This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Andrew Lee Miller. Andrew is a startup expert; in fact, he’s known as @AndrewStartups around the world and has been bootstrapping companies for over 15 years. He is a marketing expert and founder of the award-winning marketing agency, Growth Expertz. He has driven growth for 3 VC backed startup exits to the tune of $450 million and dozens of other funded startups, including raising over $25 million in seed rounds in the last 5 years.
Andrew speaks and trains entrepreneurs throughout the world on paid advertising, growth hacking, public relations, search marketing and more. He is also the author of the best-selling book, The Startup Growth Book.
What I love most about Andrew is that he is scrappy and finds a way to make it happen no matter thecircumstances and I’ve brought him on to share his best with you in this episode.
Andrew was born and raised outside Columbus, Ohio. His whole family were entrepreneurs, but he never grew up wanting to be one. He ended up having his own business at 16 detailing cars and had a problem with authority which made him want to stay independent. He went to college for general business and switched to international business. He started a virtual resume startup in his senior year. He and his partner got investment and the business took off – it actually scared him because he didn’t want to be stuck in this one business through his 20’s, so he decided to travel.
He moved the Mexico when he was 21, then after a few years moved to Dubai. Dubai was much different and didn’t have much of a startup culture. He joined a company that was a sort of Craig’s List type service as head of marketing. He growth hacked the company from 800k page view a month to over 25 million and the company was acquired for a large amount. Andrew realized there was a niche in growth hacking. He had a few more successful projects in Dubai and then went to Silicon Valley and had another successful exit. He then started coaching people and became a digital nomad helping startups and traveling to over 40 countries.
You mentioned a formula for growth hacking that you put into practice and now teach others, take us through it.
What is the difference between advertising and marketing?
What do you advise? What’s the best place to get traction?
What are your thoughts on social media? Where should people be to get the most bang for the buck?
At the 22 min mark, Andrew talks about using influencers and micro-influencers to help grow your brand and visibility.
Other PR hacks entrepreneurs can use?
At the 30 min mark, Andrew talks SEO…
Thoughts on raising money and exiting companies?
What is it that you think most entrepreneurs miss that holds them back the most?
Any other lessons from your entrepreneur journey that have made a huge difference?
Best Quote: It’s never too early to start marketing. Marketing is different than advertising. Advertising is something you do to scale up your marketing. Marketing can happen at any time.
Andrew's Misfit 3:
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This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Todd Randall. Todd is a serial entrepreneur. He is an 8-time CEO and business coach from rural Florida who has built businesses in in everything from gyms and spas, to construction and wholesaling. Todd still owns 4 businesses running all of them remotely doing over $6 million a year in revenue.
He is the founder of Beachview Coaching and uses his experience to train business owners how to create sustainable businesses. His specialty is helping small business owners create the lifestyle they desire from the success of their business instead of creating a 100 hour/week job for themselves. Oh, if that is not enough, Todd owns a horse farm in Florida and flies around the world playing polo in different countries.
It's rare to find an entrepreneur with the diverse experience of Todd and I’m excited for him to share his lessons with you.
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Todd is a classic example of an entrepreneur who didn’t fit the mold. He started out as a pharmacist and worked for 10 years at McKesson throughout the world. But, after a decade he wanted to have a bigger impact and ended up buying a franchise. He used his hobbies as an excuse to create his lifestyle. He’s a grinder and has worked himself into his diversity of businesses, but has kept his focus on having the lifestyle he wants.
Talk to us about your businesses. What are they?
How does someone build their business to support their lifestyle instead of being beholden to their business?
Do you have any businesses where you’ve outsources to VA’s?
Any best practices on scaling and running a business a well?
At the 12 min mark, Todd talks about his 5 pts for empowerment.
What challenges come up with multiple businesses? What have you learned to do that well?
Advice for those that want to follow a path like yours in leadership?
At the 29 min mark, Todd talks about how he had imposter syndrome when it came to entrepreneurship because he prefers to do it for having the lifestyle he wants vs. striving for more in some cases. His business is exactly the right size for what he wants to do.
