You're Not a Victim: How to Turn Business Losses Into Leverage and Get Back in the Game with Brook Bishop

0:01 Being great at what you do doesn't automatically make you great at business. The skills that got you here won't get you there. This is Path to Mastery, the raw and real business podcast for service-based entrepreneurs, consultants, and practitioners ready to stop chasing tactics and start building foundations that scale, hosted by Ryan Lang and Brooke Bishop, co-founders of Empire Partners. Let's dive in. I'm your host, Ryan Lang, CEO and co-founder of Empire Partners, alongside my co-founder and co-host, Brooke Bishop. Happy day, my friend. Happy, happy day. Uh, you know, this is an episode that we, we actually got a request to record this episode.

0:47 And, uh, and I'm actually really glad that we received this request because of the fact that it's, it's something that we, it is, this is, this is a theme that's never going to go away. It's always going to be present. Um, we know and have known and will know a lot of people that have gone through this. We've been through it. We will go through it again. Um, And that's really like, how do you rebound? And how do you come back when you've swung and missed? Whether that's, and we're talking specifically in business. Of course, all of this applies to life as well. But that applies both in the case of, hey, I tried something and it didn't work.

1:35 And it also applies in the case of, hey, I worked with somebody and, you know, they didn't live up to the to the expectations or the promises, etc. So I want to I want to kind of start by. I'd love to start off a little bit by just telling just telling a little bit of a story from my vantage point, because I think that having some context is important here. And for me. I started my coaching business and flailed around for a while and tried all kinds of different things that didn't work. And some things that did, it wasn't a complete failure right out of the gates.

2:15 But I eventually found myself in a spot where I had the opportunity to do some work with some folks. I was a big believer in what they were doing. I doubled down. I did what needed to be done. Um, it, it didn't pan out. And the thing is, it wasn't like, you know, Brooke, you know me, I don't, I'm not one to throw in the towel very quickly. Um, and especially one that like, if I believe in something, I will go to the ends of the earth. I will do what it takes. I will burn the boats.

2:56 I don't care. Um, yeah. If I have to push the envelope more, I'll do it. And that's pretty much what I did in this situation. And it landed me in a spot, quite frankly, where I lost pretty much every dollar that I had. I had some money in savings from walking away from my previous business. That was gone. I cashed out my 401k to try to keep going, ran through that. And between the amount of money that I was paying out and the amount that I was paying I could try to do advertising that wasn't working and all kinds of things.

3:37 I was tapped. I was done. And eventually found myself in the spot where I was monetarily broke. a little bit emotionally broken, more so than anything from the fact that I felt like I had just completely hit a wall. It was less about blaming somebody for something that didn't work and more so just that I threw in. I pushed all my cards into the middle of the table and I lost big. Or my chips, I should say. You can tell them how much I gamble. I gamble with business, not in Vegas.

4:17 But I think the thing of it is that I've been there. I've had this happen. And I think that after I picked myself up from this, the very first thing that I did was to start to really take account of of all of the things that happened, how I played, how other people in the situation played, what was real, what wasn't real. And most importantly, like, what did I want now? What, you know, now it was done. What now? What do I want? And I think I want to throw this over to you because I know you've got some vantage point on this as well.

5:04 But I think the thing is, that situation, while it sucked, I wouldn't have it back at all. I really wouldn't. I'd go back and I'd do it all over again. Because in the period of time that I spent doing the things that I was doing, I met a lot of amazing people that I'm still connected with today. Some of you and I never would have met. had that not happened. I have other people that are actually like very close friends that I met during that time. Additionally, it opened my eyes. It forced me into a situation where I had to start understanding marketing.

5:46 To be honest, that kind of began my love affair with marketing was having that huge swing and miss and going, wait a minute, what other ways are there? Um, and, uh, and so I, you know, it, it, it, it sucked, but I had to find, I probably went through a month, a good month or two where I just, I, it was just a suck fest. I felt like shit. I, I, I was really unhappy about the way things had gone. I couldn't understand why. Um, I honestly allowed myself to kind of be in a bit of victim mode. for a month or two. And it was on the other side of that, that, you know, things started to open up when I started asking questions and, and all that kind of stuff.

