936 Special 5-Minute Friday Q&A with Our Listeners

Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now, let the class begin. All right, we are going to try and experiment. What I want to do is answer people's questions about what's going on in your life, dealing with this time, the situation with coronavirus and everything that's going on. This will be a guinea pig run. So I see a bunch of people coming in, so I'm going to bring in Kathy. I'm going to bring you in to allow you to talk. Let's see if I can hear you.

Hi.

Yes. How are you?

Good. Doing good.

Yeah.

I just got off of a busy day of work. I actually work at Zoom.

You work at Zoom?

I do, yeah.

I'm gonna. I'm gonna make you panelists then. Now, when? Now. This is. This is funny. This is the first time we do this. Have you been following me before or.

Oh, for sure. For years, I'd say. I mean, I love it. Everybody that you have on, I just. I send your podcast to my co workers. I send them to my sisters. I was just connected in with some other podcaster and I recommended the School of Greatness to her. Yeah, it was Bronwyn, actually. If anybody needs a communication coach, she's incredible. But, yeah, so I was on Instagram, so I was just sitting on the couch, getting off of work, trying to take a moment to myself. You're gonna see my little one crawling up my leg.

It's all good.

And I was like, let's listen to some uplifting.

I love it. How long. How long have you been working at Zoom for then?

Today is my one year anniversary.

Wow. Congratulations.

Thank you.

We've been using Zoom for a while now, so we'll have to stay in touch after this and figure out some ways we can absolutely do some work. Zoom webinars and stuff. What's going on in your life right now? What's the. What's the biggest. What's the biggest challenge for you? It seems like you work for a video conferencing company. That's kind of nice because there's probably a lot of activity on Zoom right now, but are you having any career challenges or personal challenges? What's going on?

Well, I would say the biggest piece right now is just. It's so incredible, and I would say yes. We drink our Kool Aid. Eric Yuan, the founder and CEO really cares about our family and tries to make sure that he knows. I mean, connecting in with everybody on a personal level and just trying to. I mean, being overwhelmed with the amount of customers who were so used to giving that amount of high level love. And we pride ourselves in delivering happiness. And it's always tough when you're stretched so thin. And to be a customer success manager, you have to be kind of empathetic, and so you connect in. And I work with enterprise accounts, so I have these slicer accounts.

Yes.

I think they're in the car. Yeah. So just that level of empathy and kind of feeling everyone's pain and then hearing individual stories and having customers reach out that are my enterprise accounts and saying, hey, this has something to do with work. I just wanted to reach out to get some extra help with, you know, my church, they can't afford Zoom. Can you help? Or the funerals and needing help and the connections that they need. And so just.

Are people doing funerals over Zoom?

Oh, absolutely. I mean, yeah. So it's. It's every. Every type of connection that you can think of. I mean, it's funerals, it's weddings.

No way.

Happy hours, you name it. Whatever people did before. Here you go. Before this happened, it's. It's all happening over Zoom and my love. Can you please hold on one second? Do you want me to open that for you? I'll help you. So, yeah, I mean, I have back to back meetings all day, and I'm also, you know, taking care of a child full time, so, I mean, we're all in this together. And getting the positivity anywhere you can get it is. I mean, it's. It's so important. And, Louis, I can tell you, thank you for the positivity that you put out into the world. I absorb it back to wherever I can in the smallest ways.

That's good.

Thank you.

Of course. Yeah. Well, I don't want to keep you from your child. Is there anything I can support with or any question you might have?

Yeah, well, gosh, any positivity. I think everybody right now is reaching out to the tips of their fingers if they have a moment to get away from their busyness. Just like.

Well, here's the thing.

I don't know.

I'll give you some insights. I've been doing interviews all day, all week, with the top people I can think of who have the best information. I just interviewed a Science of happiness researcher, Dr. Laurie Santos, who is over at Yale University, and I asked her, what are five things that people could do right now to just increase their happiness a little bit, they increase their peace a little bit. And I'll just give you the first three things she said. Being service oriented for other people. When we go inward on ourselves, when we think about, oh, what's not working for me, what am I missing out on? What am I struggling with? That's when we become more anxious and worried and overwhelmed. But when we think of, how can I give to someone else? How can I be of service to someone else? That's when you can open it. Go ahead, it's fine. How can I have service to someone else and think about someone else? That's when we increase our happiness. That's number one, showing up for others and being others oriented. The second thing she said, which is something I've been practicing for a long time, it's like the power of gratitude. And I said, wasn't this some personal development woo woo thing? She said, no, this is backed by science. Now, gratitude increases your level of happiness. So practicing that every day with your family, before you go to bed with your husband, your child, just saying, hey, I'm grateful for you right now.

Mommy, Mommy, Mommy.

What's up? Good to see you. What's her name?

Hey, her name is Emily.

Emily, you have so much joy and energy. I love it. Are you like being home with your mom and dad every day? You like them being around you non stop?

Emily, do you like being home all day?

Yeah.

Okay, yeah, she says it, but I mean, even she's misses her school friends and so I do what I can to try to give her any type of connection. And we're not doing ballet or gymnastics, so, you know, walking and running and doing outdoors and. But Louis, so what do you do to stay grateful? Right? In a journal?

