Outperform Yourself By Breaking Your Upper Limit

Dave, how are we gonna make you into some kind of like Tony Robbins superstar when we can't record this on days when you're going snow, snowboarding or skiing or whatever it is that you fancy pants people are doing?

Oh, well, uh, Andrew, I think you're giving voice to a trade-off mentality that most people believe that I can't have it all. I have to sacrifice the things I love in order to achieve my vision. And I am—

don't, at least during the week, couldn't you go skate, skateboarding? I don't even know what this stuff is. Couldn't you go play with the snow on the weekend? He's an amazing amazing ski instructor.

He's an amazing skier. I went and visited him with my kids.

Did he teach you to ski and do this?

He taught us how to ski for 3 days.

He did?

And I've never seen Dave lose his patience. I saw like a tiny bit with me where he was like, dude, go a little faster. Like, stop being such a wimp.

And I was like, you didn't say that, by the way. Partially because I love skiing so much, like 3 days of skiing that slowly, I was like, okay, let's get a little, you know, let's get going here. Yeah, I really believe you can have it all, Andrew, and I think it requires more creativity. And that's something I want to— I stand for in the world and I aspire to model is, you know, skiing 4 or 5 days a week and becoming whatever my version of the next Tony Robbins is. And part of it is a week part. Yeah, I ski 4 to 4 or 5 days a week, not all day, but, you know, I'll get out for an hour and a half. You know, do a bunch of laps.

Dave's like a great infomercial. I ski 4 to 5 days a week and make millions of dollars a year. You can have that life too. Hi, hi, I'm Dave Kashen. If you want to go, that's the answer, by the way. Now he's Tony Robbins. You know what it makes me think of? Dave, actually, I wanted to ask you about this because I share this and I'm not sure if I do it correctly. But Dave has this question he asked me many, many years ago. Are you willing to have what you want? I'll repeat it. Are you willing to have what you want? And I always understand that question as this really interesting double entendre, I think, Dave. So you tell me if it's right or wrong. So one, one side of it is the things you're getting are the things you want, because that's like, by definition, you're doing a series of things to get to live a life you have. Are you willing to just have that life and enjoy it? And so like accept the thing you have, the life that you're creating. And the flip of it is also, are you willing to have what you want? Which is, are you willing to do the things necessary to get what you want to have? That, that's like my second version of it. And I'm like, it's kind of a, it's kind of a, you know, screwy question because it sort of pushes you in both directions at the same time.

Well, what comes up for me when I hear that is like the phrase, love what you do. Like everyone's like, I want to love what I do. Which also has this double entendre. Does that mean I only do things that I already love, or that I choose to love what I do, you know, or enjoy what I do? It's like, do you just do things that you enjoy, or do you add enjoyment to the things you're doing by actually being present and doing them? I think there might even be a third interpretation of, are you willing to have what you want, which is sort of like, are you willing to believe you deserve it. Like, I think most people believe they have to become something they're not already in order to have what they want. And they're like, literally, like, if you really look at your life, most people— and I, I relate to this for much of my life— it was like, it's coming soon, right? It's like, almost there, right? Like, at that next milestone, then I'll deserve it, then I'll have it.

Yes.

You know, and the ultimate it is really peace and fulfillment, but we code for that money, status, success. You know, but if you ask 5 whys, like people just want to feel joy and peace and excitement.

It's crazy for me too, Andrew, because in my journey with Dave, I remember that feeling all the time. And like, I'd say, I'll make this up, but 8 out of 10 days I would feel that way. I can't be happy yet. I can't be happy yet, Dave. Like, and then, and now I'd say it's inverted. Like 8 out of 10 days I'm like, wait, this is what I want. Like, I'm, I'm like, I have multiple companies financially. I'm good. I have a great relationship with my kids. Like, and sometimes even there's a little voice that goes, hold on, you can't have it. You can't have it all. Or yeah, that might not work out the well way. Or maybe you should be doing more. Like there's different ways I found myself bringing myself down from that moment where, where I'll have it. Um, and remind, so Andrew, so here's the story. I got a story. The year is 2019, maybe 2018. And Dave Kashen is in, I have this office in SOMA, San Francisco, 459, this beautiful like brick and timber classic startup office. I have a conference room that's my office also. And Dave would come, we used to hang out physically back in the day. I miss those days. And Dave looks at me and you got like, you know, my persona is like, you know, I'm loud. I'm like ambitious. Like I'm, you know, building a billion dollar business.

This is the plan, whatever.

And Dave looks at me. And he goes, Jesse, you have an upper limit problem. And I was like, what are you talking about? Like, I literally at first I was like, dude, I don't have an upper limit problem. Like, I am the most ambitious. Like, I have no ceiling. Like, I, you know, whatever. And he goes, no, no, you have it and everyone has it. And I'm like, what's, what's an upper limit problem? Dave, what's an upper limit problem?

