Secret Habits of Successful People

To tonight's Fireside Chat, my name is Ramit Sethi, and there's a question that I believe is taking on increasing urgency. And you know, we have access to a lot of SEO data, search terms, search volumes paid, all kinds of stuff. And that question is that's been echoing across the globe is why are Indian people so damn good at spelling? Beast. Hey, I'm just telling you what the data says. Everybody's wondering. And today, Ramit Sethi, Indian person, is here to give you the answer. Why? Because tonight we are talking about the secret habits of top performers. Now, I'd like to acknowledge a couple of things. First of all, you can see this set is slowly really developing itself. One that's not part of the set. One I was advised. Ramit, great sweaters. Love your off the cuff remarks. Why not put a little branding into your set? Boom. Thank you to our sophisticated PR representatives. A great suggestion. That's why they make the big bucks. Second, I do want to say that literally 35 seconds ago, this fire was like a roaring blaze. I was almost about to take this sweater off. I'm not lying. Sucks. Besides that, we have a great episode planned because as I said, we're just reporting on data. And the data says that people want to know, why are people who look like me so good at spelling these? Have you ever wondered. Have you ever wondered why the Scripps National Spelling Bee is basically completely dominated by Indian people for the last 30 years, including, well, I didn't make it to that level, but I was number nine in Northern California. How'd that happen? Tonight we really pull back and understand what makes a top performer a top performer. Is it luck? Is it genetics? Or is there something else going on? Well, let's try to answer the question of why am I so good at spelling? Let me tell you the politically correct answer, which would be something like, I was just fortunate to be blessed with this skill. I don't really know. And, you know, the truth is I'm not really good at a lot of other things. So I guess it's just lucky that I found this one thing. That's what most would say. What if you pride the truth? What if you actually got the truth? Truth might go something like this. When I came home in sixth grade, I would grab a snack and then my mom would open up a spelling book, literally, a book with words. And she would quiz me for about two hours. How about that? That is something that you don't hear people talk about. And whether you are a top performer at spelling at fitness, at parenting, you never hear people admitting what they actually do to achieve those results. Instead, you should just follow your passion, said every commencement speaker. Meanwhile, one thing they obscured and neglected to mention was they spent literally thousands of hours, trial and error, making mistakes, learning from mentors, teachers, advisors, dedicating themselves to the craft. And they finally became masters at it. So tonight, what I want to do is demystify excellence and really point to the behavioral sides of it. There are specific behaviors that top performers do that others do not. And my dream is that. My dream is that you could visit somebody's house for one day and shadow them. You would see many of the behaviors that are totally secret. They are secret to you, and in many cases, they're actually secret to that person. They don't even realize they're doing it. But there are profound behavioral differences between top performers and everybody else. I just gave you one of them, which is for spelling bee champs. They do that. And more. People who make it to the highest levels, the ones you see on espn, they're spending hours every day. That's what they do. Okay, let me ask a question, Cas. Why do you think people are not honest about what it takes to be a top performer? Why do you rarely hear someone saying, yeah, I spend two hours a day reading words out of a book? Why is that?

Because it's not glamorous.

