The Performance Paradox: Embrace Mistakes, Master Performance & Learning, Eduardo Briceño

Insurance isn't one size fits all. That's why drivers have enjoyed Progressive's Name Your Price tool for years now. With the Name Your Price tool, you tell them what you want to pay and they'll show you options that fit your budget. So whether you're picking out your first policy or just looking for something that works better for you and your family, they make it easy to see your options. Visit progressive.com, find a rate that works for you with the Name Your Price tool. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Price and coverage match, limited by state law. That's the sound of LEGO Pikachu training for battle. That's the sound of LEGO Pikachu enjoying a post-training snack. And that's a reminder to not let LEGO Pokémon in the recording studio. LEGO Smart Brick brings LEGO Pokémon play to life. LEGO Pokémon with Smart Play. You're the trainer now. Hello and welcome. My name is Gino Barbaro, one of the co-founders of Jake and Gino. And listen, Jake's not here today. Sucks to be him because I got this guest all to myself. I'm super excited. He wrote a book. He put my story in there. I've got a little PTSD 'cause my story years ago, I wasn't really that good at what I was doing. And I read back and I ponder and I think about it and I'm like, wow, those were the good old days, but they were the bad old days. Anyway, Eduardo Briceño is a global keynote speaker who guides world-leading companies in developing cultures of continuous improvement, innovation, and high performance. In his newest book, The Performance Paradox: Turning the Power of Mindset into Action, Eduardo discusses how we can achieve more tomorrow than today with the belief that we can and the competence to know how to change. Without further ado, welcome to the show, Eduardo.

Thank you, Gino. It's so great to be here with you.

This is the second time for you. You were on our show probably 3 years ago where you were in the process of writing your book and you said, Gino, would you like to talk about your story? And I really didn't know what I was getting myself into. And now that it's in print, what I would say to everybody, The Performance Paradox, Go out and buy the book because if you're stuck in the rut, if you're stuck in the grind and you're not getting better and you've been on 300 podcasts and you're still not where you want to be, if you read the book, it will shed some light on what your next steps are. And Eduardo, talk to the listeners. Tell them it took you 3 years to write the book. You have your heart, your soul, your passion in the book. What made you want to write this book and spend 3 years of your life talking to guys like Gino, sharing their— Well, I'm so inspired by your story, Gino.

You know, I remember you, yeah, you reached out to me to interview me for your podcast on growth mindset. And I read your story, Jake and Gino, and then I learned about Julia too. And I was so inspired by the story you've gone through and now, you know, the work that you do. So it's been really fun to learn from you and get your stories into the book. Yeah, it's been a pleasure. But yeah, I gave everything to this book. This book is my life's work. Like you said, I worked really hard on it for 3 years. And it was because in my journey, learning from other people and trying to support people who wanted to foster learning and growth, I came to an insight that I realized I had gotten in the way of myself. which is that I was just working really hard at trying to succeed in my work. I was just trying to do everything as best as I could, trying to minimize mistakes. And what I learned along the way is that that was not the way to grow and to improve and to succeed. We have this kind of simplified idea, many of us, and I did, that it's just working hard and that's the path to succeed. But What I learned is that there's 2 different forms of effort. There's work to perform or execute, do things as best as we know how, go through our checklist, get things done. That's what I call the performance zone. And then, there's a different type of effort and strategies, which I call the learning zone, which involves leaping beyond the known, trying new things, asking questions, experimenting, examining mistakes to see what we can learn from them, working with a mentor or a coach, reading a book, listening to a podcast. All those things are different. And so, in our work and lives, we need to alternate between these 2 zones and also integrate them. But we need to be deliberate about improvement. Improvement doesn't work just— doesn't happen just from working hard at trying to get things done. So, I wrote this book to— first, I did a TED Talk on it and it has like over 4 million views. So, well, first, I developed this framework along with a lot of other frameworks in doing workshops with trying to support people. Then, I realized this was a really powerful framework. an idea that was leading to insights and great discussions. So then, I did a 10-minute TEDx talk on it and it resonated. And the book was a way to go a lot deeper for me to learn, interviewing people like you, diving deeper into the research, thinking more about my frameworks and developing them more, and then writing a resource that would be useful to people.