Well, I want to give credit to Katie and Gay Hendricks, who invented this idea, as far as I know. I read about it first in the book The Big Leap. And the way he frames it is like, human beings have one and only one problem in life. It's the upper limit problem. And we have lots of symptoms of that problem. And what it is, it's like this homeostatic setting for how good life can be. How good we can feel. And so if we start to raise our, you know, temperature higher than that, we start to feel too good or life starts to go too well. It's like scary in a way for our system because it's unfamiliar. And so a thermostat, you know, will find a way, like a good thermostat does, to bring us down to our familiar level. And, you know, it might look like a thought, like you just said, like waiting for the other shoe to drop, like, oh yeah, but what if this doesn't work out? Or I should be more. He mentions in the book, like, he had just gotten his, I think, youngest daughter, you know, launched, like, off to college, and she's doing great, but he has this thought like, oh, what if she's not making any friends and she's lonely? And he starts, like, freaking out. And then he calls her, he's like, are you okay? And she's like, I'm great, why, Dad? You know? And he's like, oh, okay. And he realized, like, oh, everything's just so good, but my system is just bumping up against the limit and just finding a way to bring me back down.

And those are the more subtle versions of it, right? Like the, like winning a lotto, like the lottery winner. There's like a case, famous case studies that they basically all end up, you know, basically as, as same amount of wealth 5, 10 years forward and probably the same, if not less happiness despite winning $50 or $100 million. Because it literally, the way I think you said this to me, Dave, is it literally like overwhelms their physiology of their body, like having like that. And then they, okay, well, my wife's not pretty enough. I need to divorce her because I need a hotter, you know, like you just start doing all these things that find a way to bring you back down to the thermostat you were set at regardless of, of what you're getting and what you're having.

I think that's a really important example because if you really think about it, like, I bet you believe, like, if, okay, but if I won the lottery like my life would be amazing, I would feel so free and I would have like all the vacations I want and houses. And I think it's important to like recognize it's just not true. But like most people hold it as true. This is why, you know, the whole like outer game versus inner game distinction is so near and dear to my heart because most people think if I just win at the outer game and one shortcut to that is I win $100 million, then, like, they really believe, then I'll be happy. And when you recognize we have this upper limit, then the game becomes about, okay, how do I raise my upper limit? And I find, you know, and you do— that's an inside-out experience. And as you raise your upper limit, lo and behold, life gets better and better. So it's like, then you just had an upper limit problem.

What was he limiting himself to? And then what happened after he broke past it?

You're talking about the author?

Uh, no, when Jesse did. Oh, when he had an upper limit problem, what was, what was the problem? And then what did he, what happened after he broke past it?

You want me to answer or do you want him to answer?

I want to hear your answer and then I can say something.

Um, there's a lot of layers. I would say first of all, peace and joy, right? Like, despite having achieved, you know, a fairly reasonable amount of success. Like, he showed me once this, this like PowerPoint he and his two college buddies made, you know, Chris and Nick, I think in college or when they just graduated. You know, it's like this super ambitious for a college kid, you know, like, and most of it he had achieved. So despite having achieved, you know, a modicum of success, you know, business success, financial you know, success, he was not experiencing contentment, peace, joy, fulfillment. Like, I bet if you ask that college kid, okay, if you actually did this thing with your two friends, you did it on your own terms, you got up to X millions of dollars, had 50 people working for you in this sweet office, like, how would you— how would that be? Probably like, oh my God, I'll be so happy. I'll be like, I'm blessed, right? Just like Whistling Dixie every morning, you know, or whistling to work every morning. And that's not what he was experiencing. He was really suffering in a lot of ways, like feeling like, ah, you know, the tension and, and fear. And so at that level, clearly, and then also even at the outer level, like he was sort of capping how successful he was because he felt sort of trapped or stuck in the business he had created, you know, and would say almost like, I don't like this business anymore. I'm like, okay, well, why are you still spending all of your day and night working on it?

Right?

And so that's another level of like, we think, oh, just because of the thing I'm already doing, because some former, you know, that I started at a certain level of consciousness doesn't mean you have to stay with it. And that's what ultimately happened. He got the courage to bring in and, you know, to let go and bring in John, who was, I think, a terrific you know, CEO to take the business to the next level and sell it. But it took time to be willing to let go.

There were so many layers of the onion that had to get peeled for me to even get to the point where I'd be willing to have the conversation of leaving as CEO. But I think I'll back up just on a couple of things. One, the, you know, Dave, as he does, was very kind about that description. You know, the phone call with Rick Elias, right? I've got millions of dollars in my bank account. He literally goes, Jesse, you are one of the luckiest motherfuckers I know. He goes, Rick uses the—

Rick curses?

He doesn't. Yeah, he doesn't want— he didn't want that to be in the book that we wrote, but I think on the podcast he'll let it slide. Okay. He's a very real dude, Andrew. He's a very— he's a very—

I got to see him in person. Apparently I'm going to fly out and get to see him in person next week or the week after.

He's a very real person. But in any case, he was like, dude, you You made— you're 32, you made millions of dollars, you run your own company, nobody tells you what to do, you have two beautiful children, you know, born healthy, you're married. Like, he was like, dude, you're so lucky. And honestly, I was not— loving wife, yeah, like in a family, like he's like, your parents are alive. He's like— and he was— I mean, he just, he kind of called me out, right? And, and, and I wasn't experiencing the joy of any of that stuff. So you talk about an upper limit for a second. You go, I was, I was, that was like, I was at my worst. I was like, no, I'm not having fun. Why did I do this? I'm regret, I'm living in regret. I'm like, my company should be bigger than it is. So all these crazy things. And then the second part of it, I think is a really distilled lesson that Dave taught me around, you know, he was like, well, I don't like this business, but I'm still the CEO of it. And that was, that was not a like one month thing. That was like a multi-year thing. Right.

