Summary
So do you want to make more money in your business and are trying all the business habits that are supposed to make you more successful but nothing seems to work?
Maybe you should be focused on more fundamental habits that build a strong foundation for you to work on.
If you lack energy, focus, and drive it doesn’t matter how many productivity hacks or Tony Robbins videos you watch, you won’t be able to take your business to the next level.
Not to mention, your competition that are practicing these techniques will run circles around you. In this video I go over 3 of these superhuman habits that make me more money in then long run, even though they aren’t related to my business directly
Transcript
Habits
Trying to start, grow and run a business without working on yourself is kind of like a NASCAR driver only focusing on the actual driving and not trying to take care of or improve their car at all. But we all know in order for somebody to win the race, they have to have a full pit crew working on the actual vehicle.
And in the business, you are the vehicle. You need your own pit crew and you have to work on the machine, not just on the driving. So today we’re going to talk about three non-business activities that make meat more money. Here we go.
If you’ve been around the business world for a while, you know that, and this is kind of cliche and popular culture with mega CEOs, that it can get pretty weird. You start to do things that normal people in society don’t do to try to get an edge in business. And really we need every edge we can get. We have to take care of ourselves.
We have to make ourselves better. We have to remove distractions and we have to really turn the vehicle into a peak performer so that when we do go to drive our business, uh, we’re getting all we can get out of it. So today we’re gonna talk about three non-business activities that make me more money. And you’ve probably heard of all three of these. And you may or may not be doing some of them, but I’m going to explain to you why these have been crucial to my success in business.
Meditation for Entrepreneurs
Number one is meditation. Now, before you run away, let’s talk about what meditation actually is and why we do it. But first I want you to picture a scenario. Let’s say that somebody who’s pretty weak. They don’t exercise. They walk into a gym, they go over to the bench press and they try to pick up the weights. They can’t lift the weight, they set it down and they start to walk out of the gym and you go, where are you going?
And they say, Oh, I tried lifting. I wasn’t very good at it. So I’m going to leave. And he might say, well, you’re not very good at it because you haven’t been doing it. That would be obvious what mint yet to whenever we bring up meditation, somebody goes, try to meditate for one minute. They’re completely distracted. No kidding. They don’t meditate. And they can’t seem to do it.
And they say, I tried meditation. It’s not for me. Did they ever think that it might not be for them because they have not practiced it like anything in life. It’s going to be super weird the first time that you try it, but I can tell you, meditation has completely changed my life. I’ve been doing it since about 2012. When I first got introduced to it. And this is like getting an edge up on everybody else, especially in today’s society.
You know, we live in a crazy dopamine addicted society where you open up your phone and there’s just crack for your brain. More than there ever has been in the history of human civilization. And if you’re not taking care of your attention, one of the most valuable things that you have, you’re screwed. You’re going to get destroyed by your competitors.
If you cannot focus on your work, if you cannot sit down and get it done, because you’re too addicted to notifications popping up on your phone, scrolling through Instagram and looking at all the pretty pictures, then you don’t stand a chance.
So meditation is how we combat that meditation really gets present to the moment. Not only that, but actually changes the structural makeup of our brain. So scientists have done studies. And after as little as six weeks of consistent meditation practice, we actually start to see more gray matter in the brain. And this is going to positively impact our mood.
It’s going to make it so that we swing last with the ups and downs of business. And what I think is one of the most important things it’s going to allow us to focus. Now there’s another strong benefits of meditation is that it breeds self-awareness. So if you’ve never tried it in its most simplest form, we’re just going to sit down on the floor. We’re going to sit up straight with our back and set a timer. You can start as low as you want and work your way up.
So you can meditate for a minute today, or you can sort of five minutes and we’re just going to breathe. And we might notice the breath on our nostril so that we have something to focus on. And we’re just going to focus on in and out in and out. And the point is to clear our minds now, unless you’re a Zen Buddhist monk, who’s been living in the mountains for 40 years, you’re going to have thoughts pop into your mind when that happens.
That doesn’t mean that you’re doing it wrong. What meditation is, is the practice of continually coming back to our breath. So you’re not supposed to not have any thoughts. You’re supposed to come back to your breath. After you have a thought, notice the thought, let it pass on, and then come back to your breath. And this will teach you that you are not the same as your thoughts.
You don’t have to react to every thought that comes into your mind. You can actually just observe the thought and let it go. You don’t even have to judge it. And so what this does is it builds non reactivity in us and also builds self-awareness. All of a sudden we are the observer.
We are watching ourselves from a different perspective. And then when we are reacting in business, when we are self-sabotaging, when we are getting fired up about something, we can actually watch those thoughts in our mind and let them pass without acting on them. That’s going to be huge for you in business, just to learn, to sit still in the moment and focus and not let your thoughts just completely take you over.
So I really recommend for most people, they start meditating one minute, a day, sit down, anybody can do one a minute.
You cannot sit there and say, I can’t do a minute of meditation. Now, meditation is going to be very hard for you if you’ve never done it before. And yes, you’re going to be distracted. And yes, just like that guy in the gym, you’re not going to be able to pick up the weights.
And it’s not because meditation isn’t for you. It’s because you suck at it because you haven’t practiced it. So go out there, start at one minute adamant every single day and just work your way up sooner or later, you’ll get addicted to meditation because actually feels really good.