I mean, I know that I speak it out. Well, for me, speaking it out loud. And I try to say it to other people because when you infect someone else with the power of gratitude, that will continue to affect them and other people. So as opposed to infected by a negative virus, infect people with a positive virus of gratitude, appreciation, service. I think that goes. That's what I do.

Awesome. Well, I'm going to pass it forward. I'm going to send all the love out to the world and the gratefulness. I. Let me know how I can help you. I mean, I any bit of help in the world I can for anybody. I am more than happy.

I appreciate it. Well, stay in touch about the zoom stuff. So if you can DM me, we'll Stay in touch on how we can do more with Zoom.

Mommy, Mommy, Mommy. Come on.

Sounds good.

Thank you.

Go to pass the host back to me if you can. There we go. We got Kathy and her child chiming in. That was great. Thank you for that. Who else do we got in here? We had a bunch. Let me look at some of these comments. Franco's in the house. How you doing, Franco? Where are you from?

I'm from Puerto Rico.

Puerto Rico. Mucho gusto, my friend. What part of Puerto Rico?

No, I'm in San Juan right now.

Okay, very cool. My friend Chris Lee is from there. I don't know if you've heard of Chris Lee, but he's a trainer, motivational trainer down there in Puerto Rico.

Yes.

Chris Motivador is his.

What are you dealing with right now? What's the big challenge you're faced with and questions for me?

Right. Right now I have a. I'm not going through a divorce process where I'm separated and I'm in another apartment by myself, even though I see my kids every now and then. And we have the media now, and I can see them on the phone and all that. And I also want to do some stuff regards to motivation and all that stuff. And I have a lot of stuff going on, and it's really, really hard to know where to focus. I mean, I may know where to focus, but what should be more important, I'm trying to get back to my wife. It's kind of working. I mean, this quarantine thing has been working great up to some point with us, but also my work, the other things that I want to do by myself, and I mean to leave a print somewhere in the world and the people that I love, and it's hard to focus. How. How do I choose where to focus more of my energy? Because focusing everything. I know it's. It's not possible to focus on everything at the same time.

Right. And you say. So I'm hearing you say wife, work, passion, impact. You say you have kids, too?

Yeah, I have two kids.

Two kids. And you're. You're trying to get back with your wife. You're trying to find the time for your work, your passion and your kids, right?

Yeah, I'm working from my house now since. I mean, since we are all in quarantine and that's a good thing. And I also have. I'm having some more time to be with my wife and to start to continue building something new, something better. And I also trying to follow my passion, but I mean, the focusing part and not to where to focus.

How do you.

My kids. Yeah. How do I improve on that?

So I would create a list of your priorities. And for me, I like to scale things from a 1 to 10. That's just how I like to do it. What is the most important in your life? And is your wife the most important Is your kids? Is it impact? Is it mission? And maybe you're saying, well, they're all really important. I would say, which one needs the most attention to build the strongest foundation. That would then give you the energy and resources to make the next thing abundance. So, for example, if your wife's situation was not in a good place right now, and you know that when you guys are in a good place, your energy is down for your kids, it's down for your passion, it's down for your work, then for me, I would look at that as a priority to make number one and say, how do I go all in on this one thing? Which when this foundation is strong, it will support me in my work because it doesn't make me think about the stress at home when I'm at work. It'll give me life for my passion. It'll give me inspiration to look at my kids with beauty and joy and not resentment of what I'm dealing with with my wife. So I'm just giving this example. I'm not saying your marriage is horrible, but I'm just saying if that's the thing that's not, yeah, I get it strongest, then I would start where there, and I would create a list, and I would also track down a list and say. And keep inventory and say, what have I been doing really well in this area of my wife, my work, my passion, impact? What have I been doing that I'm proud of? What have I been doing that I'm not proud of? Make a list of those two things and just evaluate and take inventory. I think during this time, it's really important to take inventory of everything. I've been doing that with the inventory of the physical things in my closet and in my space. Do I need all this stuff in my closet? Can I get rid of this? Is it weighing me down? Can I remove some of this? And taking inventory in the relationships in my life, in my personal relationship, family relationship, things like that. What can I do with my business? Where are we overspending on money that we don't need to. That's not mission critical right now. Where are the things that we should be spending more money? And so taking inventory. I've been doing that in every area of my life. And I recommend that for you and anyone listening. And the next thing I would say is to figure out what you can control. So there might be things out of your control. Maybe, you know, you can't go to work right now to a physical location because that's out of your control. So what can you do within your own space? There might be some things you can't do with your impact, your passion yet, but what can you set yourself up for, for when the time is right? What skill can you learn? What tool do you need to master? And so really thinking about the list of priorities for you, and what's the one thing if you master now and go all in on, it will give you energy and effort and focus for everything else to flourish. So, again, maybe that's impact. Maybe that's your kids, maybe that's your work, maybe that's your wife. You got to discover what that is and then figuring out the inventory list for yourself. What are the places of my life that I'm proud of that I've done well? What are the things I need to let go of and just have that inventory and start taking action and then think about the things you can control, because there's a lot of out of our control every single day. There's different noise and media and attention. But focus on what are the habits that you can take action on every day? Even if you got 30 minutes, what can you do to support yourself? What skill can you learn? How can you show up differently for your kids and your wife and your work? And that's what you can control. So hopefully that helps. My man. Was that. Was that something?

