How to Stop Procrastinating Before It Destroys Your Mind in 23 Minutes | Devon Franklin

I only got one life.

This is not a dress rehearsal, can I remind you of that? You don't get a chance to do this life over again. This is the show.

I don't buy into this, this idea that you have to compromise who you are, compromise what you believe. As a matter of fact, be even more bold than who you are, more bold than who you believe, because you are the hero of your own story.

Do you realize that procrastination is like playing Russian roulette with your destiny? You think you have more time than you do, so you go ahead and delay what's supposed to be done today to a time that may never materialize.

What's up, Believe Nation? It's Evan. My one word is believe, and I believe in you. I believe in your potential, and I want to see that thing that you've got inside you explode out into the world to have a big impact for you, your family, and the world. So to help you on your journey today, we're going to learn from producer, author, and preacher Devon Franklin, and my take on his top 10 rules for success. Rule number 3 is my personal favorite, and I'd love to know which one you guys like the best. And as always, guys, as you're watching, if you hear something that really, really resonates with you, please leave it down in the comments below and put quotes around it so other people can be inspired. And when you write it down, it's much more likely to stick for yourself as well. Enjoy.

I hold in my hand chocolate chips.

Chocolate chip cookies, right? Now what's interesting is this is just an example of when you go to any supermarket, there is a whole aisle dedicated to chocolate chip cookies. You can get whatever flavor or ever style you want But what dawned on me is that, you mean to tell me there's a whole aisle of the same product? So as I sat there looking at the aisle, I said, how is it possible in almost every supermarket in the country there can be an aisle dedicated to the same product? As I began to think about it, I said, it might be the same chocolate chip, but what differentiates one brand from another? The recipe. May I submit for your consideration, these chocolate chip cookies represent success. We all have been destined to be successful, but each one of us has a different recipe that God will use to create success. What I know is that Keebler ain't trying to steal Mrs. Fields' recipe, because Keebler does what they do, Mrs. Fields do what they do, and they both can sell millions of cookies every single year. Why? Because they're committed to their recipe. They believe that their recipe is the best, and as a result, they still find success. You don't You see on the package of Mrs. Fields, "We taste just like Keebler's." No! Mrs. Fields is Mrs. Fields. Keebler's is Mrs. Keebler's. And Chips Ahoy is Chips Ahoy. Oh, your difference is your destiny. You have a recipe for your success. So why are you over there trying to steal your neighbor's recipe? Why don't you start cooking up what God gave you? Start mixing up your ingredients and know that if your neighbor can find space on the aisle of the world for success, that God has some shelf space for you too.

I only got one life.

This is not a dress rehearsal, can I remind you of that? You don't get a chance to do this life over again. This is the show. You're waiting to perform, the performance is now. So if you don't live out your truth, if you don't embrace your difference, will you be able to look back and say whatever you shortchanged your difference for, it was worth it? It. All right, all right. Whoever you shortchange your difference for, were they worth it? So often we become a limited version of ourselves just to be accepted by somebody who then goes on to move on to somebody else, and there we are left with the damage of having compromised ourselves for their love and acceptance, and they just said no, no, and they're on to somebody else, and we're still left healing from a situation we should have never been in to begin with. Stay in your notes, Devon. I just need to tell you right now, please do not want love so badly you compromise who you are to get it. If somebody you're dating cannot handle the fullness of your purpose and your calling and your personality, why don't you go ahead and drop them right now? Please drop them. Cut it off. Cut it off. Why? Because all you're doing is wasting your time and their time. Be who you're created to be, and if they cannot handle that, God bless them. Go ahead and buy them a bag of cookies and say, I'll see you on the other side, but I I cannot allow myself to be subject to your limited thinking. I am bigger than your capacity to handle who I am. Who am I talking to right now? Your difference is your destiny.

