Follow Your Flow For BIG Results: Learn How NOW!

Today I'm going to talk about following your flow. So one of the most important lessons that I've learned in business, and I guess in life, is you need to follow your flow. And sometimes there are external pressures that force you into following your flow. You may get a big media opportunity, you may get a new partnership, you may get a new— a big customer that kind of is a huge, big opportunity for your business. Sometimes following your flow, I find, comes from internal reasons, internal pressures. Maybe you wake up one day and you really want to go try something out, or you're on a walk, or you're in the shower and a new thing comes to your mind. I found that by following my flow and by following that idea, it's always in my best interest. One, because probably magic is going to happen. If magic is going to happen, it's going to come from a source of inspiration. Not just being, you know, doing your day to day to day to day. And two, I didn't want to live with regret, you know? Don't want to have this big list of to-dos, this big list of ideas that just builds and builds and builds and this Evernote file that just keeps growing and I never actually take action on stuff, right? You have an idea, you want to try something, go and take action on it. So yesterday, this relates to my book, yesterday I had a full day planned. Monday is my busy day. I'm recording this on Tuesdays. Mondays are my busiest day of the week, and I had a full day planned, and then I just— it all exploded on me from an external source, from 50 Cent. So I made a video, and 50 Cent saw it, and he called it good shit, and he posted on his Facebook page, and he posted it to his Twitter account. He posted a blog about it. He kind of went crazy promoting this, and And as a result, the traffic exploded on my video. Comments were coming out of everywhere. People were tweeting me. They're signing up for my newsletter. They're engaging with the video. It was just insane. And I had a choice of, hey, I can either go with this, right? Or I could just do all the work that I had planned for the day. And I chose to go with it. On top of it, it was pretty cool, right? 50 Cent likes my stuff and is sharing it. And I spent a good amount of time just with my team. Just having fun in the moment, looking at the numbers, seeing where it was being shared. It's kind of a big celebration and a win for everybody on the team. So we're all kind of super pumped and excited. And I spent the day responding to everybody, and as a result, got nothing done that I was supposed to get done for the day. And so that bled into what I'm doing today. And I— as a result, today I didn't get a lot of stuff done in terms of writing the book. There's one thing I have to do with Jen, my writer, who asked me to look at some of the stuff she wrote, and so I'm going to check that out and give her some feedback. But I thought it would be a good decision. And as always, I typically have a pretty scheduled day, but I'm not afraid to abandon everything to follow my flow. And I encourage you guys to do the same because I think it will really help you in your business and in your life. I hope the audio is coming out okay because it's raining. I seem to always film these in the rain. So I'm going to get to your questions. I love answering your comments. Let's start it off. Michael Sophia: Wait, you're writing a book? Can't wait! Yes, bro, right in the book. Looking forward to it. Next, Stike96: How do you manage to stay on task the whole day while you're writing? I know you don't check emails or anything at that time and you try to keep away from distractions, but things can just pop, like if the doorbell rings or you remember that you need to get something from the store for dinner or something. How would you be able to go the whole day without getting distracted by stuff like that? Because I imagine if you went and did those things, you would probably forget what you're writing and and have to look back over everything again? I certainly would. Yeah, that's a huge— not just for writing, any major project. You know, answering an email is a short thing usually, but anytime you're doing something creative, whether it's writing an article, whether it's writing a book, whether it's designing a new website, whether it's painting a piece of art or composing a song, you get into a creative flow and that takes time to get into, and when you get distracted, it takes insane amounts of time to get back to it. So what I do is I try to create a no-distraction life as much as possible. I don't have a phone. I don't have a cell phone. I use Skype for external calls so nobody can call me. I don't have people really ringing my doorbell. People say, "Why don't you have a phone?" I said, "Well, because when you have a phone, people call you." And they're kind of shocked by that answer, but I don't want people calling me. A cell phone, I find, is other people's agenda for your time. Anyway, I know I'm weird in that respect, but it allows me to focus way more on what I'm doing during the day. I don't check my emails. I have a— the way I do it is every morning I check my emails from a certain folder. I have a folder where all the important, important people in my life go. Friends, family, important suppliers, important clients, media go into one folder, and I answer that in the morning. and that usually doesn't take too long. And then everybody else goes to a general folder and I answer that when I have time in between breaks, whatever. But I'm definitely not checking that when I'm writing. Same thing for social media, right? I'll check that in the morning and then I don't— I'm not in. Like, I'm not checking Facebook and Twitter and all the other stuff during the day. I'm focusing on my task. And so I find that really helps. I guess the other