Yes, it does. It does help.

Yes.

Thank you very much. You gave me something, something better, something to start working on it, on that. And it's amazing.

Yes.

Thank you, dad. Putting that order and stuff. I haven't thought of that before. So, yeah, I'm going to start working on that.

Thank you very much, Franco from Puerto Rico. Thank you, my man. Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Have a great take care.

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Here.

How are you?

Yeah, I'm good, how are you? It was very unexpected.

Where are you calling in from?

I'm calling from South Korea, from Seoul.

South Korea?

Seoul, yes.

Okay, cool. What is. How did you find out about this? Do you listen to the School of Greatness podcast or do you follow on social media?

I do all of this.

Okay, cool.

Now it really helps. You know, it's been a struggle because originally I'm from Latvia, a tiny country in Europe and I came here and it was the first time I ever leave my home country and it's so much different. I knew no one. So your podcast helped a lot and I think I learned so much during the last couple of years.

Oh, thank you. I'm glad to hear that. What, and what's the big challenge you're facing with right now? Are you guys dealing with a lot in South Korea? What's going on?

Yeah, so we are a little bit ahead of the rest of the countries, I guess because we were. The whole thing began right the same time as in China, but still we are self isolating so we spend all our time at home. And I think the main thing is that I feel like my husband needs more space and I cannot really.

Needs a man cave, huh?

Right. Yeah, he feels annoyed by everything and I don't even know how to talk to him. Whenever I start talking, he would be immediately defensive no matter what I say. So he kind of turned into this negative Side of everything. Yeah, I just honestly don't know how to switch that. I don't think I can do it for him.

So how long have you gave. It's been isolated for.

For more than a month now.

A month? More than a month. And how big is the space that you're in? Is it a small apartment? Is it a home? Is it.

No, it's not a small apartment. It's actually pretty big. It has two separate bedrooms. Not bedrooms, but one bedroom and one study room. And I also arranged the study room and use it. And I wouldn't disturb him there, but somehow it doesn't really help.

So how often do you talk to him? Throughout the day? Do you see him much? Do you talk? Do you food together? Do you.

No, not much. During working hours, we don't see each other, but in the evening is when we are around each other more.

And you have kids still?

It's pretty much no. No kids.

We just.

Actually, we married just almost a year ago, so.

Wow. Okay. Well, first off, I'm sorry that you're. You're going through this challenging time. I can only imagine the stress it might be feeling if you're with someone that you love who doesn't want to talk. And I'm sorry you're facing that right now. I'm curious. It sounds like you've tried a lot of different things. Is that right? You've tried talking to him, You've tried sitting down calmly. Have you tried texting him or writing him an email about how you feel?

I have. I have. He's quite a complicated man and I love him for that. But it's also not always easy.

Okay.

Yeah. I even made a fort like as a joke, and I said, okay, so this could be your cave. Like, you know, whenever you want to hide, just go there. And I don't see you. You don't see me. Yeah. Doesn't seem to be working.

Okay, what would you like? What would you like the result to be? In a perfect world? Would you guys like to be holding. Would you like to be holding hands and dancing every day together? Would you like to be sitting down, needing dinner? What is it you want?

I want to. I think it's very female. It's a very female answer. I want to be connected and feel relaxed, at ease, that I can just talk to him and know that he will listen. I think that's the main.

I think talk to most women during non coronavirus and they probably feel that way. So being isolated and you guys are in the same place, but you feel like you can't connect with him at all. Is that what I'm hearing?

Yeah.

Okay, so I'm gonna give you a couple suggestions. It sounds like you've tried a lot of things. You've tried to be playful, you tried to be assertive, you've tried to email, you've made forts. You've done all these different things. Have you asked him what he wants? I'm hearing what you want. I want to feel more connected. I want to feel like he's listening to me. I want to feel like he's there. But what does he want?

Yeah, he says he wants to do what he wants to do, but he cannot do that. And I say that you can do whatever you want. Just tell me, I'll leave you alone. And, you know, he's just, no, like, I cannot anymore. And I think he is in the phase of relationship, as far as I remember from one of your recent podcasts, when he just realizes that life has changed after he is not alone anymore.

Yeah, his freedom, his flexibility, his ability to do what he wants, when he wants has changed.

Exactly.

