Momentum Podcast: 85

Commit To Making Your Life Easier

by Alex Charfen

Episode Description

Every entrepreneur I’ve ever coached has a tendency to make their lives uncomfortable. I want you to learn to recognize where you’re uncomfortable or you will put up with too much. 

I want to give you license to go through the people, the places, the things in your life and ask yourself are they giving you momentum or are they taking it away?

Full Audio Transcript

I'm Alex Charfen, and this is the Momentum podcast, made for empire-builders, game-changers, trailblazers, shot-takers, record-breakers, world-makers, and creators of all kinds, those among us who can't turn it off and don't know why anyone would want to. We challenge complacency, destroy apathy, and we are obsessed with creating momentum so we can roll over bureaucracy and make our greatest contribution. Sure, we pay attention to their rules, but only so that we can bend them, break them, then rewrite them around our own will.

We don't accept our destiny, we define it. We don't understand defeat because you only lose if you stop, and we don't know how. While the rest world strives for average and clings desperately to the status quo, we are the minority, the few who are willing to hallucinate there could be a better future, and instead of just daydreaming of what could be, we endure the vulnerability and exposure it takes to make it real. We are the evolutionary hunters, clearly the most important people the world because entrepreneurs are the only source of consistent, positive human evolution, and we always will be.

Welcome to commit to making your life easier. Every entrepreneur I've ever coached has a tendency to make their lives uncomfortable and put up with being uncomfortable for far too long, and here's what I mean: The people I've worked with, the people I've been able to advise have hired people that made them uncomfortable. I'll share with you just a quick story of an entrepreneur that was so ... This was one of the most shocking stories I ever heard on a hot seat, but now, I've been doing this for so long, I've heard stories like this over and over again.

I had a, one the top realtors in the country was in one of my courses, and it was a private course, so I'm not going to use her name, but she had a somewhat large team. I think there was about 9 or 10 people on her team. We asked everybody in the audience at the event she was attending to fill in forms telling us if there was anything they were uncomfortable with in their business. You probably heard me say this, find out where you're uncomfortable. Well, that's the best way to find somebody to have an interaction with, like where are you uncomfortable, how long has it been, and what is that you're uncomfortable, and what else can you tell us?

She said she was uncomfortable with her receptionist because she was kind of mean to the team. I remember when I asked her, "How long has it been like this? How long have you felt like she's mean to the team?" She said nine years. I shouldn't laugh because here's what happens to people like us: We are conditioned to put up with where we are uncomfortable. This is why I'm sharing this with you. I'm sharing this with you because I want you to start to recognize where you're uncomfortable because we will put up with too much. Here's why: Every one of us either game the system or survive the system, but you can't say the system really worked for you, and so we're used to being uncomfortable, we're used to not getting our way, we're used to having to try to figure out how to do it someone else's way, how to ... We're also used to being physiologically uncomfortable.

I remember when I was young, I had such a hard time sitting still that I would in trouble for wiggling or bouncing. In my second grade, I used to get sent in the hallway for bouncing. I used to lock my feet under the desk and squeeze the chair so that I wouldn't bounce and I wouldn't get in trouble. Physiologically, I held myself in place. That's how uncomfortable some of us are.

Then I look at how many entrepreneurs I've worked with that had challenges in their childhood and divorce in the family, or maybe some type of abuse or neglect or whatever the thing was that happened to them, illness in the family, death in the family, and we get really good at being uncomfortable, which is one the most prominent issues in any one of us being successful is that we are too used to being uncomfortable. We are, in so many ways, we're committed to being uncomfortable. This is one of those things that we're taught, like, "Get comfortable being uncomfortable. Don't ever let them see you sweat." All of those things just hold us in place.

Tonight, I had a friend of mine over to our house. Her name's Grace. She's just an incredible person. Grace is intentional. She's caring. She's supportive. She's super complementary. She does some work with us and has been to a lot of my events, and she's always like a bright light in the room every time she's there.

She was telling me tonight, "Well, I bought these books, and I haven't read them yet. I feel like I have all the tools for success. I can't understand why I'm not getting myself to do it," and I said, "Well, Grace, do you enjoy reading," and she said, "Ugh, no. Not really. I mean, I read a little bit, and then I have a hard time remembering to go back for it," and I said, "Well, do you like listening more? Are you more auditory?" and she said, "Oh, yeah. I love listening to podcasts," and I said, "Well, Grace, why not buy the audiobooks because you should lean into what you like to do," and she's like, "Yeah, you're right."

I said, "Grace, you need to learn how to make the world work for you and look for momentum. Look at what's easier. If you're not doing ... " and for all of you. This is for everyone, because when she started talking about how she hadn't read the books, I could feel her beating herself up. This is one of the most wonderful, incredible people I've ever been around. She's one of those human beings that has the unique ability to make other people feel comfortable just by being there. She's just really one of those really grounding and real people who you can trust in a situation to be there for you.

