← Young and Profiting with Hala Taha
Young and Profiting with Hala Taha
How to Build Unstoppable Momentum as a Content Creator | Marketing | YAPCreator Replay | E3
00:57:35
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- [00:03]
A
Yeah, fam. I have really exciting news. After almost eight years of running this podcast, I finally was nominated for an I heart podcast award, which is like the Grammys of podcasting. I'm heading up against the diary of the CEO acquired, Earn your leisure and all these amazing shows for the best business and finance podcast. If you love young and profiting and you love this show and you want me to win, the best way to help me is to write me a five star review on Apple Podcasts I and also to subscribe to my YouTube channel and engage on our videos. I also was nominated for an Indie Pack award. It's the first ever independent podcast and creator awards that's also happening in a couple weeks. And I was nominated for the best business and entrepreneurship podcast. I'm competing against Iced Coffee Hour and a number of awesome shows. And again, if you want to help me win these awards, please Write me a five star review on Apple Podcasts and follow our YouTube channel and engage on our videos. I appreciate any support. If you guys have been to my free webinars. If you learn from the podcasts and you guys know that I never ask you for anything, this is the one time I'm asking you guys to support the show by writing us a review or engaging on our YouTube channel. I hope to take home these wins and thanks again for supporting the show. Hello, Yap fam. Let's be honest, staying consistent as a creator or entrepreneur is really hard. I know because I've lived it. I built my personal brand while working full time, grew from zero to 60,000 followers in one year. And today, that community on LinkedIn is almost 300,000 strong. And I'll tell you, it wasn't motivation that got me there. It was systems. It was consistency. And that's exactly what we're covering today in the third episode of the Yap Creator series, Replay. We're talking about how to stay consistent without burning out. And I'm pulling in some of the best insights from incredible guests like Jenna Kutcher, Jeff Hayden, and James Clear. You'll learn how to build habits that actually stick, celebrate small wins along the way, and create the kind of sustainable momentum that compounds over time. So stay tuned. This one is totally worth it. Starting out as a content creator is no small feat. You're juggling everything, coming up with ideas, filming, editing, and promoting, all while trying to grow an audience. In the beginning, it can feel like you're shouting into a void, and that can be incredibly discouraging. The truth is, consistency builds credibility. Every post, video or podcast you put out is another brick in the foundation of your personal brand. But in order to be consistent, you first need to get started. Here's Jenna Kutcher, one of the most successful podcasters in the world, who is also in my YAP Media podcast network on letting go of perfection and taking action when it comes to getting started as a content creator.
- [03:00]
B
At the beginning, my show was interview only, which did not work out well for me. I recorded it from the front seat of my parked car in my garage because I was worried my dogs were gonna bark. I didn't even own a microphone. I had iPhone headphones, and I was like, all right, let's just do this. And so I committed to doing it for 90 days. And I was like, let's just see how it feels. I can always quit it if it doesn't work, if I run out of things to say. And here we are, years and years and years later, and it's evolved. And I think one lesson from this is that so often when we start a new project, we overthink all the things that don't really matter. I remember worrying about, like, the COVID art, the title, how am I going to sign in and sign off of every episode, how long is it going to be? What is the format, when is it going to be published? All of those things have changed and evolved over the last seven years, and my show has stayed consistent. Right. And so one thing that you brought up is, like, so many people don't actually dive in and do the thing. We think about all the things around the thing. Whether you're writing a book or starting a podcast or starting a business, you fixate on all the decisions you have to make instead of doing the actual thing, which in my case was sitting down and hitting record. Once I did that, the rest is history. But it was so easy for us to overthink all those things. So my podcast started as an experiment, and we're still going strong a hundred million downloads later.
- [04:19]
A
Like Jenna said, when it comes to getting started as a content creator, whether it's on social media or podcasts, you really need to just get started and experiment. It's okay to evolve over time and get better as you go. To be a content creator, you must create content consistently. I find that if I'm having trouble getting started on something, I just tell myself I'll do it for 10 minutes before I know it. That initial ick and anxiety of getting started just melts away, and the task seems more manageable once I actually dig into it for 10 minutes, it's not as scary anymore, and I end up working on it for longer and getting it done. So just start for 10 minutes. Tell yourself, I'll just do it for 10 minutes. Now, getting started is easier said than done for a lot of people. So many people feel that they can't get the motivation to get started. They need to find the motivation to kick themselves into high gear. But this is the wrong way to go about it. I learned from Jeff Hayden, one of the world's top ghostwriters, that getting started is the thing that will actually give you the motivation to keep going. Contrary to popular belief, motivation doesn't come first. Effort does. Let's hear Jeff's perspective on creating motivation. So talk to us about how you can actually create motivation by starting and being consistent at something.
- [05:43]
C
Probably the biggest gap or the. The biggest hurdle that people have to cross when you want to start something new is you are starting at a place of no experience, no expertise. You're kind of at the zero spot in most cases. And so if you look ahead to where you want to go, that bridge that you have to cross is incredibly daunting because it's like, okay, I'm just this, how am I going to get all the way over there? And so if you're constantly focused on that end place, then even little successes that you make early on, which you tend to do because you're new, so you learn quickly and you gain some skill fairly fast, they're meaningless to you because compared to what you think you want to be someday, well, it's nothing. And so you. The biggest thing for me is, you know, because I. I struggled with the first few things I wrote, but then I, I thought, and I would think to myself, how am I ever going to be able to do this? Because it takes me way too long. It's. I'm creating decent things, but, gosh, it takes forever, and there's no way for me to make this work. And then I thought, well, okay, but I can't sit down and think, okay, I'm going to be Malcolm Gladwell tomorrow or something like that. But what I can do is just work really hard on whatever is in front of me.
- [06:54]
A
And.
