Redefining the Hustle #566

Ever felt like you're sprinting on a treadmill, working hard but not moving forward? Our latest episode peels back the layers of conventional success and redefines the hustle with insights from my own roller-coaster ride and the wisdom of successful people like my mentor, Troy. I promise you'll walk away with a refreshed perspective on how to strategically align your efforts with the right goals. We'll uncover why it's not just about the grind, but about making smart moves that truly count, especially for our academy members who are eager to carve their own paths to achievement.

Success isn't a one-size-fits-all suit—it's a tailored ensemble that fits your unique journey. That's why we're bringing you a conversation that cuts through the noise of 'work harder' mantras, instead advocating for a minimalist approach to productivity that leverages your individual strengths. Get ready to learn why less can indeed be more and how investing time in self-discovery and nurturing key relationships can lead to a richer life. From the art of delayed gratification to mastering the skill of marketing oneself, this episode is an invitation to join us on a transformative journey towards not just success, but fulfillment.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:51

Welcome back to the episode. So good to have you here and I am really loving the feedback you're providing on these solo Thursday episodes. For those who are following along on Instagram and you're part of our academy, I'm really starting to open up and document and share with you guys more around what I'm learning, why I'm deciding to invest time into that and what my desired outcome is for that. The reason being is I remember years ago when I was doing CrossFit and Matt Fraser would always just dominate, would crush, same with Rich Froning, and this was probably before vlogging was a real thing. I wanted to really get inside and be able to walk side by side with them to see actually how they live, because people say this is what I did to achieve an outcome. But you and I both know that there are so many small things that most people who are successful or who have the results that we want maybe don't even realize that they're doing. And this is why proximity, this is why environment with those that you surround yourself with, is so important, because you can pick up on what those are. You might be able to watch what I'm doing, and let me give you an example I'm about to start really just having a live video on in our academy on a specific thing that I'm learning about, and as much as I have frameworks that work well for me, there'll be things that maybe you can pick up on and go ah, hasn't spoken about that, but I've noticed you keep doing this. Is that a reason why you're achieving X outcome or not getting that desired outcome? So I'm excited by that and it's making me more intentional with what I'm learning about and also thinking about why I want to do these things and why I'm even doing these Thursday episodes. So, as you'll know for those of you who are subscribed to the newsletter and if you're not, you can do it down below I'm choosing things that I'm curious about and I have like a big idea. The idea is something that I want to test, something that I want to explore, almost like a big idea. Right, the idea is, I guess, something that I want to test, something that I want to explore, almost like a hypothesis around why certain things happen the way they do, or maybe things that are going on in the world that I believe are holding men back or can be things that can help men move forward. Once again, 73, no 78% now of our audience is male, across YouTube, across Spotify, across Apple. So, because of that, I'm really directing a lot of my information and understanding to that, because I do believe that, as the man, I want to accept responsibility for being the protector and provider.

Speaker 1: 3:37

Now, my wife and Amy we both contribute equally financially. We both contribute and have our own roles around the house. However, the idea that I have and what I'm choosing to adopt is that I want to, should I need to be able to protect and provide. It's's why I prioritize health. It's why I prioritize building a business the way that I have, and I don't speak a lot about it with building business and why it's going the way I am, why it is sorry, but, as I mentioned, I'm going to start talking more about that, sharing more around the stuff that I'm learning in our academy, so I'm very excited about that. Let's dive into today's newsletter. That's why you're here.

Speaker 1: 4:19

Hard work won't always make you richer. I want you to think about that because our entire life I have been or I have grown up being told I need to work hard if I want anything from life, and there's the saying that hard work beats talent when talent doesn't work hard, and what I understand and think about with that is that we need to be working hard on the right things, not just anything, because there have been so many things in my life where I have worked hard I have. You know, I'm 33 this year, right, I had an original goal in 2014 to be a millionaire in my first year. Once I started, I guess understanding I probably wasn't the man I needed to be. Just yet I shifted that goal and I was like, if I can do that by 30, awesome. That's now my new goal.