Yeah, that's a good one. It's not glamorous. So I. I identify two reasons. I like yours, though. So let's say that is three. My number one was, everyone would hate you if you told the truth. If you actually admit what you do. It is not glamorous. And suddenly it removes the mysticism, the genetic gift, and it forces others to acknowledge, hey, I don't spend two hours a day working with my son or daughter on their reading. Or I don't spend an hour and a half training. Or I, you know, I don't do copywriting. I talk about it, but I spend 30 minutes a week. Why am I not converting 3.5% on my sales page? I don't know. You haven't written anything in three years. You've been on Twitter. So that's, Number one, everyone would hate you if you told the truth. And number two, many successful people don't even know their own habits. That's a crazy thing of all. I want to give you an example. I remember this. There was this super ripped friend who used to say, all you need to do is work out three times a week. You don't need more. Da, da, da, da. I run into him at the gym on a Saturday. He doesn't train on Saturdays. I go, hey, man, what are you doing here? He goes, oh, nothing. I'm just, you know, doing a light workout. I said, don't you only work out, like, Monday, Wednesday, Friday? He goes, oh, yeah, it's my off day. This guy didn't admit that he does cardio on his off day. Why? One, he doesn't really consider cardio a workout. To him, it's just cardio. Two, this guy's going around preaching to everybody, oh, three times a week. Three times a week. He doesn't do that. It's like your soul cycle instructors. They're like, oh, get on the bike for 45 minutes, you sweat. That's not how you got to look like that. I know what you did to look like that. Yes, you might do something cardio a couple times a week, but you're doing a lot of other stuff. But they don't admit it. Sometimes they don't admit it because everyone would hate them. Sometimes they don't actually even admit it or know it themselves. Okay, and then I like yours. It's not glamorous. It's not glamorous to talk about the work. It's more glamorous to say, I don't know. I'm just so fortunate. I don't know. It just happened. And I guess I should admit that. Of course, some people are better at some things than others. Like, you can spend a lot of time. You can spend the same amount of time practicing your video skills. Anybody watching this, and who's some person on tv that's really good. Conan o'. Brien. Conan o' Brien's gonna be better than you. Let's just admit it. All right? I could spend the same time. He's better. He has a gift. But most people don't even spend a quarter of the time as a master. Okay, so there is a room for talent. Of course there's a room for that. We have to allow for that. But I focus on what I can control, and that is behavioral. So I wanted to show a few examples of top performers and what they do. Have you ever met somebody who seems to remember people's names and just. They have a great memory. They remember your name. They ask about your kids or your family. You meet them two years, they're like, oh, how was that trip to Greece? You're like, wow, what I told you about that. It seems like they're just naturally gifted. But I have a few friends like that. I ask them what they do. Here's what they told me. Ongoing data entry into a CRM. So they use whatever. CRM, Excel, whatever. They track everything. Last time we met, they track the stories. So they go home and they type up quick notes and then they review them before they meet you the next time. Doesn't seem so glamorous anymore. Kind of seems like a serial killer sitting at home at night. Sitting at home under a fluorescent light like this. He told me that he likes Santorini. Oh, Santorini. Next time I see him on 7, 26, 22, gotta ask him about Santorini. But who cares if it doesn't seem glamorous? They want to create a relationship, a bond. You don't see all that back end stuff. All you see is this guy two years from now, he's like, how was the trip to Santorini? Oh, wow. And you're like, alright. So that's somebody who memorizes names, has an amazing body. How do they do it? Genetics.

No.

Here are some of the things that the top performers I do. The behaviors that they practice when eating out. They look up the menu ahead of time, they plan what they're going to order, and they adjust the rest of their day's calories so that they can fit it in. Think about that. How many of us have actually proactively looked up the menu of the restaurant we're going to go to, chose what we're going to eat, calculated the calories and flowed the rest of our food consumption for that day? Virtually nobody. I'm talking about people who look like amazing and they prioritize their aesthetics or their health. That's what I'm talking about. Top performers. Now at this moment, there's about 75% of people watching saying, this asshole, I don't want to be this psycho who's writing names in fluorescent lights. And I. And I don't want to be going on yelp to every single restaurant. Oh, you're so annoying. That's okay. I'm not. If you don't want to do it, don't do it. I'm simply trying to shed some light on what top performers do. And you can apply these principles to whatever the case is that you want. My sister, this is. You want to talk about top performers? Let's talk about how people eat spicy food. Oh my God, this drives me insane. I love spicy food. And when I think about it in America, first of all, people here think black pepper is spicy. Don't ever talk to me if you think black pepper is Spicy. Click the big X at the top right of your screen and please leave my community. We will never get along. So Indian people like spice, but, you know, Thai people like even more spice. How does it happen? I had the chance to actually observe this. My sister brought her son, my nephew, over. I think at the time, he was like 4 years old. And she fed him. She was feeding him something. And he goes, mommy, it's too spicy. And you know what she said? Drink your water. And I was like. I was like, that's how it happens. Repeated exposure. And instead of saying, these kids can't handle spies, oh, my God. The genetics don't allow. No, drink your water. And this is how entire communities become accustomed. When we were in Japan, Cas, remember what we did on that last day? We were at one of those sushi boats and we saw these, like, somewhat crazy sushi dishes coming by. And then we saw this little kid sit down next to us. He must have been four or five years old. And his mom was pulling these things off the trays and. And she would cut them up into halves or fourths. And we were looking at each other and saying, can you imagine a kid in New York or New Jersey or Oregon eating food that looks like this? No. It would be inconceivable to us culturally to be eating. The answer is not simply that they are genetically different. No. The answer is, look at the behavior. The parent brought them into a place where they are exposed to this. It's normal to eat it. They see everybody else eating it, and they do this over and over and over again. It's no surprise. It's behavioral. You can control your behavior. Not all of it, but to a large extent you can. So I find that immensely liberating. It means that I can control the way I look, I can control the way I feel. I can control my skill level on this video. Now, I may be starting at a different place.

