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Welcome back to Jim Rhone Talks. Before we jump in, there's something that's helped us stay disciplined. Our self discipline hacks playbook. It's a step by step system. We use ourselves to turn these principles into action. If you're ready to invest in yourself, check the link in the show notes. Thanks for tuning in. Let's unlock today's lesson together.
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You know what's fascinating? The other day I was talking to a good friend of mine and he asked me a question that stopped me right in my tracks. He said, why do some people make it and others don't? And I'll tell you what I told him. Success has a price tag and that price tag is called sacrifice. Now, I grew up on a farm in Idaho, and let me share something interesting with you about farming that changed my entire perspective on success. Every spring, my father would take our best seeds, seeds we could have eaten, seeds we could have sold, and he'd bury them in the ground. To a young boy, this seemed crazy. Why would you take perfectly good seeds and just bury them? But here's the miracle. And pay close attention to this because it's profound. Those buried seeds, that sacrifice of immediate consumption or would multiply a hundredfold by harvest time. That's exactly how success works. You have to give up something valuable today to gain something even more valuable tomorrow. Some people say, well, I want success, but I don't want to give anything up. And I always say that's like wanting a harvest without planting any seeds. It just doesn't work that way. The universe has set it up so that everything worthwhile requires a sacrifice. You want better health, you've got to sacrifice that extra hour of sleep to get to the gym. You want more money, you've got to sacrifice some leisure time to work on your skills, your business, your education. You want better relationships, You've got to sacrifice your pride sometimes and be the first to say, I'm sorry. I remember when I first started out, barely making enough to get by. I had a choice. I could buy TV and watch other people succeed, or I could buy books and learn how to succeed myself. That TV would have given me immediate pleasure. But those book, they gave me a future. See, most people don't succeed because they're not willing to be temporarily uncomfortable for permanent improvement. They're not willing to plant their seeds. They want to eat their seeds and have a harvest too. But life just doesn't work that way. And here's what's really interesting about sacrifice. It's not about giving up something for Nothing. It's about giving up something good for something better. It's about giving up what you want now for what you want most. The question isn't, do you want success? Everyone wants success. The real question is, what price are you willing to pay? Because everything has a price. That price must be paid in full, and it must be paid in advance. But that's just the beginning of understanding how success really works in our world today. You know, when I started studying success, real success, not just the kind you see on magazine covers, I discovered something remarkable. Success isn't what most people think it is. It's not about getting lucky. And it's certainly not about hoping and wishing things will get better while sitting on your couch eating popcorn. The marketplace, and this is crucial to understand, the marketplace is brutally honest. It doesn't care about your dreams, your wishes, or your good intentions. The marketplace only rewards one thing, the value. The value you bring to the table, the value you create, the value you become. Let me tell you a story about a young man I met at one of my seminars. He came up to me afterward, all excited, saying, I really want to be successful. I asked him, what did you do last weekend? He said, well, I watched tv, hung out with friends, played some video games, said, that's fine, but understand this. Successful people don't just want success. They work at success. Here's the fundamental truth about success that nobody wants to hear. Success is not something you chase. It's something you become. And becoming requires fundamental changes in how you think, how you act, and most importantly, how you spend your time. I often tell people, don't wish it was easier. Wish you were better. Don't wish for fewer problems, wish for more skills. Don't wish for less challenge, wish for more wisdom. That's the foundation. That's where it all starts. Now let me share something fascinating about the price tag of success. Success has a price, and the price must be paid in full. And it must be paid in advance. That's just how it works. You can't buy success on credit. You can't say, well, I'll be disciplined after I succeed. It doesn't work. The price tag includes things like going to work early when others are sleeping, studying while others are partying, saving while others are spending, practicing while others are playing, learning while others are loafing. And here's what's interesting. The price of success is always less than the price of failure. But most people don't see it that way because they're not thinking long term. They're thinking about today. This week, this month. But success