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You're listening to the Travis Makes Money podcast presented by GoHighLevel.com for a free 30 day trial of the best all in one digital marketing software tool on the planet, just go to gohighlevel.com travis the person that you're becoming matters more than what you're building. Welcome back to the show. My name is Travis Chappell. I am the host of Travis Makes Money podcast as well as Travis Makes Friends podcast. We've done over 1500 episodes, over a thousand interviews with some of the world's most successful people. These episodes are basically what I've learned along that journey. In addition to doing my own show and interviewing all these amazing people, I've also read over 200 books in the last few years, as well as listened to countless hours of podcasts. So these are sort of like, hey, this is what I've been learning. Hopefully it's helpful to you. And today's topic is about the person that you're becoming, because I think that matters more than what you're building. There are no shortage of stories in the in culture that exist where people tried to shortcut the work because they wanted the result that bad. Like, there's nothing more dangerous than somebody who wants success really bad, but is not willing to put the work in to achieve that success. This is where we get scam artists. This is where we get the Bernie Madoffs of the world. They were less concerned with becoming somebody who's capable of achieving the outcome that they claim to achieve, and more concerned with having achieved that outcome, regardless of what it took to get there. And then, you know, this is where we have Enron. This is where we have Bernie Madoff. This is where we have Elizabeth Holmes. This is where we've had even some of these parents, these famous cases of these parents that are paying exorbitant amounts of money to fake SAT scores to get their kids into prestigious universities and getting jail time because of it. It's like you are so concerned with the end result and so less concerned with becoming the person who's capable of achieving the end result. And I think that's a failure. I don't think the result is what matters in that context. I think that becoming that person actually matters more than the result does. Because if you become the person that's capable of achieving the thing that you want to achieve, then it will make it easier for that version of yourself to achieve that thing, first of all. But second of all, you'll be happier and healthier and be more fulfilled in the pursuit of that thing and becoming that person than you will be by having achieved that thing through a way that was not the way that you're supposed to achieve that thing. So there's a couple of mindset shifts here. First one is identity over outcome. You're. The person that you are matters more than the outcome that you get because you have to wake up every day and spend every waking second of your day with the person that you become. So if you are actively becoming somebody who you don't like, then it doesn't matter matter what results you achieve, it doesn't matter what outcomes you have, because you don't even like the person that you are. And if you, you could have all the money in the world, man, but if you don't have, if you don't even like you, then what's the point? What's the purpose? The, the people who, the people who do this best are the people who have these amazing, huge goals for their life, but are also the people who are willing to, to sit in the gunk and work their way toward becoming the person that's, that's, that's. That's capable of actually achieving the things that they set out to achieve. And this is, to me probably, I mean, I guess I should probably have a bunch more data before I say something like this. But this, to me anyway, is probably the number one reason why people don't achieve their goals, especially as it relates to New Year's resolutions and things like that, because those are so culturally normal. Like the majority of people only goal set on December 31st or somewhere around there for the new year. That's the only time that people are doing any goal setting. And usually it's basically like I am fed up with these six different things about me. So come tomorrow, everything's going to change. And it feels like a big thing because it is the start of a new calendar year. And it's more psychologically motivating to become somebody different in the, in the new year. But ultimately it's just another day. Like, we didn't have calendars, we didn't understand how that worked. You would just wake up and it would feel like another day. There's nothing inherently, that's, there's nothing inside of you that's inherently going to change just because the year has changed on a calendar. So the reason that you're probably not getting the results that you want, your reason that you've set the same goals on your New Year's resolutions list for the last decade in a row is because you've never set any identity goals and you're only setting outcome based goals. So you're only saying I want to be X, you know, percent body fat or I want to lose X number of pounds or I want to build this business or I want to make this much money. They're all outcome based goals. And the problem with only setting outcome based goals is that you, in your current state, obviously for the past decade of evidence that we have now of not having achieved those goals, you are not capable of achieving the goals that you have. And by the way, if you are capable of achieving the goals that you have, then you're probably not setting big enough goals. So you should be setting goals that feel like they're outside of your ability to achieve, because by definition they are. If you were fully 100% capable of achieving those goals right now, then you probably would have already achieved them. So the identity based goals to me have always have proven to be more useful to me. It is, it's sort of like what is, what is the boulder that I can move so that I can make everything else easier after this? What's the thing that I can push up the hill so that by the time I push this thing over the hill, it kind of takes on a life of its own. And that is becoming the person that's capable of achieving the goal rather than just setting up these random goals that, that feel out of reach, because they probably are out of reach. So your, your goals should be more identity based goals. Like I want to become the type of person who wakes up early, I want to become the type of person who goes to the gym, the type of person who values health, type of person who writes every day. I want to be the type of person who does this thing and then set up goals that make you that type of a person. So these are more like habit based, identity based goals. So if I want to become a writer, then you don't just