Right?

Right. I may, like, I don't know, I may have some genetics that do allow me to excel or hold me back, but I'm still going to operate and optimize within the band that I can achieve. And I can control my behavior above anything else. So we talked about memorizes names and what they do. We talked about has an amazing body. And just a couple of things they do. We talked about eats foods that would be inconceivable to us. Spicy odd fish for Americans. Spelling bee champs. What do they do? What do you do? If you want to raise a spelling bee champ every night? Every Day, they come home, you quiz them for two hours. On the weekend, three hours. That's what it takes. Can you imagine a parent who wants to spend that kind of time? That's what my mom did. So there's. Oh, and one more thing on that one. In Indian culture, you glamorize spelling bee champions just like in other cultures. You might glamorize athletes or entrepreneurs. Do you know that Indian parents will say, well, she made it to nationals and she got this scholarship. Every Indian kid right now is like, I hate that. But it also is a. It's a, it's a thing or a cultural characteristic that causes you to peg excellence to a certain level. This person's a doctor. This person is an engineer. I'm not saying you have to agree with it. I was told to be a doctor a lot. Look at me now. I'm sitting next to a book called I will teach you to be rich with a dead fire. I chose not to follow it, but I appreciate how different people peg excellence to something different. What if they want to start a business? I found that 100% of successful entrepreneurs join my program called Earnable iwt.com earn. Just kidding. Or am I? So in my final wrap up here, and then I would love to go to comments about successful people. I want to ask people watching tonight, what is a behavior that you have noticed of top performers? Something that is not obvious. Could be, how do you get your kid to eat spicy food? It could be, how do you wake up early in the morning? Whatever it is, what is it for you type that in the chat room and then we will do questions after that in the question box. My dream again is that you could go into someone's house and shadow them for one day. That you could really see the secret habits of top performers. And they would be so mind blowing. When you see what people do, the way that they do phone calls, the way that they even think about what they eat, who they spend time with, where they set boundaries. You see top performers and if somebody calls, they can be very polite, but they can also say, you know what, I'm not interested. Thank you very much, bye. Whereas somebody else who may not be as in control or have developed those skills might listen to some telemarketer for 15 minutes before saying, you know, I'm not interested, thank you very much. Maybe you could try back tomorrow. Totally different. So that would be my dream. Now most of us don't have that opportunity. I actually think it's really rare that any of us have the chance to shadow someone for one full day. So what can we do instead? We can study what the best do. We can read their interviews and we can ask our friends like, hey, how do you do that? Tell me the truth. How did you achieve that? Break it down. What did you do on day one? What happened then? What were the hardest parts? How did you know you were on the right track? That's when you know you're starting to get the truth. So that is my short foray into the secret habits of top performers. If you are interested, I have more examples on this. I have a blog post called the secret habits of top performers. You can add ramit to that and you will find the article. Cass, do we have any comments on some secret habits tonight?

Let's see. Okay, so someone said affirmations and intention setting in the morning. Okay, Someone else said exercise. Let's see. Someone said top performers are consistent and enjoy how long it takes to become good.

Oh, that is a good one. That's what. Let's just pause right there. As you're finding more. You know, you ask if you listen to people who are starting out or they're struggling to achieve something, they'll say the first question will be how long does it take? That's a great sign that someone is going to fail. Why? Because implicit in that question is I think this is going to be painful. I don't like pain. Therefore I want to know that the answer is short. Because if it's long, I'm not interested in even starting. No kid ever asked that question, how long do I get to play at the playground? They would never ask that. They're like, yeah, think about it. So when people come to me like hey, earnable sounds like a cool program, but how long will it take for me to make a thousand dollars? It's very unlikely this person will be successful. I love what that comment was. Caste. They said they, they, they look forward to how long it's going to take and they enjoy the journey. Absolutely.