isn't built in days. It's built in decades. I remember talking to a successful businessman who told me something profound. He said, most people overestimate what they can do in a year and underestimate what they can do in a decade. We want everything now, instantly, immediately. But that's not how real lasting success works. The foundation of success is built on understanding that everything worthwhile has a price. Everything. Want better health, there's a price. Want better relationships, there's a price. One financial independence, there's a price. And here's the kicker. You can't negotiate the price. The only choice you have is whether you're willing to pay it. But, and this is important, once you understand this, once you truly get it deep in your bones that success has a price and you're willing to pay it, something magical happens. Your excuses disappear. Your procrastination vanishes. Your commitment level rises. Why? Because now you understand the rules of the game. You understand that success isn't about luck or chance or circumstances. And speaking of understanding how success really works, let me share with you something fascinating about the mathematics of achievement. You know what's fascinating about success? It follows mathematical principles just as reliable as gravity. Two plus two equals four yesterday today, and it'll be the same tomorrow. Success works exactly the same way. It's not mysterious, it's mathematical. Let me break this down in a way that'll absolutely amaze you. Every day, every single day, you're either moving towards success or away from it. There's no standing still in life. Even standing still is going backward because time is moving forward. Here's a simple equation I want you to write down. Your life in five years would be the sum of two things. The books you read and the people you associate with. That's it. Simple mathematics. You can't hang around negative people for five years and expect to live a positive life. You can't read zero books and expect to have better answers. Time, the most precious commodity we have. Everyone gets the same amount 24 hours a day, 168 hours a week. The difference between the successful and the unsuccessful isn't time. It's what they do with that time. I talked to a young man recently who told me he didn't have time to read. I asked him, how much TV do you watch? He said, about three hours a day. I said, there's your reading time. It's not at about having time. That's the mathematics of time management. Here's something that'll blow your Mind small changes compounded over time create massive results. If you improve just 1% every day at the end of the year, you're 37 times better, not 365% better. That's the power of compound interest. Working in your personal development. Let me give you another mathematical principle, the slight edge. Successful people do little things that seem to make no difference at the time. They read 10 pages of a good book every day. They make one extra phone call. They save a little money. They exercise for 30 minutes. Nothing dramatic. But here's the magic. These little things compounded over time, create massive success. And speaking of compound effect, let me share something profound about sacrifices. Every small sacrifice you make today compounds into something bigger tomorrow. When you choose to save $100 instead of spending it, that's not just $100 plus $1 plus what it could become. When you choose to spend an hour learning instead of watching tv, that's not just an hour, that's an hour plus all the opportunities that new knowledge brings. The Mathematics of Achievement says your income rarely exceeds your personal development. If you want to have more, you've got to become more. Want to earn ten thousand dollars a month? You've got to become a ten thousand dollar a month person in terms of your skills, your thinking, your relationships, your habits. What's really exciting about understanding these mathematics, Once you get it, once you really understand that success is predictable, that it follows mathematical principles, you stop hoping and start knowing. You stop wishing and start working. Because now you understand that success isn't about luck, it's about law. Mathematical law. Now, speaking of becoming more valuable is. Let me share with you what successful people consistently sacrifice to achieve their goals. What's interesting about successful people? They're willing to do what unsuccessful people are not willing to do. And it's not because successful people like doing these things more. They don't. They just understand that temporary discomfort is the price of permanent comfort. Comfort zones, they're interesting places. Nice, cozy, predictable. But here's the problem with comfort zones. Nothing grows there. I always say life begins at the end of your comfort zone. And successful people, they make friends with discomfort. They understand that being uncomfortable today leads to being unstoppable tomorrow. I remember when I first started in business. Every morning I had a choice. Yes. Stay in my warm, comfortable bed or get up early to work on my dreams. Nobody was forcing me to get up. Nobody was checking if I showed up. But I knew something. Most people don't realize success doesn't sleep in time