It's interesting because in the book, you talk about Serena and Venus Williams. And I love this analogy. Their father didn't have them going out and playing match after match after match. And that's what you would think. Can you discuss that story a little bit and how we can incorporate that into our lives?

Yeah, you know, we might see somebody like Serena and Venus Williams who are obviously, you know, one of the best tennis players of all time. And we might assume that the way they've become so good is that they've spent countless hours playing tennis. Like, if you just spend 10,000 hours playing tennis and you'll become a world-class tennis player. But if you look at the research or, you know, the world-class athletes like Serena and Venus, that's not how you become great. You know, they— what we see is their performance zone. They are playing a match, doing the things they know best, trying to minimize mistakes. If they're having trouble with a particular move, they're going to avoid that move during the game because all they care about is winning.

Right.

But then, after the game, they'll go to their coach and say, coach, that move that I was trying to not do during the game, that's what I need to work on. And so, let's do that. And that's a very different activity. That's what we call the learning zone. And that work with the coach, that deliberate practice, that being intentional about what we want to improve, that's how we get better so that we can perform better in the court. And so, Venus and Serena's father, Richard, He took them out. Most, you know, the best practice at the time was for young, promising tennis players to play lots of tournaments every weekend to get a lot of experience, to get a lot of— and what Richard Williams understood is that that's the performance zone. That's not the learning zone. And so he took them out of the tournaments and they didn't perform in tournaments. Instead, they moved from California to Florida to to work with a world-class coach there. And they spent all their time training, not going to tournaments. And once they became professional, for Venus, I think she was 14, she was a world-class player, not having played tournaments the previous few years because they had focused on improvement, not on performance. Of course, performance is also— it helps you manage your nerves and it helps you understand how to manage the match and the crowd. So, you learn also, but you don't need a lot of that performance time in order to become a great performer.

Eduardo, if I'm listening to this and I see my mistakes for myself, let's say I've been doing hundreds of podcasts, I didn't see the results that I wanted to see. How do I tell my brain, or what are the first couple of steps to say that, okay, I'm performing, I'm doing 10 shows a week, I'm not getting better. How do I get myself into the learning zone? How can I get my mind prepared for that? What are the next steps that do I need to do? Do I need to hire a coach? Do I need to watch a video? What do I need to do?

Well, there are lots of different strategies that you could engage in the learning zone. One, so most of us are really, really busy and we need to get a lot of things done. Like in your case, you might need to get a lot of podcasts recorded, right? And so, one question that we can ask ourselves is, How can I get things done while improving along the way? So doing both at the same time, that's what I call learning while doing. And so in the case of the podcast, it could be recording the podcast and then after the podcast, soliciting feedback to the guest and saying, hey, you know what, what worked for you? What didn't? Was there something that was confusing, something you would suggest doing differently going forward? Or, you know, if you're interviewing somebody who's done lots of podcasts at the beginning of the podcast, you could say, hey, what are some things that podcast hosts do that you think are effective? Or some things that podcast hosts do that are not that effective, right? So soliciting feedback is super helpful. You can do that of the guest. You can also do that of the listeners, right? Just survey some of the listeners and say, hey, what do you appreciate about this podcast? What do you wish that I would do more of? So that's one strategy that is like a learning while doing strategy. You mentioned a couple other ones that could be really helpful, right? Like working with a coach could be another idea. Or when you listen to other podcasts, noticing what the host is doing and emulating and experimenting and thinking about what works and what doesn't work. So, there's— but those are deliberate strategies that are different from just recording, recording, recording.

