Ep 8 - Leadership and Self Deception

0:02 Welcome back to another episode of the MRM Podcast. I'm Chris. And I'm Brandon. Join us as we discuss business, life, and legacy. It's business time. Yo, yo. Hello. How you doing, brother? It's funny how we open these things because you and I never talk to each other that way. But it's like, it's kind of like the situation calls for like, so how do you open up a podcast? Something, right? You do something formal. It's that uncomfortable thing of like, what's the first thing you're going to say? Right. And yo, yo seemed completely out of characteristically normal. We're both dads. All right, shut up. Okay. Now that that's over.

0:43 I have a topic for us. Okay. Have you ever noticed, of course, I have lots of opportunities to point towards conversations with other people, right? It's really easy to identify this in other people. Oh, we're talking about friends, things we've observed in others. Oh, yeah. There's things, you know. You ever been in a conversation with somebody or an interaction with somebody and you know, in your know of no's, that they're not telling the truth? Yeah. And I don't mean in a way of, I caught three fish. Really, I actually only caught one. Like, I'm not talking about a bold face lie, right? Yeah. Trying to convince me the color's red when the color's blue.

1:24 I'm talking about that more... Like posturing. It's posturing. They're presenting themselves in a certain way that's really not true, right? To what's playing out behind the scenes. Yeah, what's real. So then here's the, it's so easy for me to see this. And I see it all the time, right? In my self-righteousness, I see this all the time. And then I see all the ways that when we're not telling the truth, when we're not living in the truth, when we're not speaking from the truth, that it stops us. from taking a really good coaching opportunity or taking in some information that really could have a profound impact on our lives, on our social circles, whatever.

2:09 And then a big part of me realizes it's me. Like I do this all the time. I do it as an entrepreneur, I do it as a dad, I do it as a husband, I do it as a friend, where there's lots of little moments Where I'm not really telling myself the truth, right? Here's an example for me right now. This is an easy one to tell because I can be transparent. I don't feel like it's too intimate. Physical fitness, okay, 45. I am well into the dad bod zone and I'm trying to fight that. And now the meal thing, I got a grip on this year, right? In January, I buckled down, I woke up, I got on the scale, it scared the shit out of me.

2:50 And I decided, okay, this is the year. And I've actually stuck to being really diligent with my meals and how I'm eating. And it's had a really great impact. But there's really this component that's left out there hanging, which is my physical fitness. I need to marry it with some proactive physical fitness. And I can't tell you how many times I've had a conversation with someone and I've been really free about telling them, yeah, I'm eating well. I've been really focused on some exercise and physical fitness. But it's not true. Like I'm not really like, and here's why it's important for me is that if I was actually in truth, doing the thing that I know in concept would work, that I know in theory is a good idea, that I project, right?

3:38 Because I know it's the right thing to say. I would actually be reaping the benefit of a six pack or the benefit of a quicker two mile sprint, whatever. You know what I'm saying. There's a reality that even in our business, right? There's certain activities that I talk about and I kind of allude to the fact that we're doing on a consistent basis. right? If I was, I'd be reaping the benefit of it. I can't be alone. I can't be the only person that's doing this, right? No, I mean, I think it's funny. I'm trying to think of a specific example because I think I do it so often in so many different ways. And it's a matter of, I think we all, we make our judgments about good enough, but then we have this other standard that we are trying to project.

4:25 So in the moment we settle for good enough with our behavior, I think a lot of times like our, just our willpower isn't high enough, whatever. And so we, we go to whatever the mark is good enough for us to feel okay about ourself. But then we realize it's not quite as good as what we think others expect of us or how we want to be seen. Like we want to be seen as somebody who's really like, we're out front. Oh yeah. Yeah. We like, we want to, we want to put on that discipline equals freedom shirt. Yeah. So people realize how serious we are about our life and our business. Right. Right. When, when in reality, we, we maybe don't have the energy for that or the drive for that or whatever, you know, whatever it is, we just haven't built up the discipline for that.

5:10 Yeah, we're not executing at that level, period. Yeah. Right? So then, and I think that this was what I was wrestling with a little bit this morning is I'm thinking to myself, how many times, and then this is where maybe it turns a little serious, right? Because my example is kind of funny. But the reality of it is this is having a really profound impact on my ability to make strides towards other goals. So think about this. How often are we telling ourselves we don't have time? we are working pretty hard on these things. Hey, we're making grounds on this stuff. We're falling forward. Like all these sayings that I catch myself using. And I would say the majority of the time, I do feel that way.

5:53 But how many times am I compromising what I could be experiencing because I'm just not freaking being honest with myself? So it's like, it's one thing even to take this and say, I'll be in a conversation with someone and we project a little bit. And quite honestly, guys, if you're owning a company, you run a company, is there some version of faking it until you make it? Hell yes. Let's not fool ourselves. If you're a small restoration company and you know you got the stuff, you know how you can go into a small commercial loss and execute, are you often walking into that relationship in some way, shape, or form realizing a little bit that you're a duck?

6:38 On the surface, that duck looks as if he's half asleep. But if we dive just underneath the surface and we see their little webbed feet, those little guys are just kicking away. And how often do we find ourselves in that position where we know we can figure it out, but we kind of got to fake it until we get the opportunity. Okay, that's not what I'm talking about here. There's a difference between that and me telling myself that I'm legitimately giving everything I have to something when really at the end of the day, I'm not. And I think one of the places this really... I mean, of course, we get a face full of it when you're an entrepreneur. But I think the other place that this shows up so much is... When we're really getting sound advice or we're being exposed to a scenario, there's a really great lesson if we can just speak the truth to ourselves in that moment.