Speaker 1: 5:15

What I've learned over the years is I've worked very hard. I've worked hard trying to achieve my level, I guess, or my definition of success. And for those who define success as working hard, awesome. You probably don't need to work hard on the right things, you just need to grind it out day in and day out. The way I want to think about it is this when I was a builder chippy I was going to say but maybe our American audience won't understand what a chippy is for slang, it's a tradesman or a carpenter. But when I was a chippy, I would work hard every day, and the definition of that hard was hardcore, laborious work, to the point of your hands were all calloused. You're swinging a hammer all day, you're lifting stuff, you're pulling stuff down, so on and so forth. You get the point. That, to me, was very hard work. So if I define success as working hard, awesome. But I never made more than $22.75 an hour while I was doing that job. So the definition of success that I was striving towards in regards to financial abundance because that is what society told me was the true definition of success I was striving towards in regards to financial abundance because that is what society told me was the true definition of success I was not moving any closer to that, regardless of how hard I worked, that I was capped.

Speaker 1: 6:34

I could choose to work more hours, which would take a toll on my body, which meant I would pull up sore tomorrow, or it would impact other areas because I was tired, I was grumpy, and so I want you to start thinking about this, and I really hope this has you questioning things in your life. If you're not where you are or where you want to be and there's a great quote from Henry David Thoreau it's not enough to be busy, so are the ants. The question is, what are we busy about Meaning what are the right things we need to focus on. Success for me and I'm going to share this because I want to start sharing a lot more again around what things mean to me and what I'm working towards Success for me is having the financial means to live my dream life, and I've worked out the number number.

Speaker 1: 7:22

It's $772,740 a year, and I will probably break share with you over the coming weeks in the newsletter and the podcast how I got to that number and what that looks like. I want you to keep in mind that is my dream life. Like that is some wild stuff on that piece of paper, and I'll probably share it later, as I said, so I don't even need that million dollar goal, which is is almost a relief, and I highly encourage you to start thinking about these things specifically and getting data so that way, you may also realize in order to live your dream life or in order to achieve your level of success, you need to refocus on where you're spending your time. To add to that, I want to have time and the emotional awareness to be a great husband, a great father and a great friend. I want to still be pursuing hobbies that light me up. I got the Nashville Marathon this weekend. I've been playing golf every day this week. I'm making time for the things that matter most, and I want to have great health and energy and vitality to enjoy everything that's to come.

Speaker 1: 8:25

So that's, for me, what my definition of success is right now. So it's not the working eight hours a day, doing the grunt work that will, in my eyes, never create a life of freedom. Working to create freedom is what will create freedom, meaning you need to free up time now to do the things that you love. So, as I mentioned, I've worked very hard I would say specifically more so for the last 10 years on business, and once I hit the six-figure mark, I thought I'd made it, I'd achieved what I once wanted. But, as always, we want to keep growing, we want to move the goalposts, and the thing that didn't happen was I became comfortable. When you become comfortable, it's very easy to just continue doing more of what you already have done because it's nice. Why not sit in the comfort I have recognized?

Speaker 1: 9:23

I guess that by doing more of the same thing, you know what got me to the six-figure mark isn't going to be the same actions required to get me to the seven-figure mark. For my business specifically. It needs scale, which means I need to change where my attention goes, while I feel I have been working hard over the years, I've been podcasting, networking, learning, sales learning, marketing, learning to time manage, learning more about who I am as a man, how to communicate better, how to be a better husband. I've been learning all of these things. There's some things that maybe I've avoided, that probably would be quote unquote the right thing, the thing that if I were to invest a lot of time into that, it would move the needle a lot quicker to achieving my goal. Right? So, rather than just being specifically busy all the time just for the sake of being busy, I can sit back and think about it. What are the things that I really need to do to achieve the outcome or to create my dream life? Right? Not always working hard, because it won't always make you richer, and I've given multiple examples of that.

Speaker 1: 10:29

And if you stick around to the end, I'm gonna give you two questions from our self-discovery program, which you can get access to, like at the moment it's $47. It won't be this price for long. It is evolved off the seven-day Strongman of Value program that we had. I just wanted to make it a little bit more clear and concise. It'll take you about three hours At best. $47 you'll invest. I can promise you that you will walk away knowing more about who you are, what you want and where you want to fit in in the world. Right, and I'll go through it, I guess in this email as well, with some things that I'll cover so that will make a bit more sense, especially the where do I fit in? Because a lot of people, and myself included, for a long time didn't know my place in the world and it's very isolating when you don't feel like you belong anywhere. So back to my newsletter. Back to my newsletter on that.

