← Tom Bilyeu's Impact Theory
Tom Bilyeu's Impact Theory
Hal Elrod: If You Can’t Change Your Emotions Do This Instead (Replay)
00:43:59
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- [00:01]
Hal Elrod
Book a Loved by Guest property with VRBO and you get a top rated vacation rental that's loved for all the right reasons like being in a great location or having great amenities. Ugh.
- [00:09]
VRBO/Grainger Ad Voice
I love my VRBO for the view.
- [00:11]
Hal Elrod
Good reason. Ooh, and the sauna.
- [00:14]
VRBO/Grainger Ad Voice
Sweet.
- [00:15]
Hal Elrod
Another good reason. And that it's one of those good
- [00:17]
VRBO/Grainger Ad Voice
saunas with the hot rock thing.
- [00:19]
Hal Elrod
Ugh. Love a good hot rock thing. Fancy. That's also a reason. Don't worry about surprises. Book a verbo you'll love with the Love by guest filter. If you know you verbo when you
- [00:31]
VRBO/Grainger Ad Voice
manage procurement for multiple facilities, every order matters. But when it's for a hospital system, they matter even more. Grainger gets it and knows there's no time for managing multiple suppliers and no room for shipping delays. That's why Grainger offers millions of products in fast, dependable delivery so you can keep your facility stocked, safe and running smoothly. Call 1-800-GRAINGER clickgrainger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done. You're listening to Impact Theory.
- [01:03]
Hal Elrod
Impact Theory.
- [01:04]
Tom Bilyeu
Impact Theory.
- [01:05]
Hal Elrod
Impact Theory. Impact Baby.
- [01:07]
Tom Bilyeu
Hey everybody. Welcome to Impact Theory. Our goal with this show and company is to introduce you to the people and ideas that will help you actually execute on your dreams. All right, today's guest is the best selling author of Miracle Morning and one of the highest rated keynote speakers in America. His book has sold more than 600,000 copies worldwide, has been translated into 27 languages, and his teachings are being practiced by more than 500,000 people daily in more than 70 countries. But all of that almost never happened. At the age of 20, he was involved in a catastrophic drunk driving accident that was so violent it ripped his car in half and actually took his life. His heart stopped beating for a full six minutes and over the next week, as he lay in a coma, he died two more times. After seven surgeries in just six days to repair the extensive damage he sustained, including 11 broken bones, he finally stabilized. But doctors warned that he may never walk again. But not only did he walk again through sheer force of will, he ended up running a 52 mile ultra marathon and recovering fully. But just as everything in his life were finally humming along, he found himself near death once again. This time it was a very rare, very aggressive form of cancer that took him from symptom free to the verge of multiple organ failure in just days. He immediately began a brutal chemotherapy regimen and once again, through discipline of thought and action, saw his way through and back to health. But just surviving is not his mission. He wants to help others thrive as well. And his unique ability to teach the lessons he's learned are allowing him to do just that. So please help me in welcoming the man whose book has over 2,000 five star reviews on Amazon, the hall of Fame business achiever, Hal Elrod. How you doing, man?
- [03:02]
Hal Elrod
Good to see you, Tom.
- [03:03]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, you as well, dude. Very excited to sit down and talk. And what's crazy is, even all the madness that I talked about in the intro, I didn't get to cover one of the crazier parts, which was when what happened? When the economy went bust in 2008, you lost, like, half of your income and had to fight your way back from that.
- [03:24]
Hal Elrod
Yeah.
- [03:24]
Tom Bilyeu
And I want to understand, like, the thing that really seems incredible about you is your ability to regulate your emotions, to get back on track and to keep pushing forward. So what was that like? In that moment? You said that you were depressed or close to depression. How did you restabilize?