And not liking the business and still being the CEO of it. Yes. Years of that. Uh-huh.

Multi-years. Right. And the business was stagnating and like, and you know, I, I obviously you're bootstrapped or like I had a certain structure that I could control. I had people around me who loved me, so it wasn't like anyone's trying to like fire, you know, like it was, everyone's there to support and whatever. But, but the point I was gonna make is like Dave was like, well, dude, you're like committed to that. You're literally committed to this world of, of, of living in a business, running a business you don't like and saying you don't like it. And that's all like one big commitment you've made. And I was like, what do you mean commitment? Like, no, dude, I'm committed to being a billionaire. I have no upper limit. Like, and that distinction between commitment being, you know, what you're doing is, is what you're committed to. What you're getting is what you're committed to. And that's what I was getting. That's what I was creating for myself despite, and then, and again, saying I'm gonna be a billionaire or doing all these other things that were, just not true. And there was a really, I remember pretty distinctly, like onion peel of like, why am I doing that? Like, what am I not trying to feel? What am I, what fear do I not want to face? And there was this thing of like, I get to say I could be that without ever having to take the risk of being that because I'm in this really comfortable seat.

Wait, so upper limit problem doesn't mean that you've limited what you could do and you're only thinking that you can be this, this great and not realizing you can be even bigger?

It also means that, yeah, I would say it's more holistic than that because that's when I hear you say that, Andrew, that seems to focus more on the outer conditions, like, oh, I can be this successful or make this much money or have this, you know, size of company. And it is that, but it's just, I think as importantly, it's the it's the inner experience that you're limiting. And from my experience, those are pretty closely correlated. And most people, I think, yeah, as I said earlier, sort of interpret it backwards. Like, oh, of course. Like I was saying earlier, Jesse, you said, oh, I'm really happy now and I have this multiple businesses. And a listener might think, well, yeah, you're happy because you got out of that thing and now you have multiple businesses, you made more money. And that's the trap. I think when people hear these stories, they interpret it as, oh, you're experiencing that joy because you're at this level of success, as opposed to you're at this level of success because you're experiencing this level of joy.

Right.

And it's all like—

I'll tie together a few random parts of this, Andrew. There's the super voodoo-y people who go, you've got to raise your vibration to connect with what the universe has for you. Right? Like, woo! And then on the other side of the world, there's Charlie Munger who says you gotta deserve what you get in life. Like he, you know, he says you do something to deserve it.

If, if you wanna be successful, do the work to deserve success.

It's almost like, again, you have to raise yourself to that. Like you, if you're, if you're constantly beating yourself up over the $25 million business that you're running with all these, like, versus if you're like, no, I am, it's a little bit of like, I am a CEO who could do that. A billion dollar CEO wouldn't be running a $25 million business and being whining about it. And he'd make, he'd do something different. He'd, he deserved what he earned because— or earned what he deserved. I can't— it's one of those things, but it's the same general concept of like, you have to bring yourself to that place before you can do it. And I mean, it took me many years again to shift this all around for myself. I had to leave as CEO. I walked— I like— some people were upset by that. I had people that invest, you know, Rick had invested in the company. Then I had to sit on the sidelines for a little while. Then I had to go, okay, I want to design this thing. Like, there were many pieces now to getting to designing it around my zone of genius, around, you know, trusting that, uh, which is the other— the whole— we started with the upper limit because the answer to the upper limit is in the book, right, is, is to live in your zone of genius.

Let me go one other, one or two other places before we go there. But yes, um, I was thinking about a way maybe to square the Charlie Munger quote with like the, the woo-woo frequency is like become someone who deserves, you know, what you want. And most people hear that as, well, I have to become worthy of it by achieving all these things or upleveling. Another way to become worthy of it is by shifting the belief that you're not worthy of it. Like, my view is actually everyone is inherently worthy, period, you know, and worthy of what they authentically want. And authentically is an important distinction there. But, you know, everyone's worthy of what they authentically want. So one way to become worthy of it is to do the inner work to let go of the beliefs that you're not inherently worthy of it, which is what most people believe. Back to the, like, you know, just— it's just around the corner, I'll become worthy, but I'm not yet. And that, that little trick of mind, you know, can perpetuate forever, right? And that, you know, you never get around the corner.

And it's so perpetuated, by the way, that it's— again, it's been taken as truth. And I think I believed it as truth. Like, if you go on Twitter, you see like, okay, I want to become rich. What's your number? I got to make this much money. Why? What's the answer, Andrew, when someone says, why do I need to make— why do I need $25 million in my bank account?

The big number that— the big thing that comes up is if I get X percent of it, then I can live year to year. We actually had that.

What do I get? Why? What am I getting out of that so I can live? What am I getting?

They, they'll say something like, so I can get a house so that I can do all this. And then so I can be happy is I think what you're getting at.

