WATCH THIS To Master PRODUCTIVITY & PEAK PERFORMANCE Today! | Eric Partaker

You can either pay now through the pain of discipline, or if you take the easy route and don't look at the warning signs, you'll pay a much more expensive price later, through the pain of regret.

You know, it's funny. I stumbled across your book and your. The three alarms. And I'm just got to. I'm just telling you, off air, it was like. I was really, like, impressed. There is a. I mean, I don't mean that in, like, a weird way. I mean, like, I was. I found myself getting lost in it. But one of the opening stories, right, the opening story that you gotta. Everyone has to hear is this. You almost died at 30,000 foot in the air by a heart attack.

Yep, that's right. So I, about 10 years ago, boarded a plane, had been working myself like a dog before that point. And like, shortly after the cabin doors closed, I could sense something wasn't right.

As the plane ascended, I started getting a lot of pressure in my chest. Feeling quite nauseous, started to sweat. Pressure became pain through the left shoulder, up the jaw, down the arm. Arm went ice cold. Asked my buddy sat next to me, Louis, I said, lewis, feel my arm. And he was like, man, feels like it's been hanging in a meat locker. Oh, wow. And that's what I felt too. But I thought, you know, maybe. Maybe it's just me, right? You know, and then when he said that, I was like, oh, shit.

Because technically, if I'm not mistaken, you got warned not to fly ahead of time.

Yeah.

True overachiever.

Yeah. Yeah. No, because I. I had been having, you know, issues with my heart, and.

Doctor told me not to get on the plane. And before that moment, I hung up the phone. We were in the airport, actually, and Lewis said, so what did the doctor say? And he said, oh, it's fine.

And I was just crazy, right? It's like, you're warned.

Be fine. You go up in the air. Problem is, like, once you start, like, once you're up in the air, then.

Then it's not a lot you can do.

You're about as far away from help as you could possibly imagine. And so a doctor on the plane rushed over and took my vital signs and said, yeah, we need to land the plane immediately. I think he's having a heart attack. And the plane landed, and they had shut down the Runway. Took me into a waiting ambulance.

I Googled afterwards. I was like, I wonder how much it costs to shut down Runway. So apparently it cost the airline about $150,000 to do that. I think my ticket costs like 150. So they got a bad deal on me.

So they administered nitrates right there on the Runway to open up, you know, the arteries, increase blood flow to the heart. That's like the number one thing to do right away. And. Yeah, and then the ambulance, you know, sped off to the local hospital. And I remember looking up into the eyes of the paramedic looking down at me and I said, please don't let me die. I have a five year old son. And.

The next day I woke up in the hospital and that just really prompted me to think, you know, I had, I had been obsessed with achievement before that. Working a hundred hour weeks at McKinsey, helping scale up Skype. Before we sold it to ebay for a few billion. I built a.

Just a few billion.

Like how you did that? You know, we sold it for a few billion. No big deal.

Yeah. And then, and then I built a chain of Mexican restaurants and.

And it was just like work, work, work, work, work, all, you know, on the altar of success at the price of, you know, my health and relationships. And, and then thereafter I just became absolutely obsessed with this whole idea of achieving peak performance. But like in a holistic way.

Yeah.

And.

Where I wasn't compromising my health and where I was, you know, present and available, you know, as a husband and father. And, and that's led to where I am today, which is, you know, that's what I do today. It's like at the moment I'm coaching and mentoring 26 founder CEOs.

All, you know, aligned on this psychographic. The demographic is less relevant. It's more. These founders CEOs are founder CEOs who want to not just scale their businesses, but also scale themselves, scale their leadership and do it without sacrificing their health.

Exactly, exactly.

And it's super enjoyable. Right. And it's because I can, I see people on.

Yeah.

They'Re driving full speed and brick walls with their lights off. You.

Yeah, I totally get it. You know, one of the things I love most so the, the Three Alarms book is it's so rich. Like when, when I say rich, I mean there's so much.

So many different areas that it impacts your life. It is that holistic approach. I think it is that approach that you set out to accomplish. I mean it's definitely a highlighter book all day long. It's also one of those, those works that I think.