It's interesting because I wrote those down because it's something so simple. Ask for feedback. I'm going to ask Eduardo for feedback after this podcast. Hey, Eduardo, did I suck on the show or did I do a good job? So, I rarely do that. I don't know why. Something that, I mean, sometimes the guests will say, hey, this is a great show, but what was great about it? And that's the thing. Dig a little bit deeper because I think surface-level answer, great. Well, what did you like about it? Well, Gino, I like the tempo, or I like the energy, or I like the questions. And then the hard question, what could I have done better? That's a hard one because we all tend to— I'm sorry, I tend to be sensitive. Yes, Julia, I'm sensitive. It's part of my humanity. And sometimes I don't like to hear negative feedback or criticism, but I need to understand that's part of the learning zone and of mindset. Let's shift into mindset. How does mindset work with Learning Zone? Because I'm really good at taking feedback from Eduardo. I love taking feedback from somebody in the business world, but if my wife or my kids tell me, I go off the rails. And thank God they're not going to listen to this part of the show. I promise they will not hear that, that, that, that, that answer from me. So—

Well, I so appreciate this podcast, but also a podcast you have with Julia on how to improve our relationships and family. And, and you both model learning so well. But you bring up growth mindset, which is— growth mindset is the belief that we can change and that we can improve. And so, for example, Serena Williams, she was number 1 in the world. But a growth mindset means the belief that she can continue to improve. Even if she's the best in the world, she can continue to improve. And so, when she solicits feedback from her coach or anybody else, she can better take in that feedback because the assumption that people in a growth mindset have and when we're in a growth mindset is that we can always improve. And so, there's always opportunity for improvement. And that's not a sign of weakness. Sometimes, we feel like if we receive critical feedback, it means that we're not competent or we are not confident, we're not capable. But in a growth mindset, we understand we all can improve. And the people who become best in the world, world-class like you are, Gino, and we all know that who observe you, We seek those opportunities for improvement because we know that that's what makes people great.

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And so, a growth mindset, I would say, is the belief that we can improve, is necessary but not sufficient in order to be a motivated and effective learner. In addition to believing that we can improve, we need to understand how. What are effective strategies? And that's where the learning zone comes in.

6, so you wrote 6 common misconceptions about learning. Can you go over a couple of those? 'Cause I think those are important 'cause you had growth mindset in there as well because we do have misconceptions about learning. We think, hey, learn this, memorize this, go to work, grind it out, and I'm gonna get better just because of that.

Yeah, you know, so one big misconception about learning is that if we just do the activity a lot, we'll get better. We've talked about that. A growth mindset is something that's often distorted into other things like working hard or having high expectations. But when we're not clear that a growth mindset is a belief we can change, then we might, like, we might, for example, encourage other people to work hard, but then tell them, you're such a genius or such a natural. And those messages put people in a fixed mindset because if people believe that they're good because they are geniuses, then they're going— they shift into proving that they are geniuses and that they're naturally talented. And therefore, they shy away from challenges. They don't— they react defensively to feedback. They don't kind of look at the opportunities for improvement. So that's another misconception about learning. I would say in the age of AI and kind of Internet, those tools like internet searches or AI are super, super helpful. But sometimes we get the impression that therefore we don't need to know anything. We don't have to expand our knowledge because we can always look it up. But actually, like having knowledge in our head is really helpful. You know, when when we are whether it's in multi you know multifamily investing, you're you're evaluating an investment. You know, is much more you're much more effective if you have that knowledge in your head and you can observe things and notice things and ask the right questions. Rather than rely on artificial intelligence. So, there's a lot about how to learn and what are effective learning strategies. And that involves going into a learning zone and being curious and investigating it.

