How to Quit Downplaying and Set Higher Standards for the Life of Your Dreams

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My favorite part is the fact that you do not have to wait for answers. I remember back in the day, Chris, when we were building my fitness membership for workouts online. This was like 15 years ago. So we were kind of one of the first at the time and answers were so few and far between and I just remember it would take weeks for us and it was delayed and I just felt like everything was not moving which already in a place of feeling stuck, that makes you feel even worse. And you guys, it's important to keep momentum in business. So this is real time answers, real time advice in all areas of your business. When you have questions, when you don't know what to do next, it's huge for moving forward.

Yeah, we've created Answers on Demand as one of the features of the program where we have hired with our money and put on salary coaches and industry experts from each area of business that you will possibly have questions in. And all you have to do is ask them the question they get back to you, boom, you keep moving on with your business in a timely manner. That's one of our favorite features. Another favorite feature is that there's weekly calls every single week. A lot of the time it's going to be Lori and I answering questions about your business specifically, many times it's going to be doing exercises that foster and create community with people that you wouldn't meet and get supported by otherwise. This is seriously the most inclusive, the most supportive mastermind and business program on the Internet. And the affordability is my favorite because we took our money to assemble all of the features and coaches and industry experts for you, you don't have to pay for them. So you just get into this program, which is ridiculously affordable, and then you don't have to spend the money on all the other outside coaches and outside experts. That's one of my favorite features, is the One Stop Shop. Anyhow, you're not going to have a chance of getting on this thing if you're not on a waitlist because of that accessibility. There's just so many people that can get into the first round. And if you want to get into the first round, you're going to have to be on the early access waitlist. You can get on the early access wait list one of two ways. You can go to loriharder.com forward/waitlist and put yourself on the waitlist right there. Again, that is loriharder.com waitlist. I'd hit pause and do it right now. Or you can text the word waitlist to 310-421-0416. Little Insider hack here. The people on the text list will get the link for a moment before the people on the email list. It'll literally get to your phone faster than the people waiting for the email list. So you might want to put yourself on the early access text list at by texting the word wait list to 310-421-0416. Either way, here's what I know. It's the most supportive, the most hands on business program on the Internet for businesses. 25,000 to 500,000 at the best value possible. All right, so today we're going to talk about standing up for your standards and being unapologetic even when it feels awkward, even when it feels out of place, even when you feel like you're being ridiculed for standing up for your standards. And the reason why we're going to talk about it is this is what will make or break the life that you get you know, was it Ed Mylett that says you get the life you tolerate? Right? I think it was, Ed. I might have that wrong. And that saying is so good. When you settle for pretty good. The best you're ever going to get out of life is pretty good with a lot of moments that are not so good. When you stand up for your standards of extraordinary, of rare, of incredible, then you're going to get a lot closer to incredible, extraordinary, dare I say a perfect type of life, even though there's no such thing. And standing up for your standards is the difference between those two things that we're probably going to talk about. Some things that may feel. I don't know, what's the word I'm looking for, Lori? A little shallow or a little bit nitpicky? Yeah. Or even unrelatable? That's the word I was looking for. But I ask you to stay along the ride in this episode with us because what may feel like it's unrelatable now may be something that you demand out of your life later because you see how it has a trickle down effect on everything else that you do. And I think that's where people go wrong. They think, oh, I can overlook this nitpicky thing. I can overlook that nitpicky thing. No, you can't. Because when you overlook here and you overlook there and you overlook there and you overlook here, now all of a sudden these are all little moments that have a trickle down effect into everything being not so great in your life as opposed to everything adding up to give you a great life.

So I want to go back to the very beginning of when I can remember setting my first high standard and I had put money down to do a fitness competition. And let me tell you, putting money down is the energetic exchange to the universe, to God, to your higher self, saying, this is enough money for me to literally have to show up like it is a down payment on your dreams. And for me, it was a good amount of money at the time. And doing a fitness competition was purchasing a $1,000 bikini. That might sound insane to you. There were those sparkly bikinis. It sounded insane to me. It sounded insane to my husband.

This was when we spent like $29.

