Achieve More in 17 Minutes | Maximize Discipline and Focus in Business

What's up, Believe Nation? It's Evan Carmichael. My one word is believe, and I believe in people more than they believe in themselves. And my sincere hope is that if you see in you what I see in you, you'll be able to change the planet. So to help you on your journey today, I'm going to talk about 7 ways to be more disciplined. So staying disciplined, staying focused, staying on task is one of the hardest things for especially creative entrepreneurs to do because we have all these things that we want to do and we're in our head and dreaming and vision, but then we actually have to do the work and be disciplined about it. So I thought I'd share with you my 7 tips on how to be successful doing it. Tip number 1 is create a morning routine. You have to start off right. So many times it happens with entrepreneurs, and it happened to me so many multiple times. You get inspired randomly. I would get inspired randomly. I would meet somebody for a coffee and we'd be bubbling ideas, and I'd get so inspired and go home and work. Or listen to a YouTube video, or read a book, or something that would just fire me up, and I'd be working like crazy. And then the next day I would wake up and like, poof, it's like it's gone. I'm starting over from scratch. I felt like I start over from scratch, and I still do. I feel like I start from scratch every single day. The baseline becomes maybe a little bit higher over time, but I'm still starting off from scratch. I don't wake up energized, passionate, ready to go attack the day. You know, that's not me, at least. Maybe that's you, maybe that's some people. If that's you, you're probably not watching this video. But I think most people wake up starting from scratch. I think we put on this entrepreneur mask and be like, yeah, I'm hustling hard, I'm grinding. But we wake up and we're not, we're not grinding, we're not We're not super motivated. It doesn't mean we hate our life, but we know we could be working harder. I think you need a daily reset, and it's figuring out what is the one thing that gets you inspired, that gets you passionate, that gets you motivated, that gets you the oomph, right? It's like, I want to go do something today. You've all felt that feeling before. I know what it is for me. For me, a lot of times it's the videos. It's watching successful people having success. That's what I want to do. And seeing it on a regular basis makes me want to do it. So I made the channel selfishly for myself too, like the Top 10 and the Mentor Me and all those. It's for me. I want to see it. I want to get motivated. I want to be inspired. I want to learn knowledge, yes, but just seeing people doing great things makes me want to do great things. So that's what helps me. So start your day with it. It's why I did the espresso series. Start your day with a shot of espresso to get you going. But if that's not your thing, it's cool. Like, you don't have to watch my channel, I get it. Read a book, meet with a friend, you know, listen to a podcast, whatever the thing is. There's no judgment, you know, like, if playing with your ring gets you excited, or waxing your eyebrows, or whatever it is, like, it doesn't matter. Whatever the thing is that gets you like, "Rah, this day is gonna be great," do that every day. Start your day with it, because if you start your day off on the wrong foot, or you start your day off just falling into your schedule, you may not be inspired the whole day, or you may randomly come across something at 4 o'clock that day, and then that's what gets you all motivated, but you've lost from when you wake up to 4 o'clock, right? There's a lot of time in there that could have been way more productive focusing on important things. And so find the thing that gets you motivated, that gets you energized, and start your day with it every single day. Tip number 2 is create a regular schedule. I think it's way easier to be disciplined when you have a schedule that you are following. One of the hardest things I think for entrepreneurs is we have to balance this thing. If we want creative freedom, we want creative expression, want to be able to do what we want to do, but also we need to have some kind of routine, some kind of discipline, because left to our own means, we may not wake up and do anything on that day, or at least anything of substance or value. It's easy to get distracted by other things, and it's not for furthering our goals. And so what I find really helps for me is I create a regular schedule, and every day I kind of know what I'm doing, and I chunk my time. So Mondays are one thing, and Tuesdays another thing, and Wednesdays another thing, and so on for the rest of the week. And when I wake up on a Monday morning, I don't have to think about what I'm doing today. It's already there. It's on my list. I have my tasks. I know what I'm doing Monday. I start with a great, you know, morning ritual, and then I'm into my day. Right. And I think that helps most of the time. I think on the rare occasion that you feel inspired by something else, like I wake up and I want to really want to go off and do that. I'll often go out and do that