In this part of the show, I'm going to get a little transparent. I'm going to get a little vulnerable for the listeners because I shared with Eduardo what I've been going through in my learning zone over the last couple of years. And it's I've been singing opera for the last 2.5 to 3 years. And the reason why I started was one of my coaches at one of my events said, Gino, you have a soft voice. I don't really hear you sometimes when you're not next to the mic. And that's all it took. It pissed me off. And my kids were already singing, so they said, Dad, start singing. So for those of you that don't know, opera is very challenging to sing. First of all, you need to know how to read music. You need to know how to, I guess, project your voice. You need to know the rhythm of music. And it's something where you're up there and it's your voice and you're really self-conscious about it. So, I had so many things working against me and I had never sung before. But my opera coach was a Russian guy and he thought all Italians knew how to sing. So, he told me to sing the very first day. And as I told Eduardo, the first song that popped up into my mind was Guns N' Roses, Welcome to the Jungle. I obviously couldn't sing that for him, so I took out Santa Lucia. So, and I'm singing Sul Mare, and I felt really awkward. I felt really uncomfortable. But that's where the learning zone started. And it took months and months and months to sit there and to learn the technique. And now, I mean, I can share some, I guess, what I've come from, from 2 and a half to 3 years ago till now. And it's really, when you go into the learning zone, it's very challenging because you need to work on it. And what I've done, Eduardo, over the last 6 months, I was singing easy songs like the Italian Neapolitan songs. And now the last 6 months, my, my coaches stretched me to sing arias like Asibe Mio and these really hard ones, Nessun Dorma, which are very, very challenging. And it takes me a lot longer. I get a lot more frustrated, but I'm in the learning zone. And I could go back and do the easier songs, make myself feel good, but I won't grow with them. Have you come into that, into that idea where I'm gonna be comfortable, I'm really good at these songs, but if I go any better, like you said, that fixed mindset, I'm not gonna do good with these newer songs. And I was stuck at that point and I wasn't progressing. I was sitting at an A-flat. I could not hit a B-flat. It took me 6 months of going into the harder songs to finally stretch myself, make those mistakes, sound terrible, look not so great, but then ultimately I did it. I mean, that's probably the same path that most people take in the business world and even in the sports world, correct?

That's so, so cool, Gino, and so inspiring. Yeah. You know, when it comes to music, I remember when I was a teenager, I would practice guitar and I wanted to become a great— I was in a band and we played. But when I practiced, I just played the songs that I liked and that I knew how to play. And I played the song over and over again. And I thought if I just spent time playing songs, I would get better. I had no idea what the learning zone looked like. And so tell me when it comes to— and so I think it's also voice is something that a lot of people have a fixed mindset about. Like, you know, your voice is your voice. You can't improve it. So it's inspiring that you couldn't hit that note and you worked on it for 6 months until you could. And so one question I have for you is in the learning zone, when you're working on your opera singing, are you just singing songs? And singing more and more challenging songs? Or are you doing specific exercises for a particular purpose? Can you give us a sense of what some of those things that you do in the learning zone are?

That's a great question. What I would say is voice, like anything else, is really unique to the individual. If you want to get better, you need to get feedback. That's why every Friday I was going at 5:00 PM. Now my lessons are Wednesday at 12:00 PM. I'll go. I don't really need to warm up. I used to warm up for a little bit the voice, but now I'm doing another technique. I keep changing the techniques to see what works better. I'll warm up for a few minutes. I may do a scale or 2, but not really. I'll jump into it. But what we did is we progressed slowly. So I'm a dramatic tenor. I've got a really heavy voice, so I need to protect my voice. So I do a technique called bracing where I brace. I use the back of my muscles to create what they call this kind of tunnel where you create this opening in your throat to let the air out. So when you push a lot of air out and you hit those high notes, you protect it. It took me 8 months, like I told you, to learn that. I would've quit. If it wasn't for my children telling me you need to go and singing at church, I would have said this is this is not for me. But once I learned that, then the next step was okay. Let's start pushing up and let's start going up to a higher note and then a higher note and a harder piece. And then I'm going back to pieces that I sung two years ago, which I didn't sing very well. And the irony is I have the mistakes that I made two years ago, and I'm trying to correct those mistakes that I made two years ago because I learned those incorrectly. So now I'm relearning those pieces. So the transition has been, don't rush, take your time, but you need feedback. Every Wednesday I go there and I sing with him for an hour. During the week, I'll sing with my son probably 2 or 3 times a week. I'll let him play for me. And it's embarrassing because I'm really loud in the house. The kids don't want to hear me. My wife is like, would you stop singing? And then Sundays it's performance time because we go sing at church. So you need to have, I think, a blend of all of that. You need to be humble. Those who are exalted shall be humbled, and those who are humbled shall be exalted, because it's really a learning experience. And I'm not a master. I'm a 52-year-old at the time who never sang before. So I have to give myself a little bit of leeway. I mean, he's actually pretty impressed at how I've progressed because I started at such an old age to sing. So don't beat yourself up if you're not where you are. Just take a look back where you were 2 and a half years ago. I couldn't sing. Now, I got up on stage in front of 1,000 people at Multifamily Mastery 6, and I let a couple of songs rip, and I did a pretty good job. I think that's the journey. Did I answer your question? Because it's been a long progress in going back in my mind and thinking about different pieces and segments of that whole journey.