For her to be beating herself up over the fact that she listens to podcasts, she's doing the self-improvement work, she's listening to something, she's not just not doing anything, but not really comfortable or excited about reading. Commit to making your life easier. For all of you, ask questions, like where can you make your life easier? I want you to ask yourself right now where have you been judging yourself? Where have you felt judgment from yourself because if you've felt judgment, chances are, you're not getting the help you need. You're putting up with something. You're putting up with feeling uncomfortable because that's what causes us to feel self-judgment, and this happens to all of us because we, again, we are used to being judgmental of ourselves.

For most of us, how many times have we heard things like, "Sit down. Slow down. Hey, you're being too intense. You're not being intense enough. Hey, can you tell us how you feel, and why are you so frustrated?" How many of us have had our frustration mistaken for anger, our confusion seen as irritation or anger with someone else? How many of us had been misinterpreted? We're used to being uncomfortable.

In our lives, we've had those things happen to us, and I'm not saying that they're happening anymore because you know what? We grow out of a lot of those things. A lot of us start obsessively studying or watching other people or reading a ton of books or listening to a ton of audio and doing everything we can so that we stop the areas of discomfort in our lives. We make it so that we feel better about ourselves. We start moving in that direction, but the challenge is we never let go, so many of us don't let go, and you know what? I'm just going to say we never let go because, to some extent, none of us ever really lets go of tolerating being uncomfortable.

It's just who we are, but we have to ask ourselves that question, where am I uncomfortable and where can I make my life easier? Where am I judging myself because if there's judgment, you are not recognizing the discomfort you're in because here's what I really want you to do: I want you to look at your life and ask yourself where are the things that you're not comfortable with, where are the people that don't make you feel momentum, where are the people that make you feel uncomfortable? You can't have someone in your office that makes you feel uncomfortable. It just doesn't work that way. It's not going to work for them or for you. You can't have someone on your team that makes you uncomfortable because it will not work out, I'm telling you. It's just that's how it is in employment situations. If they're uncomfortable with you, you're uncomfortable with them. Neither one of you is ever going to lean in. You've gotta start asking yourself, where are these things?

If you're in a partnership, a business relationship that makes you uncomfortable, determine what it is that is making you uncomfortable in that relationship and ask yourself, is this going to change or can it be changed? If there's not a high percentage chance that, yes, both of those are real, then you have to ask yourself, what are you doing because rarely does an uncomfortable situation end up with us being comfortable in that situation.

Normally, when we're uncomfortable in a situation, we stay uncomfortable in that situation, and it just gets worse. The problem for all of us is, we have been in the situation where it got worse, and it got worse, and it got worse, and it got worse, and it got worse, and we finally broke through, and everything got better, but I want you to know that that doesn't mean that everything in your life has to get worse. You should be looking for anywhere you can, make yourself more comfortable, commit to making your life easier. I want to give you license to go through the people, the places, the things in your life and ask yourself, are they giving me momentum or are they taking it away?

I want you to ask yourself, where am I judging myself, and then figure out what it is that you need to let to of, get rid of, get over, and move beyond because here's the shortest pathway to success, but it also the most difficult to see, is the faster you can put yourself in a situation where all day every day you are doing something you're excited to do with people that you're excited to be around for an outcome that makes you feel like you have purpose in the world, because when you get there, it doesn't matter if you're leading the team or you're part of the team. It doesn't matter if you had the idea or you're supporting the idea. It doesn't matter if you're the face on the website or one of the team who helped the website exist. When you get there, that's when everyone around you including yourself gets into momentum, but here is what the, the rigorous habit that it is going to take is you committing to make your life easier.

What are the people that are in your life that are uncomfortable around you, that you're uncomfortable around them? What are the things that you have in your life that you no longer need, and then where are the places you're going that aren't getting you to where you really want to be? Go through your entire life, figure out where are you misaligning your life with what you really want because the faster you commit to making your life easier, this is the shortest path to success. This is the fastest way that I've ever seen entrepreneurs create the life and business that they really want, and this is the easiest way to build a team because when you commit to making your life easier, you will consistently and constantly let your team know what you need, offload where you're uncomfortable, allow the organization to grow, and grow with it.

For any of you who have been struggling, remember, this is conditioning we've had for most of our lives. There's a reason you're doing it. Give yourself license to change it, and give yourself grace because every one of us including me has been there when we look up and say, "How did I possibly get here?"

If you haven't yet, download my book, the Entrepreneurial Personality Type. You can go to freemomentumbook.com and download it, and if you haven't read it, but you're enjoying this podcast, that book will tell you more about yourself than anyone ever has. It takes about 45 minutes to read it, 45 to 90 minutes depending on your reading speed, but most people tell me something around 45 minutes. I wrote it because I understand my audience and I understand who you are, and I wanted to make the most succinct argument I possibly could for the entrepreneurial personality type and who you are, who I am, and how we are so much more the same than we are even close to being different. Once you read this book, if you've been listening to the podcast, you will know yourself in a way that you never have before.

Thanks for being with me here, and I look forward to speaking to you again tomorrow.

Thank You For Listening!

I am truly grateful that you have chosen to spend your time listening to me and my podcast.

Please feel free to reach out if you have a question or feedback via our Contact Us page.

Please leave me a review on iTunes and share my podcast with your friends and family.

With gratitude,

Alex

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