6:33 But, you know, one of the things I want to, I want to hear your thoughts on this, but one of the things that I look back on now in that particular situation, there are lots of ways to swing and miss in business, but in that particular situation, um, I was literally looking for the magic bullet. When I doubled down on that strategy, I was in a spot where I was literally about to quit because I felt like I was just not getting where I wanted to go. I couldn't figure out why. I was banging my head against the wall.

7:14 And then here's this thing. And it just seemed like if I would just do, it was almost like it was a magic trick. You know, and I could say that looking backwards. I don't know that I realized I was doing that in the moment. I was just so desperate that it was like, oh, my God, if this can fix my problems, like I'm all in. And I was really kind of looking for the magic bullet. And I know that's something that we see people doing all the time. Yeah, you're hitting the nail on the head just in terms of the dynamics of what can take place and the impact it can have too, right?

7:55 Because it'll rock you and it can hit in so many different ways from, as you mentioned, like, just like you got to experience, like financially, it rocked your world. Emotionally, it rocked your world. I think what happens for a lot of people is it actually rocks their identity. Right. And so there's this dynamic of, especially for whatever reason in the coaching world, and just even thinking about it as we're here in this moment, there's this piece of the 99% of the people that we've met in the coaching world, they really love other human beings and they really want to help other human beings. And so I think they get into this game, call it a game for a reason, right? But they get into this game wanting to help people.

8:39 Many of them don't get into this game because they're like, I want to be an entrepreneur and I want to build this company. And I want to like, they're not coming to the table going, this is a business venture. They're coming to the game first as a primary of I want to help people and I have a mission that I want to go on. And then it's like, oh, shit, I've got to become a business person. And so I think that that has a huge piece of the puzzle of like why it rocks us differently when we have those experiences like you had. Right. Because you came into it with a different set of expectations and you came into it like you said, right? Like this magic bullet. Like if I could just get this problem solved over here, all of my other problems go away.

9:20 And then we think that if we can just solve that one problem, like I'm on easy street. Because here's the other thing we've seen too. We've seen people that have gone to places and they had incredible results with what they purchased for a window of time. And then it stopped working. And then guess what? They turn around and they go, what you gave me doesn't work. It's like, no, it just worked for like five years and you just made millions of dollars on it. Now it doesn't work. But you're not thinking like a business person. And so what are you going to do? Are you going to point the finger and just kind of go, well, now my life sucks and everything's broken? Or have you become a business person who has more than one leg under your stool?

10:01 Yeah, that's a big part of it, too, the one-legged stool. And I think that one of the lessons that I learned in all of this and one of the things that we preach all the time at Empire is that we fully believe you've got to be willing to become tactic agnostic. Mm-hmm. And, you know, the thing is, it's really hard because if you go and, you know, you work with somebody and you see a certain way working for other people. And by the way, like, there are a bazillion different examples of this. You can, you know, you like... a million different examples of ways that are working for people right now.

10:46 And when you get into those environments, especially if it's purely tactic-based, which most of them are, to be fair. And some of them, by the way, are really good tactics. They're very innovative tactics that, to your point, can work unbelievably well, or unbelievably well for a certain person or business, or unbelievably well for a certain period of time. But the thing is, when you get in those environments, it gets really, really easy to just get swooped into this is the only way. It's the way. It's the only way. And you are an idiot.

11:26 If you think anything other than that, you're a fucking moron. And that's the thing is that that's where it's like. Danger, Will Robinson. What I don't want to do is stand up here and tell you about how shitty every other marketing tactic or marketing business or not just marketing. I mean, there are all the other pieces of sales, whatever. I don't want to stand up here and tell you that they all suck and none of them work because that's not true. But oftentimes what is true is they're so passionate about what they're doing that oftentimes they get blinded and they start telling stories about how this is the way it's the only way.