What I refer to as a signature work because you can tell that it was birthed in the unexpected.

Right.

You know, you could tell it was kind of birthed there, which is one of the things I love about it. You have this concept inside of it called the traps. Right, the traps of peak performance. And as I was reading through that, I was like, I know exactly which one I have kind of thing.

Which one was for you.

I'm the workaholic. Yeah, I'm definitely, I'm a cross between the workaholic and the martyr. But.

Do me a favor, break it down for the audience just a little bit. What the traps are.

Yeah, so I mean there's a variety. So one is hyper focusing on a single domain.

So I mean, let's take a step back. So the Three Alarms.

It'S essentially a book about closing the gap between your current and best self across the domains of life that matter most is our health, our wealth and our relationships. And when I say wealth, I mean both making the money and what you do with the money. Because I think those three things are what, you know, without our health, we're nothing. Our wealth, you know, our work, that's what kind of keeps, keeps us busy during the day. But at the end of the day, if you think it's going to be lights out, that's all she wrote and you know, game over for you. Like me, you will want to be holding on to that loved one, you know, so our relationships are core. So I really believe that that is the three legged stool and that if we want to achieve peak performance, which for me is just code for reaching your full potential. So if you want to reach your full potential in life, you got to close the gap between your current and best self within each of those three domains. Yeah, and, and don't wait for, you know, don't wait for a wake up call like I, I got because it might be catastrophic for you. I survived. So that's just a context setting. And then in the book I say your path to closing the gap across those three domains is via ipa. So like the beer, but better for you. So identity, productivity, antifragility. And why those three? Well, because.

You can't be a better version of yourself in the future if you're going to continue to be the person you've always been. So you got to start with who you are.

Absolutely.

Why productivity? Well, because you can't become your best self and then just sit on the sofa, you know, you need to take action. And then why anti fragility? Because I don't know about you, but the number of days that go to plan for me in a Year is like five, maybe three. Yeah. So it's like, rather than try to avoid the unexpected, what if you could actually like relish it, embrace it and have it be such that the stress actually builds strength exactly as it does for your physical body, in your head, mentally as well. So that's just context setting so the traps. So one is hyper focusing on a single domain. So instead of having that balanced approach to health, wealth and relationships you are all about, well, so you're a workaholic or you're all about, you know, others on the home front, but maybe not so much yourself. So you're a martyr or you're all about like your health and you're like this health nut. And most people that I tend to work with over track on the wealth side.

Sure.

And they're a workaholic, which is still me on my worst days. Right. So I have to put in lots of, lots of stuff to protect against that.

Yeah.

The three alarms piece is nothing. You know, I'll be blunt. It's just a catchy title to get people to go, hey, what's this? But what it relates to is a specific tactic to help remind you of balancing those domains. So years ago, I took my phone and I literally said, okay, health, wealth and relationships. If I were to think of a best self identity across all three of those fronts, what does me at my best look like in each of those areas? Let me give it a name and let me cue it so that I'm reminded of what best looks like for me in each of those areas at the most appropriate time of day, that is at the time of the day that would best or most benefit from being powered by that best self identity.

Yep.

So as an example, at 6:30am and I've changed them now up from what I.

So it's not three anymore. You've got more on your phone or less.

No, I changed my phrases. Right. Okay.

Okay.

So at 6:30am the first alarm goes off for me and it says pro athlete. I'm the furthest. I share in the book that, you know, I made the basketball team and I sat on the bench the whole time. You know, I'm like, I'll never be a pro athlete. But that's. But that's the version of me that goes to the gym in the morning. Because does a pro athlete not go to the gym?

Never.

When a pro athlete is in the gym and they feel like quitting, do they quit?

Never. Nope.

When they're on the 8th rep and they're like, I don't know if I got it in me to get to the 10th. They stop. Hell no. And they probably do 11 and 12. So having that mentality, it just changes the way I show up. At 9am the next alarm goes off. At the moment for me, it says Elon Musk. Now, I have an issue with how much he works, but what I love about him is how fast focused and genius driven he is when he's working. So that's how I Show up at 9am the game changer for me, though is at 6:30pm still goes off to this day. And it says world's best husband and father. Prompt the question, how would the world's best husband and father walk through that door right now? So 3 alarms is about bringing intentionality in a way that means something to me. What does best look like for me in each of those domains? Timed at the right, you know, most relevant segment of the day.

