You'll Never Outperform Your Own Self-Image

What's going on, folks? Chapter 1 of Psycho-Cybernetics, all about self-image here. If you have not subscribed to the YouTube channel, definitely do that because I'm gonna be coming out with more videos on this book as well as all the other— I have read an insane amount of books over the past 5 years, and I was writing, and I was— it's so funny because I was reading these books, I was writing like these insanely detailed notes, headers, all this stuff. It's like, why am I doing this? I'm like basically rewriting the book. And now I'm at a point where I'm like, I want to, I want to present all these books, right? Like the most important information about all these books. I'm like, that is why I was writing such copious notes. I didn't even know why. And that's how the universe works though. It'll just make you do things and you have no idea why, but in hindsight it makes perfect sense. So now my executive assistant, Shryne, who put these presentations together, who does a freaking incredible job, one of the, one of the best, you know, designers I've ever seen in terms of presentations and graphics, and she does all this stuff behind the scenes. But now she can go into my perfectly little detailed notes and, and see all the information so we can create these presentations. So just a little aside on how the universe works sometimes. All right, so the first chapter we get into here is The Self-Image: The Key to a Better Life. So this is chapter number 1 in the book, and it sets the stage for self-image. Okay, now the whole book talks about self-image, but the first chapter really dives into the details of it. And around 1960, because this book was written in 1960, he's talking about how self-image psychology is really coming to the forefront of psychology. So that must have been around the time. And now it's extremely prevalent. I mean, everyone— I feel like a lot of people know that self-image is a foundation of a lot of things. We're gonna get into that a little bit. So you are whoever you decide to be starting now, and that's really the reality. You choose who you want to be every single day. The past has no bearing on the present right now in this moment. So you can wake up today and decide to be whoever you want to be. The key is that you got to truly believe that you're that person though. You got to truly believe it. So you can't outperform your self-image. As I had said in the intro video, right, your self-image is like a thermostat. If you're set at 72 and you get some opportunities that are heating up, you get some great opportunities that are maybe at 82 degrees, 84 degrees, you're not going to want to take those because you don't see yourself. You're set at 72 degrees. You don't see yourself as someone who can, who can take those opportunities. I'll start this out with a story. When I was scaling the, our wholesale real estate business, I cold called for a year and a half. Way too long. Way too long because I didn't see myself as someone who could manage people. I'm like, well, I'm just getting started in real estate. I don't know anything. Meanwhile, I've spoken to like 30,000 sellers, but my own self-image was so small that I couldn't see myself managing, and it was stunting the growth of our business. It wasn't until I went to a meetup and I was with one of my good friends, Mike Gomes. Shout out Mike Gomes, follow his YouTube channel, he's got some good stuff. And he was like, you don't have an acquisition manager? What are you doing? You should have an acquisition manager. I was like, oh yeah, I probably should. Or no, that actually wasn't the story. It was, I didn't even have a cold caller. I was cold calling for a year and a half. That was later in the story. I was first cold calling for a year and a half. And then we had gone to a meetup and other people had cold callers. I'm like, okay, well, if they have cold callers, I think I'm like better on the phone than they are. I should have cold callers. Then I went out and hired cold callers, right? And then I was like the lead manager and the closer, right? And then I da da da da, you know? And then I had to upgrade my identity again to say, well, I'm a closer. I'm not gonna cold call, I'm not gonna follow up with cold leads either. I'm gonna go hire an appointment setter. And then I was a closer. And then that's when I saw Mike Gomes at the meetup and he's like, and I had been a closer for, you know, a while, like another year, maybe a year. And he's like, you don't have a sales rep yet? I'm like, no. He's like, oh yeah, you definitely should. And I'm like, oh, maybe I should. So my own self-identity of who I was, like I didn't see myself as a sales manager. So I was sabotaging any opportunity that came into my space to potentially bring in a salesperson. So as we scaled up the acquisitions team, I had to constantly level up my self-image every single time, from when I was hiring cold callers to BDRs or appointment setters to sales reps, and now hiring a sales manager. Again, I was in the sales manager seat for a while because I didn't see myself as true owner. I was like, well, I'm not ready to be the owner, but it's all in your self-image. Right? If your self-image is set lower, you're gonna subconsciously sabotage opportunities that come in higher than your thermostat. So everyone carries a subconscious identity, right? System of beliefs about who they are. But you can change your beliefs at any given time, okay? Hebb's Law: neurons that wire together fire together. If you think new thoughts over and over and over again, you get emotional about them, they'll eventually become beliefs, even if you don't believe it at first. Even if you don't believe it at first. If you do it enough, it's like method acting where the actor plays the character in real life so you can really get into the, into the head of the character. And then he gets so into the character, he forgets that he's actually himself and that he's not the character. Same thing here though, works the same way. Even if it seems like, oh, this is fake, I'm not a millionaire, or whatever the case is, or I'm not a successful business owner, I'm not an entrepreneur, if you repeat it to yourself