12:13 And you're a moron if you do anything other than this. And and I think that's a that's a tough thing, because once you once you get into that, if you start believing that, then when that thing doesn't work. You feel like dog shit. You feel like garbage. It's really interesting because I honestly, 99% of the things that we've seen that are out there, they do work. Yeah. And what often happens though is it's kind of like if you plant seeds in the ground, is it going to bear fruit? Yeah. Well, the mass majority of the time, if you plant the seeds properly, they're going to grow, they're going to sprout.

12:57 But guess what can come in and crush your fruity dreams? Weather, the environment, weeds, right? Wrong fertilizer, too much rain, not enough rain, right? Like there's these dynamics that we have to really look at. And I think that what can happen a lot of times too is you might be doing the right thing, but if you're doing it at the wrong time. Yep. Or you might be doing the wrong thing at the right time and you might get great results. Right? It's like, so there's this dynamic where I think what can trip a lot of things up is timelines. Hmm. Cause I'm dude, how many, I mean, we saw this, those are like a week ago, somebody who was in one of the, one of the strategies that we're currently testing and we're, we're seeing if, is it working?

13:39 Can we kind of crack the code with this? And we're actually getting some good results with it. We had one person who comes in and goes, I've been doing this for three whole weeks. I haven't gotten leads. I'm out. And we're like, wait, what? What do you mean you've been doing it for a whole three weeks? Isn't that enough time, Brooke? I've been going to the gym for three weeks. I haven't lost my 50 pounds. I'm going back to bonbons. Right? Do they even make bonbons anymore? I don't know if I just massively did. I think they do. I think they do. Yeah. But there's this dynamic of expectations when we get into anything, whether it's a tactic, a strategy, whether we're working in a mastermind, anything that we do in our business.

14:22 You've got to have realistic timelines. Yeah. And you've got to be really honest with yourself of what am I personally willing to do and for how long. And here's the biggest piece. Is the juice worth the squeeze? What do you mean by that? Yeah. So let's, let's say, uh, let's say we'll just use organic marketing. Okay. So we know a lot of people that don't do any organic marketing whatsoever and they go, Oh, it's too much work. It's too much energy. It's too much effort. They have their reasons. And so when they go to put it into action, they go, Oh, I did that for a couple of weeks and it didn't work. Well, if you get into the game, and again, if you're in business for the short game, if you're just like, I just need a couple leads to make my numbers so I can pay my bills this month.

15:06 Well, yeah, you're going to throw in the towel every single time because you're not going to get that immediate gratification of the result immediately. But if you're in the long game, if you're like, I'm on a mission to transform people's lives, you look at it differently and you go, okay, I'm going to play the tortoise and the hare in this thing. I'm going to make the investment. I'm going to have the long game in mind. I'm going to put in the time. I'm going to do my organic social and I'm going to keep getting better. And I'm going to keep figuring out what's working because here's the kick. If and when it does crack. Like, what is the opportunity in that? If you don't have to go pay for leads and then you have ongoing consistent leads because now you've built up that community. Like, this is just one example of it, right?

15:46 It's like, how long are you willing to play in order to get the result that you're really going for? And most people will throw in the towel too quick. Yeah, I agree with that. And I think that that's one of the things that is a brilliant point. And I think that that's one of the things that I want to caution people against is that when we're talking about business, and it really is, like, especially as somebody who worked in this field for a long time and lifelong health and fitness enthusiast, like... There is no magic pill. There is no magic bullet. There is no fix all cure all like, you know, I used to see this all the time in health and fitness where, you know, somebody would do something really extreme and they drop 25 pounds and they'd be all proud of themselves.

16:31 And I'd see him in the gym three months later. It's all back on. Yeah. And more in most cases. And business is exactly the same way. Like if you want to win in business, you are playing the long game. And I'm going to say something that is probably going to come off as a little bit harsh, but I'm going to say it anyway because it comes from a loving place. If you don't have the willingness and the grit and the patience to play the long game in business, get the fuck out. Get out. I'll double down on that. Go work on somebody with somebody else. Yeah. Like, because the truth is, it is going to be a slog.