thing is chunking the day where I know usually Tuesday is my writing day and I block off that day and I plan around it. So I don't book meetings on that day. I don't take calls on that day. I don't try to do admin stuff on that day. I don't try to do anything unless, again, it's something super important that I'm following my flow on. Otherwise, I tend to stick to a usual schedule and that makes sure that I can get this stuff out on time. Chris7820, "That's great, Evan. I do find myself sleeping and rereading pages in a book." Yeah, that's something that bothers me so much in a book and something I really don't want to have. Is I'm reading the book and I have to read it over again and read it over again, and while I'm reading it, I'm thinking of something else, and so then I have to read the page again. Like, I think a book should be captivating. Like, captivate me so much. And this is not just for a book. It's your website copy. It's your YouTube video. It's your tweets. It's everything— everything you're putting out. Captivate me so I'm not thinking of something else while I'm reading your stuff, right? And I think a lot of books don't do that, and I don't want to have that boring book. That you read 3 pages up and then totally didn't remember what anything said and you have to reread it again. So thank you for that comment and I'm keeping that top of mind as I write, bro. Next, Tamara Weeks: I'm loving these book videos. What a journey and thank you for including me. Thank you, Tamara. Great question. Thank you for your loyalty to the channel. Always appreciate it. Next up is Ho Man: Well done, Evan. This is a great way of letting us know your process of doing a book and also a great way to stir interest. I'm in! Question: I watched a video from the 21 Convention the other day with a talk presented by a lad called Matthew Hussey. Excellent info. He said when we find people who we felt a connection with and we're looking to as role models, ask them or find out what are their rituals. So what are your rituals, dude? Hope that makes sense. Cool. I don't know how much that relates to the book, but rituals— I got a lot of rituals. Subject for many, many, many, many, many, many videos. I think the one that's maybe most helpful to me and most relevant that I'll share is my morning ritual. I find that the way I used to live was, you know, I'd get up and just do whatever work that I had on my plate, and then I'd find that maybe at like 3 o'clock or 4 o'clock or wherever, I might watch a video or might get inspired by something, might have a conversation with somebody, and then I get inspired fired and then I'd be like super hungry, like, "Yeah, I want to go do that." Or maybe that happened at night or maybe some days it didn't happen at all. And then I thought, why am I leaving that to chance? Like, why am I leaving it to a chance video that I watch or a chance meeting I have with somebody? Why don't I schedule that in, right? And in the morning, I start off and I've talked about it a couple of times, but in the morning my usual routine is I have a quick session of gratitude where I write down things 3 things that I'm grateful for during the day, and I send my wife a message because she's usually out the door even before I wake up. So just send her a quick message saying, "I love you," something like that. Starting the day with gratitude and love. Then I'll put on some music. I think music immediately changes your state. I have a belief playlist that I love and listen to, and you just want music that, you know, makes you do that, makes you bop, makes you dance. What I like is going to be different than what you like, and that's totally cool. I'm not saying there's one perfect song, although we did come up with, with the Don't song that I like. It's kind of an entrepreneur anthem. But put on music that makes you come alive because in the morning you can be sluggish and slow, or maybe you didn't sleep that well. So getting music on that makes you move, I find, immediately gets you a little more excited. I'll do a quick workout and then I'll look at my YouTube comments and my videos, and I created the Entpresso series as a way to— it was a selfish reason. It was a way for me to stay motivated in the morning, right? I wanted something every morning that would inspire me to think bigger. Like, yes, I'm super proud of what I have. I'm really grateful for everything that I've built and for you guys for watching. I love my life right now, but I want to have a bigger impact, right? I want to be driven to want to do more and reach more people. And having a big goal helps, but I find having a morning routine where instead of by chance coming across a video that excites you, I put that into my morning schedule. And I created it so that it can inspire me and hopefully inspire you guys too. And I find that that combination of starting with gratitude and love and then putting on music to change my state and then watching the Answer Bresslow series and trying to surround myself with greatness. Sets me up really well for the day to want to go and do something big and important. And maybe it doesn't work every single day. I'd be lying if I said every single day I wake up super excited, super motivated, ready to take on the world. Yeah! But most days. And so that works for me. I'm constantly tweaking it, but I'm curious to learn what works for you, actually. What do you guys do? What's your ritual? Leave it below. I'm curious. Next, xNaruto1: Outsource, automate, etc. for a work week. "It's really interesting to see the various books you recommend in your 7 books every entrepreneur should read through the videos. I remember even one video you shared a story of someone who went through gold mining to selling insurance, which came from the Think and Grow Rich book, I believe. Though I might have gotten the title