Avoid Burnout: 10 Alignments That Restore Your Energy and Peace

We finally got, like, the capital. We finally got all the partnerships lined up and we had all this stack of papers to sign. But I realized we were just so burnt out. We were so unhappy. We were so unfulfilled. We were striving for profit and success and ego and power and status and all the things that society deems important. But at the end of the day, we're unfulfilled. With tears in our eyes. Ripped up the paperwork. We let the partners know we're not going to proceed. Said no to the funding deals. I actually moved to Bangkok, Thailand for about a year.

Wow, that's drastic.

Yeah. A better way to work and live in alignment, I say. A way to put the happy in my hustle. And that's the rest is history.

Welcome to the Dr. Joy Kong podcast. This is where I have a chance to share with you some of the latest developments in the space of holistic health, longevity and wellness. I have always honored intellectual curiosity and scientific rigor combined with real world practicality. My goal is that what you learn here will help you live longer and live better. Hope you enjoy the journey with me. Hello. Welcome Back to the Dr. Joy Kong podcast. You know I'm here for you so you can live a healthier and happier life. There's a subject that is near and dear to my heart, which is how to live a more balanced life while you are a busy person and trying to accomplish something in the world. So. So I am so thrilled to have Carrie Jack here with us because he's going to enlighten us on how to do this. So, Carrie, thank you so much for being here.

Hey, Dr. Joy. Honored to be here. Appreciate you.

Yeah, I'm so looking forward to this conversation because I want you to teach me because I need to learn how to do the Hustle happily. So let me introduce Carrie. So Carrie is a lifestyle entrepreneur, and you can explain to us what that is. Author, podcast host, professional actor, slash model, a biohacker, a eco warrior, martial artist, and humanitarian striving to make a positive impact on this planet. As a Second City improv comedy graduate, Carrie has performed on networks such as hbo, NBC, ABC and usa. He did experience entrepreneurial burnout. And after that, Carrie founded the Happy Hustle. The mission is to educate, inspire, and entertain while reminding you to enjoy the journey, not just a destination. As a biohacking human performance expert, Carrie Jack has coached elite entrepreneurs, professional athletes, Olympic gold medalists, Stanley cup winners, Fortune 500 CEOs, and many others. So I am so excited that you're here. To teach us. So, Carrie, thank you for. For showing up here.

Yeah, thank you for having me. And yeah, appreciate you reading all that we could. We'll get you the shortened version next time, but appreciate you.

No, it's not that long. And I. You, obviously you are into a lot of things. Kind of. I mean, that. That's a lot of hats to wear. So.

Yeah.

When did the burnout happen? What happened?

Well, I've always been an entrepreneur and I never was actually a good employee. Always seemed to find a way that was more efficient or effective in my mind. And typically bosses don't like that. So I'd set out for my own path. From the lemonade stand to the construction business, to running soccer camps, to heck, doing things illegally for. For money. Not proud of it. Done. Done a lot of things to, you know, that again.

So you were a hustler?

Yeah, I was always a hustler. Always a hustler, but never a happy hustler until I started the company. For real? Yeah. The burnout really took place when I was in New York City, actually. So my brother and I, we started a company that quantified feedback. We built this tech algorithm that, yeah, had a lot of merit, still does today. But we were grinding so hard, you know, working, I don't know, 100 plus hour weeks, getting four, you know, ish hours of sleep a night. We were just grinding our faces off. All for profit, success, ego status. We had this kind of five year exit trajectory at bay and we had partnerships with Microsoft and IBM at. And I realized when I was just at this shitty apartment in Queens, New York that my brother and I were staying at, that, that we rented and we had one bed in it and we shared the bed together. My brother snores like a train. So it was rough. But, you know, we were, we finally got like, the capital. We finally got all the partnerships lined up and we had all this stack of papers to sign that came with this, you know, five year clause of commitment, which rightfully so if someone's going to give you that much money. But I realized, you know, joy, we were. We were just so burnt out. We were so unhappy. We were so unfulfilled. We were striving for profit and success and ego and power and status and all the things that, you know, society deems important. But at the end of the day, you know, we just really were unfulfilled. And so we, we, with tears in our eyes, ripped up the paperwork. We let the partners know we're not going to proceed. We said no to the funding deals. Told our team, and we closed up shop. And I actually moved to Bangkok, Thailand, for about a year. And that's where I kind of figured out, yeah, a better way to work and live. In alignment, I say, a way to put the happy in my hustle. And that's kind of, as they say, the rest is history.

What did you learn in Thailand?

I learned a lot in Thailand. Thailand is amazing. I recommend everyone go.

I don't know everything learned in Thailand.