On bikinis, especially when we did not have this money at the time. But I knew that I wanted to be on fitness magazines. That was the goal. And this was the path to getting there. Doing fitness competitions, starting to get in with that crowd, starting to mingle with the people who were editors of these different magazines. You really had to make your mark in the fitness industry was the way that you were getting the path to these fitness covers. So when I decided to do a fitness competition, I was living in Wisconsin. I remember I was living in Waukesha, Wisconsin, to be exact. And I had a group of friends that they loved to party. We loved to drink. We were super young. We were in our early 20s. And what you do in your early 20s there with your friends is you literally go out to dinner and start drinking, and then you go out to the bars and you drink all night long, and maybe you go to someone's house and you play. Can you guess? Drinking games. So I was finding that I could pretty much stay on track during the week, doing my workouts, eating healthier, but the weekends would totally throw me off. It's like I would go backwards in progress. I was getting further away from my goals, and I was really depressed. I had a ton of anxiety. And at the time, I thought this was just my baseline of who I was. I come from a family with a lot of anxiety. I come from a family with a lot of depression, Everybody on medication. So I'm living a life thinking that this is who I am, despite eating terrible and drinking alcohol, which is like, spiking my anxiety, drinking a ton of coffee, doing all of the things that are literally fuel for the fire of these two things, right? Depression and anxiety. And so the first time that we, you know, go to dinner or get these invites from people and I say to them, like, hey, I'm. I'm doing a fitness competition, so help me not to drink, because I have to not drink for these next 12 weeks, right? That was the prep for these fitness competitions. And they're like, good luck. Like, as I started going down them, you think that your friends would say, this is so cool. How can we support you? Well, when they're not the correct aligned friends for where you're going, they're going to say things like these friends said to me, oh, you really think you can do that? That'll be funny. I can't wait to watch this. Oh, are you too good for us? Oh, let me guess. You're going to order the salad tonight. Okay. Oh, are you too good for us? Oh, you can't drink. All of these things were said to be multiple times over and over. And of course, I, at the time, like, I played them off like, ha, ha. Oh, it's a. It's a funny joke. I know it's ridiculous. It's a ridiculous goal. But, you know, I really want to try it. Like, I downplayed and apologized for what I knew I wanted and why I came to this planet, and for what I knew I was supposed to do, I kept apologizing. And it wasn't until I stopped hanging around these people and stopped apologizing and found people with the same standard as me, and I will say higher standard for their health, higher standard for their life, and higher standard for, quite frankly, how they freaking treat people, that my life started to change. But let me tell you, it was a year to two years to actually, Chris, this was like five years of apologizing for my goals and for what I really wanted. And I just have to say that they didn't have to live in my depression. They did not have to live in my anxiety. They did not have to live in knowing that I was making decisions that were actually harming me, that were hurting me, that were hurting my relationship with my husband. Because when I'm depressed and anxious, I push people away and I don't treat them very nice. So this was the moment when, you know, I really started to understand that apologizing for my standards was not going to get me anywhere.

This brings up two points that I want to point out so that, you know, you listening, you. You definitely catch two things that she just said. Number one, people started to say things like, oh, are you too good for us? Or at least poke those. Those jokes, crack those jokes. You're not saying you're too good for people when you stand up for your standards. You're saying, I'm better than this situation. And there's a very big difference because they can elevate their situation. They can choose to come along for the journey. They can choose to get healthier or wealthier or happier or anything. So you're not saying I'm too good for you, but that's how people are going to try and make you feel. Instead, you're saying, I'm too good for this situation. I know I deserve better. I know I can be better. I know I can be healthier. I know I can be wealthier. I know I can be happier. I know I can live somewhere better. I know I can have something better. That's what you're saying. You're saying there's nothing wrong with you, the person. There's something wrong with the situation that I'm in right now, and I'm going to fight to improve that. I think we fought to improve that when we were living in Arizona. Freaking great place to live. But we were missing daily Walks. And you can't walk half the year there with the dogs, right? It gets too hot. And we were missing being by the ocean, and we were missing some of the buzz that comes from when you live at a denser population and you can walk to your favorite restaurants and walk to your favorite stores and you don't have to take the cars out of the garage necessarily, and all that stuff. It's just a totally different landscape. Right? And so one would say, what's wrong with living here? This is a spectacular place to live. But we were saying we have a different standard of activities that we want to do every day, year round. And it didn't fit that standard. Now, what do most people do if they have a standard of different activities that they want year round? This goes for living in the Midwest. This goes for anywhere where you can't do what you want to do every single day, year round. Most people say, well, that's okay, I'll wait for summer. Well, that's okay. I'll wait for winter, or I'll wait for her fall or spring, and I'll just enjoy that season. This is where you're not standing up for your standard. If you truly desire something else, then standing up for your standard says, all right, I don't care if it's more expensive. I'll find a way. I don't care if it's tougher to live there. I'll find a way. I don't care if it's this, I don't care if it's that. I don't care if it taxes you more. Whatever the excuses are, standing up for your standard says, I'm going to put myself where I'm meant to flourish, and I refuse to apologize for doing so. Now, listen, people will be unhappy. Our family was unhappy because they all live there. Friends run happy because they live there. And you get a lot of, this is a great place. I don't understand why, you know, why do you have to go live somewhere else? Because I have a different standard. We have a different standard for what we want to do every single day, despite it being a great place to live.