Let's see. They don't give an F about others expectations.

Okay.

They know consistency is key.

Absolutely. And, and then if anyone has questions about top performers, add that to the question box and we can tackle some of that. You know, I don't know if I would have been ready to hear some of this when it wasn't time. For example, if like when I was not interested in fitness and someone was like this is what it actually takes to be like really fit, I would have been like screw you. Like I don't want to do that. First of all, it doesn't even sound fun to go in the gym. I certainly don't want to sit there and calculate all these numbers with food. I just like chips and salsa. And my answer to that, first of all, I'm not going to try to convince anybody to do anything they don't want to do. You don't want to train five times a week, Fine. You don't want to read words off a page to dominate a spelling bee, fine. Although I don't understand you. I don't get it. Why would you not want to do that? What I would say is that we don't all start off aiming to be top performers. That's okay. I didn't. When I started off writing my blog, I wasn't like, I'm gonna have the world's best blog. And I certainly don't think I've achieved that same thing with fitness. I was just like, I want to gain, like, £10 and get a. Not a skinny neck anymore. That was it. That was my goal. But I think as we try a lot of different things, we discover, wow, I really love this. And I have a greater vision for what excellence is, and I'm down. I want to get after it. That's when you start to go down the path of being a top performer. Any questions? Cass?

Yes. What are your top performing habits?

Oh, okay. My top performing habits are that probably 85 to 90% of my daily success is due to systems I put in place years ago. So when I wake up in the morning, I pretty much wake up at the same time because I've gone to sleep the night before. Basically, at the same time, I have a safe living environment, and I'm not worried about, you know.

I guess, necessities.

The basic necessities. Yeah. I wake up. I know that I've given myself the luxury of a couple of hours to just, like, do nothing. Watch tv, scroll Instagram. I have that stuff. Now, when it comes to more specific things, I have the coffee that I make is always stocked, and it's, like 16 inches away from the French press, which is all there, ready to go. Now we're really talking. It's like a chef walks in. Everything's, like, ready to go. I sit down at my computer. All right, how much time do we have? So I'm about to get, like, 8.

53.

Oh, my God. All right, let me just scroll through this quickly. So. So I open up my calendar. Every day is basically the same. I have the same meetings on Monday, the same on Tuesday. Right. So it's all consistent. All the variation has been really generally squeezed out. But what that means is that when I open up that meeting or that call, we can be super creative. We can also know that we don't have to get everything in that day. Cause we're gonna talk again in three days or in a week. Always working with great people. The team is amazing. Everybody's got incentives that are aligned. And then we have a good thing where we know we have our own, like, rhythm. We're going to watch TV or you're going to work out. Maybe I'll work out at a different time. So a lot of it is patterns and habits. More specific examples would be. Basically like, the real nitty gritty is when I double click on my calendar, everything is ready to go. It takes me to a link, which takes me to a bookmark, and I can start writing. And I already know exactly what I'm supposed to do.

And also, your calendar is like, oh, yeah, yeah.

That's like the master. That's like the master organizer of everything. So I use a calendar and it is blocked off, but it also is realistic. It has open space for me to walk or just think or catch up on other stuff. So the calendar guides everything. And the calendar has been thought about for many, many, many months and years. And by the way, anyone who wants to know some of these more productivity stuff, we have a program called Finishers Formula. How do you finish what you start? This is a classic one. A lot of productivity programs are all about, like, tactics. Yes, there's some tactics like the ones I just talked about. I go into more detail. You can actually see my calendar. But a lot of it is psychological. A lot of times you have the time, but you don't. You're not psychologically focused on actually doing it. So Finishers Formula, you can get it@iwt.com products.

How long do you spend watching or catching up on the daily news?