Oh, you don't want to know everything. But. But, yeah, there. There is. It's. They call it the land of the smiles. You know, the people are just very happy. And, yeah, they really. A lot of them don't have much. And so I saw a perspective, you know, and I've traveled before that. I lived in Spain for a while. I lived in Barcelona there for about a year, and then I lived in Brazil for a while. And so I've traveled. You know, I lived in every major US City. I guess not every, but like, you, you know, New York, Miami, Chicago, L.A. so, you know, so I've seen perspective, but it was in Thailand where it was really like, wow, these people have so little and they're so happy. They don't need all these things that in America we deem a priority. So. And I started to make some money over there online, and I was like, I had like a penthouse apartment for like 400 bucks a month, you know, eating at like a king for, like $2ameal, you know, because, like, you have geographic arbitrage of your currency.

What a relief, right? What a way to live.

Yeah, no, it is. That's. Yeah. Have you been over there?

I. I have, but, you know, of course I love Southeast Asia, and in general, it just.

Yeah.

So fun to live there. Yeah.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. And I get to go to, you know, Cambodia and Vietnam and Singapore and Bali. I didn't go to China. I want to go to China. As I mentioned, you know, I trained martial arts and kung fu and more, so tai chi and qigong with the Taoist priests from the Wudong Mountains in China. So.

Mesmerized. Yeah.

Yeah. Really? He told me he would take me. So my list. My master Chen. Yeah. But anyway, so I learned a lot about just life and entrepreneurship and perspective over there.

And happiness crept back into your life, right?

Yeah.

And so what. What did you learn? How to balance. Apparently you went back to entrepreneurship, right? I guess you were still doing something. You said you were making money when you were there, so you. You were hustling still when you were.

Yeah, I had, yeah, I was acting technically and modeling over there as a token white guy, you know, with the mustache and sideburns. They had unique roles for me, you know, because. Yeah, but, but I also had an online business that was teaching people how to set and get goals. Just reverse engineering, pretty basic stuff. But, but yeah, I was like, wow, there's you like you work a couple hours, make money, go live, go travel, go enjoy. I was like, this is, there's, there's a different way to do this. You know, you don't have to grind your face off and like, hey, at the end of the day you're not going to take it with you. You're, we're all going to die and leave this meat suit and enter into whatever you believe is next. So I just kind of started to ponder life a little bit differently.

I see. And, and how did that change how you, you live? Did you like you. You paid more may or way more attention to your health, I assume to working on your. Just I guess. Was that when biohacking started like because you finally had time?

Yeah, well, I've always been an athlete, you know, so I just. Health is always a priority. You know, I vowed when I was a little boy too. This is kind of funny and embarrassing, but I always vowed to have a six pack and able to throw a high kick. You know, I was like if I ever don't have that or not able to, you know, then I know I'm slacking. And so I've committed to this funny trigger. But every time I take a shower or a bath or any, you know, basically like cleaning of myself, I'll do push ups to failure or, or, or pull ups, you know, and I literally like haven't missed a shower. Even if they're just half assed little push ups. Even when I'm injured or whatever or sick since I don't know, like 12 years running. So just like those type of things, I've just made sure health was always a priority.

Yeah, yeah, that, that's amazing because those things add up.

Yeah, yeah. And it's again, maybe failure one day is very little because I feel like, you know, especially now as a father of a young boy, a little two year old and now I have a little baby girl on the way. You know, you get the dad bod wanting to come but I'm doing my best to fight it off and stay fit, so.

Yeah. Yeah. So how long did you live in Thailand?

About a year. Yeah. And then I came back and Then my business partner was going through a health journey. He was very well versed in biohacking and you know, all things kind of health optimization with his background. And this was around like 2015 before like ice baths were cool. We had like Wim Hof on our podcast and we had like, you know, all these, you know, Dr. Davidson, you

already started a podcast when you get.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, we had a company, Biohacking secret. Yeah, yeah, we were early on all of it. I mean, we had ice baths, like we were doing all, all that peptides and stem cells and you know, very good, I mean, all sorts of stuff. So that's before the Happy Hustle, before I went full in. I was running that company with my business partner Anthony. And you know, yeah, we learned a lot. We, we grew that company. It was a nice business. You know, we did about 67,000 copies of our book through a free plus shipping funnel. And then we had like a, you know, kind of 50, 25k and 10k coaching package on the back end of that funnel that just like we ran out of time to sell with. It was selling out like hotcakes.

What were you teaching people?

So we, we had this assessment that identified environmental genetic mismatches, vitamin and mineral deficiencies and toxins holding people back from living optimally. And then we would layer in all different types of tests. Blood work analysis, hair tissue, mineral analysis, stool samples, parasites, all sorts of cleanses, A lot of holistic based things, but a lot of cutting edge science things. And sounds like you were running a clinic. Pretty much, yeah, pretty much. Although it was more coaching and then masterminds as a part of it. But yeah, we were dealing with like Russell Brunson, for example, from Click Funnels. He big entrepreneur. He, he kind of king maker us in the click funnels world. So we had a lot of clients come from that. And then we had some Olympic gold medal athletes, some pro fighters, some, you know, so then we got into that crowd and. And then we had soccer moms and people who were just struggling with Lyme disease or, or chronic illness because my business partner had Lyme disease. And so he beat it and overcame it. So he had the protocol. So yeah, it was an interesting time prior to the Happy Hustle, biohacking early, you know, I guess you call it early nowadays. But yeah, we were doing, you know, magnesium baths and freaking coffee enemas and all sorts of stuff, you know, nice.