7:30 I'm just thinking how often we are as business owners. We put on this. And I don't think I'm crossing paths here with other topics. But I think I see this all the time, not just in myself, but with others that we're working with, or maybe just people in the industry in general. I see this mantle that business owners put on. And they strut around in this title of business owner. I founded, I co-founded, right? But then they're not really doing anything to develop their leadership competency, right? they're not necessarily changing the expectations on themselves because they've now adopted a formal title that placed them in a whole new level of responsibility.

8:13 Like the actions aren't necessarily marrying up with this new set of game rules or this new... Does that make sense a little bit? Yeah. Like I often... I'll have conversations with my kids, like, often is like, hey, I hear you articulating that you want to do X, Y, Z. But I have to be honest with you and say, it does not appear as if your actions are aligning with XYZ plan. And the reason that comes up and often what's followed is, how often are you really telling yourself the truth? Right? Son, daughter, friend, brother, whatever. Yeah. Like, if we're really dealing in the truth... our actions would start to change because we would be confident enough maybe or we'd be honest enough to say, what I'm doing right now actually won't allow me to hit that goal.

9:02 And maybe that's where I'm going with this is like, how many times are we working with operators who hire us because they say things like... I want to be able to delegate more efficiently. I don't want to work 80 hours a week. I don't want to be the choke point in my business. I want to be able to hand off responsibilities. Like all these things, right? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And we go, awesome. There's a marriage made in heaven because that's exactly what we try to help people do. But then the reality sets in and we see some friction between change in actions, that will actually create this different outcome they want. And for some reason, we see a lot of times where these business owners and business operators, they're not saying the truth.

9:47 We're going to have someone on our show soon. We just recently got her locked in that's going to tear up, I think, this idea of I don't have time. Which is like... I use it too often. Sure. You, right? Our clients, she's going to blow that crap up when we find out exactly what she was capable of doing with her 24-hour period, which will be really exciting. But again, this is what I'm talking about. How often are we setting rules of engagements for ourselves? How often are we setting expectations for ourselves, but we're not being honest? in the evaluation of it, the execution of it, if we're following through, we're not saying the truth, right?

10:29 Yeah. Well, you know, it's funny. I always, this was one of my big kind of pitches when I was doing executive coaching. I would say, look, you are ideally, hopefully, mentoring, developing, and holding your team accountable. Who, as the owner, is doing that for you Well, and so a lot of people hire coaches for that, right? To help. And great coaches will really push on the truth, you know, that you're presenting, right? To really find out, okay, what's the real, what's really going on here, right? So a great coach will do that, but we can do that same thing for ourselves. And I think that's what you're saying is, like, how often are we reflecting on, is my yes really yes?

11:12 Like, or have I gotten a little bit lackadaisical about... Following through on what I'm saying. Yeah. Because as the owner, and I think this is the thing that all any of us could fall into. And I think we're just, again, we're lying if we say we don't. Is that we can get into this privileged position where nobody can question our behavior. Mm-hmm. You know what I mean? Oh, yeah. And I think some of the best leaders that you and I've been really privileged to either work with or under or observe, like they intentionally place themselves under the authority of others or intentionally submit themselves to other people's input. There you go. Right?

11:53 Yeah. And I think that helps them. maintain a good grasp on, okay, I have my truth, these stories that develop in my head, but often it's pretty skewed. You know, I can really start to, my ego can really start to take over. Yeah. Because I am, you know, for those of us who run companies and that can be even as a general manager, you know, somebody that only reports to the owner, depending on the relationship with the owner and all, you can get into that same situation where you're kind of untouchable. No one's questioning you. No one's poking at your decisions. No one's poking at the things that you're saying and doing. That's a dangerous position for us to be in.

12:35 Yeah. What do they call that when you basically are in an echo chamber? Yeah. Right? Like the only feedback you're getting is your own? Yeah. Yeah. I think that that's a scary place to be in. And I think the reality of it is, is that So, you and I talk about this a lot, man. We're kind of in a lot of ways currently in our state of life, a little hyper-focused on this awareness idea. The whole concept of just being more present in the moment in terms of what things are influencing my decision, what things are influencing my emotional response to this interaction. All those things, right? Right. Which I think is brilliant. I think the more that people can do to spend time in that space, they'll only get benefits from it.

13:16 I really have not experienced a time where I've looked at it and said that was either a waste of energy or I ended up net loss somehow. The more I become aware of my behavior and my self-deception, the more I can in the moment start to choose a different response. Yeah. And there's nothing fancy or sophisticated or spiritual or woo-woo about that. It's just like the more I reflect on, okay, why did I do this? What was in my head at that moment? And I'm feeling really pissed off right now. What's that coming from? The more I just start to look at that... the more I can start to realize when I'm just really having an emotional ego reaction.

13:59 Right. You know? Yeah. Like, okay, well, that's not how I want to operate. Yeah. You know, take a deep breath and, you know, engage a little bit differently. Well, and I think the theme in that or kind of like the underlying current is this understanding that it's not necessarily malicious intent. Yeah. I think about how many times I've been saying the same excuse or I've been having the same coined response for certain types of questions for so long that you're really not even thinking about the answer you're giving and or if you have the time, energy or power to actually change it.