magically wait for a book deal to land on your do doorstep. Then you just wake up every day and start writing. So I'm, you know, I want to be a writer. I'm going to write for the first ten minutes of every day. It doesn't have to be anything crazy, doesn't have to be. I'm coming up with a manuscript in 30 days. It just means I'm gonna, I'm write, I'm gonna get into the habit of writing, I'm gonna start practicing writing. If you look at some of the most successful authors, especially within the business Personal development, self help space. The, the, some of the most successful authors are the ones that built up a massive audience of newsletter subscribers or blog readers or something like that. First they, they, they got in the habit writing and writing and writing and writing and writing. Built up an audience who liked consuming the things that they wrote. And then the book deal came later on and then they were officially, quote, unquote, a paid author. They were published author and now they can put author in all their bios and stuff like that. But they didn't, they didn't get that without having, without going through the process of becoming the person who is capable of writing the book that they wrote. You know, James Clear is a ultimate example of this. One of the best selling nonfiction books of all time is Atomic Habits. And before he ever wrote that book, he wrote a newsletter and a blog about habits. And he wrote, published like one or two big articles every single week for like two, three years. Built up an audience of a couple hundred thousand people that are reading his blogs, launched Atomic Habits and now it's been on the New York Times bestseller list for like six years in a row. So try to think about what is the identity that I want to create for myself rather than what is the outcome that I want to have achieved at the end of this. Success without character is to me fake. It's not, it's not real. It does, it's not, it's not a real success story. It's like, yes, you've achieved these things, but again, what do you feel internally when you get up? What do you think about yourself? What's the relationship that you have with you? Because if you wake up every day and don't like yourself, it doesn't matter how big your house is, you're just going to be more lonely than you ever been before. So success without character is fake. Long term. Long term thinking is the only way out of this milieu is that you, you constantly are thinking short term when you're setting these. I want to lose 30 pounds. It's like, okay, great, well what happens when you lose 30 pounds? This is what happened to me, by the way. A bunch of times I was sort of on this yo yo thing where I would lose and then I'd gain and then I'd lose and then I gain and I lose and I gain. Then I set the goal and I'd reach the goal. But I didn't become, I didn't change my identity into somebody who is a healthy, thinking person all the time. I just hyper disciplined myself for A short period of time to reach the goal of having lost 30 pounds or 20 pounds or whatever the goal was. And then as soon as I reached that, that goal, that outcome based go the next day, I'm right back into sort of old habits. I'm right back into old Travis. And the, the time that it took to lose the weight during that time I didn't feel like I was myself because I said no to everything. I was restrictive completely. I was like, no alcohol, no sugar, no, no anything that I enjoy and only pain. And I'm gonna walk and I'm gonna run and I'm gonna go to the gym and I'm gonna do. And it's like I'm doing all of these things that don't feel like any sort of version of me. And then as soon as I'm done achieving the outcome, I slip right back into the ve I really wanted to be which was like eat whatever I want, do whatever I want, not have to exercise as, as much as I was exercising before. Before you know it, three, four months later, I put the 20, 30 pounds back on and it's like, oh, time to do another challenge, time to do another. It's like, look you again, you can, you can achieve the outcome, but not having a shifted the identity is, is going to ultimately not leave lasting results over a long enough period of time. So the very last time that this happened, which has now been a couple of years ago, knock on wood, of course. But it's been a couple since. I've put on as much weight as I used to put on because I finally adopted the lifestyle change. I finally adopted the identity of somebody who is just going to the gym. It was like I instead of I'm only going to the gym for the next four months while I'm trying to lose this weight, it just became a part of my lifestyle now. I just go, I just go to the gym. I'm just, I'm exercising pretty constantly. I'm at least going for walks or jogs or something like that, or getting some pull ups in or doing some sit ups or something, man, some push ups, whatever. Like a constantly doing something. Because I finally at some point dawned on me just like I don't want to only get in shape for this three month period of time. I want to basically be in similar shape throughout the entire year. And sure, I fluctuate a little bit. Again, I'm no bodybuilder, but ultimately that change came after I adopted the identity of somebody who wants to live a healthy lifestyle. Not Just somebody who wanted to achieve a certain outcome and then you'll feel better about it long term. Frankly, I think I feel better about the person that I am because that is a value of mine that I hold closely now. Also, for, for parents out there, I think that it's important to have these identity based goals because it shows your kids what's possible instead of forcing yourself to do something that you, that you hate for a very short period of time because you have not shifted your identity, you know, you can, you can show your kids what's possible over a long enough period of time. Because now I think it was during Christmas break, we, we skipped the gym three or four times right around New Year's for just, you know, holidays, family was in town, stuff like that. And one morning we woke up and we were just sitting downstairs having a cup of coffee and my daughter was like, why aren't we going to the gym? We haven't been to the gym in a couple of days and she's five. You know, I was like, well, that tells. That's an indicator that we're doing something at least correctly, that we go to the gym often enough that it was weird, it was strange for her that we were not going to the gym for some reason. And. But that doesn't happen when you set outcome based goals. Ultimately, I think, anyway, I think it's much more effective when you set these identity based goals and then what happens is like, you want to act in consistency with the version of yourself that you believe yourself to be. So if I tell myself that I'm a reader and I go on podcasts and