sacrifices. Because this is where most people Fumble the ball. Successful people treat time like the precious commodity it is. While others are watching the latest TV show, successful people are reading, learning, planning, working. While others are complaining about Monday morning. Successful people are already halfway through their most important tasks. What's fascinating, most people spend more time planning their vacations than planning their lives. Think about that. They'll spend hours looking for the best hotel deal, but won't spend 15 minutes planning their day. Successful people, they sacrifice. They go with the flow lifestyle. They become masters of their time, not victims of it. I had a friend who wanted to start a business. He told me, I'll work on it when I have time. I said, you'll never have time. You have to make time. He didn't like that answer. But six months later, he thanked me. He started getting up two hours earlier every day. Well, was it comfortable? No. Did he enjoy it at first? Absolutely not. But he understood something crucial. You don't find time for important things. You make time, style, choices. Because this is where it gets really interesting. Successful people make different choices about how they live their lives. They drive used cars while saving for investments. They live in modest homes while building their businesses. They pack lunches while others eat out every day. I remember talking to a successful businessman who told me something profound. He said, for the first 10 years of my business, I lived like nobody wanted to live. So for the rest of my life, I could live like nobody could. Think about that. While others bought new cars, he bought used. While others bought fancy clothes, he bought books. While others focused on looking successful, he focused on becoming successful. Short term pleasures that'll blow your mind. Successful people don't deny themselves pleasures. They just delay them. They understand the principle of sacrifice. They know that saying no to something good today might mean saying yes to something better tomorrow. Let me give you an example. Two young people start their careers. One saves $100 a month and invest it. The other spends that extra $100 on entertainment. After 30 years, guess what happens? The first person is financially free, while the second person is still trading time for money. Same amount of money, different choices. What's really fascinating about these sacrifices, they're not really sacrifices at all, they're investments. When you give up television time to read, you're not sacrificing entertainment. You're investing in your mind. When you get up early to work on your business, you're not sacrificing sleep. You're investing in your future. When you live below your means, you're not sacrificing lifestyle, you're investing in your Freedom. And successful people understand something else about sacrifice. It's not about giving up everything. It's about giving up something good for something better. It's about trading what you want now for what you want most. Most people want to be successful, but they don't want to change. They want different results without doing different things. But successful people understand that you can't harvest different crops from the same seeds. You want different results, you've got to plant different seeds. Speaking of changing how we think about success, let me share with you something powerful about the mindset shift that makes all these sacrifices not just possible, but inevitable. What separates the successful from the unsuccessful? It's not talent. It's not luck. It's not even education. It's mindset. And the biggest mindset shift you can make is moving from being a consumer to becoming a producer. Most people spend their lives consuming, consuming food, entertainment, information, products. But successful people, they wake up every morning asking themselves, what can I produce today? What value can I contribute? I remember talking to a young man who was complaining about his job, his boss, his paycheck. I asked him a simple questions, what have you produced today that someone would be willing to pay for? He looked at me blankly. See, he was stuck in consumer thinking. He was thinking about what he could get instead, what he could give. Here's something fascinating about excuses. Everyone has them. The successful and the unsuccessful. Both have problems, both face challenges, both deal with setbacks. The difference? Successful people use their energy to find solutions, while unsuccessful people use their energy to find excus excuses. You can have your excuses or you can have your success, but you can't have both. They don't live in the same house. Every time you make an excuse, you're voting for mediocrity. Every time you take responsibility, you're voting for excellence. Where it gets really interesting. Personal responsibility. This is the game changer. This is where everything shifts. When you take 100 responsibility for everything in your life, your results, your relationships, your bank account, your health, something magical happens. You move from victim to victor. I often tell people, don't blame the economy, don't blame the government, don't blame your parents, don't blame your education. Why? Because when