind of this weird trap.

I heard Gino Wickman do A presentation once, and this was one of my favorite talks I've ever heard. He said, if you want to be successful at anything you do, you have to love. Love saying no to everything. Because it's the only way that you can say yes to the one thing. Because if your one thing for you, for example, is to be creative and learn new things and create and develop things, the more you say yes, anything else means you're not doing right. And filling your life with what you love is an amazing thing that very few people can ever say they do. But every time you say yes to something, that takes time away from doing whatever it is that either is a priority or your unique ability or whatever needs to get done. And today, with as much distraction that we have, it is unbelievable how much time gets wasted on things that we say that only takes a few minutes. I can knock that out. Email is the best example because I think everyone can relate to it. If you have your email up during the day, if you, if you were actually using your iPhone's the best example. If you look at your iPhone at the end of the day and you track how much time you spent, you just cannot believe it's four or five hours, six hours on your phone, it's mind blowing, but it's because you're picking it up every 10 minutes, every time there's a beep, notification, whatever the case is. And our life is full of that. So when you can shed that away and you can block time. And so time management is another workshop I want to do. So how to block out your time and control your, your structure, your order of your day. And when you do bucket, certain things that are either we like to say, and I was coached by Dan Sullivan, he's talking about, you know, focus days and buffer days, things that are like, you know, you can bucket out. You know, if you're working in office, it's paperwork. It may be emails, it may be having to make calls. But when you're scattered and you're constantly all over the place, what you end up realizing is that you have actually never get anything done that's really good because you're constantly multitasking. I do this as well. So I know you and I, we work together. So I know, I know that, that, that struggle that we both have. And the good news about that is that usually people who are really busy and they're always doing things, they are getting stuff done. So you know how great we're getting it done. That's a questionable, you know, I mean, you gotta have truth tellers who can give you some feedback. But I think being able to say no is a very power, powerful tool that you gotta have in your. In your. In your toolbox. And you gotta have a strong core to be able to say no. I have a hard problem because I'm trying to always please people. I want. I want to help people, so if they come to ask me, I say yes. People in my community ask. I want to say yes. And saying no to things that you like, it's so hard. It's so hard. You know, I remember saying to one of my friends, I'd like to get on your calendar. And I reached out to him, and his. His assistant got back to me. And I remember thinking, you got to be kidding me. Like, your assistant's going to get, like. And then one day I got an assistant, and I was so buried in so much work with so many things that I couldn't. I couldn't handle it. I needed. I needed help. And I remember the first time someone said, seriously, did you had your assistant get back to me? And I'm like. I remember thinking, I can't even. I can't even return calls. My day is so filled up with so much stuff. I. I literally can't. I can't. It's not a way to live. It's not a way to. So having. Having. Having a clear focus on what. What you love, what you're good at, saying no to as much as you can, being able to share and be transparent with what your unique ability is so that you're in the flow majority of your time. The goal is to get it all the time. Just. It's very unrealistic for people to just jump to that spot. It's a process, and it's slow, and it's hard, and you have to. Again, I said before, you have to obsess and be intense. And I really do believe that people who don't have that quality, they really struggle trying to, like, follow through with something like this because it does require discipline. It requires, you know, an insatiably, you know, curious and disciplined desire to, like, I'm gonna get this. I'm gonna get this. And I. And I. I personally attacked it that way because I was so excited about getting something that I can revolve my life around, that I can filter through opportunities and say yes or no and share with people, like, what my unique ability is and then be in that throughout the day. I love doing this. Like, I do. I get jacked up. I get excited when someone Gets a light bulb in their head. And I can get people thinking. I love that. I love solving problems with people. So I know I'm excited because I can almost feel myself talking about it and smiling when I say it. And you know me well, Jacob. When I get stuck trying to develop something or trying to, like, create something or a user process or user journey, I'm trying to do automated messages. I literally. I've gotten to the point where I can so quickly identify what's not my unique ability. I'm on the verge of losing my mind a little bit with being stuck doing things. And I've had to get really good at delegating. And Dan Sullivan teaches a very incredible tool called who not how, which is you have to just find a who who loves to do it. Who's their unique ability? I mean, Jacob, you are one of my. Who's on the highest level because you can create and develop things that I can't. And I'm an idea guy, so I like to be able to share things. And the fact that I was talking to today and I said, you know, can you just do it now? And you got out and you started creating. I'm like, oh, my gosh, you have no clue. Like, you're my hero doing that. Like, you know, you and you built a team around you that can build things. And I just think, to me, that is such a special quality, what a unique ability that is. And I know you love doing it, just not sometimes.