- [06:55]
C
And so I switched over and just said, my goal every time I do something is I. To have this to do. I need to do it as well as I can. I need to finish it. I need to get good feedback from it, which means I. I did a good job. Because whether I thought I did a good job didn't really matter. It's what the client thought. So. And that's all I can do right now. But that's enough. And so if I stack enough of those experiences up, then the experience kind of comes. And so by keeping a short time horizon in terms of my, like, inner feedback loop, then if I worked on a project one night and it was a short one and I got it done, that felt really good because I set out to do what I wanted to do. I completed a task, it went well, that was enough to get me to the next one. And so I just fell into this place of all I need is enough motivation and to get to the next one. And if I get to the next one and I get to the next one, then suddenly you can look back and go, wow, I'm starting to come a long way because I'm, you know, you pop your head up every once in a while and sort of look at where you are, go, wow, that is really cool. And then you need to put your head right back down again and just focused on next and next and next. And so. And then the other part of it is that I'm not particularly smart. I have a college degree, but I'm not particularly educated. I don't have anything. There's nothing. I'm decidedly aver, let's just say that. So I don't think that's true, but. Okay, well, I don't have anything special going for me except for the fact that I realize that if I put in enough effort, there are a lot of things I can do. And so I'm very much an effort kind of a person. And so that actually works really well, because I don't think you get motivation from like this. I'm sitting around one day and suddenly I have the lightning bolt that says, I want to be a, you know, a famous writer or some. Whatever it is you want to be. That doesn't work. I don't think that kind of motivation. I don't know anybody that has that. All you really need is to say, I'm interested in writing. Let me get started in some fashion. And through effort, if you work hard at it, you improve. Because we always get better at things. We work hard at it is a natural thing. It's. It's just like taxes. It's a law of the universe. And whenever you get a little better, that feels good. And so effort equals a little bit of achievement, which feels good, which creates motivation for you to take a little more effort, which means you'll improve a little more, which feels good. And so there's this really cool, virtuous cycle of effort, achievement, fulfillment, happiness, motivation that you can spend forever and ever and ever. If you focus on doing it that way. If all you care about is this big end result, it's demoralizing and defeating and you have to rely on willpower alone. And none of us have enough willpower to do that. Motivation doesn't come first. Effort comes first.
- [09:52]
A
I love that. So let me pause you right there because I want to make sure that my listeners really understand this. So what Jeff is saying is that you don't want to focus on some big goal because you'll keep comparing yourself to that goal. You're going to think about where you are now, how far away that goal is. You're going to feel bad, and you don't want to feel bad. If you want to be motivated, you want to feel good. So you want to focus on these small wins. So how can we better focus on these small wins? Is there a trick that we need to do? Is it something we need to reflect on every day? How do we make sure that we're constantly looking at these small goals and making sure that we're making progress toward our bigger goal?
- [10:29]
C
So process really is everything with anything that you want to do. So you do need a big goal, I think. But your goal, your big goal is just there to help you design the process that you would use in order to get there. So if I is a terrible. Well, it's not a terrible example, but it's, it's a easy example. Say you want to run a marathon and you've never run before, so running the marathon is your big goal. But as you said, if that's all you focus on is being able to run 26 miles and you can only run one, you're going to quit because it's too far and you feel bad. After that one mile, you're never going to get there. So running a marathon though, you can back it up and say, okay, what are the steps and stages that I'm going to have to go through in order to build up the endurance and stamina and speed and all that other stuff that will allow me to get there? And there are plenty of people in the world who can lay that program out for you so you, you know what to do. So the goal informs the process. Then you just say, okay, I've got a. Whatever it is, six month plan. What's tomorrow? Tomorrow is I'm going to go run a mile and a half. Cool. When you run the mile and a Half. You can check it off. You get to feel good about yourself because you did what you set out to do that day. Which, if you think about at the end of the day, the days you feel best about yourself are when you got done the things that you said you wanted to do. Where you feel bad is when you didn't. So you get to feel good about it. You checked it off, you had a successful day that will give you enough motivation to tomorrow go, okay, what's tomorrow? Whatever it is, that's all you have to do. You just have to do whatever it is that you have to do today. And if you focus on that, you get to be successful every day. You get to feel good about yourself every day. And you will stack up enough of those days that every once in a while you will pop your head up and say, wow, I just did a 10 mile run. Who thought I could do that? But before you get too excited and go, oh, what about the 26? You got to put your head back down because you're not. You're not there yet. And then you say, cool, I can run 10 miles. That's awesome. What's tomorrow? Tomorrow may only be a three mile run because that's part of your process of recovery and whatever else it may be, whatever it is, if you're doing what you set out to do that day, and if that goal is, or if that process is designed so that it will basically guarantee that if you put in the effort, you will succeed, you're good to go. So the goal informs the process, and then all you worry about is, am I doing what I need to do each step of the way. You didn't start a side hustle and end up with 35 people working for you by one day. Just saying, you know, that's what I want to do. You knew you wanted to create a marketing agency and a podcast, you knew what you wanted to do, but you broke it down into, okay, but what can I do right now? What do I. What am I doing each day to get there? And then all of those wins stacked up on themselves and probably made it a little bit easier for you to keep working that hard because you saw a path to where you were going to go.
- [13:33]
A
What Jeff told me that day about motivation really stuck with me. The conventional view of motivation is if you fire somebody up enough, they're going to go out and achieve whatever their target is. Traditionally, they say achieving success is all about generating the right mindset, and that motivation will trigger you to succeed, basically. But Jeff overturns this idea that motivation leads to success. Instead, he tells us that small successes lead to constant motivation. Jeff believes that motivation is a result. It's not the spark or trigger that gets you started on your next project. Real motivation comes after you start. Motivation is the pride you take in the work you've already done, which fuels you to do even more. Motivation stems from success and fuels more success. So the only thing you need to do to succeed is to have one small victory to get a head start. Then you just follow that loop. Jeff calls this the motivation cycle or the motivation feedback loop. The cycle goes something like this. A small success leads to some motivation, which leads to another success and even more motivation, which leads to another success and, and even more motivation. And you get the idea. That's why motivation isn't something you have. Motivation is something you get from yourself after you take action. Okay, so to be a successful content creator, you need to create content consistently. You need to take action. And that means you need to get into the habit of creating content. The keyword here is habit. And many of you know that I'm one of the top LinkedIn creators and I've been an influencer on that platform for over five years now. And I remember when I first started my content creator journey on LinkedIn, I was working a full time job and I also started this podcast as a side hustle. So I basically had two jobs, a full time job and a part time job with this side hustle. And now I was taking on LinkedIn as a third part time job. So I really didn't have a lot of free time and I decided that I would make it a habit to create my LinkedIn post on the train on my commute to work. So I had a 45 minute commute to work and that was my only job on the train. I didn't do anything else. My job was to post on LinkedIn, to decide what I was gonna post, to write up the caption, to pick out my image, to post the content up before I stepped into the office. Sometimes it also required me to film a video while I was waiting for the train. And then during lunch and on my commute home, I would do all my comment and DM engagement. And then I did the same routine five times a week as a habit and every single weekday. And within a year I acquired 60,000 followers on LinkedIn and I became an influencer. And fast forward to today, I still post daily. While my habits are different, I have over 260,000 followers on LinkedIn and I'm recognized as a top voice on that platform. So small habits can make a big difference. And nobody aligns to this more than James Clear, author of the bestselling book Atomic Habits. So the heart of your book, Atomic Habits, is the idea that small habits can make a big difference. Why don't we start there? Why do you believe that's true?