Speaker 1: 11:20

But I've invested over $150,000 in my personal and professional growth, plus thousands of hours through reading, podcasting and conversations. Right and just, lived experience, which is a key part. But I kept my strategy the same. I kept doing more of what I was already doing, hoping it would provide a different outcome. Right, working hard, hoping to get richer. But I wasn't. This is why, you know, I guess in one aspect it's important to have a compelling vision, something that's going to pull you through the challenges. Most people in my situation would have quit would have just been like it's not happening for me. And I could say this and I know I'm going to show data around my podcast at some point. I know I'm going to show more data around my business where I have a really great breakthrough and I could say look, I wasn't the overnight success that a lot of people portray and I'm not saying portray me as, but portray themselves as online which people go. I need to do that or I'm not doing enough.

Speaker 1: 12:18

For me, I've been the long slow burn, but I've been consistently plugging away and because I have the compelling vision for the idea of how I want my life to be, even though I haven't grown as quickly as I would love to have or I've been plateaued, essentially, the idea of where I can get to is what's pulling me forward. It's now what's made me look at things and go okay, I have to change it up. I've proven there is enough data in my business to go okay, I have to change it up. I've proven there is enough data in my business to go dude, if you don't change something, you're going to continue to get more of what you want. And look, I don't have a bad life, I have a really incredible life, but I want more. I really do want more. So I know that the actions need to change and that's where having that compelling vision, which we help you within the self self-discovery program, will help pull you through that right, will help you accept and go.

Speaker 1: 13:07

Lockie, what you're doing right now is not the best use of your time. You may enjoy it, it may feel like you're being productive, but the needle isn't moving. Your life isn't improving. It's time to accept that maybe you need help, or the actions or where you're investing your time isn't the best. You're the only one who can redirect your energy, redirect your output, and I could say it's all about the right timing. But if I'm being honest, I just thought I could do it better. I've had coaches and mentors for years, right Years, especially Troy.

Speaker 1: 13:47

If you're listening to this, you're one of them who've been like maybe you should try to change up your approach with this and looking at doing it like this how about minimizing some things from your life and reducing your offers and not trying not to do so many things in a day, things like that that I was like yeah, good for you, but if I do more, it's going to move me closer to where I want to get to at a faster rate. That's the general idea is more should be better, but it's not. Less is more and that's very cliche. But the older I get, the more longer I've been in business, the more my life is evolving, and family and all of that I'm starting to recognize less is more. Less things to focus on, more into those things.

Speaker 1: 15:31

So when I recognized, just, I'd say, eight months ago, that I wanted to change it and I accepted that I couldn't do it my way, I needed a framework from someone else that could help me, I guess, personalize it. Because what I was worried about and this is why I believe in frameworks once again in the program is that we all have different strengths, weaknesses is that we all have different strengths, weaknesses, experience, beliefs, networks, etc. And if I were to say to you, this is how you, if you follow this step by step, this is how you will increase your love life, this is how you will make more money, this is how you will improve your health, it may not feel right for you, and when I say feel, it's so important for things to feel right and I don't want it to be woo-woo. I want to explain it. When you think about how things make you feel so, in order for me to create wealth, we all know that you need to spend less than you earn and you'll accumulate savings. We then can look at the next step to go. If I'm accumulating savings and I want to make those savings work for me meaning I need to invest them what are my options? There's so many things to look at and some things I'm interested in. Other things I want to stay well clear of, and they may be different to you, and that's where we can go.

Speaker 1: 16:52

Okay, well, this is the framework Find a way to earn money, make sure you spend less than you earn and then, when you're in a position to start getting that money to work for you, so that when you get older, when you have more responsibility or when you're just seeking more flexibility and freedom in your life, that money is working for you and it's giving you time back. How you get there is going to be very different, but if you were to look at a framework, you're like oh cool, I can personalize that for me as an individual, the phase of life I'm in and all of that sort of stuff, and that's what I want you to consider. So I need to think about if you're going to pay someone for the results that you want. So when you go back to understanding that framework is malleable to what you want, that puts you in a very powerful position and that's why, once again, when you're thinking about those areas that you want to improve, go seek out frameworks more so than step-by-step being told exactly what to do. The exact being told exactly what to do is a great place to start, but the more experienced you become, you want a bit more flexibility.

