Jimmy Naraine left Goldman Sachs to build an online course business by adopting a single identity: "I'm a Spartan." Acting on it repeatedly, through gym sessions and cliff jumping, he bypassed willpower entirely. The identity spread to his whole team, who started running Spartan Races and doing 500-push-up challenges.
Chapters
This Goldman Sachs banker quit his job and completely turned his world upside down by discovering that he could take an online course, put it up on Udemy, optimize the heck out of it, and then make over a million a year so he could live his absolute dream life, traveling around the world, learning from teachers, martial artists, climbing mountains, getting his body into the best shape, This is what happened to Jimmy Narayanan. He's an absolute rock star at this model. He's a teacher here on Mindvalley, and he teaches a program called CoursePro, where he teaches people to design online courses that make money. Here's a short video on Jimmy.
I'm a Spartan leader. I feel it. I feel the— it's crazy how it works, but when you keep doing it, when you keep repeating your powerful identity that means a lot to you, you create this trigger, this neural association. So, so, so to your question, right, whenever I feel like I need to do something, should be doing something, going to the gym, going for a run, getting on a stage, doing anything that's uncomfortable. Whenever weakness shows up, I smash that weakness with my identity.
I'm a Spartan, right? So, observe this. You overcome resistance because of your new identity. And, a new identity is a model of reality. And, in your case, it says, I am a Spartan.
Yeah.
And so, if you need to go on stage and you are feeling fear, Spartans don't feel fear.
Exactly.
Right? If you are suddenly asked to run 10 miles, right, there's a race coming up, you don't feel fear. Spartans don't feel fear. Now, here's the part of the story that's fascinating. Jimmy's identity, I'm a Spartan, became contagious. Jimmy was attending Mindvalley University and he bumped into Jason Campbell, who works for me. What happened was, Jimmy, when he shared the story of his new identity and he embodied it— remember, Jimmy, when you convinced me to jump off a cliff in Pula and I jumped off with you?
Yeah, yeah.
Okay.
It was like maybe a 14-meter cliff. We may have a B-roll.
Yeah, we have the B-roll. So we're going to show that clip because you had that identity and I had that identity, but it was something that spread. So when you said, Vishen, let's jump off this cliff, I'm like, sure, I'm a Spartan. It's gonna be scary, but Spartans wouldn't fear jumping off a cliff. But this identity spread to Jason Campbell. Uh, Jason Campbell is the host of one of Mindvalley's podcasts, really remarkable guy. And Jason decided that he wanted to embrace this identity so much that he would sign up for the Spartan Race.
Wow.
So he decided to sign up for the Spartan Race and he ran the, uh, an easy version of the race. And when he completed it, he spoke to other people in the office and he says, guys, I'm a Spartan. I signed up for the race. But because I'm a Spartan, I want to do the next race. The next race was in the Philippines. And he got 5 other people in the office to run with him. Now, here's the crazy thing that happened. It was a typhoon or a hurricane hit during that race. They completed the race in the middle of a typhoon because Spartans don't back down from danger.
Exactly.
Now, the story gets even weirder. The next Spartan Race, these 5 heroes who were now Spartans in our office, they decided to sign up for the next Spartan Race, and this time, 20 members of my team signed up. This identity from you, Jimmy, became contagious. What I love about this story is that you figured out a way to push yourself so you never, ever, ever back down from exercise. I've been out with you. Everyone else is drinking. You won't drink. You eat a plant-based diet. You are so conscious of your health because of this identity. But the thing is, A solid identity changes other people as well. I'm sure you've heard of the saying from Jim Rohn, you are the sum of the 5 people closest to you.
Yeah.
And, that's how identities shift and shape and change not just you but your world. If you and your student can install a new model of reality that gives them a new identity, you don't just change your student, you change their entire family, you change their And these changes are often irreversible. Now, let me share where this story ends up going. Jimmy came to visit Mindvalley about a year later. And at this point, there were so many Spartans in the office, Jimmy issued a challenge. He said, all right, guys, if anybody is interested, I'm going to skip lunch today. And during our 1-hour lunch break, I'm instead going to attempt to knock out 500 push-ups, and everyone is like, what? And 20 people joined you. And we, on average, everybody hit over 500 push-ups.
Yeah.
And this— and how did we get 20 people who had just been working all morning and had to work again, like, from 2:00 PM onwards, to sacrifice lunch and do 500 push-ups? They were Spartans. And Spartans don't back down from a challenge. And all we ask is this. If you enjoy this, leave a subscribe on our YouTube channel.