- [16:45]
D
Time will magnify whatever you feed it. So if you have good habits, even if they're little and seem relatively minor, on any given day, you'll continue to put yourself in a stronger position day after day. In many ways, if you have good habits, you're on the right trajectory. And so all you need is time. You just need some patience. But if you have bad habits, time becomes your enemy. And every day that goes by, you kind of dig the hole a little bit deeper. And so this idea that small habits can make an enormous difference, what it really is about is about emphasizing trajectory rather than position. You know, there's a lot of discussion about position in life. How much money's in your bank account? What's the current number on the scale? What's the stock price? What are the quarterly earnings? We have, like, all these ways of measuring your current position. And then if the measurement isn't what you wanted it to be, or you haven't achieved what you set out to achieve, you kind of start judging yourself or feeling guilty for it, or you feel bad about it. And what I'm encouraging is to say, listen, just for a minute, let's stop worrying so much about our current position and instead focus a little bit more on our current trajectory. And this is why one of the key things I talk about in Atomic habits is getting 1% better each day. Are you getting 1% better or 1% worse? Is the arrow pointed up and to the right, or have you flatlined? Cause if you're on a good trajectory, even if it's a very modest gain on any given day, all you need is time. And if you're on a bad trajectory, even if you're in a pretty strong position right now, it's not going to end well. And so building better habits, making these small improvements, it's really about getting you on a path that can lead to where you want to go. I really like that question of, can my current habits carry me to my desired future? You know, and if they can, then great. Maybe you just need to be patient and let the days work for you. But if they can't, then something needs to change about your trajectory. And so your habits are One of the things that kind of set you on that path and determine how far you're going to go and whether you're improving day in and day out. And so for all of those reasons, I like to refer to habits as the compound interest of self improvement. You know, the same way that money multiplies with compound interest, the effects of your habits multiply as you repeat them across time. Many of your outcomes in life, many of the results that we also badly want to have, they're kind of like a lagging measure of the habits that precede them. So your bank account is a lagging measure of your financial habits. Your knowledge is a lagging measure of your reading and learning habits. Even little stuff like the amount of clutter in your living room is a lagging measure of your cleaning habits. And so we also badly want better results in life. But the somewhat ironic thing is that the results are not actually the thing that needs to change. You know, it's like fix the inputs and the outputs will fix themselves. Adjust the habits and you'll be set on a different path and carried to a different destination naturally. So this concept of getting 1% better each day, it's really a philosophy, an attitude and approach of showing up, trying to make some small improvement, and trusting that that little improvement can compound in something much greater over a broad span of time.
- [19:53]
A
Well, you heard it from James. Just like exercising, showing up regularly and putting in the effort in your content creation, even on tough days, builds long term results. So think about it, Yap fam. What habits are you gonna do to build in your daily, weekly or monthly routine to accomplish your goals as a content creator? Let's hold that thought and take a quick break with our sponsors. Yeah, fam. You just realized your business needs to hire somebody yesterday. How do you find great candidates? Fast, Easy use. Indeed. When it comes to hiring, Indeed is all you need. Stop struggling to get your job posts seen on other job sites. Indeed's Sponsored Jobs help you stand out and hire fast. With Sponsored Jobs, your post jumps to the top of the page for relevant candidates so you reach the people you actually want faster. And it works. According to Indeed data, Sponsored Jobs posted directly on indeed get 45% more applications than non sponsored jobs. What I love about Indeed is knowing that my job post is getting the visibility that it requires. Plus, with Indeed Sponsored Jobs, there's no monthly subscriptions, no long term contracts, and you only pay for results. There's no need to wait any longer. Speed up your hiring right now with Indeed and and listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit. To get your jobs more visibility@ Indeed.com profiting, just go to Indeed.com profiting right now and support our show by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast. Indeed.com profiting terms and conditions apply. Hiring Indeed is all you need. What's up young and profiters? We're still at the start of a new year and you know what that means. New goals, new ideas, and maybe that little voice in your head saying this is the year that I finally start my business. But let's be real, the what ifs show up fast. What if I fail? What if this is the wrong move? I've been there and what I learned is that it makes a huge difference when you have the right partner from day one. And the hardest part is starting. For many entrepreneurs, that partner is Shopify. Shopify is an all in one commerce platform that helps you build, run and grow your business. You can create professional looking websites with ready to use templates, manage payments, and even use AI tools to write product descriptions so you can launch faster. What I love is how simple Shopify makes everything. You don't need to be technical, you don't need to have it all figured out. It just lets you start. And like I said, starting is the hardest part. Yeah, fam, don't kick yourself a year from now because you didn't take action today. Start your business with Shopify. It's time to turn those what ifs into Sign up for your $1 per month trial at shopify.comprofiting go to shopify.comprofiting that's shopify.com profiting. Yap gang, it's confession time. I thought I had my money handled. I thought I had a good handle on everything going on. But I recently checked my bank statements and there was subscriptions everywhere. Streaming apps, random charges. A few of them were billing me for a long time. I didn't even know what they were and it was a painful uncovering. So I downloaded the Experian app and now it's like I have a financial assistant in my pocket. The Experian app helps you track spending and find subscriptions that you forgot about and you no longer want. With your subscription cancellation feature available with an Experian Premium membership, you securely link your accounts. They scan for recurring charges and you pick what goes and what you want canceled. And then they cancel it. It's as simple as that. They have over 200 eligible subscription types and it's usually done in three to seven business days. If getting your money tight is part of your growth plan this year and you don't want to manually have to do it, this is your move. Young and profits. Get started with the Experian app today. Results will vary. Not all bills or subscriptions are eligible. Savings not guaranteed, paid membership with connected account required. See experian.com for details. Okay, so we spoke about getting started and staying motivated and building habits. Now let's talk a little bit more about the flip side of content creation, the dark side, I should say, which is burnout. It's easy to feel overwhelmed when you're consistently in creation mode. And that's why it's so important to set boundaries and find ways to recharge. As entrepreneurs, we tend to be proud of our energy levels and we often even boast about our own resilience and hustle culture. But Dr. Aditi Nurokar, a stress expert at Harvard Medical School, told me that you can be resilient and still be much more burned out than you think you are.