We were talking about this even with, you know, let's. Let's say someone has a dream of being a country singer and they are leaving their family who lives in Florida. And the people in Florida are like, are you kidding me? This is a great place. We want you here. We've seen people still make their career and go back and forth, and they're like, but for me, if I really want to make it and be in the scene and be singing country music every day. The opportunity in Nashville is there every day, a hundred times a day, 500 times, a thousand times a day. So the standard is if you want that dream to happen, you have to infiltrate where you want to be. And people will not understand it. It will not make sense to them. They won't know why you're leaving. They won't know why you can't make it work. But in your heart of hearts, you know that you have to have a certain standard of where you need to be in life in order to make that thing happen.

The second point I wanted to make from the story that you told, the whole thousand dollar bikini story and all that, this was 18 years ago when we were starting over financially. Right. And you stood up for your standard. I remember being like, why do you need this $1,100 frickin bikini with all these crystals or rhinestones or whatever the hell from this one famous bikini maker to be on stage. What's wrong with this one that's kind of good. What's wrong with this one that kind of sparkles? What's wrong with this one? I was like, you're still going to be up there being the most fit person or have the best routine or whatever. And you stood up for the standard of, if I'm going to do this, I need to do this all the way. And so you had to stand up for your standard. You had to stand up for your vision to me, your husband. And because you did, obviously the rest is history. Got all the magazine covers and everything else. Obviously it didn't go from, hey, look at my bikini to magazine covers, a lot in between there. But the point is you stood up from your standard. Stood up for your standard from day one, even against me, if you were going to do this.

Yeah. And to point that out, this is, you get to learn the crazy intricacies of that business. But I brought to him, like, the girls who are winning are wearing these.

Bikinis from this one designer and this.

Is what we're going to do.

Yep.

So I remember I even got one of her bikinis and it wasn't as blinged out as the other girls because it's all that we could afford at the time. I was like, it was still a great bikini, but I ended up putting even more sparkles on it, buying more crystals and putting more on because I'm like, the standard of these girls and the standard of the winners is this. And guess what? I ended up winning, placing national titles, Miss Bikini Universe, Miss Bikini America, Miss Figure America. When I started really standing up for my standards.