17:12 And this is the thing about business, guys, is that it's... And the reason that the magic pill or the magic bullet is like so dangerous, and more so it's the belief that this thing is going to cure all my problems and... You know, everything's going to be fixed in, you know, four weeks, six weeks, eight weeks, 12 weeks, whatever. In business, we are constantly evolving. And if we're not, we're getting our ass handed to us by our competition. Yeah. And I don't care if you're in coaching, if you fix cars, if you run a cleaning business, it doesn't matter. We are constantly evolving.

17:52 And that better mean that we're constantly trying new things and new ways to get better, doubling down on the things that seem to be working, adjusting when things break, finding the new things, getting rid of the things that aren't working. It is a constant process and it is never ending. Yeah. and this belief that we're going to show up and somehow everything's just going to be magically amazing and it's going to stay that way forever. It's a fallacy. And it oftentimes I find people who have been in business before don't think that way because they know better. And when you're coming out of an employee situation or, you know, or something like that and trying to start a business, you know, especially in the coaching industry, nobody tells you these things.

18:42 It's all fucking fairy tales and magic dust all over the fucking place. And everything's going to be great and you're going to change the world and all the things. Well, if you're not willing to play the long game and you're not willing to get your butt kicked over and over and over and over again, you won't do that, at least not in business for yourself. And I would recommend that if that's something that feels that just doesn't feel right or feels like it's too much. There's nothing wrong with that, by the way. But. go work for somebody else and take your talent and don't have the stressors of trying to figure out how to actually run a business at the same time. One of the things I want to look at here, man, um, Is, you know, I'll give a little bit of my take, but I'd love to hear your take on this.

19:30 How do we look back at the situation and actually remember that there's a relationship? Anytime we decide to do business with somebody else, that there's a relationship, there are two parties, et cetera, et cetera. How do you kind of think through that? Yeah. It's huge because anytime we engage with a contractor or anytime we engage with a consulting agency or, I mean, marketing agents and anybody that we work with, we look at it the same way we would look as if we were hiring that person. Right. And so as it relates to the relationship, we'll go through those, those dynamics. So there's three things I usually will look at just kind of in the space of this is does this person or does this group, do they have the right mindset?

20:15 Yeah. the right heart set and the right skillset. Why am I bringing this up? And the dating game, not that I've been in that game for many, many years, but that was the same piece of like, okay, this person I'm dating, what's their mindset, right? Like how do they perceive the world? What are their values in terms of the filters they're looking through? What's the heart set? What's their intention? Like what's their driving force, right? What's their fuel as to why they're showing up to life or maybe perhaps they're not. And then the last part is what's their skillset? And so in the relationship, traditional relationship standpoint, that would be like communication. That would be in terms of being able to reflect things back. That's in terms of, are they men or women of their word?

20:57 And so in the business context, it's the same thing, right? There's this element of you're getting into a relationship with somebody. And it's to the point that when you sign a contract, It's a binding relationship, right? And so there's this element of, are you even reading the agreements and the contracts? Do you even know what it is? Or were you caught up in the emotional moment? Cause you're just like, Ooh, I want that magic bullet. Like sign me up. This is going to solve all my problems. Or did you actually take time to sit down and go, okay, do I want to get into relationship with this person? Do I want to get into bed with this person in my business? Yeah. And, and not only looking at the opportunity, but also looking at the risk, right? Like we, we always look for asymmetrical risk.

21:38 And a huge part of that is going, okay, am I only getting into this thing for one specific outcome? Because I think it's going to solve this big problem that's been an annoyance. Yeah, nuisance and annoyance. I got caught between those two words. I'm like, what is it? In a nuisance. In a nuisance. Ryan's mom's yelling at me. Yeah. But there's this dynamic of, are we getting more than one benefit from the engagement? And if we don't get the main thing that we're hoping to get from the engagement, are there like at least 10? So this is kind of the number, by the way. We look for, are there 10 benefits that we can get from this engagement that are beyond the one thing that we think we're signing up for?