- [24:42]
E
Resilience and stress go hand in hand when you think about what is resilience. The scientific definition is that it's your innate biological ability. So we all have it. And it's that ability that you have to adapt, recover, and grow when life throws you a curveball or you have a challenge. Now, resilience doesn't function in a vacuum. You need a little bit of stress, that healthy, positive stress for resilience to show itself. What happens, though, is that that word resilience, you and I hear it and others who are listening to this conversation may hear the word and have a visceral response because it's gotten a really bad rap over the past several years. The word resilience is a positive connotation, but it feels very negative when you hear it. And the reason it feels negative now, you're like, oh, don't tell me to be resilient. It's because that definition has changed and morphed societally. We've moved away from true resilience towards toxic resilience. And so what is true resilience? True resilience, it's like, like I said, it's your innate biology. We all have that ability to be resilient.
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B
It's.
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E
It honors boundaries, it honors your human limitations for rest and recovery. And it really focuses on self compassion and leaning into that versus toxic resilience. Toxic resilience is when you and I hear the word resilience, immediately you cringe. That's toxic resilience. It's a Mind over matter, mindset. It's productivity at all costs. It's like all systems go all the time. It's the energizer bunny here in the US you know, just keep going in the uk, keep calm and carry on. Every single society has some concept of toxic resilience because it's a manifestation of hustle culture. And so I hope that the entrepreneurs listening, what they take away from our conversation is that you can be resilient and you can still get burnt out. That's called the resilience myth that people think, oh, I can't be burned out, I'm so resilient. Those two things, because what you're likely living through is this idea of toxic resilience. Because we've been taught from a really young age that resilience is about tolerating a lot of discomfort, but that's not actually true resilience. And so I want to dismantle that idea of resilience as being toxic and rather lean into your true resilience, which really honors your need for rest and recovery. Because then that is how your brain, you know, news flash that your brain really needs rest and recovery to be productive and to really be functioning at its optimal level.
- [27:15]
A
Recovery is essential to avoiding burnout, but you can also do a lot for yourself by planning ahead. That's why one of the best techniques to avoid burnout is batching your content. By setting aside dedicated time to plan and create in bulk, you reduce the stress of having to come up with content on the fly. Jasmine Star, a business strategist who helps entrepreneurs build their businesses, shared with me a powerful system she uses to batch her reels and TikToks efficiently. So what are your top tips for batching content?
- [27:48]
E
So I am producing three to four reels a week, and I'm posting also on TikTok in the same frequency. And what I tried to do is batch all of the content two days out of the month. And so I'll set aside five hours every other Friday. And what is so important is to have a plan going in. I know the reels that I want to create. I also write down the copy for the reel. So it's like, instead of wasting time,
- [28:16]
A
be like, oh, what, what are my
- [28:17]
E
three tips for this reel? So everything's laid out, including, am I going to do an outfit change? Because if I need to do an alpha change, I need to have a total count for the outfits that I need for that specific time. And so I go in and I have a document the reel I Want to create, how long I think it's going to take me to create it, what props that I need and the copy for that reel, sit down, create them in real time, save them as drafts, or just save to the video and then upload when I'm ready.
- [28:42]
A
Jasmine's approach shows how a solid plan and process can save you time and energy. If you prepare ahead and you prepare your scripts and your outfits, you can then streamline your workflow and focus on your creativity during your batch sessions. Batching also helps you stay in the zone because you're not task switching, which can actually really disrupt your flow. When you're focusing all your energy on content creation for a set period, that will maximize your productivity. So in short, try establishing a production routine that you follow for each video, podcast, blog post, or social media post. When you follow the same exact process for every piece of content that you do, it becomes second nature and gets easier over time. The routine not only helps you produce content faster, but also reduces the mental load of constantly having to start from scratch. And yeah, bam. Every good thing takes time, sacrifice, and consistency. You are not going to become a top content creator without putting in the time and effort. However, it does get easier. And once you put in the reps and once you achieve some success, it's okay to then slow down. It's okay to start saying no to opportunities and not burn yourself out. So for myself, I hustled so hard for four years straight. I worked every weekend. I worked till past midnight. I hustled, I hustled, I hustled and I built up my platforms and my companies. But then I realized at a certain point that in order to become my best self, I needed more rest and more balance. I needed to work on my relationships, I needed to work on my own health. And I put in so much work that my business and my platforms were compounding where I didn't really need to hustle as hard anymore and everything would still grow without me working so hard. I basically hustled enough where I grew everything to a point where I earned the right to slow down. Here's Jenna Kutcher again for a second time to drill this point home. So something else to know about Jenna is that she only does stuff that brings her joy. You only do things that you want to do. I bring Jenna opportunities all the time. She's in my podcast network where I'll be giving her, like, I booked sponsorships for her and she'll be like, I don't want to do that. I'm burnt Out. I'm burnt out on IG reels. And I'm like, but it's thousands of dollars. Are you sure? And she's like, yeah, I don't care. I'm burnt out. I'm not doing that. You can do it. You can book it in two months or whatever. So talk to me about that. Like, how are you able to sort of just put your foot down? A lot of people couldn't just turn down money like that.
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B
Yeah. I mean, first off, it is such a privilege to be in a position.
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A
Yeah. It wasn't always like that.
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B
No.
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A
You've got to sacrifice.
