45. Destroy "Shoulds" for Better Clarity

Foreign. Hey, my friend. Welcome back to Leadership in a Nutshell, where we're cracking the code of the driven mind. I'm your host, Kenny Chapman, and this is episode 45, destroy your shoulds for better clarity. Everything is about clarity. My new book, the Six Dimensions of Change 2.0, the First Dimension is clarity. And if you haven't read it, make sure you grab a copy, either in audiobook or in paperb ebook, whatever it is for you. This isn't about the book. This is about you getting clarity. And this is about you destroying shoulds. And put that in quotes in your mind, my friend, because it should be in quotes. And if you could see me in the studio, I'm using air quotes because there's all these things that we should be doing, and I should do this and I should do that, and it confuses the hell out of a driven mind like you and I have, and I want to just set you free from some of that today. I live along my life with a philosophy that if it's not excellent, I want to eliminate it or fix it. And shoulds are not excellent. In my world and most of my clients and most of my peers and most of the people that I have an opportunity to work with and influence generally, shoulds are not winners for them either, and I highly doubt they are for you. So today, I just want you to take a step back as we spend a little time together in Leadership in a Nutshell, and think about some of the shoulds that you're allowing to enter your focus into your mind and what that really means, because there are certain things that just paralyze growth. And last week I talked to you about sustainable growth and how important it is to release, reinvent, and replace. And this week, it's hard to do that if you're living with these shoulds. Right? I can't release something if I feel that I should be doing it, whether it's, I should be, you know, cleaning my own house. I remember when the lovely Christy and I first moved in together, and I had had a housekeeper for probably 10 years by the time we met. And she didn't feel that we should have a housekeeper because she put it in air quotes. Should be cleaning the house. Why? Because she might have had the time, she had the capacity in her schedule. So she should do it. And we, quote, shouldn't see shoulds and shouldn't also tie together. We shouldn't, quote, waste the money on having a housekeeper and think about your own life. Where does this show up for you having These shoulds and shouldn't destroy your clarity, rather than her having the confidence to own what she's developed. And now we do have housekeepers, which I'm very pleased about. And also, if something's a little dusty, I don't have to bring it to Christie's attention, other than letting our. The people that come in and help us out, let them know. But in all seriousness, though, it's one of those things where you have to find some levels of confidence to. To release where shoulds come from. Because think about it. Where do your own shoulds come from? I know for me, mine. Mine came from childhood. And I think that when we think about paying somebody to clean our house, that comes from a previous relationship with money, perhaps, and, well, I should do this. And I grew up with us in the mentality where we wore secondhand clothes and didn't have money to go on vacation. And if I have that mindset and that belief system, then I should be cleaning my own house, right? But if that changes and my reality in the world changes, then what other shoulds am I maybe carrying along that I can release? Now? When you think about how exciting it is when you step into clarity, there's been moments in times when you've made decisions, sometimes difficult decisions, mind you, that you have tremendous clarity about. And it's like, oh, my gosh, you just release yourself from these shoulds and the pains and the. And the things that happen. And, you know, when you think about it, they've come from parents over. Over time. Parents tell you how you should do certain things and how you should live. You know, teachers, when we go back to when we were in school, whether it's grade school, middle school, high school, college, advanced school, maybe you're in trade school. Should's about certain things. For me, I grew up being an athlete, and so coaches would tell me certain ways of how I should be doing something. When you really get into all of these other areas of life, what I want you to think about today day is, what about yourself? See, parents, I mean, parents don't apply any longer. Certainly they still come into play for beliefs and values and different things like that. But I'm 50 years old at the time we're recording this. God bless mom, but she's not going to tell me how I should live my life. Now. I honor her opinion, and I value her and I love her very much. My father's been dead for 29 years at the time we're recording this, so I have things that he taught me that I will carry forward. But it's not about shoulds from that. I don't, you know, I have coaches now in my performance development, my human, my human growth space, my mindset. I have coaches around that. I don't have sport, sports coaches any longer. But here's the most important person giving you shoulds now yourself. So all those other ones turned into yourself telling you that now you should, right? Think about it for yourself. Oh well, I should get to the office by this time today. I should make sure that I do this or that. I should make sure that I get something done. Now shoulds might have an emotional tie. Definitely I get frustrated sometimes if I can't communicate in a way that gets a client to take action. But I also know that it's not my responsibility to take action. I believe in having an income statement by the 10th of the month at the latest with technology today so you can make sure that you run your business as efficiently and fiscally responsible as possible. Now you should have a snapshot. Should, you can have a snapshot right at the first day of the month to know what you're doing or where you're going. So I don't want you to miss the should quote to the best practice or what works. Because I'm certainly going to do what winners do. So I could say, well, you should do the things that work in your life and you should not do the things that don't. How about