22:20 Hmm. So why do we do that? Well, guess what? Because no matter what, we can learn and we can grow and we can get benefit from the engagements. If we don't have a 10 to 1 asymmetrical risk on an engagement, we don't do anything with that person. This is true with who we hire internally too. If we don't have a 10 to 1 on the exchange, if we're paying somebody $1,000 a month, they should be bringing $10,000 worth of value to our business. If they're not, it's not a good, it's not a good setup. And so there's this piece of, it has to go beyond the numbers too, of like, okay, are they perhaps giving us a 10 to one exchange on the time? Are they giving us a 10 to one exchange on our learning capacities? So it's just these different pieces of looking at who we work with them and why, and it's got to be in the relationship piece too.

23:05 And here's how it ties in. Are we also bringing a 10 to one exchange as well? Yeah. Right. Because that's where relationships fall apart if you don't. Right. A hundred percent. And, and depending on, you know, we have so many different ways that we can work with people in our businesses and different. Sometimes we're working inside other people's programs. Sometimes we hire people to, you know, perform a very specific service for us. You know, it, the nature of that can, can change. But I think one of the things that I want more than anything is, to convey in this episode is touching on what you just said, Brooke, we all, and I've done it.

23:49 So I like, I'm not pointing a finger cause I've certainly done it. but we all have a tendency when we hire someone or we join someone's program, et cetera, to say, oh, it's your responsibility now to fix my problems. You said you were gonna do this, right? And we just basically, we're off the hook. It's all on you. And now when they can't fulfill or it doesn't work out the way that we wanted, now we're a victim. And here's the thing that I want to tell you, if you're listening to this right now, and you've been in that situation, and you tried some stuff that didn't work, or you worked with somebody that led you down a wrong path or that couldn't fulfill whatever it might be, whether it's been recent, whether it's happened a few times, whether it was a while ago, you are not a victim.

24:49 You're not. You're not a victim. And this is business. And as is the case in anything else in life, what we make it mean is everything. And more often than not, what we make it mean when we work with, you know, somebody or a group or whatever, try something and it doesn't work out, we oftentimes, we make it mean usually one of two different things. We either go, well, you said you were going to do this. You sucked. You ruined my life. You cost me so much money, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

25:31 Or we look internally and we decide that we can no longer trust ourselves because we, we, we're, we're idiots. Oh my gosh. I can't believe that I fell for that. Oh my gosh. I can't believe that I did this thing and I spent all this money and it didn't work. Oh my gosh. And now, you know, and, and, and we basically wind ourselves into inaction at that point. But when you look backwards on any engagement, And Brooke, I want you to kind of touch on this, but I mean, we totally believe in looking at these things just like you would the scientific method, right? It's not, this is not about feelings.

26:14 It's not. And in business, you're going to try things, you're going to work with people, some will work, some won't, some will be somewhere in between. But how do we set this up for ourselves in a way that you already gave us some framing around the relationship, right? But how do we set this up for ourselves in a way where we can look at this, use this word again agnostically without any beliefs around it, where we can measure and kind of figure out whether something's working, not working, worth, you know, is the dude worth the squeeze? I could eat more coffee.

26:55 Juice worth the squeeze. I don't know. Anyway, God, take it away. Please start talking. So you've said a few of the real critical pieces. One is the meaning that we're going to give it before we even start. So are you going into this thing as a scientist or are you going into this thing as, you know, like Willy Wonka? Are you, are you, uh, what was the kid's name in Willy Wonka? Charlie, Charlie, Charlie, the chocolate factory. So, but like, Oh, I got a golden ticket. Like, are you running around? Cause you thought you got like this, this magical ticket that's going to, you know, forever change your world. Or are you going into it going, you know what? I'm on a mission. And are you really clear what that mission is? Because guess what? Shit is going to break in your business. It is a guarantee.

27:36 Whatever you're doing right now in your business. If you're like, Oh my God, it's working. Cool. Give it three months. It is going to break. Like it's just going to happen. And that's true for your technology. That's true for your people. That's true for the tactics. It's all, everything in your business is going to break. It is an absolute fundamental guarantee. So if you're going in hoping that nothing's ever going to break and that it's very predictable and that you have this consistent steady of stream of leads and that everybody just says yes, and that you can charge all the money in the world and everybody's happy and you'll never have a customer service issue and your technology is going to launch and everything's going to be beautiful and perfect. And you'll never have to rerecord your modules. Newsflash. None of that shit is true.