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B
But I've realized. And here's what I've really realized, is if you have listened to this whole episode, you recognize the power of trust. And I want my community to trust me. And if something isn't in alignment, not only do I feel it, but they feel it. And so I have had to get so good at discerning what are the right partners, what are the right opportunities, what are the right sponsorships to take on. Is this in alignment? And I feel that way with every opportunity, whether it is getting asked to speak on stages that I would have once dreamt of being on, but now I'm saying no to, or whether it is, you know, hosting a mastermind or all these things. I could do a million things I don't want to. And I think that I'm just at this place in my life where I just recognize that, like, peace needs to be protected. And right now, in this stage of my life, like, my priority is my family. And anything that I'm saying yes to is a no to them. And what is the most important thing to me? And so, you know, turning down things like recording another social media reel, to me, it's like, but this is more time with my kids, or, this is protecting and preserving the integrity of my followers.
- [32:25]
A
She'll even turn down things that are a good fit.
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B
Totally. Totally. I will.
- [32:29]
A
She'll turn down things that are a great fit for her because she's like, no, my time with my family is more important. Yeah.
- [32:35]
B
And I think that, like, boundaries protect what's sacred to you. And I've just had to relearn this lesson over and over and over again of, like, boundaries aren't bad, and. And boundaries keep what I say most important to me. And they exemplify that. Like, what I am saying is most important to me is reflected in my calendar. It is reflected in my bank account. It is reflected in the way I show up every single day. And so it's a muscle that you have to learn to flex, and it takes time. Because I think that there was a time in my life where I got paid $50 to take pictures of a cat, and I couldn't believe it. Somebody is paying me to do something I love. This is amazing. And what a blessing that is. And the better that you get at listening to your gut and discerning like, well, this is a great opportunity, but is it the right opportunity for me? It keeps you in alignment so that you are not passing up things that you should be saying yes to and that you are not saying yes to things that you should be saying no to. And so I feel like I just have, like, a really strong intuition and a gut game. And I don't apologize for saying no any longer, because my no is literally just a reflection of, like, what is mattering the most to me right now.
- [33:42]
A
Yeah. But let's stick on this mindset. Why are you like this? Like, how did this come about? Were you always like this, where you're just like, no, I'd rather just have my joy than the money.
- [33:51]
B
I feel like I've realized that, like, our piece is so expensive and life is so short. And I definitely am not anti hustle culture, because I do believe hustle is required to get the dream off the ground no matter what the dream is. There have been so many points in my career where I get an idea of a project or something like, yeah, I can hustle, but if hustle is the only way that you can operate and sustain what you're building, that is not a business. Like, you are building a prison for yourself. And I've watched so many people who have really successful businesses and really lousy lives, like, they are rich in their bank accounts and empty in relationships. And, like, to me, that's just not worth it. That is such a high cost. And I feel like I have had to learn how to discern, like, what are my best yeses and, like, what can I say no to without having fom. Without having guilt. And it's interesting because I think becoming a mom really shifted that for me of, like, anytime I'm away from my kids, I want it to be worth it. And the only way for me to alleviate mom guilt was to know that, like, I was doing work that I love, work that I enjoy, work that gives me peace, that excites me so that whenever I'm working, I'm not there thinking I should be with my kids. And whenever I'm with my kids, I'm thinking I should be working. It's like, the only way to get past that was to just be in total alignment of, like, what do I want for my life? And I think we focus so much on, like, leaving a legacy, but I think in reality, we have to focus on living a legacy. And I'm like, I want my kids to see the joy. I want them to see the peace. And, you know, I've had so many turning points in my business where, like, I've just realized that, like, money isn't the answer. Like, at times in my business where I've earned the most money, I've been the most miserable, and I just feel like there's this threshold of, like, where do I get more joy? How do I derive joy? Like, what does peace look like? Like, when I go to bed at the end of the night, how do I truly rest? And it's just been a huge shift, and it's not easy, and it doesn't come naturally because I am an achiever and I am a hard worker and I am driven, but I'm just at a place in my life where I'm like, I just want to enjoy it.
- [36:05]
A
Yeah. I love the way that you and your team handle it. You guys take Fridays off.
- [36:09]
B
Yeah.
- [36:09]
A
So they don't work on Fridays, but you're still crushing it and getting so much done. Like, you don't have to overwork yourself to be successful. And you are such a great example of that.
- [36:19]
B
Yeah. There's this quote that I heard that totally changed my mentality. And it was, instead of asking yourself if you've worked hard enough to earn your rest, ask yourself if you've rested well enough to do your best work. It was by a girl, Nicola Hobbs, I think is her name, or Nicola Dobbs. And I heard that, and I was like, whoa, I have been wired of, like, I just need to get this done and then I can rest. And I was like, what if we, like, flip this on its head? And it's just been so transformative for me because I'm like, no, I need to, like, come into this feeling rested and well to do my best work. And that has, like, totally shifted things.
- [36:57]
A
I really love that mantra that Jenna mentioned. Have you rested well enough to do your best work? Remember, you're running a marathon, not a sprint, and that marathon is long. You will most likely not become an overnight success. It will take you years before you make money. Because being a content creator is not easy. And it's easy to be down on yourself and give up when you feel like you didn't become an influencer or you haven't gone viral yet or reached a point to monetize your content. Benjamin Hardy, an organizational psychologist, taught me that when you think that way, you are in the gap. You are practicing gap thinking, which is a really unhealthy place to be. Instead, you really want to practice gain thinking. Now here's Ben to explain gap and gain thinking. I heard you say on another podcast that when you released that book in 2018 that you came on my podcast to talk about willpower doesn't work. You actually considered it a full failure because it didn't reach New York Times bestsellers list. And that's like every author's dream. But nonetheless, like when you came on my podcast, I remember thinking it was such a big deal, you were such a big blogger and we, we had scored Benjamin Hardy, like episode number seven. And so you were a big deal to us and to the outside world, but inside you felt like a failure. So I want to talk about that. I think it will give us some color on your journey and help us understand the gap in the game concept as well.