Well, I think people use two words on my experience, freedom and peace. I can get freedom and I can get peace.

Freedom for sure.

Well, once I have freedom, I can do whatever I want.

Then I'm peaceful.

Then I, then I, then I, you know, I'm not, I don't need to be all hopped up like this. And we've all met billionaires who are, who are, you know, visibly unhappy and not peaceful and not free. They're the opposite of that. And then you've met people who have very little money who are free and peaceful. And there's a question. And if you ask people, and I've done this now, I'm like, well, what if you could be free and like, could you get there? And like their brains just can't, like they short circuit on it. Like the brain goes, no, no, no, I need the money first before I can have that freedom and the peace.

It's like the water we swim in, like in our culture is like, do, have, be, right? Is the way I've heard it described. If I do all this stuff, then I'll have this, you know, result and then I'll be happy. And it literally doesn't work.

So, or the Mexican fisherman parable, you know, that parable, right? Andrew?

No.

Oh yeah.

You know, tell it.

I do. Yeah. The story, the story is like, there's this investment banker and he goes, uh, on a beach vacation in Mexico, this beautiful beach and amazing thing. And he sees it and he goes and eats at some restaurant and tastes this delicious fish. He goes, hey, who made this fish? Where'd this fish come from? And they go, oh, those are the fishermen. And he also, he's the restaurant owner. He goes, hey, where'd you get it? He goes, oh, I fish in the mornings for a couple hours. I cook, I get what I need. Then I come home, I cook it for people. I sell it. And then I play guitar with my friends all night and I have a beautiful night. And he goes, what's wrong with you? This is a massive opportunity. You should be, you know, and so he goes, okay, yeah, tell me, what do I do? He goes, well, first of all, fish all day. If you fish all day, you're going to get 10 times the amount of fish you need, which you can then turn around and sell and have profit. And he goes, okay, all right, I'm with you. Then what do I do? He goes, well, then once you're making a profit, you can buy 5 more boats and you can get 100 times the amount of fish. He goes, okay, all right, cool. Then what will I do? He goes, then you'll have international distribution. You'll have a billion-dollar business. And then the fisherman's like, and then what you'll do? He's like, oh, you'll retire to like a small beach town. You'll maybe fish a little for fun. You'll feed people food and you'll play guitar and, and look, you know, dance on the beach all night. And, and, you know, the point is the guy's already doing that, right? And so I think it's, it's a great parable for this, right? Which is you need the money to be peaceful. He's like, nah, I'm good. I'm already peaceful. It is.

I love the parable. I think what I feel is I need the urgency to get to that. Like you were talk, I was bringing up that you go skiing.

Yes.

I went for a run this morning and I usually feel like this is not the time in business to go for a run. Wait till things are a little bit more organized. Wait till I have less on my plate and then go back to running in the morning. And what you're saying is, actually, I don't even know what you would say to that.

If nothing else, you're ruining your run and—

Because I'm carrying all the guilt on the run.

Yeah.

Yes.

Yeah, most people choose to do the thing and resist doing the thing at the same time, right? It's like, okay, you're choosing to run, go enjoy the run, but you choose it, but then resist it, 'cause in their mind you're judging like, oh, should I be doing this? I shouldn't be doing this.

And if most people are willing to do that, by the way, they've been taught that if they do that, it makes the action okay because at least they're judging themselves for doing it.

Right. Yes.

And if, as long as I call out to myself that I shouldn't be doing this, even though I'm doing it, then at least I'm, I'm aware that I shouldn't be. And that's right. Versus like Andrew, you know, here's a good Dave question. Are you willing to just run for 20 minutes and enjoy it without giving yourself any kind of guilt of any kind?

And here's what happens. We make tons and tons of choices throughout the day that we don't even think about, like tons, you know. The times where they occur to us, I'm parroting Joel Hudson here just to give credit, he's a great coach. The times when these choices occur to us as like hard decisions is when we're scared. So it's worth just noting that, that it's—

oh, that's interesting.

All sorts of choices all day long.

We just noticed the ones that we're scared around, and they feel like decisions. And, oh, should I go run or not? And, um, he has this thing, I think he calls it like feel over figure. So most of the times we don't want to feel the fear, so then we escape into our minds, and our minds try to figure out the right answer. Should I run or shouldn't I run? Which is kind of what I heard you doing, like What's the right answer, Dave? Should I run or should I not run? Should I run now or should I wait until the business is further along? That's what our minds do.

They—

it's like they somehow believe they can accurately predict the future. And if I could just figure out the right answer, then I can control the future. All of it is just a strategy to avoid feeling the fear. So practically, what I would recommend is feel the fear that arises when you consider you know, not focusing on the business for an hour and running, like literally welcome the fear in your body, right? Feel it. And then as you do that, just see what occurs to you to do. Actually, I want to run, or actually I want to focus on the business. And I find, again, back to are you willing to have and do what you want? There is this path where— and Jesse, you can speak to this if it resonates— you actually start to follow your wants instead of what your mind thinks is the right answer. It's a really different way of operating.