enough, you will believe it. So no matter how hard you try, you cannot act outside of this identity. You simply can't. Like I said, if your thermostat's set at 70 and opportunities come in at 78, 80, 82, 85, you're not going to be able to get there. You're gonna— negative self-talk is gonna come in and, and shoot you down. So that self-image is gonna govern how you think, feel, and respond to certain events in your life. So when an event comes in that's You know, I like to use the speaker example, but say you want to be this world-class speaker and you've only done small engagements. If you don't see yourself as this world-class speaker who can speak on big stages, when someone comes to you with an opportunity to speak in front of 10,000 people, you're gonna say no because you don't see yourself as someone who can do that. But when your thermostat is set to that level, when your self-image is already at that level, even when you're down here right, which is difficult because— or it can be challenging because you have to have a belief that's greater than your, than your physical reality. You have to be in your head, you have to be greater than what's currently around you. So when that opportunity does come in, in the physical reality, you don't even second-guess it. You're boom, you're right there, you're taking it, because in your head you were already that thing. So you got to believe that it's possible, then you behave in that way even when the external world is not conforming, and then you become that person. You will act like the person you believe yourself to be, and that's just the truth. So frequency follows identity. This is a really important point here, actually. Oh, went back too far. Trying to see if I get the animations. Oh, we can't. That's okay. Shryen's got these great— I am in it. Animations, aren't they? Makes it great to look at. So when an idea or an opportunity aligns with your current self-image, you experience a high-frequency positive response. Yes, I want to do that, right? I am a speaker. Someone comes to me, says, hey Jake, you want to speak at a meetup? You know, it's gonna be a couple hundred people there. Heck yes, right? I'm a speaker, right? I'm not the world-class speaker though. Right? But when something comes in and it clashes with your identity, it's gonna pull you into low frequency state. So you're gonna experience resistance, fear, dissonance. So say that same example, someone comes in, hey Jake, I want you to come talk about The Built Framework, 10,000 people in this stadium, 15,000 people in the stadium. If I don't see myself as a world-class speaker, someone who's already doing that, I'm gonna say heck no, right? Now I won't, and here's where it gets sneaky, here's where the self, where the mind gets sneaky. It will do it in a way that you don't realize that you're kind of denying it. So like subconsciously, so you might tell the person, oh, you know, I'm actually, I got some other stuff I gotta deal with. I would love to do it, but you know, I have another thing that's more important. When in reality, this is like a once in a lifetime opportunity, but you're gonna come up with some excuse or justify or make it seem like it's okay that you're not doing this. Because your self-image isn't there, right? You don't see yourself as that person, so you get that resistance, that fear, that negative response to the opportunity. So that's why it's so important to raise your identity. And again, you have to believe you're this person, right, in your head. You got to act like that person so that when opportunities come into your environment, you're ready to jump on them without resistance or fear. So the frequency you vibrate at drives your behavior, and behavior produces results. So your frequency is like your emotion. I like to think about your frequency as a radio station, okay? So your frequency, you can think about as energy, or you can think about it as a state of being, is basically your thoughts, your emotions, your behaviors, and your actions which lead to certain results. So if you're in a fearful frequency or state of being or energetic state, you think fearful thoughts, you have fearful emotions, leads to fearful behaviors, and then that's gonna lead to fearful actions and negative results ultimately. But when you tap into another radio station, you raise your energy and you're thinking abundant and you're positive today. You're tapping into a new set of thoughts. Oh wow, all of a sudden there's opportunity everywhere. I'm optimistic about everything. That produces new emotions of love, joy, abundance, clarity. That's gonna drive new behaviors. I'm gonna act in new ways and I'm gonna get new results. And that's literally how your beliefs rewire your emotions, your behaviors, your actions, and give you new results. So the frequency that you vibrate at drives your behavior all the time, and behavior produces results, obviously. You need to see yourself as who you want to become. The future you want begins right now with how you see yourself today, okay? I say this all the time: the past has no bearing on today other than the bearing that you give it by dragging it into right now. Think about that. Your past, whether, oh, I was this person or I fucked up or I did that or I did this and I'm not worthy and I was a bad person. Listen, that's all in the past, right? It doesn't mean there's not consequences for that and stuff, but that's in the past. The only reason that it's living right now in the present moment is because you are dragging it into the present moment with your mind, okay? The past and the future, they're constructs of the mind. The second you get out of your mind and live in the present moment, there is no past or future. Think about that. You're in the moment. The past and the future is just a construct of the mind. So stop giving the past power by dragging it into the now. Just wake up today. It's a blank canvas. It's a blank canvas today. Wake up, decide who you want to be. Write that person out on a piece of paper. I'm Jake 2.0 today. Who am I going to be? Write it all out. I promise you, when you write something out, it becomes a hell of a lot more real. And don't wait to earn that identity, okay? That's