I will tell you this from experience. It is a very, very hard thing to kill off the old identity for a man of having freedom of being able to do what you want and say what you want and. Or just do nothing all day long and not have responsibilities in a relationship. It's one of the hardest things, I think, from experience, to learn how to do, to have a level of commitment, responsibility, communication, consistency, patience that you've never had in your life, never had to do. And now you're asked to do every single moment for the rest of your life. And I'm not saying it's not worth it. I'm not saying it's not a beautiful thing. It's a different thing that, from my experience, was very, very hard to learn, extremely challenging. And again, it's like you're killing off a part of yourself. You're killing off this thing that you have become your whole life, and now it's dead. And you have to learn how to accept that. And I think for some men, they accept it very well, and they transition very well. And other men do not accept it well, because it is like you feel trapped. You feel like you're in a prison. You feel caged. Even if your partner says, but you can go do what you want, but you can do this. But there's still this feeling of, well, no, I can't, because now I'm in this new relationship and this responsibility, and it's Beautiful. And there's love and there's, you know, connection and all these things. But it still doesn't mean there's not a grieving period or a challenging period to let go of something you've held onto for so long. So I empathize with you and your husband because I can understand what that's like, and it's just very challenging. So I don't know the other dynamics of your relationship or your marriage, but I just know that until he learns to fully accept the relationship and the person he is in this. In this relationship, it's going to be challenging moving forward. And it sounds like you are doing the work, you are learning, you are trying different things, you are exploring, and I acknowledge you for that. And I just say keep doing that and keep trying new things and keep being patient for as long as you can. Maybe try and even bring him the people that he loves to talk to, his guy friends or his family, get them on a Zoom call or FaceTime with him, and just try to bring someone else into the conversation just to have normal, fun conversations with people he really cares about as well. That could be something to kind of ease the tension and bring more joy and fulfillment in his life during this time.

Thank you, Louis. It's very insightful and very helpful. It's funny that you said about the death thing, because that's literally what he told me. He feels like he's dead, which sounds scary.

No one wants to have the feeling of being dead, or like I'm trapped in a cage for the rest of my life and I might as well be dead. It's an emotional death or physical death or a mental death or a sexual death or an identity death. And these things are complicated. And there's usually not just this simple solution. Well, just say this and everything's gonna be fine. Or just do this thing. It's a journey. And, you know, that's. That's the beauty and the challenge of this is you get to learn so many new things about yourself during this time of uncertainty, of, you know, having to be patient, of dealing with someone that you fell in love with and married, who's now not happy in this time, and figuring out how to shift, how to evolve, how to grow. I think we learn about ourselves the most, Erica, during these times. Not when everything's happy and you got married and you're on your honeymoon. You don't learn a lot about yourself then. You're going to learn the most about yourself now, in this moment, for the next few months, you're going to discover who is Erica? What is she made of? What am I capable of creating in the world under extreme mental, psychological, emotional challenges? Because that's what you're faced with right now. Someone you care about deeply and love deeply, and you're living in a small space together, and the person doesn't want to connect, and the person doesn't want to reciprocate love and communication, and that's very challenging. So, again, I acknowledge you for. For how you're showing up, for. For constantly wanting to learn. And, you know, my hope for you is that you'll keep showing up for him and keep leaning in, keep asking him questions like, how can I support you? I want to make this an amazing relationship. Keep being a stand for the vision you have for the relationship and supporting him with what he wants as well, doing the best you can. But I think you're doing an amazing job.

Thank you, Louis. I still cannot believe that I got through and I got to talk to you.

Well, I'm glad you. I'm glad you're showing up. I'm glad you're taking action. And, you know, magical things happen when you say yes and when you say yes to new opportunities, just like, you know, you saw this post and you said, yes, let me go sign in and check it out and explore. And, you know, here we are. So I want you to continue with that mindset of, I'm going to keep trying things, I'm going to keep being playful, keep reminding him why he chose this relationship, keep reminding him that I'm here to support him in his dreams and his goals, not to hold him back. And I think as a man, speaking from a man's point of view, when we have a partner that we feel is supporting us in our dreams and able to make us feel free, then we feel like we want to communicate better, we want to listen more and more. And I'm sure it's the same for a woman or a partner on the other side as well. So I'm not saying you're not doing that for him, but he just may not feel it for whatever reason, and it may have nothing to do with you. It might have to be his own identity crisis around his past of letting that person go that he once was and becoming this new person, which is very hard to do. One of the hardest things to do. So I hope this was helpful. Erica, I appreciate you calling in from.

Thank you.

Korea. What time is it there?

Yeah, I don't feel alone anymore. Thank you.

Great. Yeah. And, you know, reach out to friends and family. The worst thing you can do is isolate yourself socially. Even more if you feel alone in your marriage and in your home, that's the worst thing. So make sure you're calling your girlfriends, calling your family, calling friends and staying connected. You know, if you listen to the Esther Perel episode we did, it was all about not putting all of your efforts into one person to be everything for you, but making sure you have friends to talk about other things, have family, and not just have everything be for one person to support you in this time as well. So I hope this is helpful. I appreciate you being on here and asking the question, and I'm hoping things work out in a loving, beautiful way for you, and you're going to become a lot stronger in this process as well.

Thank you.

Greetings from so.