Yeah, it's, it's a very different way of operating. It feels different. It feels less heavy. It feels less sufferingful, whatever, if that's a word. Um, 80% of the time you may do the same thing you were gonna do anyway, but you just don't carry the baggage along, along with you as you do it. And that makes all the difference because you feel light. Imagine, Andrew, again, if you could run and you were running, and then if you could work and you were working, and in neither of those two things are you doing the one and thinking about the other, right? I've just found it to be— and then I think to Dave's point around the peace, like, you also start to find things that arise naturally that capture your attention, the creativity spikes. Like, there's just a lot of things that come along with it.

So then how do you separate the feeling of what do I wanna do? Do I wanna go skiing every day 'cause it's ski season? Or do I wanna go running every morning 'cause it's good for my health? And is this the right decision for my business or for my family at this moment? Because the want is hard enough to figure out, to let go of like all the restrictions that you impose on yourself. But once you get to the want, you still have the, is this really good for my business? And then I might have limiting beliefs about that, that you don't go and have fun until the business is at X level.

You might indeed, Andrew. I want to speak to the context thing that Jasper was pointing to for a second, which is like have to versus want to. Like you can do the literal same activity is what you just said. I just want to give it like a little bit more sharp distinction. You can do the literal same activity from a context of I have to do this. And it will feel different to you than I choose to do this or I want to do this or I get to do this. And a coach said to me once, like, you don't have to pay taxes. Like, you don't have to pay taxes. There are consequences to not paying your taxes. And most people, I myself included, I prefer the consequences to paying my taxes to the consequence of not paying my taxes. So I pay them. But honestly, for a long time, it wasn't even paying the taxes so much as preparing them, right? Doing like sitting down, right? Maybe a segue to Zone of Excellence.

Paying is the easier part of the work.

Yeah, the paying, whatever. But like, God, having to go through and gather all the forms and documents, spend hours, it's like, this is not what I love doing. And I would literally do it and resist it at the same time. I made myself and my wife miserable because I would drag my feet and complain. And then at one point I was like, okay, I'm choosing to do this, so why don't I just do it? And literally this literal same activity, like put on some music. She sat next to me, just like cranked through it a couple hours. I was like, no big deal. It's not, you know, I prefer to be skiing or coaching, but like it was no big deal. So, and this, you know, we can get into maybe zone of genius conversation. This speaks to like it's not that every moment of every day you're going to be doing the one thing you most want to be doing. And, you know, 80% of the time, 70% of the time, right? Like, that's, I think, a reasonable aspiration. You can operate more and more in your zone of genius, and we should explain what that means. Did I answer your question? You had a specific question around, um, no, what's—

it feels like You know what, actually, it felt like you had energy to talk about Zone of Genius. I was giving you room for that because that's what we talked about having the topic for today.

Okay.

But I do actually, if you're gonna come back to it, here's the thing. You're saying in anything, stop and say, what do I want? Which is a big thing to be able to do. All right. Stop saying, when will I earn it?

Let me say one other thing. This is where we get into radical territory, which I like to get into. Which is people have it that like work is this one thing and play is this other thing. And therefore the work stuff, even as you're asking the question, Andrew, of course, like the work stuff requires some sacrifices is sort of what I hear implicit. Like, well, okay, but I can't just play all the time. So how do I know when I should work or it's good for the business? And I wanna bust all of that open, say like, what if your whole life felt like play and the things that you happen to do that create value for other people and therefore money for you, are at— you enjoy as much as the things that don't, right? Like for me, you know, a really rich, powerful coaching conversation or, you know, group facilitation where people are just in this like experiencing tremendous shifts or a day of powder skiing, like those are roughly equivalent experiences for me. And again, I want to just stand for like, that's possible, right? This is the upper limit. That's possible. So there's like a precursor to your question, which is, are you doing quote unquote work that you love? That's in— and we'll get it— that's in your zone of genius, in which case those questions don't really occur to you the same way of like— because I think what is implicit in your question is, yeah, but isn't there stuff that I have to just suffer through to make my business successful? And yeah, maybe 10, 20% of the time there's like, like tax stuff, like I talked about, but I want to stand for, you know, a world where people are like loving what they do. So they're like, oh my God, I can't wait to go do this thing, which happens to be quote unquote work-related. And I can't wait to go do this thing, which, you know, feels more like skiing or play.

Yeah. But Andrew, let me try to answer your question. Let's talk about zone of genius. Okay. I'm going to try to answer in a much more straightforward, like, so you asked, I think your question was, how do I know something I want? Like, how do I discern between what I want and like, it's what's good for my business?

Yeah.