you blame, you give away your power. And if you give away your power, you give away your ability to change your life. What personal responsibility looks like. If you don't like something in your life, you change it. If you can't change it, you change your attitude about it. But you never ever blame. Blame is the favorite game of consumers, producers. They're too busy creating solutions to play the blame game. Something fascinating about this mindset shift. It changes how you see everything. Problems become opportunities. Obstacles become stepping stones. Setbacks become setups for comebacks. Why? Because producers don't see problems. They see possibilities. I talked to a successful entrepreneur who told me something profound. She said, the day I stopped saying I can't because and started saying how can I was the day my life changed. It's not about having no obstacles. It's about having a different response to those obstacles. This mindset shift is like turning on a light in a dark room. Suddenly you see things that were always there, but hidden in the darkness. You see opportunities where others see obstacles. You see potential where others see problems. You see responsibility where others see blame. And once you make this shift, once you transform from consumer to producer, from excuse maker to solution finder, from blame thrower to responsibility taker, something remarkable happens. Success becomes inevitable. Not easy, but inevitable. Speaking of inevitability, how to build a foundation for success that makes failure almost impossible? What fascinates me about building a house? They spend more time on the foundation than anything else. Most people never see it, but without it, everything else falls apart. Success works exactly the same way. It's all about the foundation, daily disciplines. Because this is where your foundation begins. Your life is not made by the big decisions you make once in a while. Your life is made by the small decisions you make every single day. Every single day. What time do you get up? What do you read? What do you eat? Who do you talk to? These seemingly small decisions, they're like laying bricks. One brick might not look like much, but stack them up day after day, and suddenly you've built a wall. Stack them up long enough and you've built a cathedral. I remember talking to a successful writer who told me something profound. He said, I'm not a great writer. I'm a great rewriter, and I write every single day. See, he understood something most people miss. Success isn't about intensity. It's about consistency. It's not what you do once in a while. It's what you do every single day that counts. Insistent action. Because this is where most people drop the ball. They start strong, full of enthusiasm, but then life happens. They miss one day, then two, then a week, and suddenly they're back where they started. But successful people, they understand that consistency beats intensity every single time. What consistent action looks like. It's reading 10 pages of a good book every day. It's making those five sales calls every day. It's writing those 500 words every day. It's exercising for 30 minutes every day. Nothing dramatic, nothing extraordinary. Just simple disciplines practiced every single day. What's fascinating about consistent action, it creates compound interest in your personal development. Just like money grows through compound interest. Your skills, your knowledge, your capabilities grow through consistent action. Small improvements compounded daily create massive results over time, creating valuable market skills. The marketplace only rewards value. That's it. It doesn't reward need, it doesn't reward want. It doesn't reward desire. It only rewards value. And the more valuable you become, the more you can earn. I often ask people, what makes you valuable in the marketplace? Most people don't have a good answer. They say things like, I'm a hard worker or I'm reliable. That's fine, but that's the minimum. That's like saying, my car has wheels. Of course it does. That's the minimum requirement for being a car. To become more valuable, you need to develop skills that solve problems. The bigger the problems you can solve, the more valuable you become. The more people you can serve, the more valuable you become, the more difficult you are to replace, the more valuable you become. The key to building valuable market skills. Start with the fundamentals, master them, then build on them. Too many people want to skip the fundamentals. They want to run before they can walk. But there are no elevators to success. You have to take the stairs. Your skills must evolve as the market evolves. What made you valuable yesterday might not make you valuable tomorrow. That's why continuous learning isn't optional, it's mandatory. That's why personal development isn't something you do once in a while. It's something you do every single day. What's really interesting about building this foundation? Once you have it, success becomes almost inevitable. Not easy. Nothing worthwhile is ever easy, but inevitable. Because you're not relying on luck or chance or circumstances. You're building something solid, something lasting, something real. And speaking of real, the real price you pay when you don't make these