Thank you, Erica. Wow. I love her openness about this. And this is not. I can only imagine the stress that so many people are feeling during this time of isolation, during this time of social distancing and not being able to leave the house and feeling like, hey, I'm in a relationship with someone that I fell in love with, that I, you know, we've been married for a year, and I thought this would be the time when we come together. But, you know, that's not the case for everyone. And if you are feeling like you're struggling in your relationship during this time, then you're definitely not alone, because I know a lot of people are. And I've been saying this with some of my friends and team that, like, this is going to be the time where you find out who you are and you find out who your partner is in a big way. And especially if you're around each other 24, seven, you don't have the escape of going to work or going to school or going out with your friends right now. You don't have that escape which might have kept you sane during your long relationship with someone, because you always had somewhere you could get out. Now you have to figure out, can we be together? Do we truly love each other? Are we the right fit? Or what do we need to work on to improve? And I know there's gonna be a lot of people who are ending relationships, a lot of people who are thriving more because they're like, wow, this is beautiful. And let's create a family and let's. Let's dive in more of this. And I think this is an opportunity to get clear. At the end of 2019, I kept saying 2020 is the year for perfect Vision. It's the year for clarity. Because 2020, perfect vision. And little did I know or did anyone know that this would happen, that it would take a tragic experience for us to gain clarity. And I say this a lot and I always ask people, why does it take a near death experience, a death of someone you love, a breakup of a divorce or a long term relationship, a loss of a career? Why does it take these things, you know, a cancer scare? Why does it take these horrible things for us to wake up and see clearly of what we want and realize that we're not on the right path, we want to be, but now we need to be going in a different direction. And we open our eyes and we start evaluating what do we want and when. We can use this moment as an opportunity to evaluate and take inventory and not necessarily complain and not necessarily be angry for the decisions we've made in the past, but to say, okay, why am I here and what can I do different for my future to make sure that I'm never in this position again? And what am I willing to accept in the future? What am I willing to tolerate? What am I not willing to tolerate? Now is the time for clarity, for perfect vision. And it's the times of adversity, the times of challenges, the times of uncertainty which should force you to get clear. I just wish we didn't have to do this all the time for so many people. But I've done this myself. I went through, you know, an injury that made me get clear. I've gone through, you know, bad breakups and friendships and family pain and intimate breakups and relationships that I should have gotten out of years before, but I didn't have clarity. And I stayed in them and experienced more and more pain until something wakes you up and says, wow, okay, never again will I allow this to happen. So I appreciate that, Erica, for sharing. And a lot of people are commenting in the chat right now. See if there's someone else who would like to come on. Maybe we'll do one or two more people. Let's bring in Andrew. Andrew, hello, can you hear me? Yes. Where are you at? Where are you calling it from?

Hey, man, you and I have been emailing for the last probably three years now.

Oh, nice, man. Yeah.

So my question, first of all, I just want to thank you for all you do, your positivity, encouragement. I think I know the John Krasinski YouTube show. If you've seen that. Right now it's like we need more of these kind of conversations. My question, I just Started kind of my dream job. So I've been waiting for probably 10 years to do what I'm doing now. And I lost my job five months ago. I've never been fired, like, so this is my first time kind of on the rebound. And my question is, how do you make the most of staying balanced when life gets busy and kind of focused? Uh, I'll give you an example how you responded to Erica, to me.

You have a lot of restraint, right?

Because you're, you're sharing your openness about, about being a man, but also being balanced on seeing both sides of it. And I just, I find myself getting almost too excited and like, hey, I've got to do this. I've been waiting so many years for this moment. And how do you kind of go into Zen world and really bring a lot of peace to it? I just.

So what, so let me recap. So you had, you got let go of a job five months ago, but now you're in your dream job, is that right?

I just started something that's like kind of beyond myself. It gets a really big opportunity and it's big for my wife. I've been married 10 years. And so I'd like to say to Erica, if she's still listening, marriage is a complete war. It's very, very hard. And I think you've got the right heart to go into it, especially if.

You have a stubborn man that you're with and you said he's very like stubborn or he's very, you know, hard headed or something. And it's like if you married and that's the thing you love about him, but that's also the challenge. You just got to know what you signed up for.

You gave such good advice because being married 10 years, I can at least speak on the. Eight years is the average of divorce. And so just you're climbing a mountain. And I would say that if you're, if you're speaking to an introvert in these times right now, they really do need their space. I'm an extrovert, so I, my wife is an introvert and so I try to give her as much space as possible, give her times away. And so, yeah, anyway, I digress. I'm sorry to ask you that question.

Sorry. You got a dream job. It's an amazing opportunity for yourself. And the question is, oh, for your, for you and your wife. Is that what you said?

Just for our financial goals and kiddos and that sort of thing. And so I just feel like kind of all is on the line.

Here. So is the question, how do you balance managing that in your relationship, or how do you balance just this opportunity that came to you? What's. What's the main question?

So you know how you're a podcast. You went from doing LinkedIn and you're doing all this stuff now.

Right.

And, like, I guess now that you're here and you have so much coming at you for the. Like, you've waited your whole life to kind of be at this place where you're. You're speaking with celebrities.

Right, Right.

And I guess for me, on a very mini stage of. That this is kind of the first time I'm. I'm doing something where I might have a little bit of influence and more than anything, just control to be a blessing to my wife and do something like kind of where we're financially free.

Yeah. Okay, so is it. How do you make sure you don't blow it? Is that the question?

So, not how not to blow it? I think I'm concerned enough not to do that, but how do you bring your level of, like, you said focus, and then you said something like, you do, like, 1 to 10. Like, how do I. The biggest question I'm asking. I'm sorry, I'm doing a really bad job.

This. You're good.

How do you bring the amount of attention you just gave to Erica and, like, slow it down and, like, be very thoughtful and intentional? Because I know that's a skill. That's not just something that happens.

That's really my question. I mean, are you asking. How are you asking how can you do this for the opportunity that you have, or just in general in your life, and not say yes to too much and take on too many things, but have the clarity and the focus to make the right decisions.