Right. I think the first answer is practice of learning yourself, which, which comes via like meditation or, or blind checks or any commitment where you're pausing and going, am I doing this because I'm guilting myself or am I doing this because I actually want to do it? And in my experience, it took significant amounts, years of practice before I could actually, and even I still sometimes think I'm doing something and I'm like, oh wait, no, I was actually trying to, trying to do this other minute. Like, and, and so there's a lot of practice involved in it, like reflection and self-awareness to actually get to the point where you're discerning, do I actually want this or do I actually want the other thing? And I'm, I'm like lying to myself about it. And I think we all do that. So I think that's the first answer is practice. I think the second thing is I don't know, business is not that complicated. Like, it's a math— for like, what's our success? We got to get this many number of people to sign up for accelerators and this many people to do this. And like, and that itself— and I think like, you know, Dave would say facts don't have charge associated with them. Like, the numbers and the data and the what needs to get done— if something's down, we want to move it up. Like, it's all pretty straightforward. Business itself is not a complex thing necessarily, right? So that part of it's simple. Hey, if you make more sales calls and you do more marketing, you will get more customers, usually if you do a decent job of it. So that part is not the hard part. So then the question becomes like, what is the hard part then? Like, how could you be sacrificing one for the other? And it's like, well, you do that because you tell yourself this story that by running, I'm not doing, I'm not doing this work. And by not doing this work, I'm going to be less successful at it. And so there, I don't know, I'm not being super articulate. No, I feel like you both are making it a little too simple, simple.

There's clearly like a list of things to do and the list never ends.

Yeah.

But it's important. And if you take time off to do something else, whether it's be with your family or go ski or go run, you're taking away one of the items on the list that can't get done. Or you're, yeah. Or you're adding a lot of stress. And so the, the question is, at what point do you say, I do want this and I also want my work and I love this and I also love my work. I'm— now is a good time to do this because— and versus now is not a good time to do this.

Well, the tax— I think the taxes point that Dave was making is a good one, Andrew, which is like, if you want to run for 3 hours a day or ski for 3 hours a day between now and the end of Q1, we're probably not going to get 100 people to our accelerator. We probably get 60 though, because you know what to do well and you, and you like know the activities that need to take place. Now, if, if all you want is 150, like, yeah, that's— don't see your kids for the next X amount of time. Like, do the work. Like, do all that work and never stop working. And so you are making a trade-off around financial results. And that's my point is like, that's not a complicated thing. You just have to decide where you want to be. You said in a meeting this week, I'm okay if that number's lighter, cuz I want this other business line to exist. Like, you made that trade-off. You made it very clearly in your mind.

I see what you're saying. You're saying, look, there is a trade-off. We're not going to play Pollyanna and assume there's no trade-off. But let's own what we want and then make the trade-off intentionally. And so maybe Dave Kashen—

I think that's step one. I think step two is zone of genius, which then for like in my life, I've created more value in the last 3 years than I did in any 3-year period of my whole life. And I've worked less and I've had more fun and I've— and so the two—

let's talk about that because I felt a little bit like we were shoving zone of genius into this conversation because we had put this down on our document. But, um, but now I'm seeing the connection. Who, which of you wants to explain that?

I will explain it. So again, this comes originally from the Hendricks Institute. I learned it through Conscious Leadership Group, just to give credit. The idea is there are 4 zones that humans tend to operate from. The zone of incompetence, it's relatively self-explanatory stuff. You're worse than most people at. Zone of competence, stuff you're okay at. Zone of excellence, things that you're actually very, very good at. And for most people, you— they get a lot of accolades and validation and approval from being good at. And then zone of genius, which is the intersection between what lights you up, like what you just love to do. Like if you drew a drew like a graph of your life, you know, and saw like the peak moments, at least like when you were doing things, those would be indicative of your zone of genius. The intersection of what you love to do, what lights you up, and what you're naturally talented at and produce extraordinary results in.

And just to give examples, like for me, right? Incompetence cooking, competence driving, excellence financial modeling and numbery things. Genius, you know, a sales conversation or like a conversation, a persuasive conversation. Or so those are just for like just to bring it into someone's mind. Those are 4 very specific examples for me.

Yeah, I like when you, when you separate out zone of excellence being you can do financial modeling in an Excel spreadsheet, you'd be great at it, but that's not what brings you energy. Zone of genius is what you're great at and brings you energy, lights you up. Okay, I'm with you guys.

Yeah. And most people get that, like, okay, I probably shouldn't spend too much time in my zone of incompetence, maybe competence. The trap for most people is the zone of excellence. And yeah, I could, I could speak to this personally. You know, people look at me quizzically sometimes when I say, well, I started my career as an investment banker. You know, like I joke, I'm a reformed investment banker. You know, I went to Wharton undergrad, studied finance. You know, I worked as an investment banker and then at a hedge fund. So, you know, it's similar.

In this case, it happens to be literally working at Goldman Sachs and SPO Capital, like the best of the best of the best, to be clear.

Thank you. And I was fully operating in my zone of excellence. And it might be worth speaking to how I got out of it and what I think had me in it. But I just want people to, like, be able to map that, like, for like a long time, including even what I studied in college, right? Was all, you know, I really loved my psychology classes, but I was like, yeah, but business, you know, I was at Penn, so Wharton looms large, right? So, okay, I got to study finance and then go, you know, and then even startups, you know, I have to say, Goldman, I was at SPO, I went to Stanford for business school, did a startup, even, even the startup. In many ways was still operating in my zone of excellence. And I got a lot of validation from it. You know, like even Jesse, what you just did, like, was an example of that, you know? Oh, even—

yeah.