14:46 So like one of the things I think you and I have noticed a lot is when we started working with companies and people, you have to do these little things to get them to kind of shake up their immediate response, their knee jerk reaction to things. Because in that you give them the opportunity to almost hit reset to the type of answer they give so that maybe they can deploy a different one. And I was just thinking about, I don't know if we've talked about this before, but we've been doing some time exercises with people. Yeah. And we just, everyone's too busy. No one has enough time. I know we're going to talk on this again soon. But it's a great example of when we threw something into the process that forced someone to kind of re-evaluate what they were telling themselves.

15:35 Yeah. By instead of just operating out of the knee-jerk reaction, we said, well, okay. All right, let's say that answer is true. Well, let's just do an exercise though to actually gather some information and see if the information tells us the same thing. Inevitably, what we see when people do this exercise is there's actually more opportunities in the day to control what they're doing with their time. Well, I would say that's a great example though of how often someone's operating in that space and I'm doing it right now. Well, here's another side of that. And it brings up something that for me has been a little bit life-changing, actually. I read a book called Leadership and Self-Deception about, geez, first time maybe 12 years ago.

16:16 And then I've read it every two or three years. It seems like I'll pick it up and read it again. But on that calendar thing, one of the other things we talked about with the client was how important it is, and you and I have just observed this over time, how important it is to have honesty with yourself, even with your scheduling of your day. Because we work with people to develop time blocks. It's a really effective personal management strategy, right? It's like, okay, right now I'm going to work on estimates. Later, I'm going to work with posting job ads. And then from three to five, I'm going to do X. It's a really great way to manage yourself. But what can often happen is we say, okay, on Mondays from three to five, I'm going to go out and do sales calls because that's a function I need to make sure I spend some time on.

17:05 And we put it on there. But there's a part of us that realizes the chances of me actually doing two hours of sales calls during that time is almost nil. Because I know I'm going to have this thing, this thing, this thing on Monday. But I feel like I'm supposed to. And so I put it on my calendar. My team maybe sees that calendar. Oh, Chris has, you know, some time blocked out for sales. Okay, he's checked that box. But in reality, Monday after Monday after Monday... I get to 3.30 and I'm taking a call from a vendor. And then after that, I'm like, oh, I really need to get out. Yeah. And then I see an email pop into my inbox. And so I was never actually, I am the master of my calendar, but I was never really intent.

17:50 I was never really committed. Committed. To that three to five block for making sales calls. Right. Yeah. And what leadership and self-deception taught, it's a great, it's a fable. It has a very unsexy name, but it's actually a really wonderful fable. Yeah, it's like Patrick Lencioni's stuff. Anyways, what they would say is every time we do that, in a little or big way, Where I know there's this thing I ought to do or I said I was going to do or I intended to do and then we don't. We're betraying ourselves. And what we're doing is we're actually diminishing the amount of trust we have in ourselves to do what we say we're going to do.

18:31 Yeah. We think less and less and less of ourselves and our capacity to do what needs to be done. Because we betrayed ourselves so many times. We essentially told ourselves, I said I was going to do this, but I couldn't get around to it. And we start to lose a little faith in ourselves. And I think that's why some of us, we've observed people who are very high performers just start to fall down. Like, what in the world happened? Right. Well, I think we let those little self-betrayals can lead to us really getting off course. You know what I mean? No, I think you're right on the money. And I don't want to be overly dramatic about this, my friend, but this is how I really feel about this. Are you saying I'm being dramatic?

19:12 No, no, not yet. Yeah. The thing that stands out to me in this topic is that I think you can always run a risk of oversimplifying very hard things about life, right? Like, don't hear me wrong. I understand that every single person out there is in some different status in... In terms of home, business, personal, professional, this thing, that thing, the current political environment, whatever. There's a billion things that are affecting our realities. So life is not so simple, right? But I think there's a reality, Chris, that when I look out on the horizon and I identify people that I admire, respect, or people that are movers, people that are influencers, people...

19:58 who are having successes, people that are having repeated successes, I can almost guarantee you that if you dove down underneath the surface, you're going to identify someone that more times than not, and or someone that at least is falling forward with this, is doing a better job of living out and speaking the truth to themselves. So your Monday thing that you're talking about, dude, I freaking hate you for using that example. Because mine right now, for weeks... has been, I have a content block. And out of the last five weeks, I think I've done it once.

20:38 And it's the same thing, right? And you feel it, right? I feel it. You feel it in your guts. It's kind of this thing that's tugging at your sleeve constantly that I'm failing myself. Dude. I'm betraying myself. I'm saying one thing by placing this on my calendar and yet I'm doing another. But I'm not doing it. Andy, dude, Andy Frussellus, the Real AF podcast, for those of you who like a real shot in the arm of Drill Sergeant, I'm not doing it. he literally just did a 10 minute show on kill the monster. Right. And the entire show, 10 minutes is him just going off on the fact that when you have something in front of you and you keep putting it off, not only are you not getting the thing done that you wanted to get done, it's literally destroying your self-confidence.