A lot. A lot. And actually, it's funny, like we talked about it today. We were talking about what makes copy great in one of our product calls, because we're creating something around that and for earnable students. You. You will have access to this right away or soon. And of course, you know, we've developed our copy skills and we've practiced and all that stuff. But there's also this element of just knowing what's going on in the zeitgeist. Right. And those of you who have seen my recent. Those of you who are watching right now, there's something going on in the Zeitgeist, where you want some daily comfort, where you want something to look forward to that's not negative, that is paying attention to what's going on on Reddit, on the news, and just deciding what do we want to do about that. So we are. I track it every day. Part of it's just entertainment, but it flows right into our copy.

How do you create a circle of successful people at a young age?

The best way you can do it is to become successful first. And successful people want to hang out with other successful people. If you are a nobody trying to knock on the door and get into the poker game with a bunch of A level people, why would they have you there? It makes no sense. And frankly, once you make it to that level, you're not going to want someone who just knocks on the door and tries to skip ahead. Best thing you can do to attract those people is to become successful yourself. Now, a shortcut to do that is, is to get great mentors, follow their advice and then double back and tell them, I took your advice, this is what I learned. This is what I got out of it. Thank you. You do that, you're going to instantly move past other people. Another program that shows you how to do that, Instant network. Also on iwt.com products.

Are there differences between top performers personal and professional habits?

Yes, and they're not always correlated. There's a lot of people who are professional successes and complete personal messes. Classic. See this a lot. Actually, you see this a lot in self development. You got someone who's out there like, I really have completely failed at life and nothing is going right. I think I'll become a life coach. And then they somehow get a bunch of clients, at least for six months. So yes, they're not always correlated, but there are people. And this is a thing that people often don't understand. People. I remember actually I was my first year at Stanford and there was a panel of professors and one of them, they're all like, Stanford professors. These are the best in the world. And one of them was talking about the other one who's a chemistry professor. I believe he was a Nobel laureate. And he was like, he's like, I can't understand it. They're all speaking about each other on this panel. He goes, it is so frustrating to listen to him. Not only is he a chemistry Nobel laureate, but if you ask him about any philosophy book, he's read them all. He knows everything. It's unbelievable. And that was a great example that not always, but in rare cases, the very best in one domain are also extremely good other domains. In other words, there are people who have mastered the behaviors and they can cause them to move between verticals, between areas. And so it's not that they are amazing at work and horrible parents. No, they're actually amazing. Amazing and amazing. And if you find those people and you can study what they do and ask them, befriend them, you will have a massive leg up in life.

What's your advice to Perfectionist? I feel like it's such a hindrance for me sometimes.

I agree. I agree. Well, Cass, I think you've told that story about perfectionism with your website before.

Oh, yeah.

First of all, what is your website?

Nextlevel, wardrobe.com and check out my blog too.

Okay, thank you. What do they get at this site? What is this next level?

What next level? Wardrobe. They get amazing style advice.

Okay, very good. So can you tell the story about perfectionism for you?

Yeah, I can actually relate to this question. So basically, when I started out my business, I didn't know how to build a website. Went to Squarespace, bought a template, started crafting this website. I was, you know, typing in the code and stuff. And then one night I had. It was really late, probably like 10 or 11pm and you had noticed that I was like super, super frustrated at the computer. Yeah. Banging on the computer, on the verge of tears. So you come over and ask me what was wrong and I think I may have started crying. And then I said, I'm really frustrated because this copy needs to be left justified. It cannot be centered left justified. And you stood there and listened to me and were very compassionate. And you slowly close the computer screen and said, let's go to bed.

I was like, stay away from the windows. Just move this way.

And now it's been a few years since that incident and now we can laugh about it.

Okay, so what was going on there?

I was just. I got so obsessed with this format of my website being a certain way. Like, I had a vision in my mind and it had to be that it could not be any other way, even though, like, no one, no one noticed it except me.

Perfectionism is selfish. You are focused on yourself. You are myopic. And you have never stopped to remember the most important thing, which is not you, it is the people that you are serving or the goal that you are pursuing. In Cass's case, I totally understand why that's happened because I've had many experiences like that. In fact, my team will tell you, like ramit's like pushing this one weird feature too much and sometimes they're right. We have to remember that in your case, the goal was. What was it? Left aligned text. Well, yeah, no, no, we haven't learned a lesson. It's only been three years. Okay. Oh my God. What was the real goal? What should the goal have been?

I'm like, there's no other goal. It was supposed to be left alive.