- [03:40]
Hal Elrod
So I was 20 when I had the car accident. And a year and a half before that, I had started a career in direct sales. And I learned something in my training from my manager called the five minute rule. And he said that when you're out there in the. In the field, you're going to have disappointment, you're going to have rejection, you're going to set a goal for the week. You're not going to hit it. You're going to hit it and then have the order cancel. Like, he's like, you're going to deal with a lot of stuff. It's a microcosm for life. And he taught us what he called the five minute rule. He said, so when things go wrong, we have a rule. It's okay to be negative, but not for more than five minutes. Give yourself five minutes. Set your timer on your phone. You would literally teach us. At the timer, you get five minutes to bitch, moan, complain, cry, vent, punch a wall, whatever. And after five minutes, you take a deep breath and say three really powerful words. Can't change it. And it's simply an acknowledgement that I can't change what's already happened, so there's no value in wishing it were different. And essentially, I learned through reading Eckhart Tollean things through years after that every negative emotion that we have is self created by the degree of resistance that we have to our reality, whether it's past reality, whether it's happening right now, or whether it's even a projected future reality that we're afraid of. And so in the span of five minutes, I woke up, I was told I would never walk again. You know, I had 11 broken bones, permanent brain damage. And I went, well, can't change it. And the doctors thought I was delusional because I was so happy. And I told my dad, I said, dad, there's two possibilities. Number one, the doctors are right and I'll never walk again. And I said, and I've already decided I've imagined that possibility. Okay? I'm in a wheelchair the rest of my life. I promised dad because my parents were concerned, the doctors were concerned. I said, I promise I'll be the happiest person you've ever seen in a wheelchair. Cause I'm in a wheelchair. Either way, I'll be happy, I'll be grateful. Why be miserable just because that's my unchangeable circumstance? And I said, possibility number two is I will walk again. And I don't even know if it's possible, but I do know that that's what I want. So I've accepted the worst case scenario. I'm at peace with it, and all of my energy is going into walking again. I think about it every day. I visualize it, I pray about it, I talk about it. Imagine it. And a week later, the doctors came in with routine X rays. And they said, we don't know how to explain this, but your body is healing so quickly, we're gonna let you take your first step tomorrow. And that was three weeks after the accident. It went from, like, never walking again. And I'm thinking maybe like, in a year, not in three weeks. And then I took my first step the next day. So I share that kind of backstory, because every adversity that I've had since then, I'm able to leverage the lesson of, hey, if I can't change it, the only intelligent choice I have if I want to be happy is to accept it. 2008 was hard. It was actually harder for me to deal with in the car accident. And I think the reason is the car accident was the worst thing I'd imagine happening to me. Happen. And then it could only really get better from there. Like, I was in the hospital. I woke up from a coma. It's like, okay, I'm gonna heal over time, right? With the economy when it crashed, it's like, I lost a couple clients. I'm delusional. First of all, right? Like, there's a fine line between optimism and delusion. You probably cross it too, sometimes, right? But I. But I would people be like, you know, you worried about the economy? I go, I create my own economy. I don't watch the news, I don't pay attention to it, right? And I guess, you know, I'm losing client after client after client after client because they were affected by the economy, they couldn't pay me. And after I lost my first client, I went, oh, man, can't change it. Five minute rule. All right, That's a bummer, man. I've never lost a client. And then within a matter of weeks, I lost, you know, or about a month, I lost half of my client, half of my income, couldn't pay the mortgage. And so I got really scared and really depressed. Like, the can't change it thing wasn't work because it just kept getting worse and worse and worse and worse and worse. Like this downward spiral. So, yeah, and that's when I did some Google searching. I was just simply trying to figure out, what are the world's most successful people doing that I'm not doing. And I kept coming across morning rituals and morning routines. But I went, I'm not a morning person. Like, what else do they do? Like, where's the night owl? Like, success plan, right? And I finally saw one. I don't remember the headline, but it caught my attention. And I went, I gotta read this. And I dove in, and this was 2007. So morning rituals now are. Everybody talks about them, they're all over the place. They weren't quite as prevalent. And I realized that it was the one thing that most of the world's most successful people had in common. And then I went, okay, I'm gonna wake up an hour earlier tomorrow and start a morning ritual. Then the question was, what am I gonna do during that hour to really maximize it? I want it to be the ultimate morning ritual. So I ended up continuing down my Google searching and came up with six. It was meditation, affirmations, visualization exercise, reading and journaling. And I went, which of these is the one thing I should do? Which is the best, which is gonna change my life the fastest? And the epiphany happened when I went, what if I did all of these? What if I woke up tomorrow? I did the six most timeless scientifically proven personal development practices in the history of the world that, you know, for centuries they've been working for people. And the next morning I woke up, even though I wasn't a morning person, did all six. And I went from being depressed and scared to, like, my mental and emotional. I was at a peak. I went, wow, if I start Every day like this, it's only a matter of time. And it was less than two months that I doubled my income, decided to run that ultra marathon that you'd mentioned, and it felt like a miracle. I told my wife, I said, sweetie, this is like a miracle. She's like, it's like your miracle morning. I go, yeah, it's my miracle morning. So I started writing my schedule as my miracle morning. It was never a book idea. And the light bulb went off that I went, well, if this is changing my life and I wasn't a morning person and it's changing all of my clients lives, and none of them were morning people, this could change the world. Like, I have a responsibility to get this message out there.
- [09:11]
Tom Bilyeu
Oh, man, it's such an extraordinary story. When you were telling that, you said something that really caught my attention, and that's the duality of I accept that I can't change it, and there's something that I really, really want. So maybe I'm never gonna walk again, and I can come to peace with that. But over here, I'm thinking, I'm praying, I'm visualizing about getting up and walking. And I know that you've used that in other places in your life. How do you maintain that duality? How do you talk about that to other people? Because to me, I've always told people, you have to be able to hold two conflicting ideas in your head like it is. And I don't remember where I heard this, but that one of the hallmarks of real success is the ability to do that. And hearing you talk about it when the stakes are as high as I may never walk again was the first time I heard somebody that had that much on the line talk about the duality. Tell me a little bit more about that and how you manage that.