How did you come to know exactly what you wanted?
Best advice on how to exit a business?
What has traveling around the world playing polo taught you about how to succeed and run a better business?
Best Quote: Running a business is a set of skills that can be learned like playing a sport or other things.
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This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Michelle Seiler Tucker. Michelle is the founder of Seiler Tucker Incorporated, a pre-imminent company for fixing, growing, buying, and selling businesses. Over 20 years, Michelle and her team have assisted in the buying and selling of over a thousand businesses. She is also a venture capitalist and two-time #1 best-selling author, speaker, TV, and radio host. Her latest book is called, Exit Rich and it’s being hailed by everyone from Steve Forbes to Brian Tracy, Les Brown, Jack Canfield, and many others.
Michelle has been featured everywhere from INC to Forbes to Entrepreneur and holds just about every certification possible in the M&A space. It’s safe to say she is an expert in how to grow, sell, and buy businesses. And I’ve asked her to come on the show to go in depth in all those areas.
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Michelle has always been an entrepreneur going back to when she was a kid. She did work at Xerox and climbed the ranks quickly, but she could not stay and had to pursue her entrepreneurial spirit. She went into franchise space. She had a lot of buyers that would ask to buy existing businesses instead of starting from scratch. She saw an opportunity and began providing these services. Nowadays, her firm specializes in selling, buying, fixing, and growing businesses. She also invests in businesses and helps guide them to maximize their value.
What are the characteristics of a great business?
Go in depth on the 6 P’s. What do we need to know?
How does an entrepreneur plan their exit strategy from day 1?
What are the big mistakes entrepreneurs make in the sales process?
Anything else we should know?
Best Quote: 80% of businesses will never sell. The #1 reason businesses don’t sell is because the business is completely dependent on the owner.
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This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Yaro Starak. Yaro has an awesome entrepreneur story. From growing up sleeping in an old van parked in the backyard of his small home in Australia to working multiple jobs trying to make ends meet, putting himself through college – Yaro learned he wasn’t an employee. His first breakthrough came in the form a website where he gained following and traction making money with banner ads.
I won’t spoil his story, as I want him to tell it, but he went on to create more online businesses, especially in the blogging space making millions, and created his financial independence. Today he invests in companies – making over 30+ investments to date, continues to build others and coach entrepreneurs. He’s been featured everything from Forbes to Entrepreneur and Business Insider. His latest project is called Inbox Done, an email management company.
I asked him to come on the show to share what he’s learned on his journey and how you can use it in your life.
Yaro shares his story and his experience during this time having business and property in Ukraine. His father was born in Ukraine and escaped after WWII and immigrated to Australia where Yaro was born. When Yaro turned 18, it was 1998 during the Dotcom boom. He started a card game business, a media site where it had commentary, e-commerce store, and he sold advertising. When he went to college, he started an essay editing business to offer editing/proofreading that became a full-time business. In 2005, he got into blogging and found a lot of success and still does it today. He was an early adopter. He sold off the essay company and card business and focused on blogging full time. He turned the blogging into creating courses, e-books, a membership site, etc. It was the first business that did over a million dollars. He traveled the world living in over 26 cities running the business. He did it up until 5 years ago. He then started his current company Inbox Done to help provide outsourced professional assistants.
What are some of the principles you have applied to your different businesses that have allowed you to be consistently successful?
Best advice on how to write good content and sell with it?
Can you layout the components of your business models that you have duplicated?
If you choose one model to work with, which one is best?
Talk to us about blogging. How does someone create a million-dollar business blogging?
Thoughts on driving traffic?
How do you keep up with everything and stay successful across your businesses?
Best Quote: It’s not so much about “working hard and the time you put in.” It's about working hard on the right things that move the needle and it’s ok if takes just a few hours a day. Focus on getting the results.
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Many years ago, I introduced a new format that alongside our regular episodes called “Lessons for Hannah.” Hannah is my daughter and one of the main inspirations for the Misfit Entrepreneur. I wanted to have a place where she could go and learn from her daddy and his Misfit friends throughout her life…. even after I am gone. If you haven’t listened to the first episode of Lessons for Hannah, I urge you to as it gives some more background and tells the amazing story of how Hannah came to be in our lives.