Yeah, that is so cool. And you, you, you pointed out a great technique for all of us to get into a growth mindset, which is to focus on our progress, our own growth, rather than compare ourselves to other people who might have been you know, singing since they were young, and we just see their performance zone, and that tends to put us into a fixed mindset. So congratulations on the growth that you've done. You know, it reminds me of when I was getting ready to do the audiobook. We had a professional audiobook narrator narrate it because, you know, they have developed their expertise for many years. This is what they do, and they— he did a fantastic job. But I recorded the dedication and the afterword for the book. And so, I worked with 2 different voice coaches for an hour each just to take the opportunity to learn a little bit about using my voice and how to do the narration in a way that was more engaging for people. And I learned some really interesting techniques that are also helpful for me if I'm going to be in podcasts or I'm going to be a lot doing a lot of speaking in a day. One of them involves taking a glass like I have right here that has a little bit of water and it has a straw and like blowing on the straw, doing something with my throat. I'm going to model it here. It's like— and doing that for like 10 times. And that like, that relaxes the vocal cords and it kind of helps me take care of them and sound a little bit So I learned techniques like that, which are very different from performing.

And it's interesting because I'll give an example. For those of you who are probably my age, you probably remember Margaret Thatcher. Margaret Thatcher was the Prime Minister. If you go to her in her early years, her voice was very whiny, very squealy, very pitchy. When you hear her later, she sounds like a statesman. She sounds like an orator. She is amazing. And that is all in the learning zone. I have to say, I don't know how or what she did, but she improved her voice and it made such an amazing dramatic difference. Go back in the beginning, she sounded like a little whiny, but then she learned how to round her voice and project it. And ironically enough, those who do really well in sales have really great voices. They protrude confidence, strength, assurance in their voice, and they learn how to use it. As a tool, they're not born with it. I didn't know at the age of 52 that I was a dramatic tenor. I just saw it, but it was dormant in me if I didn't go out and try to learn it. And it's the same if you're a real estate investor. You don't know how to underwrite a deal. You don't know how to do a property tour. These are things that you're not born with, but if you want to do them, you learn. And as you're learning, you go out and you perform on a property tour. You get feedback from the broker. Then you go back and you practice it at home or with a coach and you continue to integrate it within your life. I think you should do some more vocals. I think, Eduardo, you'd enjoy doing a little more vocal.

I can definitely benefit from that. It's definitely on my kind of list. I have other things that I also want to get better at. Like, for example, when I'm doing virtual speaking, I want to be able to use tools better, to use visuals and integrate visuals with the video. So, There's lots of things that I want to improve at. That's one of them. And there's also something which is that you can't improve at everything at the same time. At least, like, you know, I need to prioritize and think about what is it that is most important for me to work on right now and be deliberate about that. But I definitely think I can benefit from working on my voice and I will at some point.

Eduardo, how do you bring this to an organization as far as working with companies? Because a lot of companies don't have growth mindset. A lot of companies want to be in the performance zone all the time, as you eloquently stated in your book. They burn out after a while. Like Microsoft, I'm not making any mistakes. I need to be perfect. How do you talk to corporations?