- [10:06]
Hal Elrod
Yeah. And you mentioned how do I talk about that or teach it? Right. Like, when I'm brought in, I'm brought in. Every keynote that I give is the miracle morning. It's always like a CEO that read the book and he's like, you gotta come teach our sales team or our staff or whatever. Right. So that's why I'm brought in for 10 years as a keynote speaker. I was telling my accident story and teaching this lesson of the power of accepting what you can't change and giving yourself the gift of emotional. What I called emotional invincibility. Right. And it's where you're invincible from any emotions controlling you, and you're in control of your emotions. And so I talked about how, yeah, what you said, the duality, where the more we want something, usually the more disappointed we are when we don't get it right? Or devastate, right? The more we want it. Right? It's that spectrum of if you really are like, you want it more than anything in the world, then if you don't get it, you're deficit, you're suicidal. I mean, you're right. And so I think that for me, a, it takes practice. Now, we say this to the audience, they go, how many of you think this, this is really a powerful idea. It makes a lot of sense, but it's easier said than done. And everybody's hand goes up like, yeah, this is crazy, right? Like, yeah, I get it, but I don't how I can't do that. And it's because we're not addicted, but we're simply. We've programmed ourselves over our entire lives. The way we respond to adversity is the way we respond to adversity, right? So, for example, traffic is usually a low level of adversity. If you're running late and you leave late because you woke up late or kids were getting whatever it was you hit traffic, what's the response? Normally?
- [11:34]
Tom Bilyeu
Frustration.
- [11:35]
Hal Elrod
I'm stressed, I'm frustrated, right? And we literally spend the entire drive. So let's say it's normally a 30 minute drive to work and it takes us 45 or whatever because of traffic. You live in LA, right? You know it better than anybody. But we spend that entire 45 minutes literally killing ourselves, right? Being that we're stressed out, we're tense, we're frustrated, we're riding the car in front of us, like, does that work? That doesn't move them, right? You know, And I realized that. So people think, well, I'm upset because of this thing. We always have something to point to. Of course I'm angry. Look at what she did. Of course I'm sad. Look at what I lost. Of course I'm frustrated. I need to be at work in a half an hour and this is Gonna take me 45 minutes, right? We think it's the thing. We always point at the thing. And when I realized it's never the thing, it's our resistance to the thing. So when I was like anybody, I hit traffic and I'd be frustrated or upset or mad at myself that I left late or mad at the person that made me late or whatever. And then I went, wait a minute, I actually used to have these wristbands that said, can't change it that I used to give out to high school students after my speeches. And I'd be driving and I would go, I'd see my wristband. I'd go, oh, yeah, wait, this applies. I can't change traffic. I would take a deep breath and I would just go, I'm going to enjoy the ride. Like, I'm going. And I would turn the radio on and enjoy. And so all of a sudden, traffic had zero control over my emotional state. And so whether it's traffic or it's being in a horrific car accident, we are completely in control of our emotional state. And the key that unlocks the door to emotional invincibility, if you will, is acceptance. It's accepting it. And so let me wrap this up. Answering your question of how do you get there? For me, it was logic. I went, okay, I can't change that I was in a car accident. It's kind of like what I said with the wheelchair thing, right? So if I'm in a wheelchair the rest of my life, I could either be miserable in a wheelchair and blame the wheelchair and the drunk driver and the car accident and all that. That's why I'm miserable. Right? That via the victim mentality. I thought, that's no quality of life. And so I think for any of us, we go, well, yeah, I don't want to be stressed out in traffic. So virtually the only choice we have if we don't be stressed out or depressed or, you know, and I'm not talking clinical depression, that's a different state, but. Right. Is to accept our circumstances unconditionally. That's where I call it emotional invincibility. That's where when you get to that point of where you've accepted everything that's ever going to happen to you and you've made peace with it before it even happens, when it happens, you're like, oh, okay, this sucks. Worst thing that I could ever imagine. But I can't change it, so I'm not going to. Like, problems are difficult enough to move through and overcome. Why add emotional turmoil to those problems? It doesn't help you get through the problem. In fact, it simply makes it harder. It takes longer, or it prevents you from solving the problem altogether because you're so emotionally engaged in it, you can't see the sunshine through the clouds.
- [14:32]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, no, that makes so much sense. And I think having that emotional resilience is life changing. Now, you said something that I think is really powerful, and that is when you're dealing with people that really want something it's the thing they want most in life or they're about to lose something and it's the thing that they're most terrified about losing. What do you say about still allowing yourself to want something, believe in it. Even though the more you invest in getting it, the more you think about it. People can feel like the farther I'm going to fall, like the more people I tell I'm doing this, the more people I potentially embarrass myself in front of when it doesn't happen. How do you help them deal with that potential fear of embarrassment or failure or just outright disappointment?