If you had gotten it left aligned, what would have happened?

Nothing.

Okay. This is a, this exercise really not going my way. If you.

I would have felt good maybe for like a few seconds and then. And then that's it. It would not have resulted in any press, any clients.

And what would you have liked? What was your goal at the time? Like, what would have made you really happy? Forget about the justification. What were you trying to do with your business?

Well, I wanted to grow it at that time.

How?

And via my website.

By getting clients who paid you?

Yes.

So if you'd gotten 10, 20, 30, $50,000, that would have been great. See, the question, the thing is when we get really tunnel vision, myopic, we, we forget to zoom out and remember and make the connection. Is left justification really connecting with my goals? Most of us don't have goals. That's okay. I'm not particularly goal oriented myself in a lot of things. But if you really get honest with yourself and you say, what am I trying to achieve here? And then CASP was like left alignment. Okay, why do the five whys? Why? Because it just needs to. Why? Because then I'll have a website. Why? Because then I'll be proud of myself. Why? Because then I'll get clients. Why? Why? Because then I'll grow my business to this number. Why? Because that's my goal. And if you really push it. Why? Because this is what I was put on this planet to do, blah, blah, blah. Right. And so if you really kind of contextualize it that way, you realize this left alignment really is so minor. I don't need to talk about this. I could skip that and go straight to getting tons of clients, which, by the way, you did, you crushed it. Your business grew massively. And like, who really cares about left alignment? So I just want to say perfectionism is selfish. Focus on the people you're trying to serve or your goal and then you can just sidestep the entire issue. Anyway.

What kind of calendar do you use?

Google Calendar. Tools don't matter. Stop asking me about tools. I don't care. Give me a pen. I'll write better than many people. It doesn't matter what kind of pen have. However, I don't use any kind of pen. So actually don't give me.

Do you use Bic pens?

Bic? I'll never pick up a Bic pen in my life.

Oh, my gosh. Jeez.

No, it's just. It's all right. Yeah, I won't. Okay.

I'm just reading through.

Okay.

Where can people find you, by the way?

Ah, you can subscribe to my newsletter, iwt.com Put your email address right there in the quiz. People wanna know how to earn more. Especially right now. Talking about side income, finding an idea. We show you how to do that with our new earnable program, iwt.com earn. People want to know about money. Get this. Oh, and my publisher, workman, workman.com I believe they're running some special discount and they have a bunch of links to indies. So workman.com go through them and you will find a bunch of links to retailers.

How can I learn to enjoy the process more?

More.

How can I learn to be more patient about getting there?

Wow, that is a really good question, actually. Okay, I'm gonna give my answer and then Cass, if you have one too.

Okay.

Okay. Let me talk about one that I just kind of naturally liked. And then one that I did not like.

Okay.

One that I have naturally liked is writing. So since I was in junior high, even elementary school, I really liked writing. Writing. I found that I was good at it. And then I got nurtured and mentored under a high school teacher, Mrs. Shelton, who really helped me to perfect the mechanics of writing. Like I was like, ooh, the subjunctive tense. But also really get into more of the artistic side to express my voice. And I'm very thankful that, you know, in everything IWT does, I try to honor my teachers as far back as elementary school. So I still remember Mrs. Shelton. She was the dedicated in one of my books. And so that kind of came easily to me. And then I put in a lot of reps and got better and better, got editors and all kinds of stuff. One that didn't come so naturally was fitness. And I remember first of all, didn't have the surroundings. My family didn't really work out when I was a kid. We didn't talk about things like protein, none of that. We didn't. None of that. It wasn't a part of our culture. But I was fortunate that I sought out people eventually who helped me. And I did a lot of ups and downs. Mrs. Like, I went and I would stop and I would not know about progression, all kinds of stuff. I remember when I finally got a trainer, which is another big pivot point, and I told him, like, I hate training. Like, I come here because I want to look better, but I don't. Like, I hate it. I hate sweating. And I would make these jokes. And I think I did actually hate it. But over time, I actually came to love it. I came to love the craft. I came to love the simplicity of when I go to work, you could do a million different things with training. I do what my trainer says, I show up, I work out for an hour, and every week, every month, I can see results. Finally, I learned to love the connections that I could make, the patience that I would develop. At first, I was definitely impatient. I want to look like that. Why is it taking so long? And then I got honest with myself. I'm like, well, I'm not really eating right. And so once I figured out how to do that, which was another multi year process, I started to really dial it in. And then I was like, oh, my God, this works. So those are my two stories. I don't really have any specific lessons, but I thought I would share that. Sometimes you just click. You find something you love and whatever it might be, you're just in it. You're kind of in flow. For me, that was writing for a long time. But the second one, just like anybody, I had unrealistic expectations. I didn't have the right psychology, I didn't have the right context. I went through a lot of ups and downs, but I was fortunate to have good teachers. And when I still remember day one, I walked in to that gym to get a trainer, and they said, you know, that's gonna. Because they were like, what's your goal? I'm like, I want to gain 10 pounds. He looked at me, he's like, that's gonna take at least a year. I'm like, I don't care how long it takes. And that means I was ready to be a student. I was ready. And you can look for the best teachers and the best programs and all the best features, but what you really need to do is look inside and say, am I ready to be the best student? Cass, what about for you? Anything you want to add?