Yep. You know, one of the things that I don't talk about enough is my career. When I was in banking here, I just, I don't mean to not talk. It was just so long ago. Right. But those of you that are newer to the show, my whole career started in banking. I worked for HSBC, the world's biggest bank at the time, 330,000 employees. And I was one of the fastest rising executives. Even though I was this punk kid in my 20s that was a college dropout in the entire company, in the entire company, promotion after promotion after promotion after promotion and literally felt like the golden child that couldn't do anything wrong. Well, the reason why was I had certain standards. When I would coach people working in the branches the way that I wanted, let's say a refinance proposal presented, there was an entire presentation, an entire script and I would sit down, I'd role play it with each employee at nauseam and they'd skip certain word tracks or they'd say things a different way. I'd say, no, you have to say it this way, do it again. And they'd do it and it was close, but it wasn't quite there. I'd say, no, you have to say these exact words and you have to pause here, do it again. And I would, I could. I knew they hated me for it. But guess what? Standing up for that standard of here's how we're always going to do our pitches, here's how we're always going to operate is what resulted in all the promotions, in all the accolades in me. Far outperforming what I should have been able to do given the standards of where I came from and how I even got into that job. So standing up for your standards against other people and how they're going to show up if they're going to be a part of your team is crucial. We do this for our teams right now. Whether it's our personal brand teams, whether it's your Gloce team, whether it's, whether it's my frollo team, we are not afraid to say, hi, I know everybody else does it this way, or I know this is acceptable in 99 out of a hundred other companies. But in our company, we do it this way or we show up this way or we say it this way and if they don't do it, they're out. And that's because we are not afraid to stand up for our standards and then you get the results you're looking for when you do, whereas everybody else settles further.

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It's because it's going to make them better. And in life, whether you realize this or not, I want you to start looking around at examples in your life. People want to be around the people who pull them up, who actually like, even if they're upset about it in the beginning, where they have somewhere to go and something to strive for. So if you want a players in your business, they don't want to be around someone with low standards. They're actually looking for someone who can help make them better and make their standards even higher. And so I want to share a couple of things. You know, even in different employee situations or having different people work for you, standing up for your standards are going to create this really interesting side effect that you don't even realize right now if you are resentful of maybe someone who works for you right now. I know a lot of people who actually are like, you know, we have these yard people who come and help us, but I'm resentful because nobody can do a good job anymore or no one pays attention to this detail. Or whenever they come, I get irritated because even though this is done, this is never the way that I want it. Or, you know, I have these housekeepers and they're so sweet, they're amazing, but they never do this thing or it feels like it's never as clean as I want. So people are resenting people all the time. Maybe it's an employee. Yeah, they're all right. But here's where all their flaws are now. They're never sharing or standing up for the standard that they want or that they hired them for. Not standing up for your standard is actual a huge communication miss. And you're not standing up for it because you fear you're going to look like a jerk. You're going to look like you're correcting them. You're going to be annoying. They're going to talk about you behind your back. Oh, here they come again. You're not going to be easy Right. You want to know what I was told my whole life? Like, oh, she's the cool girl. Oh, she's like, so laid back. Oh, yeah, I'm so go with the flow. And I thought that was what made people like me. So what feels opposite of go with the flow and chill and cool girl and so easygoing is to stand up for a standard and to correct people in a loving way that feels opposite. But do you know who people want to work for? Like a players. The reason you're not attracting a players or creating them, let's really use that word, creating, is because you're afraid to stand up for a standard when they actually, the right people are going to desire that and the wrong people are going to go somewhere else where they're like, hell, no, I'm. I'm not going to do it the perfect way. I'm not going to do it that way. I think that's ridiculous. Some people are going to think you're asking too much. And that's okay, too, because the right people will actually crave to be better. They'll crave to learn, just like I did. I want to work for someone with a higher standard. I want to be around someone with a higher standard. I want to be around someone who actually makes me question the way that I am living and how I can be better. And so I want to use this example that feels so, like, small and stupid and petty. But I grew up in a household where my mom was a clean freak. Like, it just, like, rubbed off on me. I became that kid who loved to clean things. I love to organize. I love things a certain way. And so when I was cleaning my house for years and years and years, I did it that way. My house was a certain way. I fold towels a certain way, ladies. You get me? I see these. I literally see all of these memes and reels on TikTok right now, where it's like you start to twitch if your towels are folded the wrong way by your husband or whomever. And so I have these insanely amazing housekeepers that I want them to like me. Like, I want them to love their job. And I had towels that were getting folded a completely different way all different ways and put away in all different ways all the time. So it'd be three different folding types all on one shelf. Now, every part of me when I was showering or in the bathroom, I see this, and I'm like, oh, my.

God, this is exposed shelves.