- [15:15]
Hal Elrod
I think that if you, like, if you go to the age old adage, everything happens for a reason, I believe that's true. But not the way that we've been taught or conditioned to think, right. Usually most people that's used in a circumstance where something terrible happens, right? You lose something or. Right, everything happens for a reason, it's gonna be okay. You know, you're like, screw you and your reason. So to me it's like, cause people think it's predetermined, right? Or they look up to the heavens and they're like, why? Why did this? What did I do to deserve this? Right. Like they're searching for a reason outside of themselves and it's really just perpetuating the victim mindset versus I believe that everything happens for a reason. But it's 100% our responsibility to choose the reason. And so I think that if you can go into any endeavor pursuing it knowing that if I fail at this. And on a side note, you know the book Failing Forward by John Maxwell, I don't know if you've read that, right. But that was a huge game changer for me where I went. You know, almost every successful person failed at something that they really worked hard for, they were striving for, they might have committed their entire life to, and then they failed. And then they learned and grew from it if they, if they chose to do so. And, and then they achieve something even better, right? You know, every relationship that ends creates a space for a new relationship. Right? Every venture that comes to a, you know, screeching halt creates space for a new venture. So. So I'm not saying that it's easy and you might need the five minute rule or, and if you need five days, like, you know, and, and by the way, I don't think negative emotions, like call them negative, I don't think they're negative, meaning there's value in all emotions. You know, if, if I Were to lose a loved one, I would grieve. And I think it's healthy to grieve, right. If a man accosted my wife, I'd probably pull anger out of my pocket and right, get a little right, you know, I mean, so, so there's definitely value. I believe in all emotions, but the difference is, is whether the emotions are controlling the person, right? Because they, they, they think, they don't understand, they think it's the thing that's causing the anger and because of the thing that's out of their control, the anger's out of their control, right? So I think that once you take full responsibility for your emotional state, no matter what's going on around you, it's always about what's going on inside of you.
- [17:22]
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- [17:52]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, I really like what you said about things like that, one, being a choice and two, that you're creating space rather than that, oh, the ending of relationship means that you're going to have another relationship, which is not always the case, but it does create the space for you now to act in accordance with what you want to get something new and different. But then what you were saying about looking outside yourself, looking to the heavens, why did this happen to me? It's a pretty strong impulse and I have to say, in hearing your story, I was like, I might have thrown up a why is this happening to me? When you got diagnosed with cancer, it'd be one thing if you lived like a, you know, if you're doing a bunch of drugs, you're smoking, eating terribly, but you weren't. You had, if I remember right, read a book about how to eat for anti cancer benefits and had been doing that for years. When you were diagnosed with cancer, why didn't you say, why is this happening to me?
- [18:50]
Hal Elrod
I mean, I definitely said that, but with a smile on my face. I was like, God, what in the heck am I supposed to learn? Like, I already died. I had my big life altering thing, what could I possibly learn from another one? And a lot, you know, ended up being the thing. But I will tell you this. Yeah. There was no emotional pain, in fact, so I was diagnosed.
- [19:13]
Tom Bilyeu
Because you had accepted life before it happened. Is that what you're talking about?
- [19:16]
Hal Elrod
Exactly, yes. And to be fair, like, I have a new book coming out, and I talk about this a lot. There's a whole chapter called Emotional Invincibility. And I talk about this and I say, look, I had an unfair advantage in that I had, like, for a major. The cancer thing where, because I was able to look back and go, the car accident was the best thing that ever happened to me because of who I became by overcoming it, right? By moving through it with a positive attitude and all of that. And also, it became my life's work.
- [19:44]
Tom Bilyeu
Talk to me about fear from an emotional standpoint. I will put myself in the almost emotionally invulnerable position. I've spent an inordinate amount of time on that. But I would have to process through some real fear, even if it was just, okay, now what happens to my wife? What happens to my family? So how did you deal with that?
- [20:09]
Hal Elrod
Here's an important piece of this is when it comes to accepting all things that you can't change, death is one of those things. So I made peace with death a long time ago. And I think that death is a big fear for all of us. And to me, I've gotten to the point where I realize it doesn't even make sense for that to be a fear for anything that's inevitable or that you can't change. Right. There's no point in resisting it and wishing it weren't gonna happen. And the way that I look at death is it's the other side of birth. And we don't fear birth. Right? But birth and death are both just as inevitable, and they're two sides of the same coin that is life. Right?
- [20:46]
Tom Bilyeu
But, oh, man, that's the one thing I've heard you say where I was like, and I'll say, why birth gives death takes or such is my perception right now. And maybe you're about to give me a breakthrough, and I'm so fucking open to that. You can't imag. But, like, the. The thing that. That I really want to understand, like, how you've dealt with it internally, is that. That what. And maybe I'm packaging it wrong when I say it out loud, but that sense of I want something so badly and thusly, I am terrified to lose it, and the. The wanting is so powerful and so important and so beautiful that I know I don't want to give that up. But yet it creates the fear. It is the, I mean, like the old Buddhist notion of life is suffering because you want things. Because you want things and you may not get them, because you want things, you may lose them. Like the love for a child, I imagine, I'm not a parent, I imagine is transformatively profound. But it fucking sucks you in, dude. And it gets you to the point where now, like right now I'm not afraid to die, except for my wife, legitimately, for myself, whatever. Like, I. I won't say that I'm not bothered, but it's like not a grand fear of mine. Even though I talk a lot about living forever, that's me moving towards something not away from. I don't. I'm not moving away from death. I'm moving towards the things I would be able to do if I could live forever. But dude, the thought of having kids or the thought of leaving my wife behind, that shit makes me emotional.
- [22:18]
Hal Elrod
Yeah.
- [22:19]
Tom Bilyeu
And so I really want to know, like, how did you process through that? Because in there somewhere is, is a breakthrough for me if nobody else.