28:17 So here's the reality. When you get back to it and you go, I'm going to be a scientist. Well, what does a scientist do? First and foremost, they look at things and they say, okay, there's a problem here. They ask a new question. They then go do research. They study. They then make a very strong hypothesis based on that information. They then experiment and they test the crap out of it. They analyze the data to see what's working, what's not, and they make adjustments. They then come to a conclusion, and then they either get results that they like or results that they don't like. And guess what? That cycle starts all over again. And this is this dynamic that we have to approach in our business.

29:00 We're either growing or we're dying. There's nowhere in between. Yeah. And if you're not approaching your business in that way, and this kind of goes back to something I mentioned a moment ago, if your mission and your purpose is not bigger than your process, you will fail. Ooh, say that again. If your mission and your purpose is not bigger than your process, you will fail. Why do we, why do I say that? Your process is going to break. And so if you don't have that fuel to consistently keep rebuilding your boat that might be sinking and you just go up, I guess I'm not a sailor. Like we don't have that luxury in the world of business. Like it is that strong of a thing of you're constantly working on the business.

29:44 You're constantly trying to fix it and make it stronger. And if you think that it's not going to be that way for forever, like go be an employee. And if we really get into it, society has set us up this way. Like, you cool if I go on a soapbox for a moment? I'm going to get shut down by all the powers that be. If we look at where the conditioning has come from, if we go back in time, where did the education system come from? It started during the industrial revolution when we needed a lot of employees, when people were literally dying on the assembly lines. And we needed somebody else to fill that spot so we could keep building whatever we were building. Well, fast forward in time. They just came out yesterday.

30:25 The United States is ranked 34th in the education across the entire globe. We used to be number one when it served us. But now fast forward in time. Okay. The amount of people who go through traditional education, go to college, 98% become employees. They work for somebody else. Like, let that sink in for a moment. Our system is set up to create employees. So guess what? We go out there. We want to change the world. We want to go bring our passion, our mission to the table. We're not equipped to run a business. The school system, you go get your MBA. It doesn't equip you to actually run a business. So guess what? If your mission is not bigger than your process, you are going to fall back into this bucket of being an employee and, But you actually have your name stamped on the door.

31:14 And this is why so many people struggle. They have the wrong expectations. They have the wrong skill set. The mass majority of the ones we've met, they do have the heart set. Yeah. And so this is why, honestly, why we created Empires. We went, how do we help these people who want to transform humanity get the right mindset and the right skill set to match their heart set? There's a lot of really good people that want to help humanity, but they're missing two pieces of that puzzle. Yeah. I don't know if I just went left alley, but... No, you're absolutely right. And I think one of the things I want to circle back to that you talked about, though, is I want to go back for a second to the idea of kind of setting this up as a scientist and that kind of thing.

31:55 You know, if I look backwards, one of the mistakes that I made in the story that I told at the beginning is if I would look back now, while I wouldn't take it back, I would have stopped the bleeding faster. And I talked about this on one of our Fast Five. Man, what is it? Pie Five. One of my Pie Pie episodes. Now I'm like Butt Wheat. Peanut butter and jelly sandwich before this episode. My name is Butt Wheat. And I have come pie pie pie. You tell me my baby. Oh, my gosh. Okay. Let's try this again. Shit. Oh, judge on beat.

32:39 So I talked about the sunk cost fallacy. And this is the idea that, like, we've invested in something. We've invested our time. We've invested our money. We've said yes to something. And now because we've said yes or because we invested, even though it's not working, I'm going to just hang on here. Please don't do that. That is the mistake. If there was a big mistake that I made in that particular scenario, well, there were two. Number one was believing that there was a magic bullet that was going to fix all my problems. I was wrong. Number two. The second one.