Yeah. So, that's what most of my work is. And so, for companies that want to develop a culture of learning, right, where people are sharing what they want to improve with each other, they're soliciting feedback, they're experimenting, and they're creating systems for improvement. Like for example, in weekly meetings, Are they only talking about deadlines and due dates, which are important? But are they also talking about what we're looking to improve and how and what we're learning along the way and what questions we have for each other? So, are there systems for both performance but also learning? And often, it starts at the top with the executives of the company being deliberate about how does our culture need to evolve? What are the attributes of our culture that we want to build? And they identify learning or growth mindset being part of that or agility or that And then, they say, okay, like how can we foster this? And often, they bring somebody like me, which is part of the puzzle, right? They have people inside who are going to develop learning and development programs or talent management coaching. They have kind of systems to support that. But they also often find somebody who's an external speaker. For example, I come in and I do keynotes to introduce these ideas and to support the ideas, to to answer questions, to do activities for the executives to first kind of reflect and really grapple with these ideas. Because often, what is involved of senior leaders or any leader is first to set the stage, to frame what do we want our culture to be? How do we want to work with each other? How do we want to perform and learn, for example? Do we want to be in a growth mindset? What does that mean for us? So, that's kind of setting the stage or framing. Second, what systems and habits do we want to foster in the way we work? But then, the third is super important is to model learning visibly and explicitly because often, we have the idea that once we get promoted, we're supposed to know. We're supposed to be fully sure of ourselves. And so, sometimes we engage in learning in private. We might listen to podcasts. We might work with an executive coach. But in front of the people that we lead or our colleagues, We try to pretend that we're know-it-alls. And so, what they observe is a know-it-all. So, that's what they emulate because they get the message of, oh, the people who get promoted in this company is the people who now have figured everything out and they don't have any more questions. So, they're not trying to improve any further because they think they already are the best in the world. And so, that's what they try to emulate. So, in order to create a learning culture, we have to send the message that, no, I might be really good at what I do, but I'm continuing to get even better. And so you can, you can support me in these ways by sharing feedback with me, by having conversations about how we can work better, etc.

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Now, Jake and I, we created the Jake and Gino community back in 2015. We launched our first book, Build Our Profits. And since then, our students have closed over 60,000 units. That's over $4 billion in assets they've been able to close over the last 6 years. And that's why this community has been so successful. We call it results-based education and we pour back into the community everything that we've learned on our journey from 0 to 2,000 units and all our systems and scale that we use on our very own property management and investing companies. Jake, I love that. It's not just education, it's implementation. So what I want you to do, click on that link down below, apply to work with our team, see how we can help you on your journey in multifamily. Insurance isn't one size fits all. That's why drivers have enjoyed Progressive's Name Your Price tool for years now. With the Name Your Price tool, you tell them what you want to pay and they'll show you options that fit your budget. So whether you're picking out your first policy or just looking for something that works better for you and your family, they make it easy to see your options. Visit progressive.com. Find a rate that works for you with the Name Your Price tool. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. Eduardo, now, if you had known me about 15 years ago and I'm listening to this, I'd say, this is BS. This does not work. I just got to keep working. Have you heard that? Have you heard a lot of pushback from people? Because I would have been one of those people 15 years ago saying, no, The only way I get better is by doing. If I got to get on a podcast and get better or singing, I just got to keep singing and singing and singing. Have you heard a lot of pushback from people who were skeptical? And what do you say to those people?