Correct.

Thank you. I'm so sorry. I asked you, like, five different questions.

You're good. I think what works for me is really setting a clear intention at all times and getting clear on what it is my mission is, you know, so it sounds like this is the place where you want to be right now, and it's leading you closer to the thing you want to be doing for a while or leading you to the next step of your career and your business opportunities. And I think, for me, I've been so focused on my mission, which is to impact 100 million people every single week, doing the thing they love and helping them live a greater life. So my mission is clear. So I say no to a lot of things that don't support the mission, which makes Me save a lot of time and energy. Just having that clarity of my mission saves me time and energy and allows me to just make better decisions as opposed to asking myself, should I go and say yes to this? Should I say yes to this? Could I do that? It's just wasting time if it's not supporting the mission or if it's just not something I want to do to have fun in my life and, you know, hang out with my friends and family. So I'm very clear on my mission, and I would say to you and anyone listening is to get clear on what your mission statement is as an individual. Like, how you want to show up in the world, the type of person you want to become, and you could do that in your career as well. Like, what is the mission for my dream job? Where do I want to be working by when? Or what's the side hustle or the business I want to create by when? I remember, you know, 12 years ago doing interviews of people on LinkedIn and messaging people one by one on LinkedIn and being like, man, it'd be amazing to get paid to do this because I'm just having so much fun connecting with these CEOs and having lunch with them and jumping on email and phone calls and just, like, getting to pick their brain. I was like, wouldn't this be amazing if I could just interview the most, not the most successful people in Columbus, Ohio, but in the world, and people would pay me for it. I was like, but at that time, I don't have the credibility. I didn't have the skills. I didn't have the brand, I didn't have the reach. I didn't have the experience, none of it. So I said, okay, that's my mission. I am going to build something that gets me a step closer to that mission. And every year I reevaluate. Did this get me closer to it and am I doing the thing I want? And eventually, I launched the School of Greatness with one listener on one episode. And I had some decent contacts at that time after many years and was like, okay, I'm finally doing what I want to do, but no one's listening. So now what's the next step? How do we get more people to listen? How do you know? I've got the relationships, but I don't have the audience. And we're just constantly figuring out what's the next step towards the solution of our mission. So I would say to you, write down your mission statement, and if you don't have it in one sentence, for you personally or for your career, dream job, business, write them both down. That would be step one. Step two would be to every day set a clear intention of what you're going to create that day. That's going to further along the mission. And when you do that, you're going to make a couple of decisions. You're going to hire the right people, you're going to find the right people to support you. You're going to do the right actions to give you closer to that goal, as opposed to just doing things that keep you out of balance, that make you feel overwhelmed, exhausted, that make you feel anxious. And so that's the goal, is to start there and figure out what are the habits and practices that will support my mind, that will support my body, and that will support my heart. Because those three things you need to have in balance and in order, in order to have energy and focus and enthusiasm and grit to create the things you want for your mission. And so that goes back into, okay, what's my routine for nutrition, my routine for my sleep, my routine for food and working out and all those things. And it's just evaluating those things and taking inventory. They're kind of like what I talked about with Erica is taking inventory on your life and figuring out what do I need to level up, what do I need to let go of? And when. You can start to do that on a daily basis and have your routines in order, you don't have to think about it anymore. You don't have to question, what am I going to do today? You just know, because you have your routine that you know supports your mission and supports your energy levels for that day to follow through on the intention that you want to create that day. And I think when we do these things and have our mission for our future, but then we come back to the present of like, what am I going to do in this moment? Because this is all I have, then you can start to make better decisions each and every moment. So hopefully that was a long answer that gave you lots of stuff that you could digest and maybe take one thing and apply that to what you're doing. Andrew.

Hey, Louis, thank you so much. I just wanted to point out an example of what you just did when you had all the distractions on the call earlier. I could just see you, like, sitting yourself and just embracing it. And she was so sweet. I don't know her name, but she was awesome. But just I aspire to that. And I took down a lot of notes just then. So thank you so Much, of course.

Andrew and Sarah, who is the rock star of my life, she's been my assistant for like what, six, seven years now. I think Sarah, she's probably not going to get off on mute, but she is. She was mentioning the other day because I did a live on Instagram and there was someone who was essentially just harassing me. Every comment was like her saying something nasty and negative, trying to get me to react. And I was seeing every comment and I just kept smiling and breathing and staying focused towards like the conversation I was having. And eventually I was like, I'm not gonna block this person. But it was getting pretty nasty and like vulgar and all this things. So I eventually block the person. And Sarah said to me, she goes, I don't know how you do this, where you can just see someone attack you and say nasty things and swear at you and whatever gossip, lie, whatever it is just to get you like angry and how you can just smile through it. And here's the thing, Andrew, I was never good at that, you know, five, seven years ago, even probably three, four years ago. It is a practice. I'm a 37 year old now. I think through the adversity, I've learned how to manage it better. This doesn't mean it doesn't. I still don't get a little flustered here and there, but I just try to be okay with silence and with not having something to say. So when I'm not sure what's happening, okay, you know, I'm going to pause for a moment and be okay in the silence and just hope that everyone is okay with it as well. Because I think a lot of times we were afraid to be silent and not have something to say and that makes us feel uncomfortable. And so I try to practice that. I'm not always the best at it, but I try to practice that. And I think the constant practice of these things helps us be better every day for the future instances that come up. So, Andrew, thanks, my man. I appreciate you for the question. Thanks for being on here. Hopefully it was helpful and we'll talk to you soon, man, I appreciate you.

