Gary Vaynerchuk recalls realizing in 4th grade he was a poor student but a natural businessman, arguing self-awareness lets you bet on your strengths and skip what doesn't match your DNA. He recommends creating a safe space for close friends and family to give honest feedback about your weaknesses, then acting on that data. Thick skin matters: use criticism offensively instead of chasing trends that don't fit who you are.
My goal with the Mentor Me series is to try to spend a little bit more time with people who've achieved more success than us and hope that some of their magic dust rubs off onto us. So today we're going to learn from Gary Vaynerchuk on self-awareness. Point number 5 is my personal favorite, but I'm curious to find out what you guys think.
If you know who you are, then by nature you'll probably bet on your strengths. If you bet on your strengths, you'll win. Right. In 4th grade when I got an F in Mr. Molnar's science class, I knew right then and there that I was a shit student and I didn't give a crap about Saturn. And no joke, from that moment on, I can taste it in my mouth right now, I remember everything about this day. I hid the test in my drawer 'cause I needed to get it signed. This was old school '80s school stuff. And like, I didn't show my mom and then my conscience got the best of me and I cried and it was all weird but, But I remember more than anything was at that moment, because I'd already done lemonade, and I already sold random stuff around the house door to door, I was like, "I'm a businessman," that's what I called it back then, "and that's it, and I'm never gonna hedge." And it came from self-awareness and self-esteem, right? My mom was making me feel good, and I knew who I was, and I would tell you that that is, urgency, you know, speed matters, I believe in that, but if somebody who's listening, watching right now, if they really know who they are, like, look, if my daughter wants to stand outside and do street art for 19 hours a day, I'm all in, as long as she's aware that that's what's gonna make her the happiest, right? I got lucky that the thing that made me the happiest by public standards is something that makes me money and makes me deemed successful. [Speaker:GARY] Sure. But boy, I'd be super pumped being all in on anything, right? Like, as long as you just know. I wish that I could win on my looks, but I don't, right? Like, we, we, you have to know what you're gonna win on. And too many people want to be a pop singer, or a comedian, or a pretty face model, and it's just not who they are. And too many of you are leaving enormous upside on the table by trying to force a narrative that's romantic authentic in your mind versus what you actually have. I could do so many more things to build up my following, but it's not who I am. I know the hacking ways to get more followers, to get more people to know who I am, but I'm a businessman that happens to like understand content a little bit. So I'm never gonna be followed by the most, but I'm also, that means not gonna sell things I don't believe in. So if you follow all the other entrepreneurs on Instagram, they're selling watches and cash on bed and models and bottles and private planes, and I don't sell that. 'cause I don't wanna get the cheap followers or the cheap engagement. And so, when you really are self-aware, when you really know who you are, what it allows you to do is stay in your lanes, not do other things. I can't produce the kind of videos that my buddy Casey can. I can't, like it's just not who I am. And so you stay in your lane. My daily vlog, it's just one exhausting episode of me hustling 24 hours a day, and honestly, eventually it's gonna be very repetitive, but I don't care, that's my reality. My reality is I'm a workaholic, who has some talents but wants to show people that if you work really hard, if you want it, then at least you can get the most out of yourself. Not that you're gonna make a billion if you work hard, but the most out of yourself. So, I think self-awareness is imperative. It's why I put it in the new book. [MUSIC] If you really want self-awareness, you need to wildly, if you wanna hack self-awareness, I actually think it's predicated on on having thick skin. I think that is why, I really think so much of what I pull off is predicated on how thick my skin is. My skin is thick. You know, I just can handle it. I just can. I hate it. I hate it. I hate reading bad stuff about me. It's devastating, but I respect it. I can accept it. I understand it, and I try to use it as something that I go on the offense with going forward, and so they're learning moments, and so, You know, if you can get over yourself, right? And the funny thing is, I don't know, I feel like I'm so self-aware, I'm not sure if, I think, but I, you know, even like, even people that I think are not self-aware around me, it's funny to me how self-aware they really are. It's just, you don't let your brain accept your shortcomings. [MUSIC] One thing I think I do well, and at VaynerMedia, is I make everybody feel safe. And so that's really important to me, because when you make people feel safe, they start telling you the truth, right? So if you were able to go home right now, if you're struggling to figure out what you're good at, if you're able to take the 10 to 20 people that are closest to you, siblings, wives, husbands, partners, friends, the 10 to 20 people you would consider the closest to you in the world, and if you were able to talk to them and make them feel safe before you asked them the following question, if you made them, emphatically for 20 minutes and said, look, I need, this is the most important question I will ever ask you in my life. You need to tell me the truth. My intuition is you're not gonna wanna tell me the truth, but you have to understand I'm okay with it. I'm in the right mind space for this. I need the truth. And then you ask them what do they think you're good at and bad at. It's an amazing, and obviously I put out that post, it really resonated. I'm getting crazy emails of people like having amazing things happen to them. I think the only, if you do not have self-awareness, which is what I do think I have, and I think a lot of people don't have it. The only way you can gain it is by getting other people to give you the data points. But most people won't tell you the truth. So it's on you to create an environment, a very safe environment, for somebody to tell you the truth of what they truly think you're good and bad at, and then gather that data. A lot of people don't want to recognize what they're good at. Or don't want to accept that they're bad at something. It's like that whole American Idol singing thing, right? Like, so most people really believe they're great at singing, and they suck shit, right? Like, they really believe it. And so, I don't think people are honest with themselves. There's a lot of things I wish I was. Pfft. But I just don't lie to myself, and I think lying to yourself has held back the far majority of this room from bigger upside. I think everybody lies to themselves. Being a dick about it, I know I'm sitting in a room full of number 2s, 3s, and 4s. There's so many people in this room that are gonna be, could be dominant number 2s, 3s, and 4s, and I'm pissed that the narrative now is that you need to be a number 1 and have your company because a lot of people are gonna lose or leave money on the table because that's just the narrative. I really do think you have to audit who you actually are. You can look at like how people roll and like it's great to admire and things of that nature but it's so damn important you need to bet on your strengths and don't give a fuck about what you suck at. Way too many people in this room are gonna spend the next 30, 40 years of their lives trying to check the boxes of the things that they're not as good at and that you're gonna waste a fuckload of time and lose. To stick to like your DNA. Because the truth is if you want to be an anomaly you've got to Pick one. You know, like, and so that's it. That's what I got. So thanks for having me.
Thank you guys so much for watching. I hope you enjoyed. I'd love to know what you thought of the clips. I'd love to know which one was your personal favorite. Leave it in the comments below and I will join the discussion. Again, I appreciate you guys watching. Continue to believe and I'll see you soon.
Yeah, I love to give like definitive answers to get people moving because the more you ponder, the more you squander.