- [22:29]
Hal Elrod
Yeah. So that was the hardest thing, like I said, because I've made peace with death. I was imagining my wife and my kids losing me, especially my kids. Like the, the most important thing in my world, in my life is that I can influence my children in a positive way to set them up for a great life. Right. And so that I might not have that opportunity was the hardest thing to deal with. I think that part of it is I didn't spend a lot of time on thinking about that. Right. So that's the thing is people that have a lot of fear, you're thinking about the things that you're afraid of, right? You don't have the fear of unless you're not thinking right. If you're not thinking about the thing you're afraid of. But as soon as you're thinking about it, the fear comes up. So for me, I use affirmations a lot too. That's one of the miracle morning practices, is affirmations. And affirmations, I think have a kind of a bad rap, you know, like Stuart Smalley, you know, I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and people like me and then they're taught by like a lot of self help pioneers is like, lie to yourself. If you want to be a millionaire, just say I am a millionaire over and over and over until you believe it. Right? But if we know the truth, you're like, I'm a millionaire. You know, your brain's like, dude, no you're not. Right? You're like, shut up. I'm doing my affirmations.
- [23:41]
Tom Bilyeu
Right?
- [23:42]
Hal Elrod
Like so the point is, the way that I view affirmations is they simply direct your focus on wherever you want your focus directed. So you can literally, like a computer program, you can go, okay, what are the beliefs that I want to focus on? So they expand inside of me. Even the thoughts that I want to focus on. What are my values? What are the behaviors that I need to embody? Right. So you read these affirmations every day and you're programming yourself to live in alignment with that program that you've designed, Right. So I had these, my anti cancer affirmations, which I still have. I use those to manage my mindset, right? So if I have a fear, I will look at what's the opposite of the fear, what's possible. So I could die? Yes. Does focusing on that I might die and dwelling on that and thinking about that and going down that rabbit hole. And most people live, they live with their fear. That's where their focus is. So they're consumed by fear. Right. For me, I go, oh yeah, this could happen. And that's not what I want to happen. So I'm going to accept it, make peace with it, and then I'm going to put all of my energy into, into what I want. And affirmations to me are the best way to do that. Because if we leave our brain up to whatever it's up to, dude, it's like a pinball bouncing around. It's like negative thought, negative thought, negative thought, positive, thought negative thought, negative. Right? And so we can't trust our brain until we've conditioned it. Right? But so if someone's consumed with fear, right, utilizing affirmations every day that you combat the fear.
- [25:09]
Tom Bilyeu
Give me the examples of your anti cancer affirmations. I think there's statistically, sadly, a lot of people watching this that are battling cancer right now and it might be particularly useful.
- [25:19]
Hal Elrod
Before I share that, I want to say because for people battling cancer, I want to share what I did that's different than most. So like you said, I had watched a documentary called Healing cancer from the inside Out. Like I don't know, five or 10 years before I got cancer and I lived an anti cancer lifestyle. See, I was like, how am I getting cancer? I eat like a plant based diet. I, you know, I don't understand. So I went to my oncologist when I was diagnosed and my lung was collapsed, my kidneys were failing. And my heart was on the verge of failing when I went to my oncologist and that was like, what happened from healthy to a week or two later. And I said, hey, I'm not big on chemo. I view it as, you know, it's poison, it's very toxic. I would like to, you know, heal my cancer holistically. And I've been doing a lot of research on that. Can you support me in that? And he said, hal, I appreciate that you want to do that, but he said, you don't have a cancer that you don't have that luxury. You've got about a week to live if you don't start chemo, maybe a few days. He said, look, a week ago you were healthy. Now your heart, lung and kidney is all on the verge of failing. He said, this is one of the most aggressive, fast acting cancers and you literally have a few days, maybe a week. And I thought it was a scare tactic, right? I was like, you know, like in my head, like kind of middle finger. Like I don't, you know, let me, I said, give me 24 hours, let me go home and I'll find out the truth from Google. And So I consulted Dr. Google, right, and basically found out that, oh, he wasn't exaggerating. So I found out that was true. So I basically, almost against my will, like, everything, my values, my beliefs, I had to go get chemo. It's the most intensive chemotherapy regimen to my knowledge that there is. And so that even made it harder. And it's a 20 to 30% survival rate. So I go, so you're gonna put this poison in me? And I have a 20 to 30% chance of surviving. And the side effects on one of the chemos in particular, so I had acute lymphoblastic leukemia. The side effect was may cause leukemia. And so what I ended up doing, because I felt like my hand was kind of, you know, arm was forced, I had to do the chemo. So here's what I did though. And I think this is what not only saved my life, I mean, in the chemo, I believe definitely saved my life, but my symptoms. And it was, it was, I went, it was hard, but I had less, I had an easier time than a lot of people that were getting one hour of chemo a month when I was getting, you know, 70 or 80 or 100, whatever it was. And is what I did is I did everything holistically that I would do if I weren't doing chemotherapy. So. And I didn't, you Know, and I had never found anyone that really had done that. It was usually either or, but so I did coffee enemas, right? There's nothing, no effort more extraordinary than, you know, sticking a tube in your butt. I took, like, 70 supplements a day. I did. You know, my diet was. It was already on point, so I just kind of, you know, kept added juicing and some other things. I did ozone saunas. I did acupuncture. I mean, you name it, right? I did everything I could, and I combined the two. And like, when I asked my oncologist, hey, chemo is really toxic to your liver. And some people get a lot of disease from that. What should I do to detox? And he'd be like, you know, we give you a saline flush. It's fine. Right? So the medical community, they don't learn anything except what's in the textbook that they go to school for. And so for me, I did every. I Googled how to detox your liver, right? So taking milk thistle to detox my liver and the coffee enemas to detox my liver and, you know, and all of these things. So I just wanted to share that because, like you said, people watching might have cancer or know someone that does anyway, so, sorry, I got no man.