It calms you down. It sets the tone for the whole day and it makes everything else in your life. Easier.
Yoga for Entrepreneurs
Number two I have on here is yoga. In 2013, I did my teacher training for yoga. I’m a certified yoga teacher and goca completely changed my life.
Yoga is kind of like meditation on steroids. It’s really was developed to get the body ready for meditation, but it is basically a moving meditation that unites the movement with breath. So if you’ve never done yoga, a big part of it is breathing in harmony with the movements.
Now, the thing about yoga that people don’t understand is the practice is uncomfortable. And so a lot of people, well, number one, they’ll go try yoga and they’ll do the same thing as the first example where they’re not flexible. And so they think they can’t do yoga. Of course, the point of yoga is not to already be flexible when you come into it, but you will develop flexibility, break, pack, practicing yoga, right? Just like in the gym, you develop strength. So you should not assume that because you are not flexible that you shouldn’t have yoga.
That’s silly. It’s like saying I’m not strong. So I shouldn’t go to the gym. But number two, the point of yoga is to be uncomfortable and to actually sit with that and breathe through it. So a lot of people don’t like yoga, cause they’ll try it once or twice. And they say, yeah, it’s really not for me. I don’t like it. It’s uncomfortable.
And of course the first time I go back to yoga after a while it sucks. I hate it. But if I go five days in a row, it feels amazing. And all of a sudden, I start to be so much more present in life and I’m able to sit with discomfort and breathe through it. And so that’s what it builds in you is the ability to feel really uncomfortable. Well, maybe you’re in a really hard pose and you have to focus to stay in that pose and not fall over.
And it’s also uncomfortable and you have to actually breathe through that pose. You can’t stop breathing in yoga. And so you learn to breathe through discomfort. So when you’re having an uncomfortable moment in your business, when you can’t handle spending that money on ads, when you have a client call that you’re nervous about, guess what?
Instead of the body’s shutting down and the breath stopping, just like you’ve practicing yoga earlier that day, you’re going to breathe through it and you’ll be able to keep moving. And so that is what yoga is. If you’re uncomfortable in yoga and it doesn’t feel good, that is the practice. It is learning to breathe through that. And the more you do it, like anything else, the easier it gets and the greater the benefits.
So if you do try yoga, I urge you number one, just because you’re not flexible, doesn’t mean you should do yoga. You should go try it. That’s how you would develop flexibility. And number two, if you don’t like it the first time that is to be expected, do it five days in a row, go to class. You might get addicted to it. So that’s number two is yoga.
Exercise for Entrepreneurs (Crossfit)
And number three on my list is CrossFit. Now CrossFit combines strength training with aerobic activity.
Exercise is basically A miracle drug and I that’s not hyperbole. It actually is. There are so many chronic conditions that exercise is actually a better remedy for it than medication. We can look at this in chronic diseases. Like in my research, I’m seeing Parkinson’s diabetes. Ms. Exercise can be better than medication in all of these chronic diseases, but for everything else, for mental health or ability to focus for energy, for our ability to eat healthy, getting up and feeling excited about life in the morning, getting those endorphins feeling good in our body, feeling excited, not being depressed. Exercise is crucial to all this.
And if you start to do research, you will see that it is a miracle drug in it prevents the most deadly chronic diseases that we have in our society. And so if you’re looking at number one, biggest risk in life, it’s not exercising because every chronic disease that is a leading cause of death can be at least partially prevented through exercise.
And to exercise is going to give you that energy, that enthusiasm, that passion, that fire, that you need to perform in business. And without it, I don’t even know how you’re going to get on the playing field because somebody else out there who’s in much better physical shape than you is just going to run circles around you.
And again, I know business is not always a physical pursuit, but the body and the mind are intertwined. They’re not two separate things. And so exercise will actually raise your IQ. It will make you smarter. It will make your memory better. It will make you run mental gymnastics around the competition. So if you think the exercise is an important, because you think it’s a vein or something like that, these crazy arguments that intellectuals have about it, you’re mistaken. It will actually improve your mental capacities.
So if you want the car to go faster, if you want to grow your business, if you want to make more money, if you want to be happier in life, these three activities have not only been scientifically proven to improve your life, to make you healthier, to make you smarter, to make you more alert and focused.
Uh, they’ve done great wonders for me in untangling. Some of my own dysfunction and becoming a better leader, becoming a better business owner, becoming a more effective person in life. So we’ve got meditation start small work your way up yoga. It’s a practice and it’s not going to feel good the first time you don’t have to be flexible, but the practice is breathing through discomfort. And then we have exercise, which is the miracle drug.
Just go Google exercise, the miracle drug, and read into a little bit more about just how great the benefits are. It’s not a vain pursuit. It’s not just to look good. It impacts every facet of your life. So let me know. Do you use any of these three things to increase your performance in business? If so, which one’s your favorite one? If not, what is your reluctance? What are you most afraid of when trying one of these things?
Or why do you think they won’t work for you? I’d love to hear in the comments and we can have a discussion about it and see if maybe there’s a way that you could try it out and see if it helps. That’s all Folks, Christian Martin, the work, the money or digital marketing guy. See on the next one.