Lessons for Hannah are short, very useful, and sometimes comical lessons, that I want to share with you and give to Hannah to help in your lives. Because I want Hannah to have these for her life, I’m going to speak as though I am talking directly to her. These episodes are a lot of fun and if you think there is a lesson that we should include in these episodes, please don’t hesitate to send it over to us at support@misfitentrepreneur.com. We’d love to share it.
Ok, so here goes…this week’s Lesson for Hannah.
Hannah, In this episode, we celebrate the 300th episode of the Misfit Entrepreneur. And it’s only fitting that it should be a Lessons for Hannah episode. Wow, 300 episodes – that is almost 6 years’ worth of interviews from the top entrepreneur and minds in their areas of expertise. First, I want to give my sincerest thanks to all of you that support and listen to the show. You are the best audience anyone could ever ask for. Second, I can honestly say at this point that you can find an expert on pretty much any topic in business and entrepreneurship amongst the Misfit Entrepreneurs. And I would put the content produced by this show and these entrepreneurs up against any MBA program in the world. In fact, if I can be so bold, I would say that if someone listens to the Misfit Entrepreneur for 1 year and puts the wisdom and guidance shared by these amazing entrepreneurs into practice in their lives, they will be light years ahead of most MBA programs.
Why do I say that and why is it important? Because it is part of the lesson I want to teach you today. As I write this, the world is in turmoil. Not that there isn’t always something going in the world, but particularly this time in history, I think, will end up being significant. Why? Because when history looks back at this time period, it will have a lot to keep up with. We just came out of a pandemic after 2 years where unprecedented measures were taken – in many cases to unimaginable extremes. Coming out of the pandemic, the US and the world has had to contend with a generational economic upheaval that is still in progress and will be for some time. On top of that, we have a major war in Europe in which one side, Russia, more and more, is talking about the use of nuclear weapons. We are seeing supply shortages of many things, but especially food and energy throughout the world. And if that is not enough, we have had governments create massive amounts of debt printing money to no end and injecting it into economies alongside the supply shocks, causing Inflation to reach 40-year highs.
So, what is the lesson I want you to learn in the midst of all of this. First, those that can understand, but separate themselves from all that is happening in the world, and see the “forest through the trees” will find massive opportunities. To do that, they will need to self-educate and take lessons from history. For example, we have been in this situation with inflation before from 1972-1983. If you study this period, it will give you some great insight into what to expect during these times and where opportunities are hidden.
Second, you must think independently and not follow the herd. I amazed at how many things are upside down from even just a few years ago. People scream things like “follow the science” only to change what “the science” is 2 days later. We cannot even agree on how many genders there are anymore. The number seems to change by the week. We are told that down is up and up is down and that things we know to be true are no longer true – things that have held up since time has been recorded in some cases. This where history comes in again. Throughout our human history there have been many times where we did ridiculous things, and the herd, the majority went along with it. There was a time when the consensus of the world was that it was flat and anyone who said it wasn’t, was shunned. We used to burn people at the stake because the herd somehow in a perverted way of thinking claimed them to be witches. In more recent times, we were told that wearing a mask from the time we enter a restaurant to the time we sat down, was needed to prevent getting a virus, but once sitting, we could take it off and breath openly, and everything would be fine – but we would have to put it back on again to leave the restaurant. Regardless of your view on masking, there is no science behind that – its just the herd mentality at work.
The major point I want to make in this lesson is that there are going to be times of turmoil in your life where it seems like the world is on fire and the herd is going in a direction that defies the reality that we know to be true and that has proven to be true. Hannah, it is during these times that the most successful keep their wits about them and stay grounded finding amazing opportunities. But you must be prepared and that comes from self-education and independently thinking things through – not just going along with the herd. Be curious and don’t be afraid to ask questions and challenge the herd mentality. In fact, one of my favorite quotes is from Thomas Jefferson where he said, “Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blind-folded fear.” This quote sums it up. Question things with boldness for the truth will hold up in the end vs. following the herd out of fear and going along with things that are not true. Hannah, this may be one of the most important lessons I can ever give you and I hope that you take it to heart and use it throughout your life. This lesson has served me very well in life and in business, and as I think through over 300 episodes of speaking to some of the greatest minds of our time, I find that that they embody this mentality as well.