- [28:52]
Tom Bilyeu
Really, really interesting. And another thing along those lines that I want to talk about is you said that obviously you kept your mindset the way that you've always kept your mindset. You're very positive. You knew what you wanted. You had affirmations, but you said those work when you're not, like, just doubled over in agony. But in the days you're doubled over in agony, it basically knocks you for six. How did you deal with those days? How did you bounce back, rebuild your mindset?
- [29:17]
Hal Elrod
So here's what's interesting is when we. I experience negative emotions, right? And the difference is, what do you do with that emotion? Right? So the emotion isn't the problem. It's what do you do with it? And so one thing that I've learned, and it's really powerful, and I didn't. I learned this prior in the last few years. In fact, it was a cancer lesson. I don't know. But it was that when I have a negative emotion, you know, you wake up and you feel depressed, and I'm like, what? Like, I feel just horrible. I feel. I have no confidence today. I don't know why. Right. Like hormones or something's going on. Right, Right. And what I realized is that it's not that emotional state that's the biggest problem for most people, myself included, it's what we do with that state. And we usually judge it. And we get. We get afraid. Why do I feel this way? And the problem is human beings, we're not good at creating, understanding, like, what's the word? Spatial awareness in terms of time. We think the way we feel is just how life is, right? It's this all encompassing. Oh, my God, this. Why do I. This is how I'm gonna feel the rest of my life. Like, we don't understand that. No, this is temporary. It might last a day. It might last five minutes. Like, don't make a big deal out of it, right? That's the most simple way I could put it. Don't make a big deal out of it. So when I had negative emotions with cancer, I just didn't make a big deal out of it. I go, this is temporary. So when you feel in a negative state, simply just remind yourself it's temporary. And even just smile and go, man, this sucks. Hopefully it's not too long that I feel like this. Cause I don't enjoy it. But don't give it a lot of importance. Don't give that temporary emotional state a significant amount of significance, right? Just go, this is temporary. I accept it, you know, whatever. And so, yeah, so, I mean, there were a lot of hard day, and there were days where, you know, I mean, I had this infection where my entire face swollen like the Elephant Man. My eye was completely shut. I had horrific migraines. You know, when you're in physical pain, you know, I mean, I'm like anybody. I wasn't super positive. I was like. But I was as positive as. Like, it's always be as positive as you can possibly be, even when you're going through the most difficult time in your life. And that was the thing with cancer, with the car accident. And that's the lesson for everybody, is that we can choose to be. Consciously choose to be. First, you accept what you can't change, and then you go, what emotion would best serve me? And I think more often than not, it's gratitude and happiness for the most part. Or optimism, you know, is an emotion. But we can be the happiest and the most grateful we've ever been while we are going through the most difficult, painful, scary time in our lives. And it's. And it doesn't. And here's the thing, it just makes it that much easier. It doesn't mean that it doesn't suck, but it means that you're not letting the fact that it sucks. Completely control your emotional well being. You're going, this sucks, you know, but I'm going to make the best of it.
- [32:08]
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- [32:36]
Tom Bilyeu
How do you talk to your kids about this, man? Because how old are they
- [32:41]
Hal Elrod
right now? They just turned nine and six. So when I got cancer, I just had my two year anniversary of being diagnosed about a month ago. So they were 4 and 7.
- [32:51]
Tom Bilyeu
And how do you talk to them about that? How do you try to give them mindset around what you went through, how to think about it for themselves?