Oh, Dave was at Goldman, SPO, right? That's impressive. And, you know, I'm grateful for it. I think it gives me sort of permission now, you know, or more credibility now. But the story I want to tell is this. How did I get out of it? So, well, how did I get into it? The way I usually tell the story, I don't think we talked about this in the past. My parents were divorced when I was 5. My father, who, you know, we actually had tremendous breakthrough in our relationship. But at that time, he was already not that emotionally expressive. After the divorce, I think he was in a tough place. So he really kind of retreated emotionally. At least my perception was retreated emotionally. So as a 5-year-old, it was like, oh, you know, the safest interpretation of that is not dad's going through a hard time or something's, you know, off with that. It's something wrong with me. So I made up a story. There's something wrong with me and I'm unworthy of his love and attention again, because I perceived not getting it. And so I spent 20 years in my zone of excellence, trying to prove that I was worthy of his love and attention ultimately. And I ended up going to this retreat in which I realized this, you know, and they kind of did this, like, there's what happened in your life. Okay, parents are divorced, dad wasn't engaged. And then there's the story you made up about yourself based on what happened. And what happened was 20 years ago, or, you know, at the time, like, it's, it can't really impact you. It happened 20 years ago. Other than through the story that, you know, like a, like a piece of luggage you're carrying around with you. So I let go of the story that I was unworthy, and that created the possibility of, you know, living an authentic life, living in my zone of genius. And it was a tremendous and terrifying shift. I just want to be clear about that. Like, my— I was working with a coach. I hired a coach after we sold my first startup. And I got clear. I went through a coach's training program myself. Like, oh my God, you know, these are my people, right? Zone of genius. Like, this lights me up. I love doing this. And I got all this feedback that I was naturally good at it. So I discovered my zone of genius. And then— but I was still working for the company that had acquired us and had a big retention package coming. And I would talk to my coach, you know, I was Jesse, right? I would talk to my coach about, I know what I really want to do, but I'm, you know, you have all this money, blah, blah. And he, he was like, okay, I'm going to, I'm going to hold and you're going to call the CEO and quit or I will no longer coach you. And I'm like, oh God. So like, I was terrified. I remember feeling in my body I was— I had just been married, just had my first kid, like I was sole breadwinner. And it was a lot of money. I didn't have a lot of money at the time, you know, the retention package. And I called him and I said, hey, this guy Chris Schroeder, who I really respect, I said, I found what I'm here on earth to do and I got to go do it. And poetically, he ended up hiring me as his coach. So I called it fate, but that was a huge— so I just want to acknowledge how scary it can be to go from You know, because there's so much, you know, to Jesse's earlier point about like we do what we're unconsciously committed to because we're getting all sorts of benefits from it, right? You know, we are— we create what we're unconsciously committed to. So even though I wasn't happy and fulfilled, I got a lot of goodies, a lot of validation from the things that I was doing. Yeah.

So that's awesome, Dave. Thanks for sharing.

It was a really big shift. Yeah.

My, my, Andrew, my short version, shorter version of that story with Dave was like similar, you know, I probably, I won't go into the childhood stuff, but like, I, when I was running a business, I was taught by my dad, like, you do everything, you reconcile the books, like, he's a small business immigrant entrepreneur, sweep the floors, you sweep the, I mean, there's nothing you don't do. And that's how I built Ampush and notably successfully built Ampush. And so the idea that you could let go of parts of those things seemed crazy to me. And I think the exercise from, in my experience was it took me probably at least 2 years to like fully know my zones of genius. 'Cause I was just so, I was doing everything. I was overwhelmed with everything. You know, I was, I was a guy at all, you know, all roads led to Jesse. And then I was like, okay, cool. I think I know them. And it's, and of course, as soon as I identified them, like, well, I've always known them, but I was pretending I didn't know them, but like, I always knew what they actually were. Right. And the, the moments, you know, the, the messages I got from people or the moments that I got the most energy from, I could distill them. So I think you could probably do that faster than I did it. If you're listening, someone's out there. The harder part is actually trusting that if you commit to your zone of genius, that you're actually gonna be okay. And that's, Dave talked about the terrifying phone call. I mean, my version of that with GatewayX, as you know, Andrew, is like, I'm not the CEO of any of these companies. And I, I, and I have lists. I have, okay, here's what I'll do, Casey. I'll, I'll do biz dev and sales with you. I'll help mentor the team and coach you. I'll help ideate strategy, but I won't do delivery work. I won't do administrative stuff. I'm not gonna do the benefits plan. I'm not gonna do accounting. Like I've done all that stuff, but I'm not gonna do it.

Well, you're not leading the team.

I'm not leading the team. Yeah. I don't take the staff meetings. I don't, I don't set the, you know, and, and it's really uncomfortable and it's gotten less on the, initially, I mean, the first upset client at Growth Assistant or Offer, I was like, whoa, whoa. You know, and I had to like reel myself back. And I think, but I didn't believe it could work. I didn't actually believe, like there's parts of me who were like, no. And there's still parts of me that show up sometimes, Andrew, as you know, that doesn't believe I can't be the CEO, right? I know I gotta jump in and I gotta take control of this. And so, but, but what I would tell you is at Ambush, I always felt like I wanted to get out. And this is a job where I'm like, man, I feel like I could do this for 20 years. Like I really feel energized on, on 80, 90% of my days because I'm doing things that I enjoy and I love. And, and it's, it's like, and I still have the, the upper limit thought of like, yeah, maybe it's not actually gonna work out. Like, but, but in the last few years it's worked out. It's worked out tremendously well. And, and I've like finally believed that by staying in a few of my zones of genius, I can, I can actually, I can have everything, Andrew, which is what you're saying, which I can truly have my schedule, make more money than I could make otherwise, be a bit more peaceful and happy than I could otherwise.