and cancel everything else that I was working on for that day, because chances are what I create in that moment is going to be gold. Like when you're in the flow and you're really feeling something, what's going to come out of that is going to be golden. The challenge is you're not in the flow every day. At least me, I'm not in flow every day. I don't wake up in flow and just like a whole day of flow and I'm ready to go. That's not me. If that's you, great, ignore this point. But most people don't wake up and just flow the whole day. And so I had the routine for when, you know, most of my days, and then when I'm in flow, I go and follow that passion. At the same time, when I feel like my— something's missing, or feel like I want to add something else to my schedule, it means something else has to be pulled out. And so whenever I feel like the work that I'm doing in my calendar is not matching up to what I want to do, I have a vision, I have dreams, I have other interests I want to pursue, then I start to change my schedule. So the schedule is what I live by, it's what I wake up and do on most days, and if I know it's in my schedule, it's going to get done. Super important, because left to my own devices, I would still be productive but nowhere near as productive, nowhere near as disciplined. And so knowing what you're going to do when you wake up and not having to make choices on the side every single time Makes life a lot easier. Tip number 3 is track your progress. There's a famous expression that what gets measured gets done or gets accomplished. When you are tracking what you're doing, you're more likely to pay attention to it and want to fix it. And so, you know, if your goal is to lose weight, if you're tracking your weight every day and you're tracking your calories every day, you're much more likely to lose weight. You know, if your goal is to call 10 customers a day or reach out to 10 people a day or you know, make a YouTube video every week. If you are tracking it, then you're more likely to follow through on it. Just like when you're making goals, the more specific you are, the more likely you're going to hit it. If your goal is to just lose weight, then you're unlikely to do it. But if your goal is to lose 10 pounds or 20 pounds, or your goal is to hit, you know, $50,000 in more revenue, or whatever your goal is, you're more likely to hit it because you're being specific. And so if you're tracking it on a daily basis or weekly basis, then you want to hit those numbers. You know, when I'm working out with my personal trainer, you know, he gives me goals that I need to hit. You know, I need to hit 900 calories a week in cardio, as an example, right now. So I have to do 45 minutes in two chunks, 45 minutes and 45 minutes on the, on the machine. And I'm usually on social media, you guys can check me out there when I'm answering your questions. Would I do 45 minutes without him? Maybe, maybe I'd do 15 minutes. Maybe it's like, yeah, okay, I did some cardio. Right? But if you're tracking it and you know it's happening and you make a spreadsheet or use a checklist or whatever it is, how you want to track, don't get caught up in the tools. The tools don't matter. It could be a piece of paper and a pen. When you're checking something off and you know you've got it done, you're much more likely to follow through. What gets tracked gets done. So anything you want to stay disciplined on, have some kind of tracking system in place. Email or Evernote or a CRM or a calendar. Anything. Something. Just so that you are tracking it consistently. Tip number 4 is commit to somebody else. When you commit to somebody else, you're much more likely to follow through. The reason is we will let other people down less than we'll let ourselves down. It's easy to let ourselves down. How many times do we say, "I'm gonna do something," but then you don't do it? You're letting yourself down, right? Constantly. Even for you guys who snooze— we didn't talk about that yet, it's not on my list, but let's go here now. Don't snooze. Stop hitting the snooze button. The thing that happens when you hit the snooze button is, "I'm gonna wake up at 8 AM," or, "I'm gonna wake up at 7 AM," and the first thing you do is say, "That goal is not important to me. That's not gonna happen." The first thing you do every morning if you hit the snooze button is let yourself down. That's how you start your day. And if you hit the snooze button 5 times, you start your day every day by letting yourself down 5 times. How well do you think that bodes for you to have a great day? Stop hitting the snooze button. You're snoozing, you're snoozing on everything. You're snoozing on your dreams, you're snoozing on your life. Stop it. Get up. Back to the story. So when you commit to somebody else, you're more likely to follow through. I do this in my workout, as an example. You know, I commit to my wife Nina and Sean, my personal trainer, that on Mondays and Wednesdays we're gonna work out. I'm there at 5 o'clock and we work out. If I'm feeling tired, if I'm feeling, you know, stressed out, lots of work, it's easy to say, "You know what, I'm not gonna do that, that's not important." But because