- [32:59]
Hal Elrod
My daughter, she went right when we told them I had cancer. And the way that we told them is hey, I have cancer and some people die from cancer. But I'm going to do a lot of things that those people don't do. Right? You have to explain in a way that a child will understand. And I said, I actually have a plan. I'm going to do a lot of things that most people don't even know about that are going to make it so that I'm going to beat the cancer. I have no doubt in my mind. And they're like, oh, okay. And then my daughter goes to school the next day and she says my dad has cancer. You know, she's telling people, her classmates and her friend goes oh my, my grandpa died from cancer, you know. And so she's like, oh my God. Right? So, so yeah, but that was, that was, the whole thing was kind of just maintaining my mindset, which is. So I have this thing called the miracle equation. I, I, I came up with it when I was 20, when I was in sales and it was to break a record that I had a very limited amount of time and it felt like doing it would be a miracle. It was like pre miracle morning. It's just a coincidence that I guess I like the word miracle, I don't know. But it's just a coincidence that there's even a correlation. But it is my new, it's the book that's gonna come out next year. So I've been working on it. But here's the miracle equation and it's how you create miracles. Which, and when I say miracle, right, I don't mean partying the Red Sea or biblical miracles, but I mean extraordinary results that are beyond what you even believe is possible, right? It's really simple, two components. Unwavering faith, an extraordinary effort. And if you, if you, if you, if you break down any person in history, yourself included, that has accomplished extraordinary results beyond what they maybe as children or at whatever point in their lives even imagine possible, right? I'm sure you, with, you know, quests and stuff you've done, you. You're. You, you're like, I can't believe this is like, I do. How did I, you know, I can't believe this happened, right? But every single person, they. Those were the two common denominators. They established faith that they could accomplish something that they had never accomplished. They had no evidence in their past that they were even capable of it, right? So they. But they just went out on a. That's why it's faith, right? It's out on a limb, like, I can do this. I don't know how, but I can do this, right? I'm committed. I'm going to do it. And then the faith, the unwavering piece is that most people, even if they, like, start out that way, as soon as they hit an obstacle, a failure, as we talked about, right, the faith wavers. They're like, oh, never mind. I guess I thought I could do this, but apparently not, right? So the faith goes out the window. The second piece, extraordinary effort. Most people, as soon as the faith goes out the window, the effort follows right behind it. Because it's like, what's the point of even trying if I don't really believe I can do it? But every person that's created extraordinary results, that's changed the world, that's become, you know, financially free, whatever the result is, they established faith that they could do it. The faith was unwavering, and they put forth extraordinary effort until. And the operative word, underline the word, circle the word until, until they got there. We're programmed in the past and we need something in writing to program us based on what we want for our future.
- [36:02]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, that's pretty extraordinary, man. What do you think is, like, the key trait that you have that has allowed you to be successful, to build this mindset? Like, what's that foundation? Because I know a lot of people, they love what you're saying, dude. They're in, like, they buy into it, but, like, there's. It's like they can see the ladder, but they can't Reach the bottom rung. Like, what's that like foundational trait that you cultivated in yourself? Is it optimism? Is it something that simple or.
- [36:30]
Hal Elrod
I'm glad you asked the question because like I, I view myself as a lazy person. I view myself like I have so many insecurities. I, I don't view my. And I'm like really using affirmations to keep trying to see my. In fact, the other night I had this epiphany. She was. Last night, it was last night at the hotel getting ready for this. I had the epiphany that I go and I wrote. And anytime I have an epiphany, it goes into like this, this affirmation app that I use, right? So that I can again, can't have a thought and go, oh, it's a great idea and then fall asleep and forget it, you know. So my epiphany was I still view myself as this 20 something year old kid who was trying to make it, who wanted people to accept me, who was trying to, who really loved all people but felt like I didn't know how to get that across or people like thought I was a, you know, punk 20 year old kid or whatever, right? So I, So the point is, right, like I still deal with all sorts of insecurities and you know, so I just want. Because I meet like I saw David Goggins, right? I was watching his interview, you know, and I'm like, this guy's from a different planet. Like I don't have anywhere close to his discipline or will, you know. So part of it is I've been put in circumstances that I, that I had, you know, it was either like, right, fight or flight, you know, what am I going to do? I've had great mentors that have taught like the five minute rule and the power of acceptance that was taught to me when I was 20. My parents lay lost. My sister died when I was 7 or I was 8 and she was a year and a half and just my mom and my sister at home and me. And my mom was breastfeeding my baby sister Amari. And she all of a sudden I was across the hall sleeping and my dad was at work, my sister was out of town. And I heard my mom screaming, my baby, my baby. And I'm kind of like coming to. And I thought she was playing with her, like, oh, my baby, my baby. And all of a sudden like I get clear that like the, the horror in my mom's voice and I run across the hall into her bedroom and Amari's dead in her arms. Whoa. She had heart failure. And she was born with a really rare condition. My parents, within a. Within a matter of. It was less than a year. My mother, devastated. But she. She founded a support group for parents that had lost children, like under the age of five or something, right? So she led that for years. They started a fundraiser to raise money for the hospital that. That cared for Amory while she was alive. And so I really. I didn't even know it then, but I learned, right? I think it was planted in me that you take adversity, right, and you. You find the advantage or you turn it into an advantage, right? Tragedy into triumph. I mean, so I think it's just the conscious choice and optimism is probably. Yeah, I mean, that might be the simple way to put it. Optimism. And then I will throw one other quality in there, which was a chosen, learned quality, which is what really led to the miracle morning. The day I came with the miracle morning, when it wasn't called that, but I heard a quote from Jim Rohn, and Jim Rohn said, your level of success will seldom exceed your level of personal development, because success is something you attract by the person you become. And in that moment, I went, dude, I'm not dedicating time every day in my personal development. I'm in survival mode. I just go into my office, I just, like, work all day and really not productive. I just spin the wheels, you know, And I'm in. I'm in fear mode. I'm in scarcity mode, right? And then I do that until I'm exhausted and I go to bed. That's my daily routine. And for a lot of people, I think that's it. You wake up, you deal with life, and then you go to bed, right? And I went, therefore, because I'm not dedicating time every day to my personal development, I'm not becoming the person that I need to be that has the knowledge and the beliefs and the energy and the qualities, the characteristics, the skills, the talent, right, to create the results, the success I want in my life. And that's when I went, I've got to create the most extraordinary personal development ritual in the history of humanity. And I gotta start doing it. And that's how the miracle morning was born. So the point is this. I believe that that is one of, if not the most fundamental key to success is that quote, that philosophy from Jim Rohn. And here's the way that I equate it in my head. If we're measuring success on a scale of 1 to 10 in any area of life. I don't just mean usually success. We think like professional success. I'm talking about your level of success in your relationships as a parent, your level of physical energy, your level of success, you know, in terms of your emotional invincibility rate. On a scale of 1 to 10, what level do we want?