So what how like if somebody says I'm, I'm burned out, I'm just, you know, I Can't sustain anymore. What. What do you have for me? What. Can you tell me how I can get out of this?

Yeah. Well, first and foremost, it starts by identifying which alignment you're lacking in most. You know, because awareness is key to any true transformation. Right. So what we do for. For our guys are our high level, you know, entrepreneurs who come into our community. And we. We don't specifically serve women directly, more indirectly in our program, but we do have a couples event coming up this. This year for our first one. So that's exciting. But, yeah, it starts with awareness. And usually we put people through our assessment, you know, the. The 10 alignments assessment. This is our. Our soul mapping system. So this is your soul's map to the blissfully balanced promised land and how to avoid burnout. So if you want, I could put you through the assessment live on the air right now.

Really?

Yeah. And then anyone who's listening could. Could play along with us if they want to be an active participant.

That's cool. I didn't see that one coming. Okay.

Yeah.

My soul right here on air.

Yeah, a little bit.

Yeah.

Get a. Get a pen and paper out, Dr. Joy. And then anyone listening, it only take a couple minutes.

Okay. All right.

Yeah, it'll only take a couple minutes. But basically you're just going to grade yourself one to five in each of these 10 different areas. Okay. So five is like an A. You're crushing it. You know, you're. You're happy hustling. You know, four like a B, three like a C, you know, two D and one F. Like you're failing. You really need to prioritize change asap. And again, I wasn't much.

One is F. Yeah.

One's out. But I do know the grading scale, so that's kind of how we correlated it, you know, based on the 10 alignment system. And this is 10 different key areas of life. When I was burnt out that I looked to. To, yeah, reconcile my. My anxious nature, my stress for living, my unfulfilled existence. I was like, man, there's got to be more to it. I need to look at all these different areas of life. And I've. I know there's other systems out there, but I just didn't feel like they went deep enough. So we kind of created this based on my own burnout and how I was able. Able to supersede. So the first alignment, it's called selfless service. So selfless service is the S in the soul mapping system. Again, your service. Selfless service.

Oh, okay.

So go Ahead and put a score for the last 30 days. I just want you to think about the last 30 days. How selfless have you been in your service? And this means giving your insight, your finances, your time to things completely unrelated to your business. Yeah, you know, like if you're like, mentoring somebody or giving a discount, that doesn't count as much as, like, hey, I want you to give to an organization that you care about or to a homeless person on the street or to your church or whatever it is. Give yourself a score, 1 to 5. And for those out there listening or watching, go ahead and give yourself a score as well. In the last 30 days, where would you rank yourself? Okay, and go ahead and Write it down, Dr. Joy. You don't have to tell us now, but we'll, we'll tally them up at the end.

Okay, I see. Okay. All right. Got it.

You got a score.

Uh huh.

Okay, now, optimized health in the last 30 days, where would you give yourself a ranking? One to five. Fives, you're crushing it again. Ones you're failing, you know, mentally, physically, emotionally. Do you feel optimized? Or maybe not so much. Maybe. Have you, you know, been shoving crap down the pie hole? Not moving, not getting stem cells. Right. Biohacking. Where you at? One to five. Okay, you got a score.

Yes.

Okay, next is unplugged digitally. This one's a very difficult one for high performers especially who are always connected. Five is, you know, you're being very deliberate with your phone and screen time. Maybe one is failing. You're. You're constantly plugged in, caught in the death scroll, watching Netflix, and you're off time, whatever it is, you know? And again, tech is a part of business, but are you using it or is it abusing you? That's the question. Right?

Okay.

Okay, so now you got three scores. Last 30 days.

Okay.

L is loving relationships. So this is, you know, how much love do you have in your life, you know, with your partner, with your best friends, with your family? You know, usually just one ring out. Not like, you know, random acquaintances or loose friends. We're talking like your, your inner circle. How much love? Plentiful pleasure, you know, just connection. Do you feel one to five in the last 30 days with. With that?

Okay.

Okay, so that's the soul part of the soul mapping system. You got selfless service, optimized health, unplugging digitally, and loving relationships. Okay, you got four scores.

I do.