Thanks so much, Lewis. Have an awesome time and thank you everyone for listening.

Thank you. Okay, we'll do one more. I want to, I want to make a note about Erica. Go back to this. Matt on our team is saying that, you know, your husband, Erica, is going through a grieving process. I'm not sure if Erica is still here, but your husband is going through a grieving process as well. For a lot of different Things he might be going through a grieving process in the relationship, but also grieving. And just like, he can't go and live his life, he can't go be with his friends, he can't go to his work, maybe he can't go to the gym, he can't go do certain things. And a lot of people in the world are grieving right now. A lot of people are struggling because they're used to a certain routine. They're used to a certain life that they no longer have. So it's almost like everyone has had to kill an identity of themselves and just accept this life of isolation and being okay with. Even if you're with your most loved person, it still doesn't mean you haven't had to kill off a lifestyle that brings you peace and joy and fun and fulfillment and interaction with multiple different people. If you're an extrovert and you like that routine, it still is challenging and you have to grieve. So the world is grieving from a life they once knew they had. And I'm not saying that's like, you know, people are dying and horrible things are happening to a lot of people, that is much harder than that. But you still have to acknowledge the emotions and the grieving process of feeling trapped, feeling confined, feeling like, a lack of freedom or a lack of routine or lack of fun and fulfillment, and these things happen. And people have their own emotional journeys. And having more patience right now than ever is the key. Acceptance of people more than ever is the key, because you never know what people are going through when they're going through these situations. And I'm not saying it's easy. I'm not saying it's fair. I'm not saying it's, you know, fun. But I'm just saying that's what's happening right now. And you're gonna learn more about yourself in this time than any other time. And you're going to. This will be. This will pass. Just like every recession, just like every time of war, every time of isolation, this will pass. It might be a couple months, it might be six months. Who knows? But next year will be a new year, and you'll be back to a normal routine. Unless the world is over, then we have other problems to talk about. But you're going to ask yourself in a year, am I proud of who I was during a dark time? Am I proud of who I was during a time where my partner was crazy, my partner was unhappy and angry? Was I proud of how I reacted, how I Responded how I showed up on the things that I can control. Because right now, there are certain things that are out of your control. Your husband and how he responds is out of your control. Your wife and how she shows up, your kids, things are out of your control. People getting sick, things happening, businesses shutting down, things are out of your control. You cannot control other people. You can control how you respond to other people. And I'm not saying it's easy. It's very challenging, especially when someone pushes your buttons, when someone hits your triggers, when someone knows exactly what to say to make you angry. It's not easy. But this is where you discover who you are and what you're made of. And that's something that's valuable that you can gain from this. That's the meaning you can find in this situation. I think we're going to do one more. Is that right, Mariana? I think it is. I'm going to allow Mariana to talk.

Hello.

Hello.

How are you?

I'm good. How are you doing?

Good. Thanks for being on here. Where are you at in the world?

I'm in the Dominican Republic, but I'm from Venezuela.

Okay. Mucho gusto. A lot of Latinas in here. I like this.

Yes.

Say hi to Janet for me.

I will. Okay, so what are you going through right now? What's really challenging for you and your life, and how are you dealing with this?

Well, for the past couple years, I've had it a little bit rough. I have a son, he's gonna be four in a couple of days. And I dedicated this four years to him. So I've been a stay at home mom. But I've also took advantage of that time to prepare myself professionally. So I'm a health coach, and right now I'm doing a master's in nutrition and functional medicine. But I've had a little bit of trouble, like, taking off my feet business wise. And I know now would be like a great opportunity because of the circumstances, to build my online business, but. Okay, I have a couple of things. First is that I guess I'm a little bit of a fear regarding what people might think or say. Just what you were talking about, just seeing people give you negative comments and all of that, like, you have to have, like, really thick skin. Like, I know that I have a lot of things to offer. Like, I know my mission. I know I want to help people, but that has kept me away from doing it fully.

Okay, what is your goal? What's your goal right now? What is it?

Well, I want to help people well, after I had my son, like, I developed a lot of health issues, one of them autoimmunity. So that's what led me to go deeper into my studies. So I want to help people get to the root cause of whatever symptoms they're having. But I wanted to do it in, I guess, a more affordable way. So that's like, one other thing that I have is I tend to, I guess, work for free sometimes, and I love to help people in that regard. But I've had a lot of financial trouble in this past couple of years, and I'm at the point, especially now, where I need that financial.

Some money, you need some cash. Okay, so let me.

But I don't want to keep, like, especially now. Like, I want. I also want to be conscious that other people are going through financial trouble right now.

Got it. Ok. Let me do a recap so I can make sure I got the picture painted.

Clearly.

You are a health coach, or you are certified as a health coach, and you want to be a health coach moving forward. You have a mission, and that is to serve people in their health. And you got into that because you had some autoimmune challenges in your own health after having your son. You are a single mom.

