Brant Phillips Show 14: Defining Success

[powerpress]

Welcome everybody to The Brant Phillips Show, the show dedicated to life and business results. That’s all that matters, are results. What I want to talk about today my friends are not only your results but how you define success, because how you define success is going to determine, it’s going to help to determine the results that you experience. Let me explain a little bit. For those of you on the verge of possibly beginning your entrepreneurial journey, it’s really critical, really critical that you define what success looks like to you before you begin on this journey, really critical. I’m going to share a personal example in just a little bit.

For those of you already on the path of being an entrepreneur, being a business owner, being an investor, it’s okay to shift gears. It’s okay to redirect your course and your path if you found that the path that you’re on isn’t fun. It’s not enjoyable and it’s not matching up to your definition of success, because I’ll share with you in a little bit my story like I mentioned. For me, success is not about money or fame. Yes, money is a part of it. Money is a part of it. I don’t know about the fame thing, but money is absolutely a part of it. If you’re pursuing a have it all type of lifestyle meaning that you’ve got an ideal business, an ideal life, then money is a part of it because you can’t really have this really awesome incredible life and truly help and serve others if you’re broke. Money is a part of it, the look.

Success is not just about the money. It’s not just about the fame. It’s more about what is it that you’re creating with your time on this big ball of mud. I’ve had it boiled down to this. When the ones closest to you respect and love you the most, then you my friends have reached success. When the ones closest to you respect and love you the most, you have reached success. In other words, if you succeed at the wrong thing, you’ve failed. If you “Fail” while pursuing the right thing, then guess what? You’ve won.

Just from the pursuit alone, just from pursuing what you felt called to pursue and what you felt called to create, you are creating success by staying true to yourself. That’s why it’s so incredibly important to really get clear, really get clear on what it is in your heart. What is it that you feel called to do? What is it that you feel inspired to do? If you can intertwine that with a bigger purpose, a bigger mission, a bigger drive, then even if you miss the mark, you’ve really won. Like the MMA lesson I’ve talked about before. It’s like you either win or you learn. You either win or you learn. If your target is dialed in to where you really want to go and who you really want to become, then you’re on the right path. If you go down this path of just pursuing money, then that road can get really, really ugly. That road can get really, really ugly.

My challenge to you on this podcast is to put the message before the money. That is what it is that you’re pursuing, get clear on that. Get clear on that with the importance of the impact and what you’re going to be doing and something that you’re going to enjoy and help and serve others, put the importance on that and the money will follow. I want you to take the time to really get clear on the message of life. What do you want your life story to be and make that the foundation of your business before starting your business.

Perhaps like I said, maybe you’re already, you’re a business owner, you’re already an investor and you found the foundation that’s been laid is not so solid. What do I mean by that? Maybe you’re not really passionate about what it is that you’re doing. I find that to be the case a lot. I’m doing some small business consulting. I’m working with entrepreneurs and the foundation that the company was originally built on was generally, it was something that they weren’t really passionate about but it was a way to make money, it was a way to quit their job.

I see people make the same mistake that I made. That’s where this message is really coming from, is you see whenever I began my entrepreneurial pursuits, I really just had one goal. I had one goal and it was freedom. I wanted to leave my job. I wanted to be my own boss. I wanted to do my own thing. I wanted to have the money and the wealth and all that kind of stuff as well, but really it was like, it was freedom. I just wanted to quit my job. I failed to do what I teach so many of my students in class to do which is what I learned from Stephen Covey, which was simply to begin with the end in mind. Simply to begin with the end in mind and to make sure that I’m not only building an ideal business, something that I can gain renewable energy from and I can continually be excited about and find ways to renew it and recreate it and just find new ways to make money from it so that it’s always fresh and new and sustainable.

This is all about sustainability but if we’re not passionate about what we’re doing and if that foundation has not been set really well, then it’s not really sustainable. This is why people get burned out when obstacles come, whenever there’s changes in the market, things like that, people, it’s not a sustainable business because people aren’t really committed to it. They’re not passionate about it. This is why so many business fail. It’s not because of the economy. It’s not because of this, that, and the other thing. It’s just a lot of times the owner wasn’t fully committed and passionate about what they were doing.

I encourage you my friends to build a business, begin with the end in mind and build a business that you’re truly excited and passionate about. When you find yourself on the path and things have changed, it doesn’t always mean that if you’re not passionate about your business that it’s time to shut it down. It’s a time to reassess and figure out why. This is something else that I went through where there’s a long period of time where I got burned out with real estate and I got burned out with construction, some of the things I was doing. When I really took a long hard look, it wasn’t that I was burned out with real estate or burned out with my construction company, I was burned out with some of the things that I was doing in the company. Meaning I was doing things that were just menial tasks, things that were done over and over and over, just repetitive stuff that’s just, is boring and not exciting for me and doesn’t line up with my personality profile if you will.

I realized that I needed to just change some things in the business. I needed to empower and outsource others or some things and other responsibilities. I needed to redefine my role. That’s one of the reasons I do a lot of podcast and social media promoting and things like that. This is something I’m more passionate about and it’s the ways that I like to contribute to my businesses and build my businesses. Those were some of the mistakes that I learned along my path.

My hope is for those of you starting out or those of you who are on the path that make changes now. Make changes now before you get to this point of no return because I see businesses do that where they reach this point of no return, where they don’t have any fight left in them, they don’t have the energy, they don’t have the spunk, they don’t have the whatever you want to call it and they end up in this downward spiral. Then the complications that set in at that point in time after you’ve been doing this a year, five, 10, 15, 20 years and that foundation wasn’t set, well, then there’s much higher stakes and a major setback like that may just knock out of the game. Don’t do that. Don’t do that.

Wherever you’re starting from, if you’re just starting in business or you’re just at a roadblock in your existing business, don’t beat yourself up. If you don’t have that clarity, if you don’t have that passion or that drive that you had once before, but definitely take some time and just really get clear on your place. Even if you’re starting at a place of nothing or if you’re starting … Maybe perhaps you’re at a place where your business is on like against the ropes like you’ve got debt, maybe you’re going through a divorce or some other personal things, whatever hurdles that you may have in front of you right now, in addition to maybe not even being clear about what is it that you want to do, and except knowing that I want to start a business. I want to begin investing. Wherever you’re starting at, whatever problems are against you, just acknowledge them. Not only acknowledge them, appreciate them, appreciate them and just for the opportunity to overcome them and create your own story, create your own testimonial, create something that you can look back upon and share with others and be proud of.

When you do that, just get clear. Get clear, begin with the end in mind, define what true success looks like for you, and then just go out and ruthlessly work your ass off and make it happen. Step-by-step, day-by-day, one brick at a time and just go freaking build it. Rome wasn’t built in a day my friends, neither is your business going to be. Every good solid sustainable business is built one brick at a time. That’s all I got today my friends. I just want to say that I love and appreciate each and every one of you. I thank you for listening to the show. Until next time, I look forward to helping you create results in your life and in your business.