All right. Everyone watching and listening, got four scores. Great. Now we're getting to the mapping part. Okay, so mindful spirituality, first and foremost with the M. How connected do you feel to a higher power? You know, again, I don't care one religion or another. I just think it's important to have faith in something bigger than yourself. So write something down. Where you at now? You're praying, meditating? Are you, you know, going to church? What are you doing on a consistent basis in the last 30 days? Mindful spirituality. Give yourself a score of one to five. Okay. Then abundance financially is the A. Okay, so how abundant do you feel? You know, oftentimes entrepreneurs, especially in high performance, think this is the most important one. But they actually are all equally important, and they fit symbiotically together. But you do need to have your finances figured out, right? Saving, investing, spending wisely. Do you have a system to support you, or are you kind of living paycheck to paycheck? You know, inferior finances? Give yourself a score, one to five.

Okay, got it.

And then the first P. Personal development. So are you growing and evolving or are you shrinking and dissolving? Those are your two choices, you know, and, you know, inside the book, inside of our program, we have what we call happy hustle hacks. For each of these 10 different areas of life to basically help you, you know, if you. If you did have a low score, we have ways to. To help you, you know, boost your. Boost your score. But, you know, it's important to just start with awareness. So give yourself a score. How much personal development do you feel in the last 30 days that you've been embarking on? Okay, second P. Passionate hobbies. This one is, I find extremely lacking oftentimes in high performers. They don't do fun for themselves. You know, it's like they're working like dogs.

What if. Okay, what if I feel my work is my hobby?

Like, not.

It's the coolest thing.

That's. That's great. So that falls into the next one, which I will get to. Okay. But this passion hobbies is like, you know, for me, I love fly fishing. I love bow hunting, playing soccer, doing martial arts, going dancing with my wife, stuff like that. You know, pottery, you know, random things that turn off, you know, one hemisphere of the brain and open up the. The other. That's where a lot of the creativity flows. And yeah, it's. It's important because fun is fundamental. So give yourself a score one to five in passionate hobbies. Now, to your point, the I is impactful work. So this is where you feel super connected to your work, right? Maybe, you know, this is when you're really feeling passionate about it, which is, again, it's a cliche buzzword, but I like to define terms passion, meaning that inward calling on your heartstring. Right. And then purpose is that outward serving mission, who you're actually helping to ultimately make a positive impact. Right. That's, that's when you know you have impactful work, when you have all three. Right.

Yeah.

So give yourself a score, one to five there. And then nature connection. This is the N in soul mapping. This is the last alignment of the 10. How connected do you feel to nature and getting outdoors and really, you know, out of our, you know, offices. And unfortunately, nowadays, like 99 of our time is spent indoors, studies show. So we're breathing in recycled air, we're soaking up toxic blue light, we're getting beamed by electromagnetic fields, you know, and we wonder why we feel unhealthy and not good. And then in addition to you enjoying nature, I talk about protecting it in this alignment. So being a part of the solution, being a conscious consumer, supporting sustainable companies, you know, voting with your dollar. Right. That's where we have nature connection. We become more of that eco warrior. Right. So my brother has a company called Eco Breakthroughs that's fighting plastic pollution epidemic and helping companies be more regenerative and sustainable. So I'm a, an investor and advisor there, and it's a big part of my life too, with the happy house and what we do. So. So that's important to give yourself a score, 1 to 5 in both. How often are you getting outside in nature and how much of the solution, protecting it are you, are you actually being a part of. So you should have 10 scores. Dr. Joy, do you have 10?

Yes, I do.

Okay, tally them up. Go ahead. Okay, tally them up. Basic math. No calculators, people. When you're out there, everyone tally up your scores. And. And if you tallied up a score, that's 40 or above, congratulations, you're happy hustling in the last 30 days. Now, if you're 39 or below, then unfortunately, you got a little work to do. So where'd you land? What was your score?

38, almost.

Oh, you close. You're close. But unfortunately, we still got a little work to do, right?

Yes.

So now I want to ask you, if you're feeling brave, what was your lowest alignment and if there was a tie? Tell us. Tell us the tie.

Well, the hobby one.

Okay, what'd you rank?

I wasn't sure if it should be one or two.

Well, if you're not sure, it's probably a one.

I mean. Yes. Right. I'm not doing a whole lot of other things besides working and just taking care of my health, you know, that's pretty much right. Yeah.

Yeah. So here is kind of how we look at that. Now you clearly understand where you're lacking, right. And maybe where burnout is going to affect you if we don't plug some of these holes right. In the 10 different areas. So what I would say, potentially, is, what's something fun that you like to do?

Well, definitely travel. I mean, I have traveled quite a bit, so, you know, travel. And

what's like a. What's like a activity locally that you have been curious about doing? Or maybe something that I used to like dancing?

Yeah, actually, I, I went to Cuba and I, I, you know, studying dancing. And so I do like.

