Kyle Crooke: The "Why" Whisperer (The Business Blast Podcast)

All right everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Business Blast podcast. I got Kyle Crook with us, so welcome to the show, man.

Well, thank you very much, happy to be here.

Of course. So before we dive in, I'll give a little introduction. So Kyle Crook is the Why Whisperer, is a soon-to-be author and creator behind kylecrook.com where he helps people claim their purpose and lead passionate, persistent lives. So We'll dive into the first one, Kyle. The first one I got for you is, what is the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?

I would say kind of a progressive story for my life is how I overcame social anxiety. So all the way till high school, undergrad, and college, I never hung out with people. I didn't think I would add value to them, and I just had a lot of limiting beliefs and wasn't really able to go to parties, go to events, or really interact with anyone my age. Then over time, as I got out in the working world, went back for my MBA as well, I just said, "Hey, you can show up to parties and events. You don't have to talk to anyone. You can just be there and stand around." I started doing that, and I felt awkward just standing around, so then I would go and talk to people. Over time, I really developed an enjoyment and a pleasure and appreciation of other people and of being in community with them. There was never an aha moment for me. And I think that's kind of the best part of it is that a lot of things in life, the best things come, there's not a kind of a, you know, momentary decision that changes it, but it's every day. If you push yourself, you push yourself outside your comfort zone and stay consistent and kind of build on that, you'll be able to counteract any limiting beliefs. So now, you know, to be honest, I wouldn't say that I'm the best at parties or any events like that, but I definitely enjoy interacting with people. So the best story for me was, being able to overcome those limiting beliefs or social anxiety to put myself out there and actually find a new love and a new passion for people and for socializing with them.

Absolutely, man. I'm happy you were able to overcome it. Like, I know a lot of people that do struggle with that. Like, I'm like, I actually struggled the opposite way. So like, what I had to get used to is like just being by myself. Um, like, I'm a natural extrovert, so like For me, like, even like writing, you know, like being by myself and writing was like really difficult. Um, I just— I felt really like alone, and like I got anxiety from being alone. So, um, but I think it's interesting how it's like naturally we could be totally opposite, but then if you just, you know, go out on a limb and like overcome your fears, then now you love it, right? Is that— that's what you're saying? Like now you enjoy actually connecting with a lot of people?

Absolutely. It's, you know, fear is a lot, you know, in your head, your limiting beliefs. And now I generally enjoy talking to people. Yeah, I'm not the best at it. I won't ever be the best, but I, you know, found a passion for people. And, you know, send me to, you know, Guatapalooza, the CrossFit event this weekend with a bunch of people in a crowd, and I'll, you know, have a blast, which is something I would never have done before. I went when I was in New York, there was a Drake concert, Drake and Migos. I went by myself and sat in a crowd of people. I would have never been able to do that before. And I had a blast. So yeah, it's really cool to see where your life goes, where you progress.

And that is perfect because you're on the Business Blast podcast. I had to say it, man. I couldn't help myself there. Corny but true. Um, so we'll go to the next one. Uh, the next one is, what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?

So I'm a— by day, I'm an organizational change management consultant. And by night I'm a content creator working on motivation and personal development. So, um, what I heard from a teacher in undergrad, he said the more things change, the more things stay the same. So it's great to be in change management and understand the newest technology, the newest trends, whether it's Oracle, SAP, XYZ. But really when it comes down to a personal development kind of fundamental human level, the basics are the basics, and they've been the fundamentals for years. You know, it's consistent, work hard, trust the process over the outcome and the results. People get really bogged down into the newest trends and trying to optimize their morning routine and do X, Y, and Z, when really, for hundreds of years, it's been the same basic principles are get your rest, work hard every day before you move on to the next thing, so on and so forth. The basic personal development principles are still there. It's just that common sense really isn't common practice. There's not a quick fix and it takes years to form overnight successes. So overall, I would say what really sticks out to me is the more things change, the more they stay the same. So instead of getting caught up in the newest trend or fad, you know, just get back to the basics, to the fundamentals. Even though it's not as sexy as other things are, it'll lead to sexy results down the road.

I agree, man. One of the biggest things is sleep. And it was cool because I got to interview— are you familiar with Gary Vaynerchuk?