And so here I am, an 18-year-old, you know, young man, got into the University of Southern California. I go in for my first internship interview at the management company that manages Will Smith. I'm literally about to get my foot in the door, and at the end of the interview, the lady says Devon, is there anything else you want us to know? And right there, God is speaking in my ear. He said, tell her about the Sabbath. Now you must understand something. As a Christian, I grew up observing Sabbath. So Friday night sundown to Saturday night sundown, I don't work. It's the day that I take off for observance, rest, and restoration. And I'm there in the internship interview about to get my foot in the door of Hollywood, and God says, tell her about the Sabbath. I said, Lord, after I get the internship, I'll tell her all about the Sabbath. You know how we are. We love to get what we want, and then we'll start moving the pieces around. Around about what we can and cannot do. But after a moment of silence, I said, "Well, I cannot take this internship if it requires me to work on the Sabbath." And it was quiet, just like it is now. And after a moment of silence, she said, "De'Von, don't worry, we can work around that." What that taught me in that moment is that it's not about just the door of opportunity opening in your scene, it's about how you walk through the door. Because every door that opens that does not allow you to fit your faith and who you are, I argue it is not a door to go through.

Through.

You have to understand that when you are walking in your path and you are walking in the movie of your life, the scenes in your life will conform around you if you have enough faith to be exactly who God created you to be. I don't buy into this, this idea that you have to compromise who you are, compromise what you believe. As a matter of fact, be even more bold than who you are, more bold than who you believe, because you are the hero of your own story. And if you don't believe your story, guess what? Ain't nobody else going to.

What would you say is the biggest lesson you learned from that intern experience, those 4 years?

You know, it's something that I knew already. You know, again, growing up in the church, one of the things that was instilled in us— my uncle was the pastor— was all about service, all about service. I mean, we would go into the community, we'd pass out food, we'd pass out flyers. You know, we would get to the church at, you know, 8 o'clock on Sabbath morning and not leave till 8 o'clock at night. So getting to to be an intern, that training and service was the key to my success. Because as an intern, you know, no one came to me every day and said, here's your assignment. I had to go find work to do. I had to go, you know, say, hey, can I fax that for you? Can I file that for you? And remember coffee orders, you know, go get dry cleaning. But also do it with excellence. Do it like it was important. Because sometimes those tasks we don't want. We want the office, we want the job, uh, you know, we want the title, we want the money. We don't want to do the entry-level stuff.

Yeah.

And sometimes, you know, people that I've even hired and interns that I've worked with, they don't have any excellence in that work because they, they think it's a, they're above it. But when you put excellence on that and you service it and you say, hey, this is as important as the job I want, people see that. So for me, it was applying service. How can I make everyone's job here better? And not just the principals, but the assistants as well, you know, the support staff. Because if you don't have a relationship with the support staff, you're not having a relationship with the principals. And so that was my, my lesson that I really learned is that service is king and that service is the key to your ascension. And, and, and I can tell you that that lesson just keeps replaying itself at every level, just in different ways.

People don't believe that they're good enough. Yeah, they don't believe they have what it takes. But when you embrace who you are and not worry about fitting in anybody's box—

well, you know, they don't believe they have what it takes. I think a lot of people don't believe they have what it takes because they're comparing themselves to everybody else instead of looking at themselves.

I tell people, stay in your own movie. We're over here looking at other people's movie, and you have no idea. You look at someone else's movie, and in one scene it looks like they're on the top, but you have no idea what's getting ready to happen in that next scene.

Yeah.

So you stay in your movie, you focus on your scene, you become the best that you can be, and you'll be surprised at how great your own story works.

Yeah.

Continue to refine and develop your own script.

Absolutely. And, and, and your own character.

I love that. I'm going to start using that. Stay in your own movie.

That's right.

Be very careful then how you live, not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity. And there are some translations that say making the most of your time, because the days are evil. So let me submit for your consideration that when we were born, we both were given two things: talent and time. Talent and time. Talent and time. Turn to your neighbor on your right and say, you got some talent. Turn to your neighbor on the left but say, do you have the time? Oh, I want to talk to somebody right now because see, one of these two things is a limited resource. The other is an unlimited resource. Your talent is unlimited. I need you to know this, that what you have within you, what God put within you, is unlimited.

All right, that people—

you Here's the thing. Some of you think that people have stolen things from you and kept opportunities from you. Let me tell you something, that God has more than what that they tried to take from you because there's more talent in you than they even realize. They think they stole one idea, but you got a million more. They think they took what was from you, but God said what I put in you can create again. So don't worry about not having enough talent. You got that. But the limited resource is the time.

Hmm, I wish I could tell you you had more time than you do.

