The 4 Traits of a Genius 💡

I am going to reveal for you the 4 G's of genius. What are the 4 G's of genius? And this is going to allow you to upgrade not only your thinking but also your life. What's the first G of genius? Growth. This is the growth mindset, because the opposite of a growth mindset is what? Stagnation. It's a fixed mindset that certain things like your potential, your thinking ability, your intelligence, your memory is somehow fixed like your shoe size. We know that your thinking is not fixed, that you can think in different ways. And when you think in a different way, you behave in a different way. And when you behave in a different way, you create different results. You may have read this book I've recommended before called Mindset. by Dr. Carol Dweck, which is saying that your mindset is not fixed. It actually has the potential to improve, to be able to grow. And we know that growth is a— it's a principle of nature. Everything grows. If it's green, it grows. And if it's brown, it starts to rot. But everything in nature grows or it dies. So what are you doing on a daily basis to really maintain your growth? Are you scheduling your growth? Are you scheduling your exercise? Are you are you doing things to be able to enrich your mind, your body, your emotions, your heart? Because remember this: if you're not growing, you're not staying the same. You're slipping. Nothing in nature just remains static. If you're not growing, then you're actually losing ground. And I can appreciate you because you're listening to my voice. So you prioritize growth. So I know I'm preaching to the choir. But where are you scheduling it? And where, in what areas of your life are you not growing? And where can you put some attention and some focus and energy to be able to expand? The second G to genius is giving. Is giving. You notice that everything in nature grows or it dies. Well, everything in nature also has to give, right? It has to give back to the system. Otherwise, it's really eliminated. A lot of people try to use that as a way to Maybe manipulate a situation. They give so that they could get. You give because it's who you are. In what areas can you give and share more? Even when you teach somebody else, you get to learn it twice. It always comes back to you in some form. We all know people, especially years ago, there was this culture of go-getters, going to get things. You're going, going, going to get. And then more and more people started to give and give and give. But if you're always giving, giving all the time, then you become a martyr and you have an empty teacup. You have no more to be able to give. That's why I feel like growing and giving go together, because you grow so you have more to give. You learn so you could earn, so you could return, so you could be able to give back. These are what I call grow givers. You grow so you could give. You're grow givers, right? And that's what I really appreciate about this community, because if you're following our work, you're part of our tribe, community, if you will, you're obviously very interested in growing and leveling up your learning so you can level up your life. But why do you do that? You do that so you can be more, do more, have more, and then ultimately share more with the world. Now, the 3rd G in the genius formula, if you will, is grit. This is a big one, is grit. What's grit? Grit is perseverance. Right? Grit is determination. How important is that to have in your thinking? A little bit or a lot? It's very important, right? Because we know success is not a straight line. Never is it just an easy road. And along the way to reach your goals, to reach your dreams, you are tested. It's kind of like the, the hero's journey. I wrote Limitless around Joseph Campbell's hero's journey, where in the beginning you have the hero, which is you, and you're pulled out You're brought out of the ordinary world and you're introduced to an extraordinary world, a magical world. But in this world, you have trials and you have struggles and you find a mentor, and that mentor gives you skills. They give you a new set of beliefs. They give you treasure to be able to uplevel so you could go and fight your villains and these arch-nemesis, these, these challenges, these enemies, if you will. But in order to go through that struggle, that struggle will give you strength if you persevere. And that's why grit is so important. So how do you build your grit? How do you grow your grit? Well, here's the good news. Your grit is like a muscle. It's use it or lose it. How do you build a muscle? You give it challenge. You give it weight. You give it stimulus. You give it novelty. It's like building your physical muscles. I remember years ago there was a, a big box It was Mayweather and Pacquiao. And I got a message from Sylvester Stallone and, you know, Rocky. And he's like, do you wanna watch the fight together? And I was like, do I wanna watch this big boxing match with Rocky? Absolutely. And we're in his theater, we're in his living room, and we're sitting on the couch. And it's me, and right next to me is Sylvester Stallone, and right next to him is Arnold Schwarzenegger. And afterwards, I, I'm always curious. Remember I talked about being playful and asking lots of questions and genius leaves clues? I asked the guys, I was like, after the match, what does it take to be like that? What does it take to be world-class in your opinion? To be able to do that where, you know, all these people, the whole world's watching you because you're the best at what you do. And Arnold looked at me and he said, Jim, the difference between an