Stop Sabotaging Your Success: The Key Mindset Mistake!

Hey there, thoughtful listener. With us right now, it's Noah St. John, AKA Dr. Noah. Dr. Noah, you are the author of more than 25 books. Uh, your latest book is The 7-Figure Expert: Your Ultimate Guide to a Life of More Impact, Influence, and Financial Freedom. You are the founder of successclinic.com. Dr. Noah, it's great to have you.

Thanks, Josh. Great to be here.

Well, I would love to hear from your perspective the work that you do, the impact you have in the world.

Well, I'm known for helping people, entrepreneurs, experts, coaches, consultants, people of all natures and all different businesses make more in just 12 weeks than they did in the previous 12 months while actually winning their lives back. There's a lot of hustle bros out there and they say, hey, listen here, if you want to make more money, all you got to do is work 10 times harder, 10 times longer. Don't take breaks. Don't take vacations. I'm like, are you nuts? That sounds stupid. You know, no, that, that's one way to do it.

Sure.

But that, I, that doesn't work for me. I don't know about you, but I want my business to serve me, not me exist to serve my business. So that's what I teach people is really how to make more in 12 weeks than they did in the previous 12 months while winning their lives back at the same time. Yeah.

Well, that sounds idealistic, I'd say.

Yeah.

So how do we get there?

Well, it's exactly what I teach in all these books that I've written, you know, and my online courses and my coaching and of course. But really, it boils down to really just 2 things, and that is inner game and outer game. So, if you think of a Venn diagram— I'm such a nerd, I love Venn diagrams, you know. And so, my favorite Venn diagram of all time is just 2 circles, right? One says inner game and one says outer game, and you put them together, and that's where you have the phenomenon called success. Inner game is everything that happens between your ears that you can't see directly, and outer game is everything that you can see directly that also affects everything that you do. But what's interesting is I've helped my clients over the last 30 years to make over 3 billion dollars in sales by following my methods, meaning we've helped entrepreneurs to add multiple 6 figures, 7 figures, and even 8 figures while winning their lives back. And what's fascinating and what most people don't realize is that 90% of success really comes from your inner game. Right? Mhmm. Like, I was speaking at a seminar in Los Angeles. A man came up to me and he said, Noah, I wanna hire you as my coach. He just heard me speak. I was walking off the stage. He said, I want to hire you as my coach. And he said that we've been stuck at $4 million in revenues for the past 4 years. And he said, I've hired all these marketing guys and all these, you know, gurus and everything, but we keep hitting that income ceiling. I worked with him and his leadership team for 18 months. We got him from being stuck at $4 million for the previous 4 years to over $20 million in less than 18 months. How did I do it? By exactly what I'm talking about. But, but this was the key. Nobody had shown him how to master his inner game. And that was what caused the hockey stick growth. Okay.

Well, let's talk about the elements of that. It sounds like you've helped a number of great people. What are some— for our friend that's listening today, um, you know, what are the elements that maybe they could be a little bit more introspective of or pay a little bit more attention to, uh, regarding what's going on in the inner game?

Well, the reverse of that is what I call your head trash, right? I've written 25 books about how to take out Your head trash. Now, your head trash is the voice in your head that says, "I can't do it because dot dot dot," and then you just fill in the blank, right? So see, everybody has goals, and everybody talks about goals, right? We've heard, "Oh, you got to set your goals." We've heard that a million times. But what nobody talks about is what happens after you set the goal, right? So what happens after you set the goal? So people say, "Hey, Noah, you know, I want to make more money. I want to grow my business. I want to take more time off. I want to take more vacations. You know, I'm working all the time. I want to not have my business me work for my business. I want my business to work for me." And they're like, and I'm like, great. Yeah, those are great goals. The thing is, though, then they say, but I don't think I can do it. You know, I don't have the time. I don't have the money. I can't afford it. I've tried everything. You know, I've failed before and, oh, it's so hard. And I don't know who to trust. I don't know who to talk to. See, all of those things that you just said after that, your, your, what your goal is, that's what I'm calling your head trash. That's what I've written all these books about, how to take out that head trash. So what everybody can do right now who's listening to this program is very simple. Anybody can do this. This is exactly where we start with all of our clients, whether it's one-on-one or group coaching. We say, number 1, what is your goal? Right? What is it? Right? And if you say, well, I wanna make more money, they'll say, okay, here's $5. Go away. No. You gotta be a lot more clear than that. Right? You gotta really be clear on your goals. Alright. Now, maybe you've heard that before. Probably you have. Right? But most people still haven't done it even if they've heard it before. So that's point number 1. You gotta do that. But then step number 2 is I want you to write down all the reasons why you think you can't do that thing you just said you want it. What is— what are all the reasons? What is your head trash, right? Your head trash. Well, I can't afford it. I don't have the time. I'm too busy. Oh, my spouse won't let me do it. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Whatever the heck it is, right? Write it down and then realize what it's costing you. Step 3, what is that costing you to keep holding on to that head trash? Let me give you a concrete example. I was talking to one of my clients. His name is Charles, and I asked him these questions, which I ask all my clients. And I said, Charles, how much do you think it's gonna cost you? And now he'd been reading my books, right? He'd been studying me. So he understood why, you know, how my philosophy and how my formulas are different, right? So, you know, he tried a lot of other things too, but he understood why my, my processes, my frameworks are different. I said, Charles, how much do you think it's gonna cost you if we don't get rid of your head trash in the next 12 months? He said, without batting an eye, he said, $1 million. Noah, this is easily gonna cost me $1 million. If I don't take out this head trash that you're talking about? I said, first of all, Charles, I hear that every day. It's very common. Number one. Number two, why don't you just give me 10% of that million and I'll find you $1 million in the next 12 months? In other words, if you give me a dollar and I give you $10 back, is that a good deal? He goes, yeah, that's a good deal. So he did that. He decided to invest $100K for me to coach him for 1 year. Now, as it turns out, I coached him for a year. As it turns out, I didn't find him $1 million in the next 12 months. Instead, I found him $1.8 million in just 10 months. So, he gave me a dollar, I gave him $18 back. And then he sent me an email. He said, Noah, guess where I am? I'm on a 7-week vacation with my wife. We just bought a new RV. This is a dream I've had for years, but I've never had the time or the money. So, now I have more money than ever before. But now, because of what you taught me, now I have more time than ever before. So, think about how that head trash is costing you, and then you got to take steps to take out your head trash.