Yeah, Well, I think it's even, you know, it's funny. I definitely resonated with that in the book. But one of the other things I resonated with in the book is it's almost like a limiting belief killer as well. So all the doubt, all the different kind of emotions that you would have during the course of a day, it's a mental reminder of, no, I'm set out to become this person. Whether you're, you've obviously, whether you achieved it, quote unquote, or you haven't, it still sets the tone for just an unbelievable experience of life. And one of the things you talk a lot about of is this concept of being utterly fulfilled or actually having true fulfillment. And you know, one of the things that I, that I kind of looked at and I took away from it is as you were breaking things, breaking down the traps of peak performance, you were also kind of bringing up the fact that most people. And as I began to reflect on, I'm like, dang, that is true. Where everybody is kind of focused in this compartmental, As I car compartmentalization. I think. I think I just mentioned I just got a new word out there. But they're, you know, they're focused on isolating themselves in silos.

Yeah.

Why do you think we have a tendency to fall into that, for lack of a better word, trap or mindset? It seems like. Because it seems like high achiever peak performers, people that obviously do really well in the. In the wealth category specifically. You know, it seems like that they even struggle the most with compartmentalization as a whole. And this silo thing, why do we tend to fall into that when what we really want is a holistic life? I mean essentially we're trying to quote unquote, achieve the dream. Right. So we think we get the money, we're going to have the family. And why do we fall into that trap? What have you seen?

So I think we over identify so well. I'll speak from my experience. So I placed my entire self worth, my status.

Feeling good enough based on what I was achieving professionally.

Yeah.

But again, the shocking realization was that when I thought it was game over, it was the last thing. It wasn't even the last thing on my mind. It wasn't even on my mind.

Yeah.

At all. It didn't even feature what featured was the home front.

Yeah.

Why was the home front featuring. Because I was compromising my health. Again we go those three pillars. So it's like, you know, the workaholic who's so focused on wealth creation is going to run into a catastrophe on the health front and then sacrifice what probably matters most for them, which is, you know, their relationship. So, you know, why is that? Why was I over tracking on, I mean this, you know, on the wealth front? Well, I think it's from childhood. You know, I grew up terrified that I was going to always be second best and I got lots of evidence to support it. Right. So I tried really hard to.

Work at, you know, be at the top of my class. And the best I could get in a very small class was like, you know, number 10. I worked my ass off to get on the basketball team. Never played a game, never scored a single point. I worked really hard to get on the baseball team. I couldn't hit the ball, was a great fielder, couldn't hit the ball, you know.

And I just kept experiencing that. And then the great equalizing moment for me was that when I joined McKinsey and was hired there.

But then that just, you know, I got that first taste of kind of like, you know, big success at that time. And then I just still it didn't satisfy that self doubt. So I had to work harder and longer than everyone else. So I think the workaholism at its root for me was because I was insecure.

And I didn't believe that me as I am and the things that I had was a good life, that I was, you know, good enough. And I really think when it comes down to it that at the bottom of every workaholic that it's pretty much the same.

Yeah.

That workaholism is driven by insecurity and Feeling that you're not enough, that you need more. And what it prompts is a really dangerous game where there's nothing wrong with striving, but you have to ask the question from.

What is the well that is feeding, that is satisfying that thirst? And if that water, if it's based, if the striving is coming from a place of lack, I'm not good enough. Therefore, I need to work more, acquire more.

Mm.

You're gonna be a train wreck, and it will never end. And you'll get to the end of your life and you'll still think that you weren't good enough. If you're striving from a place of, like, abundance and satisfaction, Totally different, right? So, you know, now in the first half of my career, I strive from a sense of lack. I need more because I'm not complete.

Yeah.

I'm like, screw that shit. I'm good just as I am right now, right? I'm complete. And watch me now, because I'm going to get even better.

Yeah. I get a bonus. I love it. I love it.

Right?