- [38:24]
F
So I served a church mission from 2008 to 2010 and like going on that, that experience was very transformational for me. I grew up in a really intense environment, but ever since I came home from that experience in 2010, I wanted to be a professional author. From 2015 to 2017, I grew enormously as a blogger and was able to get a book deal and be able to start providing for my family. So essentially I got a multi six figure book deal to write a book. I'm living my dreams. It all happens way faster than I thought in early 2018, honestly, it was March of 2018, the book comes out and I did have way in my head, like I'd built everything up in my head that it needed to be a certain level, it needed to be a New York Times bestseller. And I admittedly as well threw so much money at it. And so yeah, it didn't hit the goal. And for probably four or five months, I was in a very deep depression, very deep slump. So the gap in the gain is something I learned from Dan Sullivan. I read his little book on the subject. Maybe actually it was in 2018 I read his little book and I was still blogging back then and it was just an idea I loved. And I thought, if I ever get a chance to write books with Dan Sullivan, I'm going to make this a major book. And the idea is very simple. I mean it's basically the idea that as a person we all feel happy or sad based on how we measure ourselves and how we measure our experiences. The reason I went into a deep depression after I had made a monumental achievement. I mean, I'd never done that before. It was totally new and yet I felt like a loser because I was in the gap. I was measuring what was against what I thought it should be, which is an ideal. When you're in the gap, you're measuring yourself against your ideals, which are always changing, always moving, whereas the gain is the opposite. You measure yourself backward against where you were before. Truth was, is I was way further than I'd ever been. And if I was just measuring myself backward against my past self, competing only against my past self, I was radically further than I ever was. And I just did something huge. And so I've just, I'm. I'm learning and I've learned over the years to be more in the game. And it's a far more enjoyable, far happier experience.
- [40:28]
A
And I'd love to kind of dig deeper on this if you can help us understand the difference between ideals and goals and why that matters with all of this.
- [40:38]
F
So ideals are very ephemeral, like they're not actually tangible. How I learned it from Dan is ideals are like the horizon in the desert. Like you can see em out there, but every time you take a few steps forward, the horizon keeps going. And in America, we're actually trained to always be pursuing happiness. That's even in the Declaration of Independence. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And so we're very big on ideals in America, which is good. Like it's good to have ideals. It's good to good to be idealistic. There's nothing wrong with ideals. The problem is that they're immaterial. Like, I think a definition of ideal is whatever you believe is perfection. So when you're in the gap, you're literally measuring yourself against your view of perfection. But back to the idea of the horizon. That view is never endingly changing. Like, my former self would have felt like it was perfection just to get a book deal. But then once I got there, the ideal changed, the horizon moved. And so if you're always measuring yourself against a moving target, and also a moving target, that by definition is unreachable. You can't actually reach an ideal. It's an ideal. But if you're always measuring yourself against it, then you never feel like you've moved anywhere. And that's actually why we wrote the book, is because High achievers by nature have huge ideals, but they also usually measure themselves against them. And our culture is trained that way. Social media trains us to have ideals and to always be comparing ourselves externally. And sometimes ideals are other people. But if you're always measuring yourself against something that's way up ahead and also something that you can never actually reach, then what that does for you internally is it feels like you've never made any progress at all. It also devalues everything you've done to that point. And so whenever you're in the gap, it does not matter how much you've achieved. It doesn't matter if you're living way, way, way beyond the dreams of anything you ever thought you would do. You actually feel like you've made no progress at all, and you feel like a loser. And you've devalued not only your current self, you've devalued everything that got you here. And so ideals are beautiful. They're just not useful as a measurement tool. They're. They're useful as a. As a direction tool. Goals are far more concrete. Obviously. You can have goals that you set that move you toward your ideals. And so goals are specific. They're concrete. They're mile markers on a journey. And then the useful thing to do with your goals is to obviously become increasingly intrinsically motivated towards the goals you set and even the standards you set for yourself, that they're less about what anyone else thinks, what anyone else wants. And you actually get better at doing that when you just start measuring your progress backwards. So, like, I'll set a goal for myself. I've got huge goals for 2023. But in terms of where I'm. Where I'm measuring myself, and in terms of my benchmark, like, my benchmark for 2023 is what I accomplished in 2022. Like, I accomplished some cool things, but I'm using that since it's tangible. Ideals are not tangible. Like, I have concrete evidence of what I did in 2022, and I can use that not only to propel me forward, but I can also use that to say, what do I want to do that's even gonna be bigger and more exciting? So you can just measure yourself backwards and use that as the baseline for what you can do.
- [43:42]
A
Yeah, so I hear you saying a couple big ideas here. The first one is ideals are a moving target. You're never gonna get there, so you're never gonna be happy trying to go towards those ideals or. Because you're never gonna actually achieve that. You can't actually achieve your ideal. And it's always moving further and further as you become more successful. Right. Second is comparing yourselves to other people. That never helps in terms of our mindset, our happiness. And then I hear you saying that goals can be tangible and you can have mile markers, and it's okay to have goals, but you need to make sure that you're judging your progress on those goals based on your past, not necessarily how far you are from your ideal place. Right. I know I probably didn't say it as good as you, but that's basically what I'm getting.
- [44:29]
F
You broke it down beautifully. I think that this is one of the main problems with the narratives. Like, you know, there's a lot of narratives about how you shouldn't have goals. Obviously, I think it's impossible to not have goals. I think human beings can't not have a goal. That's part of being intentional. But the problem is the measurement. I mean, even if I had hit my goal, I would have gone into the gap. I would have moved the target. So even if I had hit the New York Times bestseller list from a gap perspective, I still would have felt terrible about myself because I would have moved the target. The target would have been, well, why wasn't I on it for four weeks?
- [45:03]
A
Why wasn't I number one New York Times bestseller? Yeah, yeah.
- [45:06]
F
Or why didn't I hit number one? So whether you hit the goal or not doesn't even matter. If you're in the gap, it will never have been enough because the target will keep changing, and you're measuring yourself against something that's immeasurable and something that's external and always changing. And so, yeah, whether it's other people that you're measuring yourself against or whether it's just your inflated ideals, that's the point, is that you won't be happy hitting or not hitting your goals if you stay in the gap. And that's just the key.
- [45:34]
A
Yeah. So then on the flip side, let's talk about gain thinking. What does it look like to have gain thinking or to practice gain thinking?