the reverse. It's not like, oh, you got to go do things, then you become that person. No, you become that person first, right? And then you get the results, right? So I say believe, behave, become. Believe and behave is kind of the mental side of it, but you are becoming that. So when you believe that it's possible, in the second that you believe it's possible and that you start to behave that person, you are becoming that person. You are that person. Right? That's it. And then, but the longer you do that, the more other people realize like, oh, that's who he is now. They start to perceive you differently. But you have to walk in this faith, this unknown where it seems almost like delusion, right? I love the word delusion actually, because it is delusional. It's kind of delusional, but until it works. Okay? So you believe that this version of you is possible. Write it down. Dream without the how. I don't want you to write something down like, well, I don't know, logically I don't know how I would get there. That's just nonsense. Okay, so, which the word nonsense is also funny because a lot of stuff we talk about is nonsense by definition. What are the 5 senses? Sight, sound, smell, touch, taste. We're talking about quantum. We're talking beyond the senses. So actually a lot of this stuff is nonsense, which is great. But you are the creator, so decide who you are and start living like it. So expanding the self-image expands your possibility, obviously, right? So when those opportunities come in that are at, you know, 80 degrees, 90-degree opportunities, right, for using the thermostat analogy, if you can raise that— that's basically what it is, though, right? Like, if your thermostat is set at 70, you're always gonna reject opportunities that are at 85 degrees, 90 degrees, whatever. When your identity, when your identity is already at 100 degrees, but maybe your reality is like 70-degree opportunities, 70-degree opportunities, when those 80, 85, 90-degree opportunities come in, you're not even going to bat an eye. You're just going to take them because you're inside, your identity is already at 100. You're sick. So your success mechanism, again, your success mechanism, Psycho-Cybernetics, is your subconscious mind. Right? But it only works within the boundaries of your self-image. So it can only get you as far as you see yourself. Always need to raise that self-image. If your self-image is small, your results will be too. So you need to expand the— your identity, and that will expand what's possible. Because things are always trying to come into your environment and give you opportunity. But again, if you're set at 70 degrees and you're getting 85-degree opportunities, 88, 90, 92, you're, you're pushing those away because you don't feel you're ready. But if you upgrade your mind first and you jump to 100 degrees in your mind, there's a gap now. Your mind's at 100 degrees, your reality's at 70. So now reality is going to close that gap and come up to where you are. And that's basically how you manifest realities. So new habits equals new self-image. Habits are everything. So your current, current habits reflect your current self-image. Again, so you raise your self-image, your habits are gonna change. And then as you upgrade your habits, your identity adapts to match it as well. So again, that's like the behaving part. So you believe that it's possible, you got to behave, you got to develop new habits, right? But the self-image is, is first. Self-image, right? You believe it's possible, boom, you have that new self-image and you're behaving, you are upgrading your habits, you're installing new habits. And again, a habit is something you do subconsciously. So you want a new set of habits in alignment with that new identity. So you're changing your routines, ultimately changing your reality. Again, think about it: new thoughts equals new emotions, new behaviors, new actions. So when you upgrade that identity, you think new thoughts, new emotions, new behaviors, new actions, ultimately new results and new reality. So if you look at this line down here, again, identity— and this is what he talks about, kind of similar to what I talk about— but identity, frequency, behavior, results, new identity. So you have this identity, right? A new elevated identity of who you are. It sets a new state of being, a new frequency, which drives new behavior, leads to new results, new identity. Key themes on this chapter: so you are always behaving in alignment with who you believe yourself to be, okay? Your frequency or your state of being or your energy is gonna drive your results. True change begins by expanding your identity first. So that's the foundation of this whole book. You are whoever you decide to be, but you must see yourself as that version now. All right, so as an exercise, I want you to, I want you to write down, I want you to make sure you're in a good energetic state when you do this. I don't want you to be all depressed and down. I want you to like maybe go work out or do something where you're in a high energetic state, and then I want you to sit down because energy matters. When you're in that elevated state, ideas just rush to you. So make sure you're in a good, happy, energetic, positive state. Sit down. I want you to write the top, your name 2.0. Jack 2.0. Amanda 2.0. Jim 2.0. And I want you to write down a whole page, just brain dump the highest and best version of you. Dream without the how. Like, this is a fantasyland. That's what I want you to be. Like, just make up the wildest story about your perfect life and what you have and what you drive and the car that you're in and the people that you talk to, the relationships you have, the line of work you're in, everything. Just write it all down. If you want to put it into 6 domains, the 6 core domains of life is, is health, wealth, relationships, personal development, purpose, and creative expression. So that's kind of how I look at my 6 areas of my life, and I kind of fantasize. I'm constantly fantasizing about those 6 things because I'm constantly leveling up into the next level of myself. But once you write that down, you reread it every day, and the more you look at it, the more real it's going to become.