21:20 Right. Yeah. It's giving you anxiety. It's giving you stress. Now, he oversimplifies sometimes, but he's basically saying, just get the effing part done that you said you were going to do, right? Yeah. And I think this is kind of what you're talking about here is that... How many times that when we're living out this deception of we've checked the box by putting this thing on our calendar, we don't live it out. It just accumulates on our shoulder of yet something else we were supposed to do, try to do, get accomplished that's not done. Yeah. All of that shit is working against you. We would just be better off saying, you know what? On Mondays, I'm so slow to pull my head out and actually start tackling the week.

22:04 I'm just not going to do anything until noon. Okay. Like, do we, do we think that that's the best practice? No, but you would probably get more return in your soul of just being honest and you doing something with that time that you can be honest about then pulling the freaking facade of, I'm, Oh, look at my calendar. I'm doing X, Y, Z every Monday. And when you know damn well, you're not like, I just think about that with, with in general, how many times I'm telling myself, Oh, I've been working on that for a while. Yeah. No, you haven't. No, you haven't. Right. Right. Because if you had, you would have already accomplished something with it. And so now, instead of actually accomplishing something with it or giving it no energy because I've decided intentionally I'm just not going to screw with that, I've got this thing that's dragging me down all the time that I keep alluding to people that I'm getting accomplished now.

22:58 when I'm really not. And when I say people, I mean me too, myself. Yeah. We have these stories we tell about ourselves to ourselves. You know, I'm, I'm this kind of husband. I'm a provider for my family. I'm whatever. I'm a, I'm a great dad. You know, all of, we have all these stories. I'm a great business person. I'm And the reality is there's always a gap between the story we're telling ourselves and what others are experiencing us as actually being. Oh, sure. But all of this stuff applies to our home. Yeah. Our marriage.

23:39 Totally does. Totally does. relationship with our kids. Like I tell myself a story of I want to be a good dad. I want to be connected to my kids, you know, emotionally. I want them to feel safe with me and be able to talk to me about anything, all this stuff. But does my behavior often not align with that? You But the reality is a lot of times my actual behavior when I come home from working all day and talking with people is not reflective of a dad that wants to be connected with his kids, wants to be totally super present, super safe. You can always talk to me about anything, right?

24:21 Oh, yeah. And in that book, Leadership and Self-Deception, what they basically say is anytime... You have the instinct that there's something that you ought to do. You're capable of doing and ought to do. And you walk past that. You neglect it. You ignore that. It's an act of self-deception and it erodes our sense of self and our self-confidence. And I think, and when I read that, I'm like, wow, okay, there's something really powerful there in terms of marriage. All right.

25:01 So one of the simple examples in this book was a funny one that I could relate to. So my wife works part-time, so she's home more, but we have shared household responsibilities. At times when my day gets hectic, I have a wacky morning, I get a call from a client on the East Coast and I'm engaged earlier in work than I usually am. I can have this internal dialogue with myself when I'm supposed to put out the recycle bin and the garbage cans and kind of do some of the routine chores. Occasionally, there's a part of me that's like, I don't have time for that.

25:42 Knowing my wife is just going to have to pick up the slack. And in hindsight, when I look at that small little moment where it's like, I got to get to the office or I got to get on this conference call and I shove this thing off my plate. In hindsight, the reality is, is that I could have taken the extra three minutes before I hopped in the car and left. but I chose not to. I chose in the moment for my own convenience to inconvenience my wife. Yeah. And I'm communicating value right there. Oh man. Yeah. I'm communicating value right there. And I've, and I've learned that the hard way in my marriage is that it's those little moments that actually speak volumes to our spouse.

26:27 And yet our ego inside of us, it's like, no, but I got important clients and I provide, I'm the provider for my family. And I, I, I don't have time. My wife has time though. Yeah. Okay, I'm going to... Here's another example. I'm not going to use any names. Someone walks in my house, makes them... So the kitchen's clean. Nothing in the kitchen. Someone walks in the house to be unnamed. Unnamed. makes themselves some breakfast before they go to work at noon. Might have your same last name. May, may or may not. Throws the dishes in the sink, the dirty dishes all over from their robust breakfast cooking opportunity. And the text I get is, I'll take care of it when I get home.

27:07 So they're now going to proceed to be gone for the next 8 to 10 to 12 to 24 hours, depending on if a friend asks if they want to go do something after work, right? But it's, you know, they were busy. Yeah. They, you know, so anyway, that's it. I'm just feeling far, sorry for myself. So that was why that used that example. But no, seriously, man, here's, here's what strikes me about what you're saying is, I think all of us can kind of connect the dots a little bit here of the profound negative impact. And really the delayed gratification in a lot of ways that we can experience as individuals when we continue to allow ourselves to really operate in this fake version, almost like a want version versus an execution version of ourselves, right?

27:58 And there's been a little piece, triangle piece of blue foam at the bottom of our stairs in front of our office. And it's been there. Let's see, did I come? I came another day this week, early this week. I can't remember. So technically, I think I'm at day three that I've seen this piece of foam sitting at the base of the stairs. This is so wild, man. I'm being really transparent, everybody. Every time I've looked at it, This is how persuasive this can be. Every time I've looked at it, I say, I really should be the person to pick that up. In fact, I coach people on don't ignore the little things, right?

28:38 Yeah. Like stop and pick it up. You know, I'm on the third day. I've not had time in quotation marks to stop and pick that up. Yeah. So then we have this episode, which is totally profound. Yeah. Here's where I'm going with this. The cool thing is, is that obviously, you guys, this just happens to all of us. You're not alone. None of us are alone experiencing this. And it can have super negative effects and it can delay opportunities. But you know what's really powerful about what you talked about in this triangle piece of foam? how many opportunities do we have each day to do something that really is such a little battle that when it's won, will compound, will add up, will begin to tell ourselves the truth of, when you say something to yourself, it believes you.