It's like, yeah, it's the decor. And every Time that they would come and clean, I would take all the towels off and refold them, and I'd be resentful. And I'm like, I love these people. They're. They're the freaking best. But I don't want to feel this way anymore. So the other day, I literally said, hey, can I show you something? I'm literally. I love all that you do. I'm so grateful for you. But I'm a little. I'm a bit of a clean freak when it comes to how I want these towels. Or a bit of an organization freak. Could I just show you how I like these folded? And she was like, oh, my gosh, yes. Like, absolutely. Like, we want to do it the way that you want it. Like, tell me. And so I told her, and I felt so bad. I felt really stupid. And then afterward, guess what? I love looking at my shelf. I'm so grateful. Every time I see her, I'm like, I'm so grateful for you. Like, thank you for letting me share, like, how I want it. And she literally said to me last time, she goes, I want it to be exactly how you want it. Please always tell me, because that makes me happy. And I'm like, oh, my God. Like, this seems so small, but it was one of those things that I'm like, you guys have to stand up for the way that you want things so you don't resent the people who are great to you in your life, so you don't resent the people who are all around you trying to help you. And I hope that people do this exact thing for me, because I never want them to be like, you know, I asked Lori to do that job, or I joined that thing of Lori's, and I just wish it was this way or that I could at least share some feedback. And the more that we can do this, the more that we're all going to rise to a standard together.

Well, what you're talking about is actually the greatest litmus test to see who's meant to come along in your journey and who's not. So whether this is a friend, whether this is a partner, whether this is an employee or a team member or somebody who cleans your house or somebody who cleans your cars or someone who takes care of your yard, this is the litmus test to say you are signed up for the journey or you're not right for the journey that I'm taking. And what I mean by that is, when you keep looking the other way, it's a recipe for Resentment. And that recipe for resentment turns into a situation where then you have to fire that person or break up that person or walk away from that relationship. And now nobody won. But if you do the opposite, if you don't look the other way, but instead always coach them up. When you coach people up, you give them a chance to then take the journey with you. And the right people will want to know the right way to do things so that they can have a better life, too. You're not doing people a favor when you grow resentment and then, you know, kick them out of bed, so to speak. You're doing people a favor when you have open, honest, quick communication and paint the journey for how they can take the ride with you in life to a much better place where everybody thrives and everybody flourishes. So stop looking the other way, because that's just a recipe for resentment. And nobody wins when that resentment gets so big and you have to, you know, go your separate ways.

Okay, so your homework is to think of one standard right now that you feel like, okay, this one would really clear up some energy for me. Like, I would get a lot of energy back of every day. I didn't look at that. That thing that drove me crazy or if every day, the way that that person talks to me, if I could clean that up. Because when they say it like this, like, I just cringe or want to cry. And like all of these things that you could get energy back from, that you don't have to think about you guys. There is a. There is a place in life where you feel really clear. It is rare that that's why I can talk about the towels, is because I've cleared up so many of the big things that all of a sudden, you know, your life starts. You start seeing even the small things. And that's how all the standards rise, is because you take care of it one thing at a time, until all of a sudden, your life feels really like it's your life. It's the life that you want. It's curated by you, and it's set up so that not only you thrive, but everybody around you thrives because you're helping them.

This reminds me of when you used to work with Jack Canfield when he was your coach and he would always tell you the story about the loose newel post on a banister. If you walk by every single time and it's a little bit loose and is going to chip away at your life, have the standard of stopping there and getting it repaired right away, that's the exercise Lori wants you to do. I want you to start noticing the things are chipping away at your life that you're settling for, and I want you to come up with a way to fight to stand up for the standard in that thing. So I don't care if it's something in your yard, something with a team member, something with an employee, something with your significant other. It's time to start standing up for your standards. And it's also time to start standing up for who you're going to learn from, for the types of programs that you're going to invest in and for the return on investment that you're going to get for those programs. No more. Okay? Programs. No more. Pretty good programs. No more. Oh, well, it was good enough. Programs start demanding that you get everything you need for one great investment. And that's exactly what our new program is. The mentor collective mastermind for businesses. 25,000 to 500,000. You won't have a shot at getting in if you're not on the wait list. So now that this episode is over, go to loriharder.com waitlist and put yourself on that early access waitlist.

We're so grateful for you guys and we will talk to you next week.