Yes. Oh yeah, yeah.

So I got to interview him, and I've probably been watching him now for like 3, 4 years. Um, and like, I went down a path of following his, like, you know, hustle, you know. And but I was like not getting a lot of sleep, and I actually started to get— and I don't know if this was all the cause, but I started to get like panic attacks. It was really strange. I didn't know what was happening, but my health was like not going well. And then actually when I interviewed him, it was interesting where he kind of said like he still gets, you know, the appropriate amount of sleep. So it's not just like working 24/7, it's like what do you do with the hours that you have available? And like sleep is one of the most important things, um, to even operate at a high level. So, and again, it's like so basic, but it's like I think a lot of people when they're like working really hard trying to get to that next level, they like forget about the simple things that like, well, listen, man, even if you work 4 more hours but you only got 4 hours of sleep, you're probably not going to be as productive. So it doesn't, it doesn't work out that way. So you should just get your sleep and then, you know, work for less hours but more productively.

Exactly. It's sleep management, time management in there. I've met one person legitimately who can thrive on 2 or 3 hours of sleep. That is not the norm.

So That's crazy. I want to meet this person.

She does, she like will write, you know, tens, tens of pages of, you know, books and TV scripts and do a bunch of other stuff during the day. It's absolutely insane. Wow.

All right. Well, let me know, maybe I want to have her on the show too. Maybe that's crazy.

Oh, she has lots of stories. She can talk your ear off for hours and you'll just, your jaw will be dropped the entire time.

So my next one for you is what's your best piece of overall business advice?

Is, you know, it's kind of kind of boring and kind of hackneyed at this point, but it really is just staying consistent. I see a lot of people who are focused on the result, on the outcome. They say, okay, I want $1 million in the next 2 years. I want to, you know, lose 50 pounds in the next year, which is great, but they don't focus on the process or focus on loving the process. So I've become much more— it allows me to be much more consistent and much more present on a daily basis and then focus on the process. So I'm writing my book. I challenge myself every day to write 500 words or to edit, you know, 1,000 words or something. So it's really made me appreciate the kind of the grind of doing it every day. And every day having that one tangible little chunk gives me momentum for the next day. And then after, you know, a month or two, I was able to get my first draft done. And I'm doing the same thing for my second draft. Whereas for a couple of years, I was telling myself, all right, write a book and be done in 2 years. I never actually did anything towards it. So really is trusting the process over the outcome and staying consistent. That's the best advice that I can give right now. Yeah, yeah.

No, I couldn't agree more. I tell with my first book, I tell everybody the same thing, like how I did it is I wrote 1,000 words every morning, and then I got my— and it's shorter book, but I got my rough draft done in about a month. And that was from— but it had to be part of my morning routine. And there's something like this weird thing, at least with me, it's like when you do something for a while, like you don't want to— and I guess I guess it's just called a habit. But the reason that I completed it is because I had done it for weeks and I was like, I've already come this far, like, why would I stop now? So like, if you can just even get a few days, I think, of consistency in a row, it really just like picks up momentum and helps. Exactly.

Once you, once you get that and it becomes a habit, you know, the momentum turns to habit, then you're good to go.

That's absolutely— yeah. And it's like a different mindset of it too. It's not like you're looking at it like, oh, I'm gonna write a book, and then you never get to it because you're looking at like the big picture. You got to break it into smaller chunks, and that's how you can achieve it. So, um, so my next one for you is, if you could, uh, give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?

So I'm a nerd by trade and by heart. Um, in, in high school, I was carrying around 20-something pounds of textbooks on me every day. So It was great in developing my academic appreciation, but I would tell myself to stop spending so much time in my textbooks and spend more time in sports, hanging out with people, socializing, develop that more, the social life for me. Even though it was a great foundation to go for college and all the stuff that I love reading about and learning about now, I just spend a little more time out of theory and more in application with other people with the natural world around me, because I find— I found much more fulfillment and enrichment in relationships and, you know, being in nature and the outside world than I ever have in a textbook. So, not to ignore the textbooks, but to, you know, take it in stride and really use, you know, life as my main teacher. So, I'd say don't stress out so much and, you know, get your nose out of textbook and just have a little more fun. Yeah.