Sure.

Okay.

So, if— so, let's say that we have a list of reasons. And some of those reasons are just like, look, it's going to be very labor intensive. You know, I'm likely going to have to give up my weekends for quite some time. I'm likely going to have to sacrifice this or that. I, you know, I may not be able to— I mean, I mean, there could be legitimate, you know, if-then type things. And I guess it's just a matter then of getting clarity of What you really, really, really want, and, and then just being intentional about that is what it sounds like you're saying.

Well, there's a lot more to it, but yes, that's part of it. So see, we all think we want things. Everybody thinks we want things. I want more money. I want a new car. I want a bigger house. I want whatever. All those things are perfectly fine. I want a yacht. There's nothing wrong with those things. The problem is that people focus on the thing, but they forget that what we want is the emotion associated with the Yeah. See, we humans are emotional creatures, right? We're not, you know, we're not Vulcans. We're not androids. If you're a Star Trek fan like me, you know, we're, we're humans. We're driven by our emotions. So, yeah, you want more money, but why do you want more money? Because of the feeling associated with it. You want more time because you want that freedom. You want that peace of mind. You want your health to be better, whatever it is. So I encourage my clients to focus on the emotion rather than the thing. I mean, they go together. So, I'm not trying to say, you know, oh, don't want more money. No, of course, we all want more money. We all want those nice things. That's perfectly fine. But it's actually smarter and easier to focus on the emotion first because that way you can be a happy person going after more money rather than I got to get more money so I can be happy. Yeah.

That's interesting. So, rather than thinking, again, it's a little bit more of a focus on the emotional journey or the emotional beingness. Like, who do you want to be right now? What ultimately do you want emotionally? Again, rather than, sure, you saying you— you're saying you want to sit on a beach for 3, 4 weeks. Why? What's, what's below that? What are you really, really, really after? Yeah, because it's interesting. I, I think, um, Dr. Noah, we see a lot of maybe examples of, you know, maybe it's someone that's living that lifestyle, and so we look at those very superficial things and And that's not really it. It's, it's the emotion we want underneath it— stability, uh, freedom, you know, th— those sorts of things.

And don't forget that most of us want to really look good to other people. That's a very big emotion. We want to cause envy in other people. And then I was like, what? Wait a minute. No, we getting— I'm like, yeah, no kidding. You want to look cool. That's really what it is. And if you look at the gurus in the, in this space, in the entrepreneur space, That's exactly what they're doing. Hey, look at my yacht. Hey, look at my jet. Hey, look at my helicopter. Nothing wrong with those things. The problem is when you give them money, which I did that, you know, I bought all those things because, you know, those images are very seductive. The problem is that those gurus can't teach their way out of a paper bag. Right? There's no there there. And so that's the problem is that's what I call personality-driven success. That's a big, big part of the, of the guru marketing. So the point is what you wanna look for is system-driven success. Now, how do you know it's system-driven success? Very simple. That when you look at the gurus, their only or main success story is themselves. Hey, man, I made all this money. That's great for you. Have you helped anyone else? Right? Have you helped anyone else make any money? So, I would rather brag about my client success than my success.

Oh, yeah.