Yeah, okay, so dancing's a fun hobby. You know, maybe since you're on the coast, like, surfing could be a hobby or kiteboarding or something like, to do with the water. Right. Or you could talk about, you know,

I do like, painting.

Yeah, painting. I tell you what, like, pottery is really. You'd be surprised, but I love doing pottery with my hands. My brother's a great potter. But, you know, stuff like that is really what a hobby is all about. And then my recommendation would be to put on your calendar every week, two times a week, a hobby, a block that you treat just like you would a podcast or just like you would a client meeting. And you are committed to it, you're disciplined, and it's a date with yourself. And you will be so shocked at actually how much more money you make and how much more impact you have and how much better you feel after doing fun things for yourself. It's. It blows people's mind every time.

Well, explain that to me. Why is hobby so important? Like, Like, I think of people having all kinds of hobbies. Right. I mean, I see people play board games.

Yeah.

Does that count? Like, I go, yeah, yeah. We have a coffee shop is a board game coffee shop, and people were playing board games and they were, you know, yelling and, you know, having fun and cheering on, and then they, they finish. But then, but to me is like, okay, so you finished your game, but what did you really, besides just, you know, you, you, you were having fun in, in. In the midst of it, what did you accomplish? Because when I'm working, I'm making, I'm making shifts in people's lives. I'm making changes in medicine and, and how, you know, to me, that's a Lot more fun. So like, like if I have limited time, why would I want to devote to a hobby that I don't think has enough impact? So you break that down for me.

Yeah. So I mean, the science of it, you might be able to tell me more so than, than me being in your line of work, but for me, I can speak to my own journey at least when I am constantly working or when I was. Now I don't, you know, I'm roughly 20ish hours a week. And I'm feeling blessed about that, you know, just because hey, now I got time to devote to my family and to my friends, to myself, to my community, et cetera. But when I was constantly working, I realized that I was not only in a constant state of fight or flight with my clients, with my business, with my, you know, my being. I was operating at a pace that was unsustainable and I was short patience. I didn't give full presence because I was constantly thinking about the next thing. Right. And I actually did less in terms of quality when it came to my delivery. And when I started to integrate doing fun things, it gave me that necessary reprieve from a nervous system breakdown, you know, from, from a, a decrease in of cortisol. Will you, you know, the, the stress hormone, really making sure that I was centered and filling my own cup. Giving from my overflow to my business, to my company or to my clients, to my team. And same thing with, to my family. You know, it's, it's not exactly something that you could maybe articulate. You have to almost feel it for yourself. And it is difficult because I find a lot of high performers struggle to do it guilt free. They feel guilty wasting quote unquote the time because they, they could be allocating it towards money making or impact having with their business, but you actually will end up making more both impact and income when you do prioritize your own well being.

Yeah. Yeah.

You're not buying it.

I'm just trying to think, you know, what, what count as hobbies and what, what it. Yeah. Can do. I mean I, I did like painting.

Yeah.

I studied architecture and I remember really, really loving it because it was very meditative.

Yeah.

It takes a lot of time.

And so, so here's what I'll say.

What about. Okay,

let me help you with this because this is maybe something helpful for everyone. So think of like a Venn diagram, right. Where you got three circles. Okay. Now in one circle, this is how I like to find new potential hobbies. Okay. And this is what I wrote about in the book. But you think about something you. You would enjoy, Right? Something that you potentially would enjoy. Then a potentially life, you know, beneficial skill, like a skill that might be serving you in your. In your life. Maybe it's, you know, Krav Maga. You're like, okay, yeah, that. That would help me as a woman to be, you know, prepared. And then I think I would enjoy it because it's active. I'm. I'm, you know, I'm burning calories. I'm learning different, you know, techniques. And then something you're curious about. Maybe you're curious about the history of the martial art and how you could learn about where it came from and the different disciplines. That could be a passionate hobby. I love Krav Maga. Right. I think it's such a useful skill, and that became a hobby to train that for me. Right. And it could be for you, too, but it's not just random shit, you know, like, you don't want to just be like, oh, okay, I'm going to just do, like, go color in a. In a book. Because, yeah, as a high performer, you're going to find that wasteful in terms of time. You find something that is passionate, a passionate hobby, by, again, something you think you would enjoy, a potentially beneficial life skill, and then something you're really curious about on the back, and you infuse those three, and then you find something that fits. Mm.

Yeah.

Makes sense.

Yeah. Well, cooking could be great, right? There are people.

Yeah, cooking is good. Yeah.

Cooking and. And being inventive to make really healthy things that taste really amazing. So that. Yeah, that I do.

Like, There you go. Yeah. Go get yourself, like, cooking classes at Le Cordon Bleu Academy. And, like, you have to show up twice a week, and, like, I bet you it'll be a nice reprieve from all the other stuff. And then when you get back to work, you're going to feel more energized.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

Challenge you to do it.