29:30 Yeah, right? Exactly. What I think it is, is us getting closer to actually executing on the vision we have for ourselves. It's not accepting the dumbed down, discounted, corners cutting version. It's just moving closer and closer to this is what I know I'm capable of. This is what I know I ought to based on the resources I have, the luck that I've been given, that, you know, all of that stuff. I think it's just calling us to what we already know we ought to be, you know? Right. Yeah. But it's like, I... I, this, this thing, I don't think we talk enough about this stuff.

30:13 We talk a lot about integrity. And I find it to me, it's a real pet peeve now when people start talking about integrity. I'm like, hold on. All right. If you're going to throw out a word like you, you have integrity or your company has integrity. Let's, you, you... You are integrity from moment to moment. Yeah. Yeah. You are either in integrity or disintegrity at every single word you say, every single behavior you produce. Yeah. You're either in integrity or you're in disintegrity. And we throw around that too much. People love to wear the label of, I have integrity. It's important to me. Yeah. Because what integrity is, and I think it really is everything we're talking about here, is all in what is integrity and what does it mean for me to be a person of integrity?

30:59 So last night, I was the last one here at the office. And so our office set up, we're in a historic building. And so we've got a couple suites up, three or four suites upstairs. And, and we have a shared rest public restroom and there's a fan that's integrated with the light switch. And so I'm the last one there and I realized it, you know, I like connected to it. Okay. Everybody else is quiet here. Everybody's gone. And then I noticed the fan running in the bathroom. And it's honestly, it's like 10 steps. It's 10 steps. But no one would ever know if I left the light on, the fan on all night in the office building. And frankly, I don't have to care about it.

31:40 It's just included in my lease, you know, technically, right? And so I could just leave it on and just keep... I was turning after I locked the office door and I was turning to walk away and I noticed the fan and I'm like, I had this moment... of am I going to keep going and just leave it on all night? Or am I going to turn around and turn the fan off? And I'll honestly say, I actually said to myself, I don't want to be the kind of person that walks away and leaves it on because I can't. It's just needlessly adding to the landlord's power bill. And then I also even just, before I said this, I was thinking, I wouldn't want an employee to do that.

32:29 Right. It's the decision I'd want them to make is turn around and turn the freaking light off. Right. You know, let's not waste money. Yeah. Let's not be wasteful people. Yeah. Uh, And I don't say that in any way. It was just a random thing. I noticed it and I made that choice. I think it was the luck of my character in the moment. I was having a good day. It's possible I would have just walked away. And so this is not any kind of... Holier than thou. No, no, no, not at all. Because the point is, I've made the other call so many times. And it's an example of so many times, like when I'm home with my family, a similar example is walking through the kitchen, past a kitchen, a sink full of dishes, knowing that my wife appreciates having a tidy kitchen.

33:21 And me just walking past it anyway. Yeah. When I'm fully capable of stopping, taking five minutes and emptying the sink. Right. It's the same kind of thing. And we can think of a multitude of applications in our day-to-day work life. Oh, yeah. A multiple. Dude, the first one that slaps me in the face as you're talking about this is just this idea of we all talk about, we want to develop a better culture. We have a family work environment. We want our staff to know how valuable they are. How many times do you walk through your shop and you get that tug in the back of your mind? I should stop and talk to Joe for a minute. It's Monday. I'm going to find out how the weekend went. I know that he might go on about this thing and his wife and the stuff.

34:04 Whatever, right? So you don't. Yeah. Everybody just had a joke come to their mind. Exactly. But then you don't do it. And the lost opportunity there was for that two or three minutes. And again, I think what's beautiful about this topic and kind of scary all at the same time is the reality of it is I think this one... little variable is both so easy to make positive ground on, yet has the most powerful positive and negative effect on our ability to pursue new goals, new initiatives, new levels of success.

34:48 become more of that person that honestly you look in the mirror and the reason that you're frustrated is because you know what you want, you know what you could be doing, but you just keep, keep not getting it right. You keep just falling a hair short of it, but really how much of it could begin to change if we just did, if we just stopped Took the five minutes to do the dishes. Stopped. Took one minute to pick up the triangular piece of foam that's sitting at the base of our stairs right now. Right. Took the three minutes to stop and talk to our Joe. Yeah. Like, that's the changer, right?

35:29 Yeah. I mean, and the list goes on and on and on and on and on, right? And take the 10 minutes, you know, to look at... this important KPI spreadsheet that you're supposed to be tracking and staying on top of your AR or whatever area of your business, right? It's those disciplines that we all say we do, but our actual discipline in the matter oftentimes looks different behind the scenes. So we can point at it on our calendar. We can point out, hey, that document's open on my screen. Look, I checked that box, but it's that small distance between... what we said or what we kind of presented and what really was. And I have, you know, sometimes I get nervous when we start talking about this and you made the comment, we're going too deep here or whatever, because I have, I've had clients that felt like that.