Speaker 1: 18:01

With that, I recognized that I needed to get out of my own way and let go of an identity that I didn't even realize I was attached to. I was so fixated on helping men who weren't ready to be changed, who weren't ready to change, and the opportunity for me to improve my business growth get more time back. Because what I've realized as well men who are in a position and who want to change aren't as needy, and my insight of that is people. There's people that I've worked with that are constantly needing to be validated and triple and double checked on everything that they're doing. And then there's people who go okay and double checked on everything that they're doing. And then there's people who go, okay, this is a framework that we're going to follow. I'm going to go out there, test some things, make some mistakes, come back and share my learnings, and then we can move forward from that, and I believe the latter is the most beneficial way to make improvements.

Speaker 1: 18:52

So you need to think about what you want, you need to have a plan to achieve it, and you need to know about what you want. You need to have a plan to achieve it and you need to know how it makes you stand out from other people, because once you do that, you're not going to be working harder on things that aren't moving the needle for you. The other belief that you need to let go of is that working harder is always going to make you rise to the top. It's that same thing that I was talking about in the beginning that it's not going to work that way for you. You need to understand that working harder on the wrong things is just going to burn you out. It's going to make you feel fatigued and tired. So working smarter, in my eyes right now, means solving bigger problems. With the flexibility I need to live a great life, and I do believe it's possible. Most people who are working hard believe that it's always going to rise to the top, and that is not the case. You must work hard on the right thing.

Speaker 1: 19:44

So three key points I wish I accepted earlier. The first one is success doesn't always mean money. It could mean time and probably should mean time. The second one is delayed gratification can pay off in the long run. Third one is marketing always wins, and you're probably wondering why I'm saying marketing when we're talking about how to create a better life. So if you stick around to the end, I'll share why.

Speaker 1: 20:07

I adopted a belief that success didn't motivate me for anything apart from recognition. I'd never questioned why society put money on the pedestal. That it always did, and I guess men seem to be recognized for the amount of money that we have, and women generally are recognized for their looks, and we need to think about why that is more, because it's not right, nor should it define who we are as individuals. So I think it's just this big distraction that's just distracting us from the things that should be truly important, like family, health, happiness and money in itself. The way that it's marketed to you or the way that it's positioned, has so many shiny things attached. It's got the freedom, the success, the recognition, the status and it grabs the desire of so many.

Speaker 1: 20:59

I know it did for me and it probably does for you, and I've coached a lot of men who earn seven figures or six figures, seven figures and even eight figures, and I've seen how achieving the status, money and the success doesn't always lead them to living a fulfilling life. They've started working with with me because they wanna get more control over their time, they want to improve their relationships, they wanna boost their energy and get their confidence back and find new hobbies and happiness right. We don't need money to achieve that. We need to invest our time in the right things. Once again, communication, time management, nutrition, sleep are some examples of that. And if you come back to, hard work won't always make you richer. You need to think about where the time is, because if all you're investing your time in is hours at work and you're not ever improving your communication, never learning to manage your time better or learn about nutrition or exercise, it's going to bite you in the ass in the long run. So I'm in a fortunate position where I believe I can achieve the financial goals without sacrificing relationships, time, health and hobbies, and it comes down to working on the right things, managing your time and saying no In saying this.

Speaker 1: 22:13

This is where that delayed gratification comes in. The world we live in affords us everything at the press of a button. When we watch anything we want on our phone, we can watch anything we want from our phone. We can order dinner from Uber Eats or gifts on Amazon. Just this morning I decided I wanted something for my golf bag. Three minutes later it was ordered. We don't have to wait, but building a great life doesn't work like that. It has to be delayed gratification. It's about doing this dance between the things we want now and delaying things for the future. The easiest way is to look at it like this Life will be full of regrets and you must decide which regrets you can live with. I regret working hard for the past 10 years and missing out on birthdays, reunions and events, but I can live with that regret as it's helped me improve my ability to coach, build my network and grow my understanding and grow my business.

Speaker 1: 23:10

It wasn't possible for me to work on the right things when I was younger because I had no idea what the hell the right things were, and this is why I love the framework. It's not being told what to do, but giving or being provided some guidance on how to figure out the right things for you as an individual. Now you can take a framework and fill it in for your own personal experiences. As I've mentioned earlier, we all have the strengths, we all have weaknesses, and that's why what works for me isn't the exact thing that's going to work for you. But if I were to give you a framework like the one we have in the three-hour self-discovery program, your process to finding out who you are, what you want and where you belong will look entirely different, and so it should Do. I regret not finding the frameworks for outcomes I wanted earlier. Well, I probably would have liked the idea of being more successful earlier.