wrong. I don't know. I find it interesting to see all your various influences you talk about and come across in videos in various ways." Yeah, I'm not sure that example is on, but you know, I made that video of the 7 books because those books had a huge impact on me and I hope that it can inspire other people as well. And people ask me a lot, "What books do you read?" Instead of responding every time, I felt, "Hey, I'll make a video on it." Yeah, you know, I try to include the things that I'm influenced by and the books that I read and the places I go and my views in every video. You know, I'm me. That's it. The easiest way to live, I find, is not to try to be somebody else and not try to lie and then keep track of what lies you told. This rain is insane. And so I reference those books because I've read those books, because those books have meaning to me, right? So I'm glad that that comes out. And I think for anybody who's trying to build an audience, being authentic is is super important and super relevant and not everybody's going to jive with you, but the people who do will love you for it. Next, Jackie F54 suggests, "Outsource and use ghostwriters, then edit it with your thoughts." I can't do that, Jackie. I can't do that. I can't just outsource the content because it's important, right? I think for anybody writing a book, you got to put you into it, right? Nobody can speak for me, I find. And yes, it takes longer, and yes, it's frustrating, but I'm going to be super proud of it. And I can't just give it to somebody else and say, "Hey, you write this for me," because my words are important and I put a lot of value into it. And the stuff that I create for my audience, stuff like— it's like, have somebody come on here and do this video for me, right? And answer these questions for me. Nobody can answer them like me. Not that I'm the greatest, just nobody can answer them like me, right? You're asking me a question. I'm giving you an answer. And that's what I feel is with the book too. I don't want it to be just some cover where I put my name on it, but it's not actually me behind it and I've done some editing on it, right? To me, that's not cool. I'd rather not write a book. And so yes, even though it's frustrating and painful, I'm doing it myself. And it— you know, I'm getting some help where it's not my words being spoken. And I mentioned that in last week's video. But yeah. I don't want to just outsource and edit it. Next up, Luther. "Man Evan, you are a video-making machine. Nearing 1,900 videos. Wow." Luther bro, follow your passion, follow your flow. You like something, you find something that you enjoy, you go all in, man. This week I just brought on 3 new people to help me with my YouTube channel. I'm the front man, but I need help having it behind the scenes. I had brought on a cameraman recently, I brought on a researcher, I brought in an extra editor. I brought on somebody to help with my comments. Yeah, when you love something, you go all in. You own it, man. Okay, 1,900 videos is nothing. More is coming. I'm proud of it. I'm happy with it. I'm passionate about it. Hopefully you can feel that here, and I hope that you find something that you're so excited about that you want to go all in on, and it doesn't seem like a lot of work because 1,900 videos to me doesn't seem like tons. Next up, Cino, or Chino, "Thanks for the video, Evan, related to this topic. 2 videos per day feels like a whole lot to me. I truly appreciate the value and your insight and energy you put out. As a viewer, as much as I can, I—" Oh, I got cut off. I think the comment was something like, "I have a hard time keeping up." I'm making another video about this. I'm not sure about the timing. Maybe it will have already been released by the time this one comes out, but I've never seen myself as a show, right? I have a channel, not a show, and that's the difference in size, right? I don't care if everybody watches every single episode on my channel, but I'm putting up different shows, right? So this book series is one show. The Enespresso is a show. The Top 10 is a show. The Ask Evan is a show. These are all different shows on my channel, and I'm actually going to be adding more content, and it's okay if you can't keep up with everything. You know, when you turn on ESPN, NBC, you're not watching every single show that they have on there, but there's something about that channel that you really like. And so that's how I see myself. I'm not limiting myself to saying, hey, I'm only going to do one show per week or one show per day. And I truly appreciate and am grateful for everybody who's watching these different videos, um, and your comments. And I don't expect everybody to keep up with every single video. That's okay, that's cool. Like, take the stuff that you are interested in that works for you, that you can apply to your business. At the end of the day, I want to see your business take off and grow. And so as much as I can help with that, you know, that's not going to happen by you just sitting and watching me 24 hours a day, right? You got to get to work. You got to do some work. And so take what you like from my channel, take whatever shows you want to consume. I always appreciate the views and the likes and the comments and the shares. and if it doesn't work for you, you know, if one is not as inspiring as another, that's cool too. You know, don't watch it. But I appreciate the feedback. That's it. I'm going to wrap up. Hopefully you guys could hear. The rain is getting out of control and kind of dripping down my back. Love you guys. Thank you for your support on my journey as I write my book. If you have questions for me about my book process or writing a book in general or anything related to the book, leave it below. Comment down. And I'll answer it in next week's video. Thank you guys. Believe.