33:19 is I hung on way too long. It was stupid. When it was not working anymore, I just kept dumping time and money and effort and energy and emotion into something that was not working. One of the things that I've learned over the years, some of the most successful business people I know are successful because they will pivot fast. Speed to decision in business, the most successful business people in the world are people that are willing to pivot quickly. They will not sit in a situation that is completely broken or not working or they'll figure out a way.

34:03 They'll cut it off. They'll move. And oftentimes it's. A lot of times, and I want to take this down. I want to give two different scenarios for this. It's important, number one, when we're in a situation where we're doing something, it's not working. We have assessed that it's not working, and then we just keep doing it because we like the environment or we paid these people or we made a commitment or whatever. Um, now the, the other piece is we also have to be willing to do something when, you know, when there's an opportunity.

34:44 And so I want to bring this full circle today by saying this in the interest of speed to decision. One of the things that I see, and I know a lot of people who are in this space right now. And for the people that I know that are in this space right now, I want to tell you that I love you. I want to tell you that we care about you. I want to tell you that, that, you know, it sucks when you get, you know, kicked in the nuts. Here's the deal. So many people I watch, Brooke, when something doesn't go right or they get burned or they make a mistake or whatever it might be.

35:25 Now they go on this deal where they become a martyr. They decide that they can't trust themselves and they won't do anything. I mean, we've heard this on sales calls a million times. people who tried and failed or got burned. And I don't know if I can trust somebody again. I get that. Like it sucks. But what do you want? And so many of you right now are wasting precious time, not doing anything about the problems that you have, not trying again because you're afraid. What do you think is going to happen if you keep doing that?

36:06 You're going to end up going out of business anyway. Right. And I'll tell you one thing. I don't know about you, but if I'm going to go out of business, motherfucker, I'm going down swinging. I don't care. Like, I will. And I guess, like, if there's a superpower, you know, that I have, one of them probably is that I don't care. You can knock me down a million times. I will get up and I will try again. And even if I am scared shitless, I am willing to trust people. I am willing to. To say, hey, even though A didn't work, I believe that B could, whatever. And I'm not saying that to pump myself up, but it's conditioning.

36:47 And it's one of the things that I want to give to anybody listening to this today is like, look. It sucks that you tried and it didn't work. It sucks that somebody didn't fulfill. It sucks if you made a mistake. It sucks if you lost a bunch of money. It sucks if your family is looking at you going, my God, when are you going to figure this out? But none of it matters. If your mission is that important to you, get up, dust yourself off. Even if you're scared, trust again. Find the right people. Surround yourself with other people who are crazy enough to keep going if this is what you really want.

37:31 Because the amount of time that you waste being wounded is, can oftentimes be the difference between whether or not you can make this work or you won't because if you wait too long, then if you're missing pieces of the puzzle, they're there, you know, you'll, you'll basically bleed yourself out. You're, you're, you're hitting the nail on the head. I mean, we, we talk so often about the who versus the how, and for all of, for all the coaches who are listening to this, it's like, we say this to our clients. But we got to have some real healthy looks in the mirror and go, who am I going to be in my business?

38:13 Am I going to be a coach? Or am I going to be a business owner who's going to be a gladiator who's going to be willing to go into the arena and be willing to lose a limb for the sake of victory? And in our business, here's the craziest part of this game, especially in this industry. All it takes is one good month. That's all it takes. And to get one good month. So I had a mentor early in my career and he, for whatever reason that landed when he said these numbers, but he goes, look, all I'm looking to do is have four good days per week. If I have four good days per week, that means I won the week.

38:53 And if I have three good weeks in a month, I'll have won the month. And if I have nine good months a year, I'll have won the year and I will have blown out the competition. And I think that we get so wrapped around the axle that we've got to have seven good days every week. And we've got to have four good weeks every month. And we've got to have 12 winning months every year. And it's not true. But if we play that way, if we're playing from that perspective of I've got to be perfect, Like we're setting ourselves up for a really bumpy road. And at the end of the day, you mentioned earlier, I wanted to address it. My wife told me this a while back because I got into my own pity party at one point in time because something didn't go my way.