I already make the healthiest and the most amazing popcorn, and I can. Yeah. And I have a really incredible yogurt that I make very healthy with.

Nice.

All the important probiotic strains.

Well, hey, I mean, so. So, yeah, like, if you're ready, a super fan of cooking and you, you know, enjoy doing it, maybe you pick something different that really kind of, you know, gets you out of your comfort zone, you know?

Yeah. Okay. All right.

I think it's important to do it with other people that are inspiring, too, or people that you can learn from at least as like one hobby because then you know, you have that public accountability too. Especially if you're on like a co ed sports team or something.

Yeah.

You know, it's like, oh, I got to show up because my team's counting on me, you know.

Right. Like yoga or something. Right.

People who yoga. I don't know how many team, team yoga's sports racing against yourself because it

is never going to end as far as how much you can challenge yourself.

So yeah, yoga is a great skill. I would almost put that under. It could be under passionate hobbies, but if you do it for like optimized health, like as a regular fitness routine, then that would probably fall more under there. Unless it's something you've never done. Then it would, could, could be a hobby.

Well, this gives, gives a lot of fruit for thought because that's a, that's a lot of areas that people may, may not think about.

Right.

But you, I guess one trick is to look at just like what you did with me. What, what's the lowest score? Like what, what, what's, what's not quite, you know, filling the cup and, and then work on that first.

Yeah. And again, I mean this is stuff that we go through like with our, our clients. This is not just a one and done thing. Like I take my own medicine every Sunday. I'll do the same assessment and I'll say, okay, well where, where was I lacking last week and how do I prioritize change this week? And then it's a shorter feedback loop, you know, so now it's like, oh, okay, well you know, I was off this week. And so we have something called the Blissful Balancer that we put our clients through. So they're tracking every single day an action task in one of these different alignments. I'll send you one so you have it. But this is where again, you can shorten that feedback loop and, and you're able to really quantify because what you measure you can manage, as the saying goes. So this is just a, a simple, you know, way to do that. It's not rocket science. But I typically find the stuff that's most effective, typically is the simplest.

Yeah. So it's interesting that you put selfless service as the first thing that you were asking people about. So I've definitely heard that many times that one of the best ways to help yourself is to help others.

Yeah.

Can you break that down on why that is so good for us?

Well, Tony Robbins says the secret to living is giving and I love that quote, and I think it is so true because he references the science of achievement, which, yes, it is a science. Like, you know, you know, it's like you can deductive reason and replicate success, quote, unquote. As an entrepreneur, that the. The. The model's out there. But then he talks about the art of fulfillment. The art of fulfillment, right? That's where selfless service comes in. You have to have a pull, not just a push. Something that really lights you up that you feel called to support. Not just money. Like, money's cool, you know, but once you have some, then you're like, okay, well, what else is there? Right? That's where, you know, selfless service comes to play. And working in relation to causes that are meaningful to you, you know, stuff that really lights you up or pisses you off, you know, something that's like, damn, this is a serious injustice in the world. I want to help this, you know, and selfless service can be woven throughout your business. You know, it's important. Like, for us, we do the 1% for the planet. So 1% of revenue every year, we give back to eco causes. You know, we're also starting the Happy Hustle foundation soon. This is a organization that I want to give back, you know, the power of entrepreneurship to the Native American people, because I feel like we've just screwed them over so royally in this country. And, you know, everyone is always looking outside to give their time and resources, but what about our people in our own country? You know, and so this is something I'm passionate about. And then, you know, obviously, being an eco warrior, having causes that you can tie your. Your business, too, I think, is. It's just really good for business. One of our guys owns Four Ocean, the ocean cleanup company that's pulled, I don't know, 50 million pounds of plastic or something from the ocean. And they have the bracelets that they. For every bracelet they sell, they pull pounds of plastic. Know, he's been able to do a whole entire business that. Like a. A massive company that's making a massive impact, but he's infusing the triple bottom line, which is people planet and the profits. So even better if, you know, your business can be integrated or whatever your career integrated with the causes that you feel most passionate about. So that's how I deem it to be so royally important.

Yeah, I love that. And then. And then unplugging digitally. Why is that so important?

Well, I think, you know,

don't you want to be up to date with what's going on in the world?