Hannah, there are so many other lessons to share you and many new ones for me to learn and I look forward to sharing them over the next 300 episodes!
I love you,
Daddy
Best Quote: If I can be so bold, I would say that if someone listens to the Misfit Entrepreneur for 1 year and puts the wisdom and guidance shared by these amazing entrepreneurs into practice in their lives, they will be light years ahead of most MBA programs.
Misfit 3:
You must learn to think independently of the herd and logically make decisions.
There are going to be times of turmoil in your life where it seems like the world is on fire and the herd is going in a direction that defies the reality that we know to be true and that has proven to be true. It is during these times that the most successful keep their wits about them and stay grounded finding amazing opportunities.
Question things with boldness for the truth will hold up in the end vs. following the herd out of fear and going along with things that are not true.
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This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Molly Rose Speed. Molly has a great story. She is a military spouse who had enough of being a corporate accountant cubicle dweller and decided to create a business to help military spouses and others reach their own dreams through entrepreneurship. In fact, she was named 1st Special Operations Group Spouse of the Year.
She is the creator of Virtual Assistant Academy which provides trusted Virtual Assistant solutions and flawless tech execution to busy entrepreneurs and business owners. Molly has become the go-to professional for some of the most successful entrepreneurs in the speaker/author and content creator industry. Even the former president of Chicken Soup of the Soul is her client. Molly has created the life she dreamed of and is helping others do the same. And I’ve asked her on the share her story and how to completely outsource your business.
www.VirtualAssistantManagement.com
Molly was a young, focused executive hustling in corporate America. She woke up one day and realized that there was more to life than just moving up the corporate ladder. Her husband was being deployed at a rapid speed. And when he was home, she was working and they hardly could see each other. So, she quit. Her husband came home to find out she did not have a job and said, “OK, you’ve got 4 months to figure this out.” She started doing freelance work and had success. It evolved into more clients and success in the personal development space. She was creating the life she wanted and other military spouses kept asking her how she did it. She saw an opportunity to help other military spouses do what she was doing in the virtual assistant space. Virtual Assistant Management was born.
How did being a military spouse help prepare you for entrepreneurship?
What there a catalyst that spurred you to quit? And what is your advice for someone who is in the same place you were and wants to make the leap to entrepreneurship?
Talk about having a plan and taking action. How do you advise people in this area?
Other lessons that you feel are most important from your journey?
Being present in the interactions with people you are with every day.
Talk to us about utilizing virtual assistants, the dos and don’ts, etc.
If you were coaching someone on how to hire their first VA, what would you have them do?
Tell us about hiring an outsourced, COO…
What are the major duties Outsourced COOs do and how can they do it in less than 40 hours per week?
Talk about automation and its importance…
Other best practices to free time and be productive?
Take some time and look at your calendar for the last couple weeks. How did you spend your time? Did you enjoy it? How many things would have made sense to avoid or eliminate?
Any other advice for managing and hiring VAs?
Best Quote: By doing nothing, you are not going to get anywhere.
Molly Rose Misfit 3:
Time freedom – wherever you can create this in your life, look for it and enjoy it.
There is great importance in human connection. Those your surround yourself with greatly affect all areas of your life. Choose wisely in your connections.
We are here to support and engage with one-another. Give and have gratitude. In the end, it is about the impact and experience you had on this earth.
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This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Ari Galper. Ari is the world’s #1 authority on trust-based selling. He’s the best-selling author of “Unlock the Sales Game,” a must read by the way, and “The One Call Sale.” He’s been featured everywhere from Forbes to INC and CNN and is sought after by business owners, entrepreneurs, and major corporations like Citibank and GE to help them improve their sales organizations.