Often, I don't hear a lot of pushback. I do. So, once people learn these ideas, they really want them. I don't know if it's because it's by a set of companies that are coming to me that want to develop a culture of learning. But even in those companies, there might be hundreds and hundreds of people. And I do a poll. I do live polling. And usually, 2% or fewer of the people in the room say, I don't want the performance zone, or sorry, I don't want the learning zone, or the learning zone wouldn't be useful for us. 98% of them feel, we're either already doing it really well. That's usually less than 10%. Or we can get a lot better at this. That's usually more than 90%. But they also say, because I ask like in a poll again, I ask like, what makes it challenging to engage in the learning zone? And there are real challenges in that. Like the 2 biggest ones are first, time. We have so much to do in so little time. When are we going to find the time to engage in the learning zone? And the other one has to do with fear or ego, right? Of like, or safety. Like if I am vulnerable, if I share that I want to improve at something or I solicit feedback, am I going to lose influence or am I going to get a bad review or am I not going to be considered for opportunities? And those are usually the biggest challenges. Around time, the biggest opportunity is to change the way we do things so that we Do and learn at the same time. It doesn't have to take more time, right? So that means we have to at least tweak, but, you know, change, make some change to the way we do things. If we're always doing the same thing in the same way, there's no way we are going to improve, right? So we have to develop hypotheses and get ideas about what to tweak, what to try differently, see if it works or it doesn't work. Like you said, you know, in your work in opera singing, like you might warm up or not warm up or use a different technique to see what works better. So, you're experimenting. Soliciting feedback is another way. And also, developing quick but frequent learning zone habits. A very powerful one for me is every morning reminding myself of what I'm looking to improve. That only takes less than a minute and it primes a growth mindset. It primes the learning zone and it helps me notice opportunities to work on that during the day. That's so, so rather than try to block, you know, 2 hours every Friday, which can be super valuable if you can do it, you know, first prioritize something that's quick but very frequently something that you can do every day. And regarding fear is about creating that culture that of, of where everybody is a learner. Learning is valued. We are sharing with each other what we're working to improve, soliciting ideas, you know, giving and receiving feedback, doing debriefs, right, of like What was a great success? What went well? Why did this go so well? And also like, what did we fail or what could we have done differently? What are we going to try differently next time? So, those again like a system, a process that we can use either at the end of each project or in the middle of projects. And so, being deliberate about what that looks like.

I can give a tip as far as what Eduardo said in the morning being intentional. I'm trying to become a better speaker. So, my speaker coach has an exercise called the random word exercise. So, I have one of my children every morning pick out 5 random words and I'll do a 1-minute speech on the random word working on the 5 levels of speech, whether I'm either smiling, my pace, my pausing. I'm trying to work on those levels of speech. And, like I said, when I'm in the performance zone right now, it's very difficult to be cognizant and to try to do that because I may not want to make a mistake. But, if you're able to, number one, what are you trying to work on, which is really important. Eduardo said that. You can't try to learn 15 different things. What's the most important thing for this quarter? And number 2, what he just said, try to be intentional. Start the day with what are you trying to work on? You don't have to block off 2 hours on a Friday. If you could spend a few minutes every day, maybe it's 30 minutes on a Friday. But being intentional and trying to do some exercises, I think, will really truly help out. Now, habits. One of the habits that I think we've been discussing is the learning zone, is to really create a habit of a culture of learning. What other habits have you incorporated in your life to become successful?

So I mean, the most treasured habit for me is the morning habit, the first thing that I do every day, because at that point we haven't been distracted, we haven't been derailed into something else. So that way we can live life proactively and we can remind ourselves of what's most important. So the very first thing that I do on a daily basis is just, I'm still in bed and decided to get out of bed. I just express gratitude for the things that I deem to be most important, which is life, health, love, and peace. That's what's for me. And then noticing the presence of those things because there is hate and conflict, but there's also peace and love. And so I want to notice that so that I get in a positive emotional state and so that I'm appreciating those things and it helps me Put into perspective all those kind of daily challenges that come, which at the end of the day are not as important as those things. So that I think is is the most important habit that I have. And then like you're saying each morning, so I have a like a whether it's a short or longer meditation or mindfulness moment that I do every morning. You know every morning I I drink kind of. Vegetable and fruit smoothies. So, taking care of our bodies, right? Whether it's like sleep and physical movement or nutrition. And then, reminding myself every morning of what do I care most about? What are my missions? What are my kind of strategic priorities? And what am I going to be focused on today? What are my biggest priorities for today? And as I said before, kind of what am I looking to improve? So, So that before I get distracted with email or social media or other things so that I'm kind of living proactively rather than reactively. I also have other habits like I meet once every 4 to 6 weeks with a couple of different kind of what I call friendtors. They're friends, but we're also mentors to each other and we share things that are going on in our lives. We ask questions, we ask for ideas. So we support each other in that way. I've worked kind of with coaches like you do. You've mentioned your singing coach and your speaking coach. So coaches are super helpful. And I've kind of had different coaches for different purposes at different points in my life, whether it's a book coach or a speaking coach. I'm a public speaker, so I like to solicit feedback after my keynotes. And I also like to So, you know, in the performance zone, I want to do a great job. I want to do what I have learned that works very well. But I also usually tweak something that I think will work well for that particular group. Like, you know, next week I'm speaking at Universal Studios in Orlando. Like, I'm going to show some pictures of me at the parks and a video in a roller coaster and like talk about some things that I don't talk in other organizations. I haven't done that before. done those things before, but I think they'll work really well with this group. And I learn by tweaking and getting new experiences and reflecting on how those things go.