they're gonna be there, I'm gonna be there. Right? When I come in on Mondays to work at Toronto Dance Salsa here, I work with Alex and I work with Lily, and they're gonna be here and they're expecting me to be here. We have a meeting set and I have to go over stuff with them. I have to show up. I'm not gonna let them down. So whatever goal you have, whatever you want to stay more disciplined with, try to line up somebody to be with. Try to line up a meeting, try to line up a schedule, try to line up something with somebody else because if you commit to them, you're more likely to follow through. Tip number 5 is have big whys and little whys. It's really important to have a big why to feel like what you're doing is inspiring, is motivating, there's a reason for you to get up and do work. If you feel like the work you're doing is not important, you're not gonna stay disciplined on it. If you feel like the work you're doing is just pushing paper and just filling out forms and grunt work and administrative work and something you don't care about, you're not going to work hard. If you feel your work is meaningless, you don't want to work hard on that. It's really hard to stay disciplined on it. And so having a big why, to know that the work that you're doing matters, means something to people, you're working towards building a better life for yourself, whether you're thinking about yourself and, and that ideal life you're trying to build, whether you think about your family, your community, or the customers you're serving, having a big why helps you stay motivated. So for me, I want to help a billion entrepreneurs. It's a big, scary, ambitious goal, right? Can I do it? Is it possible? The work I do has meaning, right? I'm making these videos trying to extend that goal. It's not just, "Oh, I gotta film more videos." As soon as I get to that point, I'm done on YouTube. If I dread the thought of coming in and making videos, or if it's just okay, like, "Ah, yeah, whatever, gotta go make some videos," I'm done. I have to move on to something else. You have to do meaningful work. And so thinking about what your big goal is, what your big vision is, the change you want to make, And looking at that on a regular basis, keeping that in mind, and seeing how your work ties into you accomplishing that big goal is really important. That's your big why. At the same time, you need to have your little whys. Because the big why takes a long time. The big why is a lifetime goal, right? Or a year goal, or 5 years— like, it's out there. It's not going to happen today. It's not going to happen tomorrow. And so thinking long-term sometimes can be very motivating, But sometimes it can also bring you down. Sometimes it can also make you feel depressed, like, "I'm never going to hit that," or, "Who am I to hit that big goal? I can't go out and do these big things." And so it doesn't always serve you to the best that it can. And so that's why the little whys are really important. And the little whys are the day-to-day little meanings that you have in your business. So for me, as an example, the big why is helping a billion entrepreneurs. The little why are the comments that you guys leave. Feel a little wise logging in every day and seeing that, you know, Johnny really loved my video and it made a big impact. Like, your comments mean a lot to me. I look at them every day. It inspires me and inspires my team. And it— and we know that, yes, we're helping millions of people, right? We have millions of views every month happening on the channel. We've had over 100 million views on the channel. It's a number— it's, it's hard to even imagine 100 million people watching these videos. But then to know that this one person liked it and appreciated it and talked about the impact that it had. Those day-to-day interactions are really important. When I was first getting started up in this business of helping entrepreneurs, I would find this huge spike of enjoyment when I did speaking engagements. And I would speak and just feel so great. But it may be 2 weeks until my next speaking gig, and then in between I felt down, like I didn't have anything, like what— I'm not getting any feedback, I don't know that my work is meaningful or contributing. And so I'd make a PowerPoint file that I would watch every morning, and in it I would include some of the feedback from the people who were in my sessions, some of the complimentary things that people had to say, for me to feel like, yeah, like the work I do is meaningful, it matters. And it's the little why. It's not solving a big problem, it's helping one person with one thing that they had in their business. So I think that combination of feeling like you're doing something important on a big scale, and also knowing that the work you do today is touching one person's life and having an impact, it's easier, much easier to stay disciplined and on task. Tip number 6 is have a designated workplace. This is really important for entrepreneurs who are working from home. It can be hard when you have all the comforts of your home to float in between and try to work from the kitchen and work from the couch and work from your bedroom or wherever it is that you