necessary sacrifices. What's interesting about life? You're going to pay a price either way. You'll either pay the price of discipline or you'll pay the price of regret. And let me tell you something. The price of discipline weighs ounces, but the price of regret weighs tons of procrastination. Because this is a silent killer of dreams. When you procrastinate, you're not just putting something off, you're choosing your future. Every time you say, I'll start tomorrow, you're literally voting for a smaller life. And here's what's fascinating about procrastination. It doesn't just cost you today's opportunity, it cost you the compound interest of that opportunity. I remember talking to a man in his 50s. He told me, 20 years ago I had an idea for a business. I thought about it every day, but I never started. Last week I saw someone else become a millionaire with the exact same idea. See, that's the real cost of procrastination. Watching someone else live your dream. Cost opportunities. Because this is where it gets painful. Every time you say no to growth, you're saying yes to decay. Every time you choose comfort over progress, you're choosing a smaller future. The opportunities you miss don't just disappear. They go to someone else. Here's something that'll blow your mind. Poor choices compound, just like good ones. Just like saving 100amonth can make you wealthy over time, wasting $100 a month can keep you poor. Just like reading good books can make you smarter over time, watching mindless TV can make you duller. Everything compounds good habits and bad habits. What's really interesting about the price of not making sacrifices, it's always higher than the price of making them. Always. When you don't sacrifice time for exercise, you sacrifice your health. When you don't sacrifice immediate pleasure for long term growth, you sacrifice your future. When you don't sacrifice comfort for progress, you sacrifice your potential. The cost isn't just financial though. That's part of it. The real cost is in who you become. Because while you're avoiding sacrifice, while you're choosing comfort, while you're procrastinating, someone else is working, growing, progressing. And one day you wake up and realize the gap between where you are and where and where you could have been is so wide it seems impossible to cross. But here's the good news, and this is important. It's never too late to start making the right sacrifices. It's never too late to start building. It's never too late to start growing. The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is today. And speaking of today, let me share with you exactly what you need to do right now to start making the kind of sacrifices that lead to success. What separates the dreamers from the achievers? Action. Simple, immediate, decisive action. And right now, in this moment, you have a choice to make. Not tomorrow, not next week. Not when the conditions are perfect. Right now, I'm going to challenge you to do something that might make you uncomfortable. Take out a piece of paper. Yes. Right now. Write down three Things you've been postponing. Three sacrifices you know you need to make but haven't had the courage to make yet. Maybe it's getting up an hour earlier. Maybe it's cutting out that unnecessary spending. Maybe it's finally starting that business. Now, here's the real challenge. I want you to start with one of these sacrifices. Tomorrow morning. Not next month, not when you feel ready tomorrow morning. Because if you're waiting to feel ready, you'll be waiting the rest of your life. Everything you want in life is on the other side of sacrifice. Everything. Better health. Sacrifice comfort. More money. Sacrifice spending. Better relationships. Sacrifice pride. Better future. Sacrifice. Present pleasure. Here are your action steps, and I want you to take them seriously. First, choose your sacrifices carefully. Make sure they're sacrifices that lead to growth, not just denial. Second, start small, but start immediately. Third, stay consistent. Remember, it's not what you do once in a while that shapes your life. It's what you do consistently. And here's something fascinating about taking action. The moment you start, something magical happens. The universe has a way of rewarding action. Doors begin to open, opportunities appear, help arrives. But, and this is crucial only after you've taken the first step. Success is not about what you're going to do, what you plan to do, or what you hope to do. Success is about what you're doing right now at this moment. The sacrifices you're making right now, the disciplines you're practicing right now. Remember what we talked about earlier. You're going to pay a price either way. So why not pay the price that makes you better? Why not pay the price that moves you forward? Why not pay the price that transforms your life? Years from now, you will surely arrive. The question is, where? Two people left the same spot five years ago. One move forward, made sacrifices, did what was necessary. The other waited for the perfect time, avoided discomfort, made excuses. Today, they're miles apart. And five years from now, you will arrive at a destination. Where that destination is depends entirely on the sacrifices you're willing to make, starting right now.