Oh, no, not at all. If I could, I'd throw my phone in the river. You know, I live in Montana. I, I'd rather just hang out with my horses and my, my family and go just be a cowboy or a mountain man. But that's not a very productive use of my time. And in terms of impact, will you, you know, I'd like to, to leave a bigger impact in than that. And so I use technology. It's important. I agree. It's a beautiful way to share our message with more people. And I think being a consumer of it is different than being a producer with it. Right. A lot of people out there watching, listening, probably are consumer of technology and social media especially. But I would ask how much are you actually producing? Right. And so you need to first and foremost check your ratio. Like where are you at in the producer consumer ratio? And then two, I look at, okay, well in my line of work and in your line of work, like being a podcast or having an online business, a brand like this is a great way to build trust, social media, right? You can build trust the know like and trust with people in an expedited, scalable fashion, right? What do people look at nowadays? They barely look at your website. They go right to your Instagram or something like that. You're like, oh, this is the real person. Like the website was like probably created once. And like, that's cool. It's the best highlights the, you know, the social media is now more like the real person, you know, so you go there to verify your preconceived notions oftentimes of a, of a business or an individual as a personal brand. So it's important. I don't disagree. It's a vehicle, you know, but one of the best things I've done is delete it from my phone, completely delete social media from my phone and just have it on my desktop and only use it for an hour a day, largely for production work, not for consumption. And oh my goodness, it has been such a game changer because, you know, the dopamine dumps of constantly getting in integrated into our, you know, everyday reality is overwhelming. And my team helps me. You know, if you don't have a team, you know, you can, you can hire a team or you can get even just one executive assistant to help you post and just schedule posts on, you know, hootsuite or whatever and get AI to help create content, but you can use technology more effectively. I think all of us know that setting barriers imperative I like to be, if I can, when I'm really dialed into my game, I'll do a 30 minute or an hour in the beginning and the end of my day, depending on. On the week. I'll block a 30 minute, no tech right when I wake up. That's a sacred time and right one before I go to bed. Now, I'm not perfect, but when I have this dialed in, I feel much better. Just starting and ending my day with God or higher power or prayer, meditation, a book, what, whatnot. No screen time, right. Then when I'm really doing good, I'll do a. A dopamine detox of seven days every single month, typically where it's just work. No social media, no Netflix, no podcast, no nothing. Focusing on my own original thoughts and ip. And then when, yeah, when I'm also, you know, on my game and focused, I'll do a quarterly complete digital detox where, you know, you just keep your phone off for, you know, a span of time at minimum. I like to do a Sunday, you know, screen free Sunday, and that way you kick things off on Monday ready to get back in it and get after it.

So these detoxes, what did that do for you?

Well, it's just like any cleanse, like a juice cleanse or a fast or, you know, anything like that. It resets your entire being around that specific topic. For me, it makes me more present, it makes me more purposeful, and it also makes me a lot more money. It's kind of crazy, but the more time I take off a technology, the better work I do, the more it impacts my business.

So this is just your experience. What about others?

Oh, yeah, and our guys too as well. Same. Yeah, I just had a guy text me two days ago. He's like, dude, I deleted meta and all meta apps from my phone. Unbelievable productivity because we're just, you know, task switching and, you know, like this multitasking or this. Oh, this little, you know, I would be like, oh, damn, let me just look at this one thing. I got to send this one DM through Instagram, and then 18 minutes later, I'm watching a guy build a cabin with his bare hands, and I'm like, what the. You know, where'd my time go? Like, I get sucked in the algorithm, and the truth is, you know, and I say this tongue in cheek with love. But, like, the Silicon Valley tech nerds out there were outgunned by their brains and their ability to create addictive algorithms. Like, they based it off of the casinos and the. The addictive nature of casinos and the slot machines. Social media has that novelty baked into it. And especially with the customization of the algorithms, we're outgunned with our mammalian minds to this technology. So we wonder why we're so addicted to it. Well, there's. It's designed to be so. And without real discipline or, you know, habits, then you're gonna. You're basically give it all the time that you allow it. It'll suck. All of it. You know, so you have to be specific and deliberate and intentional with the time.

That's so interesting. So people feel like they're making more money because they're more focused and they, they're saving their time. They're actually getting their time back.

Yeah, right.

That's one reason. And then they're, they're more focused, they're less cluttered in their brain and they're

doing better work because they're creating original content, not what they just saw from somebody else. Because it all has an impact on our subconscious brain.

Interesting. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Those are some interesting points for me. Yeah. For. For some people. Right. We all have different areas of lacking, I'm sure.

Yeah.

So I'm gonna try this. I'm gonna try this digital detox. Yeah.

Well, let me tell you something. Try is like one of the worst words in the vocabulary. You either do your don't in. In this life and when. When guys say the T word in our club, they have to do push ups.

Okay. All right, all right. So.

Because try gives your brain an out.

Okay?

So commit or don't. And that's cool either way. But that's what I say to people. It's like, okay, if you're going to do it, just commit to not touching your phone for the first 30 in the last 30 minutes and only do one hour a day. Social media just to start as low hanging fruit.

That's awesome. And then, and then that's very doable. Yeah, yeah.

And then give yourself a consequence if you don't. So if you break it, I like to say a thousand bucks goes to the opposite political party that you despise. You have to donate it. No one likes to give money to the opposite political party.

Oh my God, that's funny. I thought you're gonna say if I didn't make it, then I have to double the time I have to do the next day.