I want to add to that because I'm a total cliché in that regard as well. I, I thought, really thought I was making the choice of purpose, passion, living in my zone of genius over money.

Like, back when you had that job, you're saying you thought that?

Uh, yeah, basically like leaving behind the startup world. Yeah, quitting, well, specifically that money, but in general, like, I didn't think of coaching— by the way, this is 15+ years ago. Coaching wasn't, first of all, a well, high-status thing to do.

No, it was a place where people who couldn't do and just wanted to talk would go work, or at least that's what people— that's the perception of it. The other perception was it was for people who needed so much coaching that they finally felt like, okay, I want to be loud enough that I can be like my coach. And now it's become really— it's become a real profession that's taken seriously. But you're right, back then it wasn't.

It was, it was a thing to So it was a real leap for me. And I, yeah, I truly thought I am willing to let go. And God bless my wife, she was supportive of like, we're not going to live that. If I had stayed at the hedge fund, I know what life that would have been. We're not going to have that life. And that's okay. Well, I think we'll be happier and more fulfilled. I'll be happier, more fulfilled, and it's okay. And it's turned out to be a tremendously financially rewarding thing to do. In part because it's become more widely accepted and more valued. And I've, I've had the opportunity to earn equity in some of my clients' companies, and that's done well. Yeah, but that was— it's like the cliché of like, do what you love and the money will follow. But at least having had that experience of I'm just going to follow flow, do, you know, be in my zone of genius. And because I love it so much, you know, it's not like I'm like fiercely competitive, like I'm going to be the best coach and be better than everyone else. But I love learning about how to help human beings thrive. Like I said this recently, you know, a 7-day personal growth retreat or a 7-day powder skiing trip are equivalent for me. So like, I love this stuff. I love learning like what's in our way. And so of course I'm going to be, you know, get better and better at it because I just love it. And, you know, that, you know, leads to mastery and mastery leads to, I think, you know, helps lead to abundance.

So Dave, because, because we were talking about your background, Goldman and all that, and SPO, which I never heard of before, I went to your LinkedIn. The company you were talking about is called WorkLife. It was acquired by Cisco. It was a Y Combinator company. You were a Y Combinator founder.

I was— that the company I was talking about was called WellSphere. I did two startups. The one I did out of GSB was an online health company that we sold to HealthCentral. And then we don't have time to get really into it, but I did another startup, um, where we were trying to rid the world of soul-crushing meetings and build, uh, collaboration software. I was sort of trying to take what I was learning as a coach and, and build software around it. Um, we sold that—

had no idea.

And at another time we could talk more about why I jumped back into startup. Some imposter— I, well, I'll say it real quickly. I was not CEO of my first startup and I was coaching all these CEOs and I felt a little like an imposter. Um, and for other reasons, I think I started to, I started to actually make it more about the money as I charged more and more. And so I started to get scared of losing clients. So I started to pull punches and like talk to them about the things they wanted to instead of the things I really wanted to. And I started to lose energy for it, which is partially why I ended up leaving for a little while, doing another startup. And then, you know, after we sold that, I've been coaching since then and I've gotten really clear, like I'm, I'm going to coach people on the things I love to coach people on. And I'm really clear with new, new prospective clients. This is what I do. This is not, you know, this is not what I do. And if you want something else, I'm not your, you know, I'm not for you. And even that, what do you not do? I was terrified of being that clear because I thought, yeah, you know, even when I started doing like conscious leadership coaching, like, who's gonna want, you know, who's gonna want that? Like, that's such a narrow set. I might have talked about this past, and again, the opposite has been true again and again. So for me personally, the more I have followed flow, followed what I love followed what I really want, like so much more than my mind could have ever calculated and figured out how to do, you know, success in all different ways to measure it has followed.

I will say one last thing before we end. On the last session, I commented on Jesse's clothes, and then he told us that he went to a Chinese app and he bought it. Apparently I got the wrong app, but on Black— no, Cyber Monday, just before the end of the day, I went out and I bought like a haul of clothes.. And wait till you see how handsome I look in future podcast episodes. Do not judge me for buying from China, but I will look handsome.

Glad you got in.

I'm traveling today, so this is my travel attire. Very casual.

Where you going?

Glad you got in before the tariffs. So yeah, you know, can't wait to see how handsome you look.

If only you have the right clothes, then finally you will look handsome enough. Where's Jesse traveling to and what are you going to do then, Dave, this weekend? Let's end on that.

We're both going to ski, I think, just in different places. Oh, wow.

Yeah. Did you ask what we're doing? What I'm doing this weekend?

Yeah. I—

you mentioned I'm a ski instructor. I have my ski instructor training tomorrow, and then I will ski probably with my family and some friends on Sunday.

All right.

Right on. I'll be doing some running.

All right.

Thank you. Bye, everyone.

Bye-bye. Bye.