When I'm not in my unique ability. When you're in a bad way. Right, Right.

Exactly. We all are, though. And, you know, I'll tell you the worst part about that is, can you imagine how much strife at home with people's kids and their wives and their. Their partners because they're drained, they're stuck at work doing things that they're. They're not good at, that they don't like, and they come home and they take it out, and it's not even. It's. It's. It's not their fault. I mean, they. You know, you could be so blinded by it, and you could be. Have been doing it for so long that it's just, like, normal to you. But I have to tell you, it's not normal. Like, we're not designed to, like, to do things that we don't like. We're designed to actually do things that we are good at. I believe that every person has a set of unique abilities and skills that nobody else has. You just have to uncover it. You have to actually know what those are and be able to then zone in on those and then focus on those and then enhance those by either learning or developing or nuancing it by integrating other things to it. And it's incredible, like when you really start. Start thinking about it, like how many things you actually are good at, but you never get a chance to do it. And it's really sad when people think that they can't make money doing the things they love. So for example, people who are musicians, they love, you know, playing instruments and they think, oh, how can I, how can I do that for my job? How can I? But you know what's so funny about that? There are ways that you actually can find jobs that allow you to use your unique abilities that maybe, yeah, you're not going to be playing your instrument. What if you're working at a company that deals with musical instruments? And I'm just, I'm going to give you one example because I know you love to. You love to be in music and you, and you play and I've heard you play and yet you don't get to do that for your profession. Right. You've played with it on the side as a, as a hobby, with your friends. But imagine if you were in the workforce right now trying to find a new job and you know that your experience and your skills has to be within developing. But you love music, so why can't you go to a company that's in that industry and develop?

Yeah.

And then you're connected to it. Right.

I think like there's also, you know, what someone loves about music at least. Again, just speaking of myself is, is that the fact that I get to be creative, I love like sitting down and like I used to not so much these days, but love, you know, trying to write a song or just messing around for a while on the guitar. And it's like that translates into other things that have nothing to do with music sometimes too.

Sure.

So I know what you're saying. And I think, like, I guess to add to that, even if it's not the actual thing that you're doing, there are aspects of what you're doing and that probably translate other to other professions, I think.