No, because then you just keep perpetuating and then it's like, yeah, then you just quit. I like real money, real stakes.

Wow. Okay. All right. Okay. I like that. That's very doable.

I'm gonna check in with you. I'm gonna, we're gonna see where you're at next week.

Accountable.

I will love that. Accountability is the key. And with any transformation, what it takes. Expert mentorship, accountability and community. If you really want to transform your reality, you need all three.

Yeah. That's so interesting. I think that's a beautiful idea. You know, just getting up. I admit, probably like a lot of people, first thing I reach for the phone and checking to see what, you know, what do I need to respond to what's, what's, what has happened, who you know, you know, what's my day like, what's my appointment. But instead, if I can commit just half an hour and just breathe and maybe go outside and feel the wind and listen to the birds.

There you go.

That probably is going to make a huge difference. Yeah. And at night, instead of. Until the last few minutes before I go to bed and I just have a chance to unplug and the question is, what do I do? Right. So if you don't have the phone, unless I want to keep working, then maybe, maybe meditate, maybe just,

you know, read.

That's true. Read. Yeah. Yeah. I used to love reading.

Journal.

I. I love reading. Yeah. And I haven't, I haven't done very much. Yeah, you're right. Journal. I used to be a huge. Yeah. Every day, everywhere in the world, I was journaling. Yeah. Okay.

And you'll see how it changes your reality. I'm telling you, it's, it's, it's so stupid simple. But it's this kind of stuff that we, we practice and preach in our community and with our guys. And I'm telling you, I see it time and time again just transform these guys reality. It. And they just feel so much more joyous, so much more excitement about their every day because they have a structured system to follow. But nothing crazy. Just like simple intentionality. And then when you're working, you're freaking working. You're there, you're not thinking about your family or what you're going to do later. You're. You're getting after it. And then when you're with your family, you're freaking there, you're not thinking about your business. It's like that's where I think a lot of people go awry nowadays is just where we have this, this presence problem, you know? And I have it too at times. I'm not perfect in any of this. I never claim to be the guru of. I'm Just like, here's some things that are working for me. Take what works, leave what doesn't. I'm the reporter. If anything, you know, so I still. You have to cheeto chop myself in the neck. Like, what are you doing? That's not protocol, you know.

Yeah, yeah. So this Happy Hustle, how many members do you have?

Well, we cap our community. We were capped at 50 last year and this year we, we upped the cap to, to 100. So we doubled it.

Yeah. High powered entrepreneurs as part.

Yeah, yeah. They're all studs. Yeah, yeah. So we have, we have hundreds of guys who come through our Mastermind program, but the guys who ascend to our actual community, we keep it really intimate. And it's more like, would you rather have four quarters or 100 pennies? You know, we'd rather have four quarters. And so these guys are all there, like committed, invested in one on one another, personally and professionally. And so that's like the brotherhood we build. I was a part of a lot of groups and programs and conferences and all things that just kept signing up more members and it just diluted it. And the quantity was the priority, not the quality. So we wanted to change that paradigm.

Great. And what kind of transformations have you heard from. From.

Oh, man. I mean, we have guys, you know, save their marriages, get off of sleeping medications. Some guys saved their lives. You never even know what they're struggling with. Guys. I mean, we had guys start businesses together. We've had $50 million deals get struck around the campfire with a handshake. We have guys start their new book outlines, completely sell their companies and start a non profit. You know, like all sorts of cool stuff happens. It's just all about helping them. Happy Hustle and true alignment with something bigger than, you know, maybe what they're currently doing.

Yeah. And you start by these. These, the scores that we.

Yeah. The foundation.

And then working on. On these areas that may be lacking in their lives.

Yep.

Wow. Wonderful. So how do people see if they can even become part of it?

Yeah, Well, I mean, TheHappyHustle.com is our website. We do have the assessment on there too, if people want to take it. We have our book on there. We give it away for free on the. In the digital format. So, yeah, if anyone wants to check it, the happy hustle.com or we have our podcast, the Happy Hustle as well that Dr. Joy was a recent guest on. So. That was an awesome interview. Highly recommend it.

Thank you. Yeah, Amazing. Thank you so much. This is a fabulous conversation and you're giving me work to do. And I hope that at least, you know, the listener is going to take one thing, at least start with one thing that they can implement and just see, see what it does for their lives. Yeah.

Yep.

I love it. Thank you so much, Jack. It's been a pleasure.

Thank you guys.

Thank you for sharing your wisdom and your journey with the world and and making this world a better place.

Appreciate you peace and love everybody.

Thank you for listening to this episode. Hope you enjoyed the content. And if so, please rate and follow this podcast. To learn about everything I do, including my memoir, Tiger of Beijing. You can go to www.drjoykong.com and if you'd like to reach me, simply send in a contact form. You can also subscribe to my YouTube channel, Joy Kong MD I'll see you next time.