But the thing I am most excited for Air to share is the journey he took to become who he is. In some ways, it parallels my own journey with the Misfit Entrepreneur as we both have a very special why. Of course, we are going to talk all things sales and selling too.
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Ari met his wife over 20 years ago. She was from Sydney, Australia. He came to meet her family and fell in love with the country. They lived in LA for a while and moved to Australia after the birth of their son. He was in professional sales in tech and other industries prior to going out on his own.
At the 6:30 mark, Ari tells the story of a major sale that would double the size of the tech company he was working. He did the demo and got awesome feedback. It went so well, he thought it was a done deal – until it wasn’t. This was where he learned how important it was to use trust-based selling to succeed.
Ari asked himself, “Why are people afraid to tell me the truth?”
You must shift your mindset away from the goal of the sale and instead build deep trust with people where they feel vulnerable and comfortable enough to open up and tell you the truth.
You credit learning to be your son’s dad as a breakthrough for Trust-Based selling – what was the breakthrough?
So, what is it that companies and salespeople doing wrong in selling?
Define Trust-Based Selling…
The redefinition of selling as you know it.
Take us through the process. How does an entrepreneur or salesperson get to the point where a prospect believes that they truly get them and understand them?
Why is the sale lost at “hello?” And what do people need to do differently in the beginning?
At the 25 min mark, Ari gives examples of what to say on an initial call.
How is unlocking the sales game comparable to the Japanese art of Aikido?
How does someone develop themselves to be able to practice Trust-Based Selling?
Talk to us about the “One Call Sale.” Explain your philosophy.
Final thoughts?
Best Quote: There is an invisible river of pressure that flows under every sales conversation, and you need to learn how to remove it, so you don’t play the sales game.
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This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Carson Tate. Carson is the best-selling author of Work Simply: Embracing the Power of Your Personal Productivity and founder of the business with the same name which helps clients amplify team performance, better engage their workforce, and increase productivity.
Carson and the principles of Working Simply have been featured everywhere from Fast Company to Forbes to the Harvard Business Review. And Working Simply has helped some of the largest organization including FEDEX, J&J, Chick-Fil-A, and Lowes, just to name a few, improve their performance.
I bet you can guess why I asked her on the show. What entrepreneur wouldn’t want to improve team performance, better engage, and increase productivity?
https://www.workingsimply.com/work-style-assessment/
Carson started her career in corporate America in HR/Training. She then went into outside sales for Big Pharma and that is where the light bulb went off for her and where she realized she wanted to be an entrepreneur. It was like having her own business, until they changed her compensation which require her and her team to change how they did things. They had to become more productive, so Carson developed a system that got great results to a point where it became a model for the company. Carson saw that there was a good opportunity for a business to help companies in this area, so she left and launched her business.
What does it mean to work simply? What are the principles?
What are the principles?
Where do you see challenges in productivity consistently?
Explain why email management is so important?
At the 14 min mark, Carson and I have a great conversation on being productive in training people to be respectful of your time.
Thoughts on running a team to be most productive?
The data on multi-tasking proves it does not work. Multi-tasking is an illusion and goes against your biological design of voluntary vs. involuntary focus. You are much less productive when you multi-task.
Any other productivity tips that people should know about?
What do you see as the most important thing a leader can do each day to help their team’s success?
What have you learned along your journey about how to consistently perform and succeed?
Best advice to an entrepreneur just starting out?
There is a difference between being a leader and a CEO. What are your thoughts on how to maximize your success as a CEO?
Your thoughts on how to select the right coaches?
Anything else you feel is important for us to understand for success?
Best Quote: The most important practice is the recognition that people don’t think and process information the same way, so there is not a one-size fits all solution to productivity
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This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Alisa Cohn. Where to start with Alisa. She has been named the top startup coach in the world and has been coaching startup founders to help them grow into world class CEOs for almost 20 years. She is also an angel investor and advisor and has worked to help everyone from Venmo to Etsy to Draftkings in their sucess. She has coached CEOs and C-Suite Executives at many of the largest Fortune 500s such as IBM, Google, and Microsoft.