This is why God wanted me to come here today and, and, and hopefully inspire and motivate you to reclaim your time, reclaim that which is yours to begin with. At the end of your life, at the end of my life, God is going to ask me, what did you do with the time that I gave you. I'm gonna come sit next to you. Watch this, watch this. So often— can't even get through my message. Because there's something I know I have not done. And God, in his grace and his mercy, keeps sending an alarm in our spirit saying, my son and my daughter, I need you to be obedient. I need you to get it right in this season. I need you to stop procrastinating in this season. And so the alarm keeps going off, and some of us, because we're not ready, we say, oh I'll answer it tomorrow. Do you realize that procrastination is like playing Russian roulette with your destiny? You think you have more time than you do, so you go ahead and delay what's supposed to be done today to a time that may never materialize. And then we wonder why we're not happy because we're not productive in doing what he called us to do. I don't know who I'm talking to right now, but God said it is time to reclaim your time. We all have the same amount of time in a day. Now, how much time do we have in this life? I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know how much time you have left.

I don't know how much time I got left. But guess what? I don't worry about what I don't know. I worry about what I do know. He woke me up this morning. He started me on this way. And if he woke me up, that means he financed my gift for today. So I better get busy. Turn to your neighbor, say, you better get busy. You better get busy. You better get busy.

I'm growing up in a Christian home, in a Christian environment. I had this dream that maybe one day I could go to Hollywood and work in entertainment. Now, that was not a very faith-friendly dream because Hollywood still is today by many people viewed as Sodom and Gomorrah, as the devil's playground. Many people said, well, if you want, you know, to live out your faith, Devon, don't go to Hollywood. Don't do it. You're going to lose your faith. It's going to corrupt you. There's no way you can be about God and be in that industry. And so here I was as a young person having a dream, a vision, a call from God, but having the conflict that those that around me don't see the call the way that I see it. So I had a choice. Do I stay within the lane that they have ordained, or do I have enough faith to go after the lane that God had ordained? And that was And that was a challenge, and that was a conflict that I think all of us face.

What you say in the book is that development begins when you have the first vision of what you can be, correct?

Exactly. You can't write a movie unless you know what the movie's supposed to be about. That's what development is. Sometimes we get so frustrated in our lives, but we have to go back and say, "Wait a minute. Do I understand what the big idea of my life is supposed to be?" If my life is a story, then I have to know the point of my story. And sometimes what happens when we start developing a movie, the producers may have one vision of what the movie's supposed to be, and the studio has another version, and then the movie becomes nothing because there's not clarity of idea. So with our life, we have to have clarity of what we're supposed to do. What do we believe we're called to do in this life? And in that way, it gives our whole development process more shape.

My mother was— mother was, still is a disciplinarian. And she, you know, from we were young, I mean, from 3 and 4 years old, I mean, having to do chores and vacuum and wash dishes and take out the trash and keep our room clean and, and all of those things that at the time I hated, I value so much now because they gave me a foundation that really helped me navigate, organize, lead, manage. So, you know, that discipline was something that she really instilled in us. And I think a lot of the success I've been able to have comes from her.

Yeah.

And her, you know, saying, look, I'm not gonna let you guys just go and be wild. Say that's just how boys do it.

As a studio executive, one of the things I do is I develop scripts into movies. But there are some scripts that we develop for a very long time and it never looks like it's going to get made. And we call this period of time development hell. Some of you have been in development hell because you had an idea for your life and you've been trying and you've been pushing to allow that idea to get into production, but you seem so far away from it that you don't know what you're gonna do. And in this moment, in development hell, it is so tempting to give up on the very idea that brought you this far. You must realize that in development hell, when you are going through a time where you're about to give up on yourself, give up on your God, give up on your friends, give up on your dreams and your beliefs, this is the time when you have to go go back to the original idea that motivated your life and hold on to it and don't give up. Because you know why? Because it is just like a scene of a movie. There are some good scenes, there are some bad scenes, but if you keep walking forward, guess what? The hero always wins. And you know what makes the story good? The conflict the hero faces. So when you go through bad scenes, that must must mean you are getting ready to be prepared to be victorious. You must know that a bad scene with conflict is not meant to take you down, but it's meant to actually bring out the hero in you and build you up.

So how do you define success?

You have to define success.

One, I define success as peace. Do you like—

Me too!

You're my kind of guy.

That's right, that's right.

There's nothing without No. Okay, good. I'll let you finish.

Go ahead.

Who you—

who looks back at you in the mirror?