36:18 Oh, it's just like navel gazing. There's no profit in me spending a whole bunch of time looking at what happened in the past. And I'm like, well, no, you're kind of missing the point. I think the point is to look at what we're doing and why. Why? Because in the moment, most of our life, we've just been doing things kind of automatic, just kind of shooting from the hip and not really thinking about this stuff. And by thinking about it, we can choose to behave a little bit differently. Yeah. You know, and then the other thing I get people say is, well, gosh, you know, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. And yeah, I got my flaws, but you know, we got 50 people here that count on me for a living.

37:03 And, uh, and you know, we got 20 rigs in our fleet and my wife's happy. And so it's working okay. And I'm exaggerating, but we, we do encounter that kind of thing where it's like, it's good enough. And I think what you and I have started to find is, the more we press into that, like our effectiveness, our productivity, our growth accelerates. Oh, I think it does. You know? I think the other thing that strikes me about that is that not only do those things happen, exactly what you're talking about, it's like, dude, self-confidence goes up. Your belief in yourself and what you could achieve grows.

37:44 Like all of a sudden the expectation, the bar keeps moving because you're like, oh, I did that. But you know what? The other thing that I feel like I come closer to landing on when I spend more time in this space is this idea of my version of success gets more honest. Yeah. Right? So it's like for the first time, well, dude, the whole premise behind us doing what we're doing. really started as part of that journey of us just spending more and more time being honest about wants, dislikes, achievements, lack of discipline, discipline, right? And what we were identifying individually is that...

38:28 what success looked like for us in terms of what we really wanted was not necessarily the same that culture or community or existing relationships was telling us that success looked like. And so I think that that's, I think you just bring up a massive point is that, okay, so what we understand what not telling ourselves the truth looks like. I think all of us can very easily look at the last 24 hours and find a handful of examples. Yeah. Right. It's not hard. I think you look at that and you can easily see, okay, there's an opportunity if we're honest that we could make faster gains. We could actually start putting into place these things that we're well aware exist, right?

39:11 We're not in a world lacking information. You and I are not necessarily delivering rocket science most of the time when we're working with people, right? So you see all these opportunities to actually move the bar. But here's the, I think the other piece to just remember is, you might just start re-engineering a little bit of where you are putting your time and effort because you may all of a sudden become crystal clear on the fact that the things that you have been prioritizing and searching and going after were not yours in the first place. They're not even the things that you really give a shit about. And I think there's so much power in that too. And so again, this is one of those topics where the impact, good and bad, is massive.

39:56 Yeah. But I really think the day-to-day way that you begin to tackle this is pretty damn simple. Yeah. And I think you just start to feel better about yourself. Yeah. Like I... I can't tell you how many really successful people I've met that when you, when you get into a real personal conversation with them, they admit, you know, a lot of times they feel like a piece of shit because I think because of what we're talking about, They're aware of all the self-betrayal. So they have an outward view. People think, you know, they see the nice cars, they see the growing business, they see that stuff. But there's these little self-betrayals, like these compromises that they know they've made or they're making.

40:42 That's been a surprising thing to me. Yeah. Because we have this image of people and we have our own images that we work so hard to protect. Yeah. Yeah. And the trade-off with that. Yeah. Right. Is that we actually don't think very highly of ourselves. Right. The foundation is fragile. The foundation is fragile. And I think some people are even listening to this. It's hard to even talk about. It really is. Like, because we see ourselves as really strong. We're successful entrepreneurs. We're this, we're that. But... At the same time, we're also aware of just how fragile our marriages are, right? Yeah. We're aware, like we feel how fragile our ego is and what's happening really internally.

41:24 Yeah. And a lot of people cover that with alcohol, really common. Oh, sure. Yeah. They cover that feeling, just kind of detaching a little bit from that reality, just how complicated their head is and everything that they're carrying and holding on to. But yeah, I'm just finding a lot of freedom in it. taking a look at that stuff, it's like the more honest I get with myself, the less of that stuff I've got in my head. Yeah. Like I'm just in a more positive head space. Yep. When I'm more honest with myself. Right. Because I trust myself more. I have a lot more confidence. Yeah. That, yeah, when I say I'm going to do something, I, I do it. I believe it. As often as possible. Like I, I hold myself to that standard. Yeah. Yeah.

42:05 So let's connect the dots a little bit. I always like to, I mean, we talk about this with employee engagement as leaders, just doing a good job of making sure that we actually kind of draw the connection between points. And so let's think about this. tactically, what are some of the things that maybe you've been doing or that I've been doing or that our listeners can literally begin to do tomorrow? These little tiny battles, these little things that they can do to gain wins. And really then the petition would be to pay attention. Pay attention as you're doing these things and begin to monitor if you're picking up on any subtle changes in terms of confidence, reliability.

42:50 Just, dude, this is totally wow, wow, but soul-centeredness. Just like this idea of I just feel a little bit more grounded, a little bit more confident. Mm-hmm. Because I think people would be shocked how quickly they note a measurable difference just by doing some small, tiny things on a more consistent basis, right? Yeah. Well, let me offer a big thing. That's a little scary though first. Oh boy. You went, okay. I'm going to tell a story too. Yeah. One of the most profound moments in my life, really transformative for me, was back in my early 20s. My wife and I were living in a large six-bedroom, three-bath house with two other married couples.

43:33 We were all youngsters going to college in different directions. I was starting a business, et cetera. And we would have these shared meals together. And it was really great. I wish I could almost recreate it. And sometimes... I know there's so many people listening right now going, what are you? Who are we listening to? You include me. That's fine. That's so funny. There was no white robes. This wasn't like a cult. This was just three college age couples minding their own business, having dinner together. I understand the picture I'm painting. But anyway, so we get done with dinner one night and one of the other dudes says, hey, Chris, you got a second. Everybody else was kind of finishing dishes and stuff.