Yeah. Well, the Three Alarms is so good because it, you know, it's. It actually touches on so many different things. One of the things I love about the book is there's a lot of action steps. It's not just like thought process and theology. There's vulnerability, there's trans. There's transparency. There's this essence of. Okay, so here's. Here's what I've shared with you. Here's how we put it into action. Here are some things to consider for yourself. Here are the types of questions you should be asking yourself as you're trying to plot that course. Did you find that as being kind of an intentional thing, or did it just kind of flow as you were writing?

Very intentional. Because.

Because when I was growing up, you know, I'm 45. When I was growing up, I remember the phrases, knowledge is power. That's just a load of crap, though. These days, knowledge isn't power anymore. You know, I can Google. I can get knowledge so fast and cheap. It's like, knowledge is in power. You know, it's about taking action, translating knowledge into action. That's where the game is played.

Yeah.

And so for me, it's like, in general, use theory, when it provides a bit of context and maybe helps people understand, but after that, just, like, move to, like, practical application. Like, how do I actually apply this? Use it, you know, actually benefit from it, which, you know, the Three Alarms in and of itself is like, ultra practical. Because lots of people have heard of the concept of think of your best self.

Yeah.

But not as many people have heard of think of your best self in the domains of life that are most relevant. And take a device that you use every single day and use it to remind yourself of what you just said at the right time of day. So that's like making it stupid, simple, practical. So, yeah, that's just something that I generally like to do. I think in general, things are.

If I have a superpower, it's taking complex things and making them super simple because we don't need more complex stuff.

Yeah. Well, the other thing I loved about it, when you started breaking it down into the practical, again, I think that is a superpower within the book, which obviously is a direct reflection of you as the author. There is this nature of, okay, let's keep it simple, stupid. Here's step one leads to step two. Here's step three. Even as far as the words that you chose in creating your three alarms. Right. You were very specific in identifying and with all clarity who these best selves were. You didn't leave it to happen. Chance at all. I assume you went through several renditions of that best self on a number of times. So with that being said, I think what I've heard from the book and now even speaking with you is it takes.

It's.

It in and of itself is a simple process, but it's a process that must be done.

Yeah, it's a process, and it's meant to be fluid and dynamic. And.

You know, it's all about progress, not perfection. You know, like Mark Zuckerberg said, you know, done is better than perfect. Just ship it, get it out the door. And, you know, I encourage people, like when I'm coaching it, you know, new, you know, founder, CEO, and if they. I don't force people to use all this stuff, you know, it's like, if it resonates with them and I'm like, okay. And they're like, oh, yeah, I'll have a think about the alarms. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Hang on. If you're going to use it, just. Just pick a phrase. First one that comes to mind.

Yeah.

And if it's the wrong phrase, it'll piss you off and irritate you. Like, it's popping up every day and you're like, that's, you know, I know I'm into swimming, but no, I'm not Michael Phelps in the morning, you know, or, you know, it pops up Mr. Rogers and the, you know, in the evening, you're like, yeah, I would aspire to be him as, you know, as a dad. But, you know, I just like the beautiful day in the neighborhood. I don't want to see that every night.

And I don't have to change my sweater every five minutes.

Yeah, yeah. So, you know, it's about taking rapid, imperfect v1 action and just get it out the door. The perfection that we seek, which is, of course, never attainable. But the act of perfecting happens through action.

Yeah.

How you perfect or get close to it. And so it's dynamic in that just pick an identity, anything that even partially resonates, and you're free to change it and shape it. And at the end of the day, the alarms are nothing more than training wheels on the bike. And so if you suddenly find that you're bringing that intentionality into each of those day parts without the need for the training wheels and take them off the bike, maybe you're able to just think intentionally at the start of your day about, okay, me at my champion best in each of these three areas. Who is that version of me? What will I be doing in the context of the day? How am I going to evidence that today? And that little morning ritual is enough for you? So it's up to the person.