Mm-hmm.

Do you like that person?

Are you at peace with that?

Are you at peace with that person? Are you content?

Yeah.

That is the foundation of success.

Mm-hmm.

You can be the most famous person in the world—

Yeah.

—and not have peace.

And I would argue— And we know a few of them. We do.

Yeah.

We do.

And I would argue you're not successful. You know, we cannot allow external forces to tell us we are successful. When you are fulfilled by what you do, you are fulfilled when you get up in the morning. You know, so many times we wake up in the morning, we're depressed, we're down, we're angry, we're frustrated. But when you can wake up saying, I'm glad to be alive, there is purpose to this day, to me, that is success. And I would argue that once you have that internal success, then externally, it's just a manifestation of what happens internally in the best possible way.

Thank you guys so much for watching. I made this video because Cephas asked me to. If there's someone you'd like me to cover in a future top 10, check out the link in the description and go and cast your vote. I'd also love to know what did you learn from this video? What lesson really hit home the hardest? What are you going to immediately apply somehow to your life or to your business? Leave it down in the comments below. I'm really curious to find out. I also want to give a quick shout out to Devon Trish. Devon, thank you so much for picking up a copy of my book. You're one one word, posting it to your Instagram account. I really, really appreciate the support, and I'm so glad that you enjoyed the 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. You know, the biggest lesson I learned from my father was to be— to not accept um, substance— I don't want to say abuse, but don't accept, uh, you know, what do you call it, digesting or ingesting. So don't, don't— because some part of culture is that, you know, substances, whether it be alcohol, whether it be cigarettes, drugs, or whatever— well, that's just a part of the culture, right? I mean, you know, what's big? What, what difference does it make if you drink? That's just part of culture. And if you don't drink, then you're weird. So what I learned from him is that, you know, as someone who did drink and for someone who drank, he did drink, he did. And he, he was an alcoholic my entire life, um, which contributed to his early demise. And so what I learned from him was like, don't just buy into the status quo. You have to find what works for you. And there was a lot of pressure he felt in his job and didn't realize, you know, the severity of what alcoholism would do to him. You know, he was doing it and didn't, you know, thought, oh, it's just me just doing what everybody else does, right? And everybody else goes out to drink after work, and that's what I do. And didn't realize that was setting him up for, for some very tragic events. So I really learned from that experience not to do that, to not, not go with the flow, uh, just because that's where the flow is going. Have a point of view. It doesn't serve you.

That's right. And others, find out what works for you.

Yeah, it works for me. So there I was having to make a decision. Am I going to go to Hollywood? Am I going to try to live out my faith but still be adherent to what I believed as a Christian? And I had to challenge those that came at me and they said, I said, you know, if you don't actually have experience with Hollywood, if you haven't actually worked a day in Hollywood, so you mean to tell me you're using your perception of what you think it is based upon a secondhand knowledge of it, not a firsthand experience. And then you're trying to dictate the destiny of my life based upon what you haven't experienced yourself. I appreciate that you love me, but love me enough to teach me how to use my faith in the most treacherous waters. Don't love me so much where you want to keep me close to the shore, because I don't care where you live, the shore gets the waves of life too. So teach me how to use my faith when life gets rough. So I had to go. I had to see. I had to explore. I watched these movies like Rocky and Back to the Future. You know what I loved about Rocky is, is Rocky said, listen, he thought he was a bum, and when he got the chance to fight Apollo Creed, what was his number one goal? He said, I don't even care if I win. I just want to go the distance. And when I would see movies like that as a kid, I said, that's me. You know, as a middle child— any middle children in the house? OK, we're going to have a support group after this. All right, you know we need a little extra care and counseling. Because the older one, my older brother, he was the oldest, and my youngest was the baby. And here I am, the middle child, kind of put off to the side. But when I would see films, I would get inspired. And I said, I want to be able to make movies that can absolutely touch people in the way that Rocky and The Color Purple and Back to the Future did for me.

So let me give you the one word secret to happiness. One word. This is all you need to be happy. The most important word ever.

If you had to think of one word that's most important to you or that sums you up or that would be kind of like a little beacon.

Hey, Believe Nation, if you want to know what the most important one word is for Tony Robbins, Gary Vaynerchuk, Oprah Winfrey, will.i.am, and Howard Schultz, I have a very special secret video for you. Check the description for details.