that? Where I want you to really be mindful of is what are the things that you continue to do because you should do them. I should stay in Colorado because it's small town America. It's where I grew up. It's where I am the most comfortable. Instead I moved to Scottsdale, Arizona where I am much more comfortable. Where I like the weather better, where I enjoy the energy, where I have the ability to go out to dinner at multiple nice restaurants, a week if I want or a month if I want, where I have a better airport because I can travel quicker, easier to get to clients. Where I live in a market that clients want to come to when they come and do a deep dive individual one on work with me for different strategic growth days, whatever that is, I should stay doing what certain people think that I should do. Stop it. It's up to you to get to decide. And when you eliminate and destroy shoulds, Clarity comes with clarity comes action. With clarity of action comes passion. Passion comes from you taking action from a purpose standpoint. The next thing you know, you're having more fun. You're making more money, you're creating better relationships. Life is a lot better. You're more fulfilled, you're drinking less, you're eating less, you're working out more, you're breathing better. Holy smokes, is life great when you get clarity. And destroying shoulds helps drive clarity. I was recently working with an individual who I had done some deep work with and really had a growth mindset that was taking place. And from that she decided that she should go in a little different direction in the business than she had thought that she wanted to. And that was what her intuition was at the moment. And then come to find out as we continue to work together, that was really a should that was almost based on fear of not saying yes to everything. And it was weighing on her. It was in the back of her mind, it was in the pit of her stomach. From the moment that she told me this was the direction she wanted to go, she was going in that direction because now she'd convinced herself that she should go that direction. We revisited, we went a little deeper, we got some more things on the table and, and realized that she was doing those things for the wrong reason. And it wasn't really clear of why she wanted to do it. When you get rid of those shoulds, all of a sudden amazing things happen. I was recently working with another manager in a different capacity, different situation where they felt they were tapped out in their own management ability capability and decided that they really maybe want to go back in the field. They wanted to do something different than what they were doing and, and they should take a different action because they should be making more money that like some of the top technicians were making and different things like that. And so all of a sudden should began running the conversation. And the next thing you know, where are we at? What are we doing? Oh my gosh, my friends, so many things in life come from this. I would call it a four letter word, even though there's what, seven letters in it. Shoulds suck. When you wake up and live a life that you should live, there's no passion, there's no excitement, there's no fulfillment. When you kill that off and go, I don't care. Think about some of the stories you've heard. People go to school for six, eight years, they get a law degree and then they decide that they want to go do something different. When you wake up in the morning and you decide who you want to be, when you tap into your purpose, when you do the nitty gritty quote challenging work in order to really Step into your greatness, incredible things happen. And my fulfillment, my happiness isn't tied to where I live, but it's also like, money doesn't make you happy, you know? Well, poor never made anybody happy either. So it's one of those things, you know. Oh, somebody that drives a McLaren $150,000 sports car must have major ego issues or they just really love fast sports cars. Maybe it's because I drive a sports car that I'm. That I'm saying this, but no, in all seriousness, it's kind of funny how we generalize things. And I've had people say, oh, man, I would never buy a car like that, no matter how much money. That's a limiting belief because where you are in your perspective, you don't feel that people, quote, should spend money on things like that. But when you're at a different level and you create enough value in the world that you have a different choice. And who knows how you're going to operate? And it doesn't matter. People that make millions drive 1987 Ford Tauruses. That's 100% fine. All I care about is your own emotional regulation. And I don't believe that we are able to step into our greatness of emotional regulation if I'm living in the should world. When you destroy shoulds, clarity shows up. When clarity shows up, passion can follow in the six dimensions of change. I talk about clarity, habit, action, never give up gratitude and enthusiasm as the platform of change. Because I have got to know who I am, what I want, what I'm willing to take action for in order to live my best life. So maybe it's time that you, quote, should release yourself from shoulds. How about that, right? It's a matter of time for you to be able to say, I am worthy. I do want what I want. And guess what? It's okay for me to want what I want, regardless of if I should or not. Set yourself free, my friend. Want what you want because you want it. Eliminate shoulds and step into clarity. Like clients before you, like friends before you, like other people have. But it's not about other people. It's about you setting yourself free. Do me a favor. Give us a rating. Give us a review. If you would help us grow this community of leadership. In a nutshell, we're a bunch of driven minded individuals jumping on once a week to share a little time, to download, to debrief, to step back, have a pause and go, wait a minute, maybe I'm not crazy. You're not crazy. My friend, you are exactly where you are supposed to be. Trust in your process. Eliminate shoulds, get some clarity, and until we talk, make it a better than fantastic week this has been. Episode 45 of Leadership in a Nutshell. I appreciate each and every one of you. Stay in touch and I'll see you next week. Sam.