Well, another interesting. There was this phrase that I'll repeat in a second that I love. I just simply loved. It resonated with me in big time. But, you know, we've been talking a little about kind of the wake up call, so to speak. And it's obviously, you know, I've said before, there are really two ways to learn. You can either learn by your own mistakes or by somebody else's. This is a direct example of, like, there's a lot of wisdom here. There's a lot of, you know, because I do even today, people that are, you know, we're communicating with on Clubhouse and then direct message you, they're. They're definitely pursuing the. The wealth side of things, or, you know, they're trying to get their initiative off the ground, which is, you know, there's nothing wrong with getting your initiative off the ground, but you can tell that they're sacrificing a great deal sometimes by what they put in the chat messages. Right. You know, and then you said this, this very interesting concept as we've been talking about identity. And to me, it was very pivotal just because to me, it's profound. And that is that behavior follows identity. So if behavior follows identity and you don't have a Healthy identity, which directly correlates to the taking in effective action.

That's right. That's right. Can you. Can you see this, Stephen? Can you see that there?

Yes, I can. Oh, that's so cool.

So that is. I got two boys, 16 year old Alexander and a 7 year old Leo. So Leo drew that. He put his little name there. It's Captain America, in case you happen to be listening to this and not seeing the video. But so this is fascinating. So I have that little post it that he drew me on my monitor. I look at it every single day. So he drew me that about four weeks ago. This would have been in the book. Because this was like genius when it happened. And I thought, oh my gosh, this is. This is it at its core.

So what I'm trying to get people to do with this whole behavior follows identity, just choose an identity is actually do something. I'm not trying to get anybody to do something that they're not a pro at doing. We all did this as kids. We all like became superheroes. We all pretended. And that little drawing Leo made. So I got him a Captain America shield. The shield arrived. He gave me that as a thank you. So the shield arrived at the door. I pulled the shield out, I gave it to Leo. Do you think I needed to take Leo through Captain America behavioral training after I gave him the shield?

No.

Did I have to tell him what he should do? Didn't do? Hell no. He grabbed that shield. He immediately ran. He grabbed the Nerf gun. He's like, shoot the Nerf gun. Let the shield papa. And it's like flying around the house. He became Captain America. And that's the thing. We focus on the behaviors. What should I do but start with who you should be? Behavior follows identity.

Yeah.

And once again, you know, this isn't asking of you anything that you're not a master at already. You just need to dust it off. You did it as a child.

Yeah.

And your children do it today right in front of you. And when you put on that superhero costume each and every day. Yeah. At first it feels like you are acting. But you know, if you break down. I learned this from James Clear. So he said that the etymology of the word identity is two Latin words. Which individual, which together mean repeated beingness. So basically our identity, who you think you are, is nothing more than the summation of all the actions. Yeah. And the beingness that you represent. So although at first you may feel like you're having to act out being Batman or Wonder Woman, and it feels A bit unnatural as you repeatedly do it. The gap between how you feel and that identity just fuses over time.

Yeah, absolutely. You know, it's funny that you say that, or. Very interesting you say that, because when I was homeless and going through all that stuff and broken. Going through all that stuff, I wore that entire identity for almost two decades of my life before I realized it was actually damaging to the person that I. That I felt like I truly was. I mean, I always woke up and felt like I had something inside of me that was going to be explosive in a good way, but I never could really tap into it. And it wasn't until I started trying to model my first mentor, after he started believing in me, long before I believed in myself, that I became aware of the type of person I wanted to become. And then as I pursued the type of person I wanted to become, you know, I'm now in that chair of the person that I wanted to become. And now I want to become a greater version of that, which means that's now what I'm after. But I want to do that through service at scale. So I love that. Perfect.

And that's exactly. You know, it's like, if you want to, you know, inspire others, then be inspirational. If you. If you want to be, you know, more disciplined, then, you know. You know, assume that identity of, you know, a disciplined person and ask yourself, well, day in and day out, how would. What would. What choices would that person make or not make? Yeah. Yeah, I could talk for.

Well, we don't have to make this the only call, that's for sure. One of these other things I was. I was just thinking about reflecting on as you. You were talking was if relationships are so powerful that they can actually work towards our beingness. Meaning. You know, I've said this before on other shows, and my audience may be tired of me saying this, but it was such a pivotal statement that I believe for so many years that I think everybody has a lie like this, that they believe at some point, at some level. And that was when my father said, skagens don't get ahead. They get by.