Speaker 1: 24:02

So, yes, delayed gratification is why so many dads miss their children's first sports carnivals, birthday parties and bedtimes because they believe they're working for a better tomorrow and they hope to buy that time back in the future. Look, there is no right or wrong with that. It's always going to be personal preference. We may disagree, but that's your own personal thing to focus on and structure. As a man, I think it's something that you need to think about and you need to decide. I personally don't want to miss out on the sports carnivals, the birthdays, the bedtimes, and that's why I've been building my life the way I have since 2014.

Speaker 1: 24:39

Working hard can make you believe that others will appreciate your sacrifices, but that's not always the case. Just because you think it's the right thing, your wife may think it's the wrong thing, your friends may think it's the wrong thing, and this is what sort of moves us into the marketing position. Some of the hardest workers I know have been spinning their wheels for years. They've been watching their life fall apart around them, have a clearer image of what they're building towards, but they've done a terrible job of marketing it to the people that matter most. We live in an extremely busy and noisy world and everyone is after attention, including you, including me attention from our family, our friends, our clients, for connections, for experiences in business, and if you aren't marketing yourself to the right people, no one's gonna notice. If you're wondering why I'm saying marketing, it's the same reason why I believe you should learn sales. We are constantly marketing and selling ourself, yet most people hate the idea of it. Those who understand how it works tend to build the life that they want, and those that don't tend to hate the people who do sales and marketing. But I do it daily. I market myself as a husband, as an athlete, as a coach and so many other things.

Speaker 1: 25:55

People need to know your goals. They need to know your vision. They need to know your mission. The problem is that many of you are too afraid to share it because you fear judgment and you fear being seen. It's one of the scariest things that I've seen men battle with is allowing their true self to be seen, whether it's to their partner, to their friends or to their workplaces, and that's why so many people are walking around not feeling valued, because it's hard for you to be valued if you aren't allowing people to recognize who you really are, and it's something that I believe you need to get comfortable with in order to live a great life. It's something, as I mentioned, that I'm going to help you guys within the three-hour self-discovery program. By finding out who you are and embracing that, you can start building that best community to thrive.

Speaker 1: 26:42

Think about, I guess, how so many families grow together. Iron Cowboy, who I had on the podcast in episode 561, he had his whole family buy into his vision to do 50 Ironmans in 50 states across 50 days, and his children were all different ages back then, but 10 years later they're all a part of the bigger picture of what they've created for a business that they get to travel and have a bigger purpose on. So it's really cool to think about how marketing yourself and positioning yourself, learning to put your time in the right places and delaying the gratification you know some people disagree or agree and understanding what success really means to you can then afford you more in the future. And it's coming back to thinking about where does the hard work need to go in order for you to improve your quality of life? And sometimes the hard work needs to be invested in your relationship. It needs to be invested in, I guess, subsets of skills that will improve that, from time management to communication, to vulnerability, et cetera. But they're things that I want you to think about, things that we go through. So don't underestimate marketing in that If you were to think about how people perceive you, that is how you're choosing to market yourself, and if you don't like the idea of how you're showing up, you need to think about how you would better position yourself if you were to market yourself better.

Speaker 1: 28:09

So I want to leave you with two questions to think about, and I want to also encourage you, or thank you, for listening to this week's podcast and reading the newsletter. But the two questions I encourage you to think about are this what do I want to experience over the next five years? And so you could think about career milestones, you could think about family events, you could think about travel. But think about that, because when you start thinking about the things that you want to experience, it helps you get clear on your financial number. It helps you understand whether you need flexibility or stability. It helps you understand whether you need to really prioritize your health or not, and by doing this, you then create sub goals From that. The second question is where do I need to invest my time to achieve this? What are the right things that, if you were to work on, are gonna deliver a better outcome? So hard work doesn't always make you rich. Working hard on the right things will make you rich, and the meaning of rich in this instance is whatever you define as success.

Speaker 1: 29:08

Finally, as we wrap up this episode, make sure you go check out the self-discovery program. It's $47. It won't be staying at $47 for long. It is the evolution of the seven-day strong mental value program, which we've had a lot of great feedback on. I just wanted to condense it and really make it punchy, but there's a workbook that you'll go through to really start unpacking what's going on in your head so you'll walk away knowing more about who you are, what you want and where you, I guess, fit in in this world. So you have more certainty in that. Finally, let's connect on socials. Check me out on Twitter, instagram and Facebook at Lachlan Stewart. Thank you guys for being here and we'll see you next week.