Well, let me give you the best example that I can give you. Just my own personal experience. I ran a collection agency for 25 years and I can tell you firsthand, I did not love running a collection agency. I did not love being in collections. But I figured out how to use my unique ability in that environment. And it Ended up creating a company that changed your life, other people's lives, and now is having. And we plan to have a huge impact across the country. Right. This company is now about $2 million of debt and wrote it off and relieved it from people. And we're giving people free access to. To jobs and resources. Because I was using my unique ability at a collection agency. And so just for people who don't know me and just don't understand what I'm saying, I'm operating a collection agency. But I figured out what I can do in that collection agency that I love. And so I was solving problems because my unique ability is to take how things have always been done and find better ways to do it and pour my heart and soul into building teams around me that can help me make them happen. And so I had a vision to change the perception of collections. So here I am running a collection agency. Me and my teammates are ashamed to tell people what we do for a living. When people say, what do you do? I didn't want to tell people I worked at a collection agency. None of my employees did either. And everybody hates us. Everybody hates collectors. They hate collection agencies. So I said, my vision is to change the perception of collection. And I brought a leadership company into my company, and we were doing personal and professional development. And one day one of my employees said to me, how are we changing people's perceptions? What is that vision? And it's like, put your money where your mouth is. And I said, well, look, we're nice to people. We're not like everyone else. And they challenged me. They said, that's not enough. And so I had to figure out a way to be different than every other collection agency. And our way of doing that, long story short, was to try to help people. People like, why not help the people that we're trying to collect from because they can't pay their bills. And I had to do something that was very difficult. I had to take two employees off their desk that I was paying full time. And again, I did this because I was solving a problem, a perception problem in my industry that people hated us. And we said, we want to flip it. We want to. We want people to know that we're not the bad guys, that we're going to help you. And so I was solving these problems. It required me to take action, which was I took some employees who. They wanted to change people's lives. Which people hear that? Like, that's kind of gushy, like, oh, change people's lives. Rah, rah. But I said, you know what? Let's do it. And I took a collector who was calling people up, trying to get money from people. I said, here's what I want you to do. Whatever you need to do to help people get jobs. I know you don't know how to do it, and I know you don't know what to do, but go figure it out. And I challenged her to go figure it out. And she came to me after the first day, crying, hysterical. And I said, why? She said, because no one wants my help. I'm like, what do you mean, no one wants your help? And she said, because they think it's weird. Like, they don't even understand. I go keep trying and find someone who you can pour your heart and soul into and do whatever you can to help them. That person. And long story short, she found someone, she helped them, and she actually worked with this person until they became employed. And by the time we told the story to people in my office, they were in tears hearing the person's story because they shared a testimonial with us. Now think about the power behind that story. Here's a guy at a collection agency who doesn't necessarily love collections, but I found something that I love doing which was having an impact on people's lives. I love giving people an opportunity to grow within their role. Here's this girl that I took off her desk. I love challenging people and doing leadership stuff. So I challenged her and held her accountable to make sure that she just poured her heart into this person. And it literally transformed my company overnight. I had people who wanted to be part of that company. I didn't even have a company. It was a department that we started. So I always say, you can find something that you love within what you do, and it doesn't necessarily have to be so. If you love to play guitar again, you may not be able to make a living playing guitar, but it doesn't mean you can't work at a company that is something in the music industry. And I think the more you can get connected and get creative and the only, you know, with whatever you do with wherever you move towards in your career, figuring out the first step was, what, what do you love? What do you want to be around? What do you want to surround yourself with? You know, we always challenge people and say, you know, your culture. You have a culture. Your company has a culture, but you have a culture. You're right. Your little circle. When people come up and talk to you, they walk into your culture. You know, we Used to tell people, your face is not your face. You don't have to look at it all day. I do. We'd say your face is public property, period. So when you walk around the office, and I had to learn this the hard way at my office because I used to, we used to get lawsuits from people because they hated us. They'd sue us for no reason. And I'd be upset, you know, I'd be upset, we made a mistake. I'd get, I got blackmailed by attorneys. And I'd hear people behind my back say, oh, watch out for Chad, he's not in a good mood today. And I remember thinking, wow, like how powerful is that? You can walk through an office and people are scared because they see the look on your face. For me, it's a responsibility. And the more you love what you do, the more you smile, the more you attract people into your culture, the more you, you don't repel people out. You know, it's an amazing thing when you meet people for the first time. Have you ever met someone and immediately you just got a weird feeling, like not so good. But then you meet someone and you immediately connect. How do you explain that you don't even know the person? I literally with interviewing people would walk in as soon as they walked in my office. I could have that. Call what you want, first impression, a good vibe. But you wear that, you wear that. And I think your life and how you choose to live your life has a lot to do with, with a big portion of, you know, how people perceive you. And people like to be around happy people. It's important that you, you know, take responsibility because happiness is not chasing money and it's not chasing anything. It's being happy with what you have. And you have gifts, you