And that was spoken a handful of times. And inevitably, you know, I think I was sharing this with a friend recently. I was like. I think when he said it, he was genuinely trying to be a father. Like, he was genuinely trying to show me love and affirmation. But I think from his perspective, because everything that he had seen about achievement, success, identity, insecurity, blame, shame, all the stuff that kind of gets rolled up into a negative Behavior system or negative thought system. He was, in his mind, he was trying to save me from that.

But Steve taught me that thinking like that was actually what's going to, was going to keep me stuck. Rather than learning to do this modeling style, behavior and learning to lay out this identity. That's one of the reasons why I love the three alarms so much. Because it's legitimately three alarms in your phone. I mean, legitimately it pings. It's just like a normal wake up call. Right. And what you say in there is so pivotal, you know, about being a world class athlete, about being a world class professional, about being a world class father and husband. And I think there's a lot to be said for that. That, to be honest, until I read your book, I took a lot of it for granted. It wasn't like high on my radar. I think I've kind of moved personally, just being transparent. I kind of moved from this place of workaholism into the martyr where I would just. All I want to do is serve. That's why I spend hours creating content, because I want to. I don't want, you know, at the end of the day, I'm trying to help the person I used to be.

Right, yeah.

As you start building these different things up, I think some of the constructs that are so powerful in the book that everyone should read and identify and apply.

Can ultimately set the course of actually having a meaningful life in a big, big way. Now, one of the things that you. So everybody's heard of a 8020 rule? Well, I say everybody. A lot of people have heard of the 8020 rule, but you took an 8020 role at a different perspective and a different understanding. Break down what you believe the 8020 rule is and how we can best apply it to actually help live this meaningful Life.

Yeah. So 8020 appears at a meta level in the whole book itself. And then you can also apply it at.

More micro levels as well. So.

So in the fact that we are focusing on health, wealth and relationships, are there other aspects of life that we could be focused on that would help us reach fulfillment? Absolutely. But I just believe that those three is the 8020 to life improvement. It is 20% of the categories, factors, domains that you can focus on that will create 80% of the benefit that you seek in life. That is just an example of 8020 with the whole book itself. Stepping back even a little bit further, what does 8020 mean? Just to make sure everyone's on the same page. 8020 is nothing more than the recognition that the universe and the world that we live in is a nonlinear place, meaning that it's not always like for like. It's not this cause always yields this effect. Think about your own life, for example. It will be a minority of the choices that you made in your life that have led to the majority of where you are today. True. Every single choice. There was probably a few pivotal choices that created defining moments for you.

If you operate a business, you may think that every single feature is important for the customer. No, probably not. It's probably 20% of the features that drive 80% of the improvement. Or the guests, you know, or the customer satisfaction. Now this, you know, people shouldn't get too hung up in the numbers. Maybe it's not exactly that, but the point is, is that it's disproportionate. And the beauty in that, in embracing that, is that in a world where we're constantly trying to do more, the realization that you can actually zero in your focus on less, provided that you pick the highest leverage things so that you can get, you know, an 80% benefit means that you have more time, you're focusing on the right things. It leads a less stressful life. You know the problem, One of the, you know, we're talking about traps to reaching your full potential at the very beginning. One of them is perfectionism. And so a perfectionist approach is, no, I'm going to put in 100% effort for 100% result. Yeah. So let's break that down.

Like with. Okay, so let's say we're making a. I'm just going to make something up here. We're making a presentation.

Mm.

Let's say it takes five hours to create a presentation where at the end of it, we're gonna look at it and go, damn, that's perfect. That's a hundred percent perfect. Now.

80, 20 says.

If you would have spent one hour on it 20% of the time, could you have gotten to something that was like 80% good enough? Again, don't get too caught up in the example, you know? Well, the last presentation I did was like, no, I definitely could have done in an hour. Okay, fine, two hours. You know, don't sabotage the message. You know, you probably could have spent less time and got, you know, a good enough result is.

Yeah. I mean, baseball games, if you think about it, are not won by home runs or won by at bats.

Yeah.