Oh, so for me, I would say just throughout the years, knowing and repeating, repeating to myself, like, it's gonna take a long time. And going into it with that mindset versus paying X amount of dollars and getting quick results that are not Gonna last?

Yes.

Right. So I think it's like your mindset going in and then the second part of that is tracking things. So for example, with my fitness journey, I have photos from years ago of what my body was then over the years to now. And so whenever moments of doubt or stuff like that comes pops in, you know, it's a. It's good to go back to the photos or maybe journal entries and read through like how far I've come.

Those are great answers.

Do you, you don't. Do you journal anything like.

No, I just do this.

Oh, okay. Yeah, it's all journaled on YouTube.

Ramit Sethi. So one day, you know, somebody in the future can come and say, wow, what was that guy doing? Was that guy. Was that guy ranting about big pens on April? Whatever day it is, is it even April?

Oh, it is, huh? Okay, one more question.

Okay.

All right. This is a good question. Question. Let me see if I can find it. Okay.

Oh, before you ask that, I want everyone to think, who are you going to tag after this question? Because I guarantee one of your friends needs to watch this with you. It has some really interesting content about improving your behavior, changing the way you think about success. So think about who you are going to tag and then, and then I'm going to ask you at the end of this.

Yeah, this is actually a good question for family, friends, friends, like on the zoom calls everyone is doing right now. So. Okay, last question. How to help others help you to be a top performer? How do you and cast support each other?

Oh, that's a great question.

That's a great question. Because you need resources to do a lot.

It's extremely difficult to become a top performer if your partner not at least neutral and better yet on the same path with you. If they are an antagonist, it's almost impossible. It's very difficult.

You saw that in your fitness program, right?

Yeah. We had people who would come and they had finally decided, like, I'm ready to make a change. They joined this weight loss program that we tested and they would come on Wednesday nights and attend our webinar. They were pumped. They got information. And then on Thursday, their husband or their wife would say, when are you going to eat normal food with the kids? That's what a good mother does. And I was heartbroken to hear that because those people had virtually no chance. They had no chance. And they could come and they could spend any amount of money and they could find the best teacher, but it doesn't matter because their environment did not Support them, Excel. So in that case, you really have to take a hard look inside and say, am I with a partner who's going to support me? Have I spoken to them candidly and said, this is what I am working to achieve? Can you be on board with me? Let's talk about what that looks like. You know, a lot of people, they. They're frustrated, but they've never actually had a conversation. So you need to do that whether it's alone or with therapist. How do we do it? Cast. So let's give a few specific examples. I remember over the weekend, I came by and I said, hey, do you want to work out? And we're just kind of having, like, a lazy day. And you were like. And I was like, come on, let's go. And then we both went, and we had a great workout. I think that is one just, like, quiet behavior of do you want to go do? So we did that over the weekend. You've done that many times, asking me if I want to go do something. Can you think of any examples?

Oh, so during this quarantine, when it's sunny outside, I will sit outside and work or eat and just soak in the sun. And so I'll ask you, do you want to come outside to eat lunch or take a break or whatever? Just to, like, get you out of your routine and to get some vitamin.