44:16 I just said, hey, can we talk? And he said to me, he said, you know, I just want to let you know as your friend, like I feel like you've been really sarcastic lately with me. And I feel like for what it's worth, I feel like I've observed you being really sarcastic with your wife. And I feel like I've observed that really hurting her. And I just wanted to let you know, like it hurts my feelings. make these comments or you use the sarcasm with me. It just, I don't like the way it makes me feel, you know, when I'm around you. Man, I was, that was a hard moment for me.

45:00 I felt really embarrassed in the moment because all of a sudden I was so unaware of how I was affecting others. And I'm not, I think most people that know me would not describe me as a real aloof, unaware person at all. But I think that was one of those situations that really changed me for the better in terms of that went a long way. to transform my self-awareness in just that one conversation. I'll never forget it. And I actually, I'm still really good friends with this person. I so valued it. Now in the moment, it was really unsettling. It really knocked me off my stool. You know what I mean? But, you know, after that, I went back to my wife and I's apartment and I said, Honey, you know...

45:47 My friend just said this, have you been experiencing that? She broke down crying because she had. She'd been experiencing me the same way and I was just unaware. I was, and at the time I was starting a business and I think I was just in my own world. And a part of my stress response was I was being more abrasive and sarcastic. There's more, kind of just more anger kind of seeping out from all the stress and whatever starting a company. And I'll just, I'll never forget that. It was one of those, you know, we all have kind of our top five moments that kind of changed us. They all look different, right? Yeah. And this was one of those simple moments where I was just so grateful, especially after the fact, my friend, because that's a hard conversation to have.

46:28 And so here's where I'm going with this. Since that experience, one of the things that I've tried to make a practice of, and again, I get these instincts every once in a while, like, you know, I need to ask for some feedback. It's been a while. But I think one of the places that all of us can start right today, you and me both, I'm realizing now, it's been probably a few months since I've done this, is going to somebody in your sphere, a peer, a downline person that has authority and that you respect and that you've given permission to be honest with you. Could be a spiritual mentor or something like that. But just somebody who regularly observes you.

47:09 in your different elements and say to them, Hey, listen, you know, we have this relationship. So whether it's a, you know, a best friend, a spouse, a coworker, whatever it is, we have this relationship, but I know you observe me regularly from a certain distance. What do you feel like is one thing that I could work on that would help me be a better person, a better father, a better leader? And please be as specific and severe as you can, because the more specific you can be, like the more helpful it is. Yeah. And I would just covet, you know, any feedback you can give. But, you know, you observe me regularly. I trust. I trust your perspective.

47:50 Yep. What is one way that you think would make the most difference in my leadership, my care for my kids, my whatever the, you know what I mean? Yeah. Because I think that has been probably the most powerful tool in my tool belt in terms of developing as a leader. Because the things that people have told me when I've asked that question and they know what I genuinely want the answer to, have just been the most powerful learning moments for me. Yeah. When followed through on, they created really substantial change. Big time. And of course, some of the feedback scared me or made me feel defensive. And I haven't always handled it the best or leveraged it.

48:31 Yeah. But when I have, right? When I'm willing to hear the answer and really think on it, that's been the biggest source of change for me. No, I love that one. And I think the big thing that you're pointing out with us is, and we kind of alluded to it earlier, is there's a real challenge sometimes with just seeing this stuff, noticing it. We're often in this automation mode where we're just acting, responding, doing. We're not giving it a ton of thought. And so by establishing this formal opportunity, maybe this formal boundary with a mentor, a coach, a friend, whatever, where you're like, hey, I... from time to time, I'm going to need you to point out my blind spots.

49:12 That's really powerful. And I think it's very similar to some of the tactics we teach with an after-action review. It's this, you'd probably be shocked by the more times that you do this quarterly check-in or monthly check-in with a friend or a confidant. that you actually get better than doing your own little self-evaluations, looking for your own weaknesses, blind spots, or really what we're talking about here is a disconnection between who I want to be and who I am currently, right? And who I am currently. No, I think that's a huge one. I think the other one that we've already kind of ping-ponged around a little bit is just this take action on the little prodding that you get in the back of your mind, right?

49:57 You're walking through the shop. Yeah, practice responding to that. Responding. Take action. Don't give it too much thought. Don't hang in that moment very long. When the thing hits you to... Go pick that thing up. Or you know what? Grab your keys, walk out your office, get in the work truck and drive to the closest job site. Yeah. Just get in the truck right now to keep this podcast rolling and go ahead to the nearest job site and meet your team. Yeah. Do a quality control walk. You're not too busy. Go right now. Yeah. Right? Yeah. Like those little things. And we're not talking about being, and again, there's, there's, there sounds like an impulsive kind of quality like that, that we're just always going to this.

50:37 But no, we're, this isn't about being distracted. No. Like it's not taking every single opportunity that presents itself to do something good. What we're talking about is something I think all of us have felt. which is some people might call it their conscience. Some people from religious background might call it the Holy Spirit or the force or the Stoics called it the logos. It's that still small voice, right? Where it's like you just have this inkling or it's not even a voice inside your head. It's just like, I know I ought to do this. There's this thing here that's tugging at my sleeve that I know what to do. I can do. And I'm just faced with this choice of, am I actually going to do it or am I going to keep walking on it?