You know, it's. You know, there's. Yeah. You've got guys that can walk up and have a unicorn business or a Unicorn life or whatever, but it's, it's rare. The vast majority of the people that I know that have a meaningful life, well, be it, you know, they have wealth or they have a level of freedom in their, in their, in their income level, those people are just people that just get a daily, you know, kind of get a daily achievement done by priorities. I think, you know, one of the things that, I think that the 80, 20, as you've shared it both in the book and even here today, the biggest takeaway is it says, look, focus on what matters. Like that's called a priority, right? If, you know, if I, if I, if I invest an hour with my wife, you know, that's, that's time well invested. You know, if I'm at the gas station or something like that and someone's having a hard time, you know, with life or whatever, and I invest an hour of my time, it's stuff well invested. You know, even I get on myself from time to time because, you know, my kids are a little bit older. I got one that's 19 one, that's 21, that's 23. And now I got a grandson and another grandchild on the way and I'm 45. So. But as I began to look at that, you know, it's, those are moments that I miss. I had a two year window where I couldn't spend time with my family because I had to put together, put back together one of my flagship companies that, you know, got started. We had an embezzlement scenario and it just was a hot mess. And the one like you were talking about on the airplane, the one thing I was constantly thinking about while going to and from miles, driving back and forth to various states, looking at my, my divisions was I miss my wife, I miss my kids. Yeah, I miss my wife, I miss my kids. It taught me so much about understanding the value of balance and then priorities. So much so that it's taught me how to say no.

Yeah, there you go. Beautiful.

And I just love that, you know, before I go into the last couple questions, you know, we've talked a lot about three alarms. It's absolutely a must read for anyone who is doing anything with their life, which is a pretty broad spectrum. Yes, if you're a business person, you will definitely get a lot from it. But also if you are an aspiring person, just in general, you know, someone who has levels of achievement in your heart, why not start now learning what not to make mistakes on it and kind of balance yourself. Where can people actually get the book.

So just head over to my website@ericpartaker.com and you can actually grab a free digital copy of the book right there.

Oh, I love it, dude. I love it. I love it. Well, look, you know one of these other concepts that you've got in the book that to be honest, I was shocked about when I began reading the book. I was like, I don't know if this is possible. Doesn't sound realistic. And that was this concept of shaving 13 weeks, actually adding 13 weeks to your lifespan.

And then I read it and I was like, he might be onto something here.

So how did you discover that?

So that, so there's, there's a lot of research. So I read the book called the One Thing. And in that book they talk about research that says the average person loses about 28% of their workday to multitasking ineffectiveness. Basically jumping around too much from one thing to the next.

Yeah.

That if they just focused and single task, they would actually get a lot more done. And if you take 28% loss in the day times the number of work weeks in the year, that means that 13 weeks on average per year are lost.

Goodness gracious.

And so that's an entire calendar quarter lost every single year. So of course the average person feels like they don't have enough time in their days. They're playing with three quarters in the game instead of four. Like playing a basketball game, you get to the fourth quarter and the referee says, oh, I forgot to tell you, you got to sit out this quarter. And you're like, what, me? No, your whole team. And you're like, well, how are we going to win? Oh, you're not. And so most, most people, you know, they're, they're struggling to compete because they're only playing with 3/4 instead of 4. Now if we extrapolate that to a 40 year career, the average person, because they can't manage their distraction throughout the day, losing an entire decade, a whole 10 years lost to distraction. So how do you practically combat that? Just timesheet your day? If a lawyer can do it for their entire career, you can do it for two weeks to shine a spotlight of awareness on how often you're jumping around from one thing to the next and how often you're jumping around to meaningless things. And if you do that for two weeks, the very act of doing it will make you stick with tasks for longer because you'll be tired of having to record every single time you start something new and you'll start to Question whether or not you really want to put down on the sheet. Facebook, 17 minutes for the third time in an hour.

I love it.

Yeah, so get out. You know, become a single tasker rather than a multitasker. Work on one thing at a time, maintain your focus, and you'll reclaim 13 weeks, an entire calendar quarter every year.