And if that is not enough, she is a top leadership speaker and guest lecturer at Harvard, Cornell, and even the Naval War College. Alisa is the author of the best-seller, From Start Up to Grown Up and I’ve asked her to come on the show to talk everything startup and leadership.
Alisa was in the non-profit world and had a moment of truth when she was working at a university. A provost told her that “you could not manage faculty because the have tenure.” She thought that it could not be. She went to business school at Cornell and ended up focusing on finance and accounting. She ended up working at Price Waterhouse Coopers. She was fast-tracked. After working for some time, she knew it was not what she wanted to do. One Sunday she woke and thought to herself that she hoped to get the flu, so she didn’t have to go to work the next day. 18 hours later, she was rushed to the emergency room with the flu!
She was out for 2 weeks and during that time really thought about what she wanted. She went to a conference and there was speaker and coach. They were amazing. The next day, she followed the coach and watched her speak – she loved it and decided that she wanted to go that route. She took jobs during the dotcom boom and went through coach training. When the dotcom bubble burst, she decided it was time to go on her own and she’s been doing it ever since.
Define Leadership…
Qualities of great leaders?
How do you teach people to gain better situational awareness?
Leaders have blind spots. What are the ones you see most prevalent in leaders?
Most important aspect for a startup leader to get right from the beginning? Most important aspect for a leader in a mature company?
Talk to us about dealing with the internal politics of business….
Power and Influence – what role do they play in the development of a leader and what should leaders understand about them?
How does a leader and organization developer their guidepost and values?
Key elements of a successful startup?
Personal mastery – how does someone learn to live and work at their peak?
What have you learned that is most important for success as an entrepreneur?
What is the most unexpected thing you found on your journey?
Best Quote: The longer you can stay in the game, the better chance of success.
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Many years ago, I introduced a new format that alongside our regular episodes called “Lessons for Hannah.”
Hannah is my daughter and one of the main inspirations for the Misfit Entrepreneur. I wanted to have a place where she could go and learn from her daddy and his Misfit friends throughout her life…. even after I am gone. If you haven’t listened to the first episode of Lessons for Hannah, I urge you to as it gives some more background and tells the amazing story of how Hannah came to be in our lives.
Lessons for Hannah are short, very useful, and sometimes comical lessons, that I want to share with you and give to Hannah to help in your lives. Because I want Hannah to have these for her life, I’m going to speak as though I am talking directly to her. These episodes are a lot of fun and if you think there is a lesson that we should include in these episodes, please don’t hesitate to send it over to us at support@misfitentrepreneur.com. We’d love to share it.
This Week's Lesson for Hannah
Hannah, I am excited to speak to you about one of my favorite topics, mental toughness. There are many takes on this subject and tons of books written on it. It seems there is a new book out on the subject every week. And I can understand why, achieving true mental toughness is personal to each person. How you find yours will be personal to you. I can only speak from my experience and how I have achieved my levels of mental toughness in my life – and I hope it inspires you to level up in yours.
First, what does it mean to be mentally tough? To me it is the ability to respond rather than react to hard circumstances in our lives. Notice I said respond. Most people react emotionally and let fear drive them when hard times come. They cede control of thought to the basic animal side of humanity and react in ways that are typically detrimental to themselves and their potential.
Being mentally tough is being prepared for the hard times because they will inevitably come, and then having the fortitude to say no to the emotional reaction and instead think logically and work through the challenge to reach the best outcome. Being mentally tough is keeping perspective as hard times come, and they go, and life goes on. You must never lose faith in yourself, but you must see reality for what it is.
To be mentally tough is to be able to endure and outlast. One of my favorite movie trilogies is the Batman Trilogy directed by Christopher Nolan. I like it for a lot of reasons. The series is a great set of lessons on good, evil, how fragile societies can be and of course, mental toughness. In one scene in the Dark Knight, Bruce Wayne and Alfred are talking about how in order to stop the Joker, he will have to turn himself in as the Joker has demanded it in order to stop his anarchy and crime spree. This was a moment of mental weakness for Bruce Wayne as he knew deep down that turning himself in would not stop the Joker and Batman was the only way. He asks Alfred what he should do, and Alfred says, “Endure, Master Wayne. Take it. They'll hate you for it, but that's the point of Batman, he can be the outcast. He can make the choice that no one else can make, the right choice.”