amateur and a champion Is the champion is willing to push past the pain period. The champion is willing to push past the pain period. And we know that in every area of our life, there are struggles, and we have an opportunity to either give up or a chance to be able to move forward. And what are those decisions that you're making? Let's say you're exercising and you're doing curls with dumbbells, and you're doing 10 reps. Out of those 10, which one do you wanna do the least? Number 10, right? Which of those gives you the most growth? Number 11, right? Because you're pushing past— it's the things that you don't want to do that give you most of the reward. Even when people procrastinate and they put things off, I believe that often the treasure you seek is hidden in the work you're avoiding. That work that you have that you keep putting off, you're getting really good at putting things off. You're building procrastination muscles, as opposed to when you have something difficult and you take it on, then you're building your grit, your determination muscles. And that's why I recommend often that when you wake up, one of the first things you do when you start your day is do that hardest thing first. First you make your bed and do something with excellence and you build some momentum, but handle that big thing that's weighing you down because that's where the freedom lies. And I believe it, that if you do the hard things, the difficult things in your life, life becomes easier. But if you're always doing the easy things in life, life gets very, very hard, gets very, very difficult. It sounds like a paradox, but it's very true that discipline does equal freedom. Because if you can't get yourself to do the things that you need to do, then you have no freedom. Then you're in a cage. So that's the 3rd G. You have growth, You have giving, you have grit. Now what's the final 4th G? Gratitude. What's gratitude? It's a deep, connected feeling of appreciation. I remember for our Thanksgiving podcast episode, I talked about gratitude and different ways you could feel instant gratitude and how gratitude actually rewires your brain for positivity and for performance. And you know that, right? Because if you're fearful, And you're scared, or you feel those negative emotions, when you connect to what's important to you, of the things that you do have in your life, those feelings go away. Let's do a thought experiment. We talked about creativity and thought experiments, using your imagination, and how imagination is more powerful than knowledge. Here's a gratitude exercise. What if tomorrow, the only things you had in your life tomorrow were the things you expressed gratitude for today. Because if you're not grateful for the things in your life already, how are you gonna go and achieve more and more and more? We all know somebody who has a lot of things and a lot of blessings in their life, but they don't appreciate it. And we all know people with a lot of less resources, external resources, but they're truly happy. And I think that happiness and that fulfillment comes based in a sense of gratitude. Gratitude gives you genius. So here's what I want you to do right now. I want you to take one of these Gs, pick your one, and I want you to list it in the comments and right next to it, one action you could take over the next 24 hours to build that, to progress in that one area. Let me give you an example. If you pick growth, maybe you're thinking, okay, I'm gonna commit to reading 10 minutes a day, and you put it in your calendar. If you pick something like grit, you're thinking, wow, I gotta get myself to do something difficult. Now I understand why Jim takes cold showers every morning. I'm gonna commit tomorrow to taking a cold shower. It doesn't have to be cold for the whole time, and you could go cold 30 seconds and then warm 30 seconds, but the important principle here is you're putting yourself in an uncomfortable position. position, and yet you're training yourself to still plow through. You're building determination, you're building persistence, you're building your grit, and it shows up in other areas of your life because how you do anything is how you do everything. So maybe you have that same level of grit when you get uncomfortable to give a talk in front of your classroom or in front of your coworkers. You build that grit. Or maybe it's giving. You're thinking about, wow, you write down giving in your comments, and what's one thing you could do to contribute to another person? It doesn't have to be something big and global. What's one thing you could do to be kind to somebody? Because we need that now more than ever. You could be sitting or standing next to somebody that's having the fight or battle of their lives. They feel completely broken, and that's why kindness goes a long way. And kindness is free, so sprinkle that stuff Everywhere. Where can you give? One idea. And finally, the last G, which is what? It's gratitude. You could write down gratitude and what's one thing you could do to feel that appreciation. Remember, what you appreciate appreciates. Take these 4 Gs of genius into your life. Remember, knowledge is not power. It's only potential power. It only becomes power when you utilize it. Are you tired of constantly feeling overwhelmed by your never-ending to-do list? Do you struggle to find enough hours in the day to accomplish everything you need? But what if I told you there's a solution that can help you take back control of your time, your focus, your productivity? I'd like to introduce you to Kwik Productivity. 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