I explain that I'm a reader, and then I start this podcast off by saying, I've read 200 books, if I have that identity, then I want to act in consistency with that identity, which is only going to make me desire to read more, not make me feel like I have to read because, well, I, I was going to read 10 books. So, man, I figured, better figure that out. You know, it was like I just adopt this identity that I'm a reader. So I'm constantly going through some book. Does it mean that I'm constantly reading a book a week? No. Sometimes I am. Sometimes I'll read a book for six weeks and it takes me six weeks to finish a book. You know, it just depends. But it, but it, but what that means is that I'm constantly in the state of thinking about it. I'm constantly looking at books, buying new books, reading an excerpt from this book, or reading an article about this book or reading a synopsis of this book. So it's just something that's sort of in the zeitgeist now because it's an identity that I've created for myself. So instead of asking yourself, what do I want to accomplish? Ask yourself, who do I need to become in order to make it easy to accomplish these things? If you were going to, if you're going to assign a project like I want, I'm going to, I'm going to produce a best seller here and I'm going to be the producer. And you had the choice between picking an author who's already written seven New York Times bestsellers and picking somebody who's never wrote a book before. Which one of those two do you think you're going to make your bet on as the producer of that project? Probably the one who's already done it. So it's sort of a similar thing just with yourself in this context, where you're basically saying, if I can shift my identity and put in the work to become this type of a person, then that person that I will become in a year from now by having done these small actions along the way, that person will be able to write a book like it's nothing. The person who's written seven New York Times bestsellers, it's much easier for them to write the eighth one than it was for them to write the first one. But they didn't write the first one by just sheer force willing it into existence. They did it by building up identity over time to then be able to get that first one, to be able to move to the second one, then the third one, then the fourth one, and then they can kind of churn it out because they, they are that person. They are a New York Times bestseller. So it's easier for them to jump into that new project. So if you have the, the, the goal of man, I want to build an eight figure business or something like that. Well, ask yourself, what are the actions that somebody who is building a figure business did to be able to get to build an eight figure business? I'm going to do those actions every day. And then in a year from now, I will objectively be a more capable version of myself who will be able to achieve that thing much easier than the version of myself that I am today. So instead of asking what do I want to accomplish? Ask who do I need to become in order to accomplish those things? If you don't become someone capable of reaching your goals, you'll either never reach the goals that you have or you'll be tempted to cheat to reach those goals, which is some of the people that I mentioned at the beginning of this, the big scam artists of the day, the famous people who've gone to prison for paying off college admissions teams to get their kid into school. So don't conflate the outcome with the success. The person you become is arguably much more important than the outcome itself, because again, you wake up and having achieved everything that you wanted to achieve, but not liking the person that you are at the end of the day, or knowing you cheated the system or you're headed hits the pillow and you know that you did it the wrong way, you're probably not going to be the happiest version of yourself that you could be. So success without integrity always sends a bill, and it's probably a bill that you don't want to pay. What you build can be lost. Who you become cannot be lost, which is another great thing. So if you are constant, if you're, if you're willing to take shortcuts to achieve an outcome, because you said it was the outcome that you wanted to achieve, and you, and you think this is the outcome that's finally going to earn you respect and status and all the things that you're searching for in life, you set this outcome, but you know that you cheated along the way and you don't become that person. You know what happens if you lose it all? Because that's something that happens. You know, Black Swan events happen all the time. You know, there's a lot of people who were fantastic real estate investors in 2006 and then come 2008, they lost everything. So if you were some of the, if you were part of the category of people who were kind of cheating the system and using stated income and not actually understanding quite how the real estate markets worked, you were just sort of in there for the cash grab. Then by chances are if you lost everything during that time, you couldn't go build it back very easily because you weren't actually, you didn't actually do the work of becoming the person that was capable of doing it. Regardless of the, what the market looked like. You were only doing it because of the ease that, that, you know, came with that vehicle at that time. So if what you build can be lost, but who you become can't be lost, then it's objectively more important to focus on the person that you're becoming. Because if you know that, that's why they, they say that, you know that if all of the wealth in the world was redistrib distributed completely equally to all, to everybody. Everybody. You know, they took all the money from the billionaires, they spread everything out equally, and everybody, starting tomorrow, had the same amount of money in their bank account within five years, 10 years. All the same people who had the money now would have the money at that time, obviously, minus a few exceptions like trust fund kids and things like that. But the only people that would not be able to build that back up are the people who either shortcutted the process, they cheated the process, they were given something that they didn't deserve, something like that. The only the people who would build it right back are the people who built the identity along the way, because they became the type of person that's capable of achieving the things that they wanted to achieve. So focus on who am I becoming rather than what do I want to accomplish, and you'll probably see a little bit more success and more happiness, fulfillment, better relationships along the way, which is really what it's all about. So that's it for today's episode. Thanks so much for tuning in. Catch you guys in the next one. Peace.