I’ve learned that mental toughness is making the right choice even when it is the hardest choice, even when it may bring pain. It is making the right choice knowing others may not understand why at the time or be angry at you for it. It is enduring through all the things, including your own thoughts, that tell you to stop or quit, or give in because you know what is on the other side. You know the ultimate prize is waiting.
I have found my mental toughness through sports and entrepreneurship. I played football from grade school through college and then after college started endurance racing and ultimately Ironman. Sports provide one of the ultimate battle fields for mental toughness. You will go through highs and lows. You will stretch yourself physically and mentally. You will experience fatigue, not just from the work you must do to compete, but also in the form of doing something for a long period of time. I played football for almost 15 years and there were times where I just got tired of it – after all, I had been doing it for so long.
But something I realized is that I spent all this time getting to where I could be my best at the sport and to quit would be to waste all of that hard work and effort. It is the same with Ironman racing. There are a lot of days where my training plan calls for me to train for 5, 6, 7, hours or more. This means, I need to be starting at 4 or 5am in the morning to get everything in alongside all the other things I do and commitments to our family. I would be lying if I didn’t state that there are days where I get up and just am not feeling it and don’t want to do it. I question why I am even doing it – after all I don’t have to…it is an elective sport for me at this point in my life. Those are all emotional reactions, and I have learned to respond logically. It is in these moments that I think of all the benefits of what I am doing and move forward. For example, I have done all the work to get into the best shape physically and mentally of my life and the training is the practice to keep it. After all, it is a lot easier to stay in shape than to get in shape. I also know that it helps me in my health and my ability to be able to do all the things I do with you and your mom. I also know that it helps me as an entrepreneur and in my life as it keeps me disciplined. It keeps me in a good routine and structure. Lastly, I am being rewarded for the work as I am now Top 10% for my age in the world in the sport. And I also know that I have not reached my full potential yet. So, this keeps me going.
Entrepreneurship is similar to sports in that you have to take a long-term view and have the endurance to keep going through the challenges that present themselves on almost a daily basis. I have learned that the more problems you can handle and the bigger ones that you can handle, the larger your business can grow. And this capability allows you to develop others and help them reach their potential, because you can show them through your experience that they are capable of so much more. And ultimately, as an entrepreneur, you want to develop your systems and people so that the business can continue to grow and thrive without you having to be there for it to do so. The only way you can get there is by being mentally tough and sticking it out until it happens.
Hannah, developing your mental toughness and learning to respond rather than react when challenges and hard times come is a lifelong journey. It is worth it. It is worth to push and stretch yourself. It is worth to live into your true potential and capabilities. It is worth it to endure and develop the fortitude needed to see things through. I’ll leave you with a secret and probably the most important advice I will give you on this topic. You don’t have to do it alone. In fact, you are not alone. While you can rely on others, like your mom and I, to help in tough times, there is something else that is always there for you and by your side and that is God. Knowing God and Jesus are walking with you on your journey will keep you going. In fact, one of the most important phrases I use late in Ironman races after swimming over 2 miles, biking over a hundred, and getting deep into my marathon is “God is with me.” When I am feeling like my muscles don’t want to move any more or that I am too tired physically and mentally to go on, I just say that to myself, “God is with me. God will help me finish.”
And it is in these moments that I truly understand what it means to be mentally tough and keep going, because that is what Jesus did for us. He endured more than any human being every could to sacrifice himself and take on the burdens of this world, and knowing this, knowing I have him by my side means I can see anything through. He is the greatest example of mental toughness there is. Hannah, develop your mental toughness and you will be amazed at how you can see anything through.
I love you,
Dad
Best Quote: Being mentally tough is being prepared for the hard times because they will inevitably come, and then having the fortitude to say no to the emotional reaction and instead think logically and work through the challenge to reach the best outcome.
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