Yes, I've done well. I mean, sure, I'm doing great. But who cares, right? It should be about the per— the people that I've helped, right? The clients that I've helped because of my system. And that's why when you go to our website, you see Hundreds of case studies, and I have. I literally have gurus, and they they make fun of me. They're like, Noah, you got enough case studies? And I'm like, no, you can never have enough case studies. Why? Because trust is so low right now. Because all most people have been ripped off by all those guys, right? So trust is very low right now. So my job is to prove that yes, what I'm saying is true. How do I prove it? Not by me, but by all the other people that have helped.

Mm-hmm. And so if we're thinking about like ourselves as leaders, is is there an exercise that that that maybe you could recommend? What does that process look like where someone might get clarity over the emotions that they truly want? I mean, again, it sounds like it could just be a very simple mind mapping exercise, but if you're not taking the time to do it, then of course you don't have clarity. And without clarity, yeah, of course you're not going to do anything different because you don't know where you're going.

That's right.

But what a valuable uh, you know, time, uh, that, you know, investment that one can make in themselves on a Friday afternoon. Just say, I'm gonna block off this hour and I'm gonna start doing some deep work, and I'm gonna think about, you know, who I am. What do I really, really want? What are the emotions associated with that that I really want? And, and, and would you say then, Dr. Noah, that, um, is there, is there a sense of, um, You know, kind of bringing those emotions into our life now or sooner? Like, let's say that, you know, say, well, listen, you know, I've got, you know, $200,000 or something like that in business debt, and that's looming over my head. And when I pay that off, that's going to make me feel X. And so, if X is very valuable to them, what are some— what would you recommend? Do they start enjoying a little bit of X now while they work toward the big goal there?

Yes. I do recommend that. And let me give you an— a concrete example. When in 2007, I lost everything because ironically, I'd been paying all these gurus all this money, and they gave me so much bad advice that I ended up $40,000 in debt and then moved back into my parents' house because I lost everything by— because of listening to them. And so I realized, you know, when I had nothing, I literally had nothing, but I'm like, well, wait a second. I don't have nothing. That's not true. I have, you know, a brain that works. I have 10 fingers and 10 toes, and my, my eyes work. My ears work. I have a, a phone and an internet connection and a laptop. You see, so I started to go through, even though I had nothing, I went through what I actually do have. So, the point of that exercise for me was about instilling and installing gratitude every single day. See, there's an old saying that we all know, what you focus on grows, right? What you focus on grows. So, what most people are focusing on is what they don't have. Well, when you focus on what you don't have, what do you get more of? The experience of not having. So even when I lost everything and had nothing, I started to focus on the little teeny bit that I had. And guess what started to happen? I started to attract better people into my life. I started to attract the right mentors, and I started to attract the right clients that then I could help. And of course, that got me out of that situation and into the awesome situation that I'm in today. And so the point of the exercise or the point of the story is for everybody out there, no matter what situation you have, you always have something to be grateful for.

Mhmm.

Gratitude is The, you know, the parent of all virtues. And it is the most important thing. And I want people to realize that I— this was not natural for me. You know, I grew up poor in a rich neighborhood. So I— it was pounded into my head every day that we don't have, we don't have, we don't have.

Yeah.

So that's what I grew up with. But I had to force myself to say, well, if that's what I keep doing, then that's what I'll keep getting. So I forced myself to be grateful every day. So my point of the story is if I can do it, anybody can do it.

Yeah. Well, Dr. Noah, I'm certain that you have some next steps for our friend that happens to be listening. You seem at the ready. Your websites, there are a few. Which one should we send folks to?

Well, the thing you can start with right now is my new book. As you mentioned, it's called The 7-Figure Expert. I'll just hold it up here. It's called The 7-Figure Expert: Your Ultimate Guide to a Life of More Impact, Influence, and Financial Freedom. What we all want, right? And the great thing is, because you're watching this or listening to this program, the book is free. Just cover the shipping. And so, all I have to do is go to go7figureexpertbook.com. Very easy to remember, 7figureexpertbook.com. The book is free. Just cover the shipping. That's a great place to start. My main website is my name, noahstjohn.com. We have lots of online courses and programs and coaching. And by the way, if you want to talk to me or one of my coaches, Just go to breakthroughwithnoah.com and you can schedule a breakthrough consultation there. Uh, that's a 15-minute complimentary call at breakthroughwithnoah.com. Very easy to remember. Yeah.

Well, those links, uh, Dr. Noah, that you just shared will be in our show notes. So our friend that's listening, just kind of click around in your podcast app. You'll find exactly where we've got that all linked up. Well, Dr. Noah, thank you so much again. Congratulations on the launch of your latest book, The 7-Figure Expert: Your Ultimate Guide to a Life of More Impact, Influence, and financial freedom. Uh, again, all the numerous websites that you shared, we've got those all linked up. Uh, Dr. Noah, thank you so much for joining us.

My pleasure.