work. It can be hard to stay on task. It's easy to get distracted by, "Oh, what's in the fridge?" "Oh, what's on TV?" "Oh, who's that calling?" "Oh, the dog needs to be walked." All the little tasks that kind of come up and get you distracted. If you have an easy time staying focused, then it doesn't matter, right? It doesn't matter at all. You're fine, but you're not watching this video because you have a hard time staying disciplined and you want some tips. And so I would suggest having designated place to work and also designated time so that you know from 9 AM to 1 PM you're going to work at this place. Place. And maybe that's outside the home. It could be leaving, it could be going to a coffee shop or going to a library or going to a place of business somewhere that you're going to go out there and work. Or it could be designated spot in, you know, you have a home office in the garage that you're setting up, and when you're there you work, and when you're not there then you don't work. And I think that makes it easier for people have a hard time staying disciplined. You create a routine that allows you to stay disciplined. So an example, when Alex and Lily both started working for me, and we're— I'm helping mentor and coach them to become entrepreneurs. I give them options, like you can either work from home, you can either work with me, you can work from TDS, you can work from my place, you can follow me around, you can— whatever you want to do, whatever works best for your schedule, whatever works best for your personality style. And if they want to be around me all the time, and that helps kind of keep consistency and like show up here at 9 o'clock, Great. If they want to work from home or work from coffee shop, great. But creating a schedule helps, especially if you're not the disciplined kind of person, to know that, you know, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, whenever, whatever days you're working, put it in. I have a designated place that when I'm going here, I'm focused, I'm shutting off all those distractions, and I'm working. And tip number 7 is do something you love. And this is a tip that comes up most often when I look at famous entrepreneurs and how they achieve success. They did something that they love. If you are forcing yourself to do something that you don't love, you can only do it for so long before you're gonna quit and wanna give up and wanna move on to something else, 'cause you don't love it. You know, not every day is amazing as an entrepreneur, but you have to actually enjoy doing the work. Where if you sit down and you're doing the work, you don't see it as much as being disciplined to have to do it, because you actually enjoy doing it. And so a lot of people just set these big goals for themselves, and they'll do whatever it takes to go out and get there, but if they don't actually enjoy the process of doing it, they're never going to actually go out and achieve those goals. Much more important is that the work that you're doing is something that you are passionate about. There has to be something in your business that you can get lost in. There has to be. If everything is just work to you, you're not going to make it. Like, quit now and go do something else that you can get lost in. Not every piece of your business you're going to be able to get lost in, especially at the beginning, 'Cause you're doing everything, you may not get lost in the accounting of your business. Maybe you love accounting and that's great, be an accountant, but otherwise a lot of people don't wanna do the accountant side or don't wanna care about their taxes and all that kind of stuff. It has to get done, but there has to be something in your business that you can get lost in and forget what time it is, and the more you're doing that kind of work, the more you're gonna be able to not just stay disciplined but achieve your big goals. And as soon as possible, I'd be looking at how can I build a team to be able to take away some of the things that I don't like, that I keep getting, you know, drawn in by or keep procrastinating, and give that to somebody else so I can focus on what I can be great at. So those are my 7 tips on how to stay more disciplined. I'd love to know what do you guys think? What was your favorite tip? What are you gonna apply to your life or your business immediately? Did I miss an 8, 9, 10 that you wanna add to the list? Leave it down in the comments below, really curious to find out. And if you're commenting in the first couple hours, you have a chance to win one of two daily prizes that we have going on. If you want to vote on the next top 7 ways video I should make, check out the link in the description. You can go there, give us your suggestions, and maybe you'll get lucky. I also want to give a quick shout out to Marisha Rodriguez, Rishi Cup TV. Thank you so much, Rishi, for picking up a copy of my book, Your One Word, and posting it on your Facebook. I really, really, really appreciate it, and I'm so glad that you enjoyed the book. Book. Thank you guys again for watching. I believe in you. I hope you continue to believe in yourself and whatever your one word is. Much love. I'll see you soon.