39:37 And she goes, look, you're either a creator or you're a victim. You cannot be both at the same time. And that, for whatever reason, that just, and this was probably 15 years ago that she made that sentiment. And it's like, okay, there's moments I go into my pity party and I go into that victim mindset. And I'm like, oh, I was wrong. This didn't go my way or I didn't win or whatever it might be. Or even somebody took advantage of me. Or if somebody committed fraud. Okay. What am I going to make it mean? Who am I going to be in this moment? Am I going to learn from it and become stronger and become better and do something in a different way? Or am I going to focus all my energy on it and give it even more energy and magnify it and give up on my mission?

40:21 So I'm glad this topic came up today because I think there's so much just in the world right now of everybody wanting to point fingers somewhere else instead of just going, I'm done looking in the rearview mirror. I'm done pointing fingers. Where the fuck am I going? Who am I committed to becoming? And why am I doing this? And what am I willing to do in order to make that happen? We've got to get back on track. I couldn't agree with you more. And I think the other piece, too, is as we talk about creator versus victim, when we allow ourselves to stay in that victim space, basically, we give away our power to other people.

41:02 And I don't know about you, but for me, I... I can't stand the idea that anybody else is determining my outcomes other than me. I can't stand it. And if there's anything that I just that just incenses me, it is when people hold a hard core belief that the outside world is to blame for their problems and, you know, all of the things like, look, This also comes down to, and I realize some of you right now, you're listening to this, you know, like, man, like, I thought I was going to get a little sympathy from you today.

41:49 And like, here's the deal. The reality of the situation, you guys, is that this is a tough love moment. One of the things that I read in that, that sticks with me today that I read in a book is one of Patrick Lencioni's books, uh, called, uh, getting naked. And, uh, it's kind of a business fable. I really, I love that book. Um, but one of the things, and I read this many, many years ago now, uh, one of the things that really stuck out to me was be willing to tell your client the honest truth. Hmm.

42:29 And that's what I want to, that's what we want to give you today is not something to make you feel better. Could we do that? Sure. Could we bang on all the crappy other people and companies and whatever? Yeah, sure. We could do that. But that's not going to serve you at the end of the day. And it's not going to serve the people that need you either. Yeah. And so one of the pieces of all of this, you know, we've mentioned it now multiple times, but around what we make it mean, the meaning that we give it also determines whose responsibility is it at the end of the day? If it's mine. I can live with that because I know I'm going to make mistakes.

43:12 I am not a robot. I'm not perfect. I am going to make mistakes. I am going to swing and miss. But if the responsibility is mine, I can handle that. I can fix that. The moment it's somebody else's problem or somebody else's responsibility, now all of a sudden I've given that power away and I'm helpless. And that, you know, that does not feel good. Not only does it not feel good, but it's disempowering. And every moment that we spend being helpless, there are people out there right now. And this is why we wanted to bring a little bit of tough love here. So there are people out there right now that are waiting on you.

43:55 They're waiting for you to trust again. They're begging for you to try one more time. They're praying literally every day for the solution that you haven't been able to get in front of them yet, hoping that you'll give it just one more chance, one more try. Because if you don't, they stay stuck in suffering. Let that sit with you for a minute. So... Uh, all right. Well, uh, I think we can take them out of the penalty box now. No, I'm kidding. Never, never. Uh, this is good, man. Thank you for bringing in everything that you brought to this episode.

44:37 This was one that, that weighs on us very heavily. And again, I just want to say that if you're listening to this right now, we love you. We care about you. We want to see you win. Um, and so go back, listen to this again. When you get kicked in the nuts again, uh, and it will happen, come back and listen to it again. And anytime you need a reminder, because here's the thing that I just want you to know. We're all looking to feel good because everything is working. How about instead we feel good because we're still playing the game? How about that? Thanks for listening to the Path to Mastery podcast.

45:19 If you got value from this, leave us a review and subscribe so that you never miss a single episode. And if you know another entrepreneur who needs to hear this, do us a solid and send it their way. We'll catch you next time on the Path to Mastery podcast.