- [45:42]
F
So I look at gain thinking two ways. One is it's a way of measuring your progress and measuring your experiences. So for me, for example, I've had a number of experiences already today, like, even just to this point. And some of them went to plans, and some of them didn't go to plans. But if I'm in the gain, I'm measuring what actually did happen. And I'm measuring myself backwards. I'm only measuring myself against where I was before. And the truth is, I'm always ahead of my past self, even if things go backwards, seemingly. Like, even if I lose my leg in a car accident. Right? A lot of bad things can seemingly happen. But if you're in the gain, you are finding the gains and you're creating gains from your experiences. And so I consider it. You're squeezing as much juice out of your experiences as possible. You're also always choosing to become better as a result, no matter what happens to you, you're in the gain. So everything ultimately happens for you. So I guess it's really two big ideas. One is it's measuring yourself backward against where you were before and always realizing that you're further than you were before and that the only thing I'm actually measuring myself against is myself, which is where I was before. So that's number one is just measuring yourself backwards. The second one is literally turning everything that happens to you into something that happens for you. So anything, no matter what it was, you can actually gain and grow from it. And if you do, then you're always getting better. You're always learning from every experience. Whereas if you're in the gap, then your past becomes a problem. Like, that's from like a psychology standpoint. What you need to be happy in the present is you need a happy past and an exciting future. And the past is literally a meaning. And so the gain is just a lens of using your or of transforming your past into more gains, more learning. Even from your most extreme traumas, you can learn to turn those into gain so that you're constantly better and even grateful for them, which is what psychologists would call post traumatic growth. So it's really just those two things. I'm only measuring myself against myself backward, and I'm literally turning every experience into my gain.
- [47:43]
A
Let's hold that thought and take a quick break with our sponsors. Hey, app fam, question for you. When somebody Googles you right now, are you proud of what they see? Or would you say ignore that it's under construction for two years? I've been there. At one point, our site didn't reflect the level we were operating at at all. It felt so outdated, and every small update required way too much back and forth. That's why I love Framer. Framer lets you design and publish a premium professional website without writing a single line of code. It's fast and you can launch pages in minutes. You're in control, no waiting on developers, and the designs look modern, clean and polished on any device. Serious founders know your website is your first impression, so let's upgrade it together. Learn how you can get more out of your.com from a framer specialist or get started building for free today@framer.com profiting for 30% off a Framer Pro annual plan. 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That's why Northwest Registered Agent is the company I wish I had back then. Northwest is an all in one business formation and identity platform that gives you everything you need to launch and run a legitimate business in one place. When you form with them, you get a registered agent service, a business address to get your home private, a domain website, a professional email, business phone number, and built in privacy all bundled together. Now yapm I want to take a detour right now and talk to you about the importance of a registered agent. I had no idea what it was when I first started Yap. I signed up with one and then I never checked the platform because it was only for my registered agent. I didn't even know what it did. Apparently I learned this the hard way that a registered agent is what notifies you if anybody ever sues you. So I actually got in trouble this year because I didn't even know that an old client that we barely worked with put out a lawsuit and they didn't notify me and I ended up missing a court date and it cost me a lot of money. So you really need a registered agent that you trust that does a great job. And I've recently switched to Northwest Registered Agent so this never happens again. Don't pay hundreds or thousands of dollars for what you can get. For free on Northwest Registered agent, visit northwest registered agent.com yap free. That's yap free. And start using free resources to build something amazing. Get more with Northwest registered agent@northwestregisteredagent.com yap free. Yeah. Bam. I have to say, for some reason, this second interview that I had with Benjamin Hardy a couple years ago just really different from me. The first time Ben was on my show was episode seven and I was literally just starting out as a podcaster. Now, if I look at the progress from then until now, it is beyond anything I could have ever imagined. Cover of Podcast Magazine, Webby Award Honoree, dubbed as a podcast Princess, now running the number one business podcast network representing huge legends that I used to look up to and thought I'd never even meet. Jenna Kutcher, Amy Porterfield, Neil Patel, Russell Brunson. I mean, my past self 6 years ago would have never imagined my future self. But even with all this progress, I don't always feel accomplished. Sometimes I fall into the trap of comparing myself with others, with other podcasters who were early adopters and captured more market share on Apple, with podcasters who seem to get more traffic than me but don't try nearly as hard or don't have as good as content, people who feel like overnight successes. And even though I'm a top podcaster, a top 100 podcaster, I want to be a top 10 podcaster. I want everybody in the world to know my name. And that was always my goal when I set out on starting the podcast and I fall into what Ben calls the gap. But really, I shouldn't measure myself this way. I should be measuring My progress, the gain. I should be measuring my current self against my past self and not my future self. And although it's healthy to measure progress looking backwards, it's actually not healthy to always stay there. It's better to think about who you want to be in the future. And Ben told me the best thing to do is to get really clear and connected with your future self.
- [53:44]
F
This is a really interesting concept in psychology. Typically the way we look at time is we look at it as past, present and future. And we kind of look at it sequentially and we also look at it chronologically. Like my past is behind me, there's no way I can get back there. My present is now and the future's up ahead of me. I can never, I'll never actually be able to go into the future. All there is is really now. From a psychology standpoint, that's not how psychologists view time. Psychologists don't view time sequentially, we actually view it holistically. So what I mean by that is that the past is currently existing in my life. Like who I'm being right now is a complete amalgamation of my views of my past, my experiences of my past. We even today were talking about us having a conversation four years ago, right? And so like my past is of course influencing me right now. And my narration of the past, my story of the past, the feelings I have toward my past, the anchors I may have in my past that are unresolved, call it trauma or whatever, but also my goals are heavily influencing me. I mean, anyone who's listening to this is listening to it for a reason. They're listening to it because they feel like this is gonna help them contribute to their goals or help them move forward in their lives. And so everything about my life right now is a combination of my feelings and my perspectives of my past, and also my excitements or my feelings towards the future. They're certainly not mutually exclusive in terms of being in the game, but also having a future oriented mindset. Most people who read the Gap and the GAIN are very future oriented people. The Gain doesn't stop you, I guess, from having a future. Actually, in my perspective, whenever I'm living in the Gain, it actually helps me to be more. It helps me to have a future that's more genuinely coming from my own self rather than something that's coming from the outside. Usually people's goals and their call it their standards or their ideals actually were fed to them by culture, by society. They, the future that they want actually isn't genuinely intrinsically motivated. And so for me, tapping into the gain just helps me to stop worrying about the outside world as much, stop competing with other people. And so in terms of future self, I guess I would say in simple terms, we all have a future self. What the research shows is, is that most people, especially the older they get, they stop thinking about their future self very much. Most people probably 30 and above assume that even their future self 10, 20 or 30 years from now is mostly going to be the same person they are today. So most people don't have huge imagination towards their future self. What the research does show is that your future self is going to be a wildly different person than you think. Even in five or ten years from now, it's going to be hard to fully predict who your future self will be. But if you start imagining it, start thinking about it, and importantly, getting really connected to your future self, who you want to be in the future, you can then start using obviously your vision of your future self to guide and direct who you're going to be today. And you can be extremely intentional about it. And so from my standpoint, the best thing to do is get really clear and connected to your future self, who you want to be. Get very specific about that, and then use that as, I guess you could say the North Star for directing everything you're doing here and now and each and every day as you're moving forward, you're measuring yourself against where you were before. You're measuring yourself backwards. And you're always seeing that by increasingly living intentionally as your future self, you're always outgrowing your past self. And I do this daily. I mean, if I even look at where I was a week ago, I am not the same person I was last week. I've changed a lot. I've grown a lot. I know a ton of things my past self didn't know. And so I'm never my past self and I'm always growing into my future self.