And that perfectly leads into the next one. So in your opinion, what's the key to happiness?

So it's interesting. So I— and again, maybe it's just like a semantics thing, but for me, I'm gonna take a little more, I guess, a little deeper philosophically. Um, I don't, I don't really like the, the coin— the verbiage of happiness. To me, I associate happiness as being very temporary based on circumstance. Like, oh, I'm feeling really happy today because I crush this podcast interview, which hopefully I'm doing. More importantly, what I'm looking at is joy. So I kind of look at joy as the permanent feeling of peace and comfort regardless of circumstance. And to really get joy is to have an anchor point on what your identity is. So as a Christian, my anchor is I'm a child of God and a person of worth. And that doesn't change based on any circumstance. And so around that anchor, that identity, I have core values and core beliefs. That don't change based on whatever else happens in the world. So for me, joy is really just having an identity and permanently understanding that the identity and your value doesn't change based on the temporary. So I'm definitely, I'm not the happiest person all the time, and that's, you know, granted because of circumstance, but I would say that I'm getting more joyful and joyful in each circumstance. That's what I'm going towards.

Absolutely, man. Um, so I'm excited for this next one because you seem, you know, nerd by trade. Uh, so, uh, what is the best book or textbook that you've read and what was the number one thing you learned from it?

A textbook would have probably been one of my chemistry books. I actually had like a sacred chemistry binder with like all my work and everything, and she was my baby for a while. Um, I'm gonna be very— or I guess, you know, kind of generic in this and say, uh, Stephen Covey's Seven Habits for Highly Effective People. Yeah. One of the books that I've read like more than once, I've read it 2 or 3 times, and 2 things that stick out to me. One is sharpening your saw. So like you said before, taking the time to sleep, and you talked about, you know, before the podcast, your, you know, love of running. It's just great to get the juices flowing and to be able to, you know, take recovery and rest. But what really stuck out to me in Covey's book was that people develop and mature at different rates. And so especially with Instagram, social media, it's easy to see other people's progress and Comparison really is the thief of joy because you're saying, "Hey, why am I not at that stage?" It's funny because you'll never compare yourself to people who you think are better off than you, and you won't look at other people who you think are worse off than you to gain appreciation or gratitude for it. I would say just understand that you're running your own race. You mature in your own time. Nothing is right or wrong. Nothing is good or bad. It just is, and it's what you do with it. I forget where it is, but for me, biblically, recently I read All things are made beautiful in their own time. So for me, it helps me keep present and it keeps me focused on myself and what I can control.

So absolutely, yeah, yeah, I agree. I think one thing to like really remember as well is that a lot of social media is a highlight reel. So like you can't take Instagram, you know, you can't like think that that's actually that person's life all the time, you know, because I mean, nobody— it's just nobody's very tough life to live. Yeah, yeah, right. I think you Maybe you just die from ecstasy. Like, you'd be like, ah, all the time. I don't know. So, and you may have already said it, but my next one is, what's your favorite quote and why?

So recently I came across it from Anthony Hopkins. I forget the exact quote, but paraphrased is essentially, expect nothing and accept everything. So, and expecting nothing is really great at managing expectations, not just for others but for yourself. And then accept everything, just, you know, is a sense of empowerment and ownership. I can only control, you know, what I do and how I respond to other things. So everything that happens outside of that, just accept it as is and do the best that you can with it. So expect nothing except everything. That's been a mantra for me lately.

Yeah, I like that, man. That's awesome. Um, well dude, thank you for coming on. The last one I got for you is where can our listeners best, uh, connect, uh, with you online?

Perfect. Yes. So you said before the website at kylecrook.com. I've got a blog there. I keep it consistently updated and I've got, you know, my services and offerings for content and all that good stuff. LinkedIn, I'm happy to connect. Just look me up, Kyle Crook, the Y Whisperer. I'll show up there. And then Instagram as well. I'm @claim_your-purpose. So @claim_your-purpose. I put inspirational fitness videos on there and other motivational personal development stuff too.

Perfect, man. Thank you again for coming on. Awesome.

Thank you so much, Tyler. Appreciate it.