Yeah, yeah. You know, I was, I did a bootcamp not long ago for, you know, just everyday folks who are just looking for a breakthrough. We called it the Breakthrough Bootcamp. Ironically.

I spent almost an hour talking about distractions in general, because one of the questions I used to get all the time or still get all the time, is how do you get so much done in a day? And how are you able to go home and shut it off? Or something along those lines. I was talking to a young man just the other day, and I was like, I made a list of the distractions, exactly what you just talked about. Now, I didn't give myself the timesheet like I was on Facebook for 17 minutes or Clubhouse for six hours, but I did go to it and began to eliminate things that just didn't make sense. Because to your point, some of the research that I found was the average person from 16 to 48 is spending roughly two and a half hours to four and a half hours on a daily basis not doing anything productive. Tv, media, video games, hanging out like, and I don't mean this in a bad cause, you should hang out with friends, especially as soon as you're able to in many respects, in a lot of places, you know, but over almost overdoing it. It's almost like that, that measurement of overindulging anything and harms the whole thing. Yeah, that makes any sense. Which is kind of ironically a premise of your book.

It's the overindulgence that, you know, we gotta, we gotta watch out for. And I just want to say too that like, you know, when I just say overindulgence, you gotta watch like, don't think that.

Living this balanced, more balanced life means that you don't have more fun or it's constraining you.

Your health is so important, you know, that if you're listening or watching right now, you know, deep down this to be true. You know, deep down that your relationships are so important. You know these to be truths. And in the long term, these things will be far more important to you. So you got to remember that nothing in life is for free. Everything requires a payment of some form. You can either pay now through the pain of discipline or if you take the easy route and don't look at the warning signs, you'll pay a much more expensive price later through the pain of regret. So choose your pain wisely. And the pain of discipline now is always cheaper than the pain of regret later.

I don't. That's. That's. Let me. Let me. This is my microphone here. I just dropped that. And I'll see you later.

That was. That was beautiful, man. Well, look, Eric, man, I've had a blast chatting with you today. You know, I have simply loved the conversation. I can't wait to have more and more conversations. We get to know each other even better.

Yeah, I'm happy. Happy to, you know, chat again. And maybe I have you next time around. You come on my podcast.

Oh, that'd be amazing. That'd be fun.

Yeah. So, no, I enjoyed it. And, yeah, again.

Super grateful for. If you're hearing this right now, that means you've listened to this moment.

That's right.

So you can go to Amazon and buy the book. I won't stop you. But you can also pick up a free digital copy. And the reason I'm doing that, by the way, is.

For me, I've had a series from the Skype exit and some other things. Money is important for me, but it's not a primary driver anymore. And after I finished the book, I thought, the messages in this book are so powerful that I don't want money to be a factor. I have people writing me from India who are on incomes. One woman wrote me. She said my annual income is $5,580 a year. She's like, I just wanted to write you and say that this book has had such a profound impact on my life, and I've given it to other family members. The free digital copy.

Yeah.

And that was all I needed to confirm that it's worth just giving it away for free. So if you head over to my website, erickcartaker.com you can pick up a free copy as well.

Guys, it is that rich. It is that rich. It really is. Like I said, I started off with a digital copy, and then I decided to go to Amazon to get a physical copy because I need more space to write more notes and to have more highlighter marks and to do that. So, you know, from my heart to yours, I just want to thank you for answering the call to write the book. You know, I think there's a lot of hidden books and a lot of people that they don't answer the call. And as a result, people that need to hear that inspiration or those words of wisdom and knowledge, they don't get. They don't get that opportunity. So thank you for answering the call, my friend.

I appreciate it. And thanks for giving me the chance to speak about it. Yeah, I could tell you got a good, genuine soul, so thank you.

Appreciate that. Well, look, we'll have to do this again, but for the time being, I know you got other things to do, so I'll let you get back to it.

Cool. All right, thanks.

See you. What a great interview with my good friend Eric Partaker. Make sure you go get his book, but also make sure you put the three alarms to work for you. And if you love that interview, you're really going to love this one right here. So check it out, because when we're.

Lit up because it's something we love to do, everything is different. Our attitude is different, our energy is different, our behavior is different, our courage is different, our vision is different.