- [57:20]
A
So, yap, bam. Who is your future self as a content creator? What goals will your future self achieve and how can you make these concrete goals? Rather than chasing an ideal that has a goal post that is ever moving and leaving you feeling unfulfilled in a gap mindset? Write these goals down. What does your future self as a content creator look like in one year, in five years, in 10 years? Imagine with limitless boundaries and write these goals down. Then use these goals to prioritize and plan your actions. Understand who you want to be and then make your decisions from that lens. It's your North Star for directing what you do day in and day out. Finally, I wanted to touch on a concept that might seem a little abstract, but which is actually deeply connected to staying motivated as a creator. Luck. Have you ever felt like certain people seem to get all the lucky breaks while you're stuck spinning your wheels? Well, what if I told you that luck isn't just random, it's something that you can actively cultivate? Case Kenny, a writer and mindfulness expert, broke down this idea beautifully for me when he shared how luck is intertwined with patience, action, and authenticity. I was listening to an interview with you and James Altucher a couple days ago, and you guys were talking about how luck is similar to faith, which I. I thought was like, just a really cool way to think about it. How can we make ourselves more lucky? What are some ways that we kind of can break the rut that we're in, the routine that we're in to try to bring more luck into our lives?
- [58:51]
G
I like the idea of luck is faith, and I like the idea of luck and faith and patience being intertwined. Like when you give yourself patience, that is saying, I have faith in myself, right? When you're saying, I don't need to rush to do this, I don't need to conform to someone else's timeline. I just need to keep doing what I'm doing. That is faith in yourself, and that is what creates luck. There's a book that I reference quite a bit that has been passed around a little bit that talks about luck. I'm blanking on the author of it, but it's called Chase, Chance and Creativity, the Lucky Art of Novelty. And it's basically written by this scientist professor who was talking about the role that luck has played in some great scientific breakthroughs, right? Specifically, luck in the lab, like the invention of pasteurization and Louis Pasteur and the invention of penicillin. These were technically mysterious mistakes that were made in the lab when they just, like, randomly did things. Not a scientist, I don't know the exacts, but they randomly mixed things together and something great happened, right? It was luck. It wasn't part of the plan. It was luck. And basically, the scientist looked over the years, over the many decades and centuries of luck in the lab, and he said, luck is actually categorizable. It's something we could break down, and it's something we can't control. And he said, there's four kinds of luck, and one, luck is the kind of luck that I think we're all so apt to identify by. And for me, I used to think, well, I'm an unlucky person, right? I've never won a lottery. I always hit red lights. Like, if something bad can happen, it tends to happen. To me, that's the kind of luck that we need to ignore. That's random luck. Like, we don't really care about random luck. We can't control it. It is what it is. But there's three other kinds of luck that he identified in the lab that I think is very immediately transferable to life. The first was luck that comes from experience and association. Basically, the more you do something, the wiser you get about it, such that in the future, you make better decisions. You're able to quickly form more mental associations of, if this, then that, and you just have better results. It's luck that comes from wisdom. So for me, it's like with writing quotes I've written, I don't know, a thousand on Instagram, I kind of know what people want. I know what makes people feel seen. So people like, I posted something yesterday, today it's got like 90,000 likes. That's a lot of likes. It's a little bit lucky. The algorithm lucked me today. Kind of. It was just a little bit of association. So that was luck. 1. The other luck was luck that comes from motion. Can't deny that, right? The more you do, the luckier you get. Objects in motion stay in motion. Objects in motion bump into other objects in motion. The more you do, the more podcasts you release, the more music you release, the more cold calls you make. Literally, the luckier you get. People, for some reason, we conflate luck with being irregardless of effort, but luck is truly effort. And then the last luck that he broke down was luck that comes from uniqueness, originality, authenticity. Just the fact that the more real you are, the lucky you get in the sense that people can detect that. Like some of the examples, if you have blue hair and that's authentic to you and your expression, it strikes up a conversation with someone, oh, and they're an editor for Vogue, and you want to be a fashion model. Things like that. Luck that comes from originality and authenticity that in very practical ways, whether it's a conversation in an elevator or something you post, that shines through it attracts the right people, and you get lucky. But it comes from that. That level of realness. So, yeah, I like thinking about luck in that sense because I used to really victimize myself as an unlucky person. And of course, that's not true and that's unfair. Back to the idea of that's bold of you and vulnerability. It's an unfair thing to say. I'm an unlucky person. You could break yourself free of being unlucky by being real, by leaning on your past for those associations and then for doing more.
- [62:27]
A
Of course, Case's Breakdown of Luck is such a powerful reminder that you don't have to sit around waiting for opportunities to come to you. Instead, take action, stay true to yourself, and trust that your consistent efforts will eventually pay off. And that's a wrap for episode three of the App Creator series Replay. Today we explore the journey of staying motivated as a content creator, from starting small and staying consistent to avoiding burnout and gap thinking while practicing game thinking and focusing on transforming into your future self. Thanks for tuning in and I can't wait to see you in episode four of the YAP Creator series. This is your host Hala Taha, AKA the Podcast Princess, signing off.