D. Yeah, that's awesome. And I normally would not do it on my own.

Yeah, I know.

Okay. What else do we do to support each other?

Oh, so a big thing that I do for Remy is food. So make sure that he has his food for the week and his meals ready to go, because I know it's important to you to eat properly and on track and also have it ready to go quickly.

Definitely. And I appreciate that. Like, it makes a huge difference for me. How else do I support you? Well, I know that you like physical touch, so back rubs. That's, like, really important.

Can I get one tonight?

Sure. And then if you try to do it to me, I'm like, nah. So those are some things. Are there any other things? Like, business stuff we talk about? And then sometimes, like, I try not to give advice all the time. Sometimes I'm just listening.

Yeah, you do a good job at asking, like, do you want me to give you advice? And I'll either say yes or no.

Right.

Like, because sometimes I just want you to listen to me, and sometimes I want your advice.

Yeah, that's a. That's. That's a tough one. I think a Lot of guys, probably. Probably. We just kind of like, we're ready to give advice. Especially if you're in the professional advice business.

Yeah. You're ready to get solutions out there.

Yeah. So that's a way that I think I can support, even though it's like, not my natural tendency. But I have to say that I like giving advice in certain contexts, but, like, in other contexts, I don't want to do it. It's not like, it's not the way to go. So I think there are a lot of subtle things we do that support each other, whether it be, let's go do this, let's go do that. Physical touch, acts of service. You know, those are some examples of what we do. And I don't think we're perfect. I think we. We set up those times, which I think we've fallen off the wagon on a little bit. We got to get back on that. But one of the things I talked about on that Tim Ferriss podcast was how we have a regular standing, like, relationship time time where we talk about what's going well, what can we improve? What do we. What are we enjoying? And that kind of keeps us on track or it just helps us have space to do it.

Yeah. Because life can get so busy and we don't even have kids, so it's. It gets busy really quickly. So carving out the time. But in regards to this question, I think one thing that we have done pretty well and we can improve on is just communication, what we're working on or what our goals are. Because if the other person doesn't know what you're working towards, then it could be hard to figure out how to support them best.

Yeah. I think you multiple times have said, hey, if you have something big coming up, let me know. And sometimes I'm just like, heads down on earnable launch or something. And I'm like, I just need to, like, focus on this and I'm not going to be very talkative for the next week.

Yeah, yeah.

I would naturally not do that. I'm just like, if I'm not talkative, I don't want to talk about it. But now I'm like, okay, I can spare the time, of course, to try to communicate. And I think that. I think that's a good lesson. It's helped me a lot. Okay, so let's zoom back out. We talked about the habits, secret habits of top performers. We talked about how many people do not actually tell the truth, what it is, why, number one, it's politically incorrect. People would Hate them. If they told you what it takes to raise an amazing kid, or what does it take to be a spelling bee champ or be super fit or have a business that generates X dollars, most people would hate you. They don't really want to hear it. We prefer to hear things like I'm just lucky and I'm passionate, etc. The second answer is actually that a lot of successful people don't know what those secret habits are. So you can ask them and you can build relationships. We have that instant network program that shows you how to do that. My hope is my dream would be that you could follow people home and study what they do for one day. That's unlikely. So the best thing you can do is surround yourself with top performers and find people who tell you the truth. I've always, always pledged to tell you the truth. I tell you the truth. How I wake up. First thing I do is I scroll Instagram. You don't hear many people telling you that. Instead, what do they tell you? I wake up at 5:02. I start meditating until 5:42. Then I drink 83,000 gallons of water. Then I go out and I work out for three hours. No, you don't. I know these people. I know what they do. They don't do that. Get the truth. Even if the truth is uncomfortable or confusing. Confusing. Fight for the truth. The world will not give it to you. But when you do that, when you are patient, when you have support from the people around you, whether it's a partner, teacher, mentor, advisor, it becomes much easier to become successful. Please tag a friend. I do these every night. I hope that you have at least two friends, family, loved ones, whoever that would benefit from seeing this. And it helps if you spread the word to them, let them know you. And they can also sign up for my newsletter@iwt.com I'm on Instagram ramit YouTube. Ramit Sethi. I have a bunch more Fireside Chat videos on money, business and psychology. And I will see you back here tomorrow night. Thank you.