I have my partner. I have my partner. And where. We've been great on that sense. But, yeah, I was a single mom for the first three years.

Okay. Now you have your partner who's supportive and is encouraging and there for you. Right?

Yeah.

Okay, here's what I want to say to you. It's Mariana, right?

Yes.

You are doing such a disservice by giving away your stuff for free.

I know.

You're actually hurting the people that you're working with because you're saying, you're telling them, you know, not to value their health by not investing in it. By you just showing up for free and saying, I'll do this for free forever because I care about you is a disservice to yourself and them. You might need to do that to get started, to get one or two clients. So you have testimonials, you have case studies. That's okay when you're getting started. But if you are already certified health coach, you've been doing this for a while, you have experience, you give people results. Then we like to talk about it here. It's like people don't pay attention unless they pay for it. You know, you pay attention to what you pay for, and the more premium you pay for something more committed you are to that result for that service. So if someone gets something for free, typically they don't pay attention to it and invest in it because they're not invested themselves. But when we exchange something that is meaningful to us, money, for most people, it's very meaningful. And we place meaning and importance on the paper of money and we hand it to someone else for a service. It's saying that I care so much about this result for myself. I care so much about how I want to feel, how I want to look, my health, my weight, the strength, the energy that I can have in the future, that I will give it to this person, trusting that they will hold me accountable. They will give me the solution, the tools to get that results. And you need to start charging because you're doing a disservice to yourself and other people by always doing it for free. I love your heart. I love your energy and your passion. And I know you're a Latina, so you've got all the heart in the world. I know this. But now is the time for you to step up as a leader in your life and to lead by example and be an example to your partner, to your son and say, listen, Mommy is going to start making money. Mommy's going to start doing the things she loves and help people, help people get healthy. It's one of the greatest gifts you can give to someone is their health. So I want you to step up as a leader for yourself. And it's hard and scary to charge people when you've never done it. I know the feeling. It's terrifying. But this is what you've got to start doing. If you can help people with results, then now's the time to start putting yourself out there. Being okay with having the opinions of others. Like you said, you don't want to deal with that. Being okay with people laughing at you or rejection, because it will happen and just continually moving forward and finding the right clients that you can support in your coaching. So that's my feedback for you.

Thank you so much. Yeah, I mean, it's hard because people, especially with health, with health and how you raise your child, people online are very opinionated. So it's a little bit difficult.

But, yeah, if I listen to all the people online, I would both be the most insecure person in the world and the most egotistical person in the world. I would be committing suicide. And, you know, I don't know, just saying I'm a God every single day. At the same time, if I listen to all the hatred and negativity and things that People said about me I would be in self isolation, in the fetal position, on the floor, constantly taking drugs. And I've listened to all the hype and all the praise and all the acknowledgement allowed it to go to my head too much. I would be a nasty, mean person as well. So you can't listen to too much of it at all. You can't listen to the hype. You can't listen to the negativity. You've got to be focused and committed on what you can do to be a leader for yourself, how you can overcome your fears and insecurities, to lead by example, to be the woman that you want to be for your son, the woman you want your son to see growing up and being inspired by. I want your son, in five years, 10 years, 20 years, when he gets asked the question, who is the person that inspires you the most in your life? I want your son to say, my mom. Because she showed me what it was like to be an amazing mother, to go after her dreams, to be a great partner to her man, and to be a great mother at the same time while taking care of the people she cared about and herself. I want that to be a dream that happens for you. And I know it can happen because you've got the power in you to make it happen. So that's my wish for you. Mariana, thank you so much. Louis, thank you for calling in. I appreciate you. I hope this was helpful and enjoy time with your son.

Yes, definitely. Have a good day.

Gracias. We'll see you. Awesome. I hope you guys enjoyed this. This was an experiment. We had a lot of people in here. I see Erica still in here. Andrew, all these people in here who are chiming in, hopefully. Emily, good to see you. Hopefully you guys enjoyed this. This was an experiment to do a live kind of caller in episode or the School of Greatness to connect with people around the world who are listeners of the podcast to see what you guys are going through and how we can help you, how it can lift some spirits, how it can give some inspiration, some clarity, some focus, some tools to lead you during these challenging times. And I hope you got some of that today. If you did, feel free to share with your friends. Let your friends know. School of Greatness podcast is the place to go and maybe we'll do some more of these in the future. We appreciate you. There are a lot of good people in the world who are doing amazing things. We will get through this. We will become stronger because of this. So I appreciate you guys I love you guys. And we'll see you online, on social media and in the next episode. Thank you guys. The School of Greatness is sponsored by Capital One. Nowadays, most people subscribe to everything. Music, tv, even dog food. And it rocks. Until you have to manage it all. Which is where Capital One comes in. Capital One credit cardholders can easily track, block or cancel reoccurring charges right from the Capital One mobile app at no additional cost. With one sign in, you can manage all your subscriptions all in one place. Learn more@Capital1.com Subscriptions Terms and Conditions apply. Gas, gifts, tolls. This holiday trip is draining my wallet. Yeah, but we'll get to see all our family. You, you're festive. What's your deal? What's my deal? Holiday savings.

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