It may be obvious, but I need to state it. A lot of the habits that Eduardo does supports the learning zone. If you're in a state of gratitude, if you're in a positive mind state, if your physiology is one of happiness, one of joy, it's going to be a lot easier to learn. I mean, the No Can Do book written by Ken Blanchard, negative thinking, stinking thinking as he says, if you're in that type of zone, it's going to be a lot harder to learn. So, becoming aware of your state, if you're really depressed, down, I mean, we should mention that. I mean, it's going to be a lot harder to learn a subject at that point because first of all, you don't think you can do it, so you're probably not going to do it. Your behaviors are belief-driven. But also, in that state of negativity, it's a lot harder to consume knowledge and to be able to learn. Isn't that correct?

Absolutely correct. And that is a big lesson that I've learned in my life is that I used to believe that happiness was not something that I was trying to do. I just assumed that what I was supposed to do in life was just to get promotions, get high-paying jobs. And once I got promotions and I got paid, then I would be happy, as opposed to happiness being something that really I can create. It's an emotion that I can create deliberately. And then, like you're saying, that positive emotion helps us better connect with people and better learn because we're less fearful. So, we can experiment more. We can listen better. And we can perform better. So, absolutely.

I love that. Before we, I guess, sign off, where can the listeners get a hold of you, Eduardo? Where can they buy the book? Sure.

Well, the book is called The Performance Paradox. It's available wherever books are sold— Amazon, Audible, wherever. I am active on LinkedIn. So, I like to connect with people there and I share ideas there regularly. And my website is my last name. It's briceño.com. I have a monthly newsletter there and some free resources on kind of tips to promote a growth mindset.

I'd like to share part of Eduardo's story as we wrap up. I know when he first started out, he was in corporate America. He thought working 80 hours a week, being perfect, not making any mistakes was the way to go. And, I think it was soul-sucking for him because he didn't feel as if he could make any mistakes. He wasn't living his true purpose, his true self. And, I think when he started working with Carol Dweck when he was the test subject for mindset, I think everything sort of changed. And, it was this new world where I've been living in a fixed mindset for all these years. I've been working and not trying to grow and that's not who I want to become. I don't want to just, like you said, make money and continue to work and not really get any better. But be worried of having that fixed mindset. Meeting Carol Dweck, I think, changed everything. And then, I think the second step is when he met Jake and Gino and said, well, I'm not the only one who has this fixed mindset. I think I'm going to write a book called The Performance Paradox, and I'm going to have these guys in the book and a couple other people in the book as well and share their journeys. And the idea that working hard and thinking you're going to get better without implementing a culture of learning, It's just not going to happen. And the book, 3 years it took to write. And as you read it, you're going to say, wow, 3 years to write a book? That seems like a long time. But when you read it, you'll see the work that's gone into the book. The stories are amazing. The frameworks are amazing. There's a lot of actionable content. And if you want to continue to have the growth mindset and continue to learn the craft, go out and pick up the book.

Awesome.

The Performance Paradox. Thanks, Eduardo, for being on the show. I really appreciate it.

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