have skills, you have unique abilities. And so it's, it's like it's on you. Like do the hard work, figure it out, stop your complaining and, and, and sit down and do what no one else does. Put pen to paper, start thinking about what you're good at. Start figuring out what process can I take. And I take responsibility to enhance that. That might be taking online classes that mean me joining forums or groups on LinkedIn, other like minded individuals. Because I'm stuck in my house now that I work from home, I don't care what it is, but people are just giving excuses. And honestly it's a, it's a, it's a weak excuse because if you really want something, if you really want it, you go get it. You do It. And, and it shows up in your life any which way. Back to the guy who wants a cigarette, when he wants one, guess what ends up happening in his hand. He gets one, period. And that's why people don't, that's why they don't quit. And my leadership coach, Chet Scott, used to say to me, you know how, you know when, you know when you say f. Yeah. And it's like a, it's like a steak. You just, you put it down and it's like a bolt down, like, I'm gonna get this. And thank God. For me personally, I know that one of my skills is to be intense and to have that type of a. Kind of a go get it attitude. And I had a very close friend, Friend say to me one time, because everyone always says, you know, it's not good to be so intense. It's not good to be. And he said to me, so what's the alternative? To be lazy and to procrastinate and to like, not get things done? And again, I agree that you need a healthy balance. You need to pull it back. But I think there's something really attractive about people who know what they want and they go after it. And I think it's rare. I think it makes people nervous and I think it reminds people of things that maybe they should be doing. So it makes them look at it negatively. But I, I personally think it's a great quality for people as long as it's healthy and it's taken doses. I think the word balance is a big problem for people. They try to find work, life, balance. They try to find. To balance out their, their. Their way of being. But at the end of the day, there are times where depending on what season you're in, and when I say season, I mean like right now you're engaged and you're going to pour yourself into your bride, and that season is now. And after you're married for five or ten years, your season might change because you have a kid, you know, and all of a sudden now you're pouring yourself into your kid and it's like full time. Because you have a, you have a life that's okay. You don't ignore the other stuff, but it's not balanced. And the same thing with your career. You and I are pouring ourselves into our career, and I'm in buckets all over the place. And I'm not in my unique ability as much as I want to be, which is why I love doing things like this. But the more we can attract other like minded people to join our team. Like what you got to do with two developers that you have on your team. You get to delegate and you get to take things off your plate. And now I've got a designer who's going to help us out and that can take some pressure off you and that'll give you more time to open up your world to do what you do best. And, and the one thing I know about you and just to give you feedback is that when you're creative and you're given freedom to go do what you love. You're unbelievable. Like I think that I just, and I'm not just saying this to you and you, you have such a skill, Jacob, that like, and it's so rare and it's not the developer skill, the developers developer skill in you, it's your ability to remain flexible, creative and be smart at the same time. Like that is such a. You write out your unique ability statement. You work on this and you get yours and you surround it and I'll show you what mine looks like. So this is my version. Everyone has like a different expression of kind of how they, you know, write out their unique ability, but mine is my, my unique ability is to challenge how things have always been done and find ways to make them better by pouring my heart and soul into the things I love to do while collaborating with others who can help make that happen. You know, Jacob, you're one of my, one of my partners in being able to help my unique ability come true because you're one of the people I get to collaborate with to make things happen. And you also give me the ability like we did today when we brainstormed to look at a profile and try to make it better and try to come up with this process for all the people that we're trying to pour ourselves into to help them find jobs they love and we're trying to make it better. So I get to do that with you every day. And for me, when I can take my unique ability and then, you know, give you my best self, which are going to be my best traits that I've identified for me, but also from all the people in my life that have helped me kind of clarify, you know, my best version of myself, it really just gives me a guiding compass for my work. And you know, I hope that over time I can continue to, you know, be able to like say no to things. So I'm stuck, stuck doing my, my unique ability more often than I'm not. And if that develops into us building out our community and not being the only ones that show up on our workshops. That'll be fun. And if I could pour in other people, I'll do that. So it's good. And glad I was able to like kind of talk it through. It's kind of all over the place, but there's a lot.

I'm sure we'll do it again. And I think, you know, that there will be people on this and that they will find it valuable. So excited.

You know what's really cool if you think about it? What we're creating and what we're building is not only an integration of two unique abilities that come together and which, you know, we always say it's a, it's a, it's a ten times multiplier, right? When you can empower other people to figure out what their unique ability is and you bring them together with a shared common purpose. That's what makes companies unstoppable. And that's what creates outliers and industries that disrupt industries. And with all the disruption that we see now with new technology and AI kind of hitting the scene, the ability to now integrate AI with that stuff puts people either lightning years ahead of others or it stops them in their tracks. And what I love about it more than anything is that it puts people on an equal playing level field and allows two guys like us to compete with the big dogs. Which means that college kids, I said this to my niece who's interning right now. I said, for the first time in history in the world, this has never happened. What we're seeing right now, and people don't know that they have to wake up. It does not matter that you went to college and have a degree or that you know coding skills and you develop them for 20 years.