51:21 You know? Another example. And this one, you know, honestly, man, it's like I'm saying this one out loud. And I think that this one is like, it's so good. Like I do, this has been the thing I've been trying to do more and more of is being, where this truth conversation comes out to is that when we set an expectation or a goal for ourselves, right, it's almost like the Monday time blocking you were talking about. Let's just start with integrity. So like if we say an example, I want to introduce a completely new, fully integrated mitigation process. Okay, that is a lofty goal. That's fantastic.

52:02 I know it will have a profound positive impact on your business. But where are we starting? Right? Like what, what is the, what's a part of that that you could commit to and be honest about and get that win first. And maybe that means, you know what I'm going to do starting next week is I'm just going to start formalizing our morning routine. Yeah. Don't tackle the whole war. Just be honest with yourself and say, the wars may not be winnable for me right now, but I know I can win a battle. And that battle is I'm going to establish a new AM routine with my team. And I'm just going to do that like clockwork for a month and then evaluate yourself. Here's the beauty of that.

52:43 A, you set the bar to a place that's challenging yet realistic. And then you get the opportunity to experience a win. Yeah. Right? You proved to yourself. You proved to yourself. That I've set an objective and I've followed through and I've accomplished it. And doing that, we always say consistency compounds, but let's say you did that back to back 12, 14 initiatives in 2022. Yeah. that would be more powerful of an impact on you as an individual, your team as a whole, on your business than it would to set some stupid, unachievable goal that you continually tell yourself that you want to do this, you have the capacity to do this.

53:23 And then Monday after Monday after Monday, you don't take initiative or steps to actually execute on that. Which one are you going to get more from? Yeah. Yeah. Right. Right. Yeah. Are you just going to toss it? Are you going to go into your, your team room and then toss it over your shoulder as you walk out? Hey guys, here's this great vision. We're going to switch this up. You guys are going to do this and that. Then you kind of walk out the door. That's the last time you think about it for, you know, and then you're frustrated. It didn't happen. And yeah. And there's yeah. Hostility and gnashing of teeth. It's never been part of it. Luckily I've never experienced that. No, I think those are good. And I think that that's the idea here too, is this is not rocket science.

54:04 It's not super complicated. There's just little baby steps that we can take to become more in alignment between who we want to be and who we currently are. And just understanding that this is just a war that's won one battle at a time. These are not huge, wild swings and behaviors or attitudes. It's Just let your yes be yes more often and your no be no more often. Yeah. Let's take our integrity more seriously. Hmm. Because it's one thing to have the image of integrity and to be mostly there. And it's, and it's another thing to take it really seriously and be like, and, and yet people feel the difference.

54:46 Like our team, there were periods of time as you and I've been building businesses where there was more disintegrity than others. And it, and it was always reflected in. In the morale of the team. Yeah. Their buy-in, the speed at which we could make change because they trusted us. Yeah. It was when there was heavy integrity coming out of you and I and the rest of the leadership team. Yeah. Like there was momentum and power. Yeah. In the leadership team tending to the details and... keeping the small promises, like doing what we say we're going to do. Even when we thought nobody saw the results, nobody, nobody was looking.

55:27 So that's the other thing is a lot of times we do much of what we do as leaders is in secret or it's, it's the view of it is limited. It's not super public, but the results and the effects on the business and everything, it totally trickles down and people feel it. Yeah. People feel it. They know it, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All right, man. You ready for a summary? Kind of did a living summary, but here it is. A little bit. Break it down. So main topic here, guys, living in truth, right? Working to find more alignment between what we say we are, right? Versus who we currently are in the moment. And the idea here is that we have an opportunity to really see some massive positive impacts in our business, growth in ourselves, modification to our leadership capacity, us really...

56:17 experiencing wins versus always having this goal out on the horizon that we just don't quite achieve. We're always kind of falling just shy of experiencing that win. And what we can do basically to build that muscle or build that experience, that trust with ourselves is that it's just the little things. It's take the little initiatives of when you see the thing, stop and take care of it. When you get the prodding to, you know, you should stop and have a conversation with one of your downlines, just do it. And then the harder thing here, but really powerful is identify someone in your sphere of influence.

56:58 This is not a downline thing. This isn't really a peer thing in a lot of times. But just find someone that is safe that you can go to and say, hey, I need help identifying my blind spots. I want your input. I want you to be able to freely let me know when you see a disconnection between what I'm doing, how I'm acting versus what I say I want to do and how I want to act. And I think if we do that on a consistent basis, little win after little win, you're going to find that you have far more trust in yourself and that this kind of sustainable confidence begins to develop. Because more times than not, when you say you're going to do something, you actually do it.

57:41 And it's profound that its impact on you is so profound because all of a sudden, you you begin trusting yourself. Yeah, that's the thing, right? Because we all, I mean, listen, most of us have gotten really good at delivering more often than not for others. Yeah. What we're really talking about is what's happening internally, all the internal compromises that no one, it's possible, very few, if other people are specifically aware of, they just see the byproduct in your character. Yeah. It's what they feel. Yeah. When you're making all those compromises. Yeah. Yeah. I love it. All right, man. That's good. All right, everybody. Hey, thanks for joining us for another episode of the MRM Podcast.

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