- [41:06]
Tom Bilyeu
10.
- [41:06]
Hal Elrod
10, right? Nobody's like, I don't want to be too happy. I don't want to be annoying happy. Like, I'll just. I'll do a six. Like, I don't want too much money. I don't want family coming out and asking, no, no, we all want. Like, that's one thing we share in common as humans, is we aspire. Like, we actually all have it in us. We all want to fulfill our potential. And sadly, most people don't. And I believe that it's because it's. For me, I went, okay, I want level 10 success in every area of my life. But like Jim Rohn is saying, my level of personal development is, like, at a 2, maybe a 3 on a good day right now. Right? And this is the disconnect. This is what we want in our lives. This is who we are. And that's not a judgment. It's just right in terms of our level of personal development. And then my epiphany was, if I dedicate time every day to personal development, I will gradually become a level three and then a level four, and then a level seven. Eventually, if I become a level 10 person in terms of my beliefs and my knowledge and my habits and my skills, I can only help but attract and create and sustain level 10 success in my life. So it's a result of who we become. Right? And so I think that is, you know, optimism combined with a relentless dedication. And I know you have it, too. And almost any successful person on the planet does. Right? To personal development. And it's that idea that if I want to create an extraordinary life, I have to become a level 10 life. I got to become a level 10 person.
- [42:25]
Tom Bilyeu
I love that. Awesome. Before I ask my last question, tell these guys where they can find you online.
- [42:32]
Hal Elrod
Halelrod.com or MiracleMorning.com that is awesome.
- [42:37]
Tom Bilyeu
My final question is, what is the impact that you want to have on the world?
- [42:43]
Hal Elrod
Yeah, of course. A beautiful question. And it feels good to have clarity on that. And it changes too, by the way. I always tell people that. So my mission in life is to elevate the consciousness of humanity one morning at a time, one person at A time. And I had a. It was probably, probably a year ago. We were talking, somebody asked me this question, we were talking about it, a friend and I had like a realization. I go, this is kind of grandiose to say this, but the miracle morning literally could lead to world peace. And the reason I say that, like, right now we're working on doing a program in schools where across all grades, from preschool to college, where teachers start every day with the miracle morning with their students, right? So they lead them through. It's a six minute version of one minute of affirmations, one minute of meditation, one minute of exercise, one minute of reading. Right. Journaling all the way through. And my thought, like, imagine if every student in the world started their day with meditation with those practices, like, it could end bullying. How are you going to beat up the kid that just, you just, you know, you just meditated with and you heard his dreams and his ambitions and his affirmations and so on and so forth. So, yeah, so I'm seeing it in the community and around the world that that really, as it elevates the consciousness of each person each morning, there's a ripple effect that expands out to their world, their families, their communities. CEOs are better leaders for their employees, so on and so forth. So, yeah, that's the mission that I'm working on.
- [44:16]
Tom Bilyeu
Damn good mission. Awesome. Hal, thank you so much for coming on the show. Man.
- [44:20]
Hal Elrod
That was.
- [44:23]
Tom Bilyeu
All right, guys. There are few people in this world who get to show what their leadership is really about because they've been tested. And I think after hearing his story, I think it's very fair to say that he's been tested not once, twice, but three times and built that mindset by going through those things and really seeing in the trenches what works, what helped, and then bringing that back. I was telling him before we started rolling. The thing that I find so extraordinary about him is in the classic hero's journey, the ending of the story is always the person bringing the lesson back to everybody else and teaching. And that's how I see him. I see him as somebody who is living the hero's journey and really engaging in that final, most amazing piece, which is to share the things that he's learned. And I think as you engage with him, engage with this content, read the book, you're going to see that. You're going to see the profound way in which he's able to really explain things and make it accessible to everybody else so that we can use this stuff in our own lives. I think that what he says is just extraordinarily powerful. And it works. And it's the kind of thing that I've seen countless people in my circle that have achieved just amazing things in the their lives. They're all using the elements that he's talking about. So, like he says, this really is tried and true stuff that a lot of people are putting to use. His own community. 500,000 people every day wake up and do the miracle morning routine. So check it out. It is something that could be really profound in your life. The affirmations. A lot of this stuff I just think is unbelievably powerful. So give it a shot. I'd love to hear how it's working for you. I think it's going to serve you well. If you haven't already, be sure to subscribe. And until next time, my friends, be legendary. Take care.