You're Still in Preseason, Not the Real Game

0:00So many lives would transform overnight if they realized my life sucks. I have nothing going for me really means I have nothing to lose and that makes you a very dangerous person. >> In any kind of game position, so like in business, right? Every position has advantages and disadvantages. A lot of people look at the really big guys and they're like, man, they they they like they're like they're like at me like, must be easy for Alex, right? And I remember when we had Jim launch and we had a very big company, I would tell the guys who were coming. I was like, if you're trying to compete against me, I was like, you have advantages. I was like, if you're on a sales call, you're like, listen, you're just a number to Alex. You're never going to talk to Alex, right? Here with me, you're going to get my attention.

0:39I'm the one, right? I was like, that's how you're going to throw stones at me. I was like, but on the flip side, if it's me marketing to the masses, I'm going to be like, this kid's in his mom's basement and he has no idea what he's doing. He's been in business for 12 months and of course he has no idea. Like, wouldn't you want somebody who has thousands of success stories behind it because we made a system. Like, both sides have advantages. And so what happens is people are in this small position where they're more nimble, they can give more personalized attention to people, etc.

1:04And they see it as a pure disadvantage. And so you can flip the fact that you have nothing going for you with you have nothing to lose. And that means that you can take lots of risks very quickly and end up in the exact same position you are, which is nothing. And so if you eliminate downside, it should decrease your action threshold. Meaning you should be able to do more things faster rather than do fewer things because you don't have a great life or things going for you. And so I think if people flip that, a lot more people would take action because they actually realize the advantage of their position.

1:38>> Jack Butcher says, you get rich by taking lots of risk with small amounts of money and you stay rich by taking small amounts of risk with lots of money. >> Yes. I wholeheartedly agree. I didn't know that was his quote. >> Uh he may have repurposed it. There's there's something called Churchillian drift. Do you know what that is? >> No. >> So it's a A phenomenon >> at the at the core. >> It's not the opposite. It's the um quotes that weren't said by Churchill often get like erroneously attributed to him. It's like all quotes lead back to Churchill even though they didn't.

2:06>> And Socrates. >> Yeah, it's like it's just one of those things where it's like I thought I think that Churchill once said that you get rich by making large amounts of It's like no, you [ __ ] But there's another one as well that a good friend James Smith talked about which is if you're succeeding at a job that you hate, imagine how good you'd be at a job that you loved. >> Mhm. >> And that's kind of the this person is starting from essentially zero. How much [ __ ] worse can it get? >> Right. Is the downside. If you can eliminate someone's downside for action, it's like then the bias it should bias you towards taking action.

2:39>> Why is it that people in that case if they do have nothing to lose still feel like they have lots to lose? >> Cuz I think most of times So, this I think this is really important is that they have nothing objectively to lose. And so everything that they feel like they have to lose is purely made up in their mind. It's stories they tell themselves about what other people are going to think about them when those people aren't even think about them to begin with, right? But like that's where they live all of their lives or live out all of the potential downside is in the mirror reflection of what other people will think about them in the future should they fail.

3:12>> Mhm. >> And I think that is the like if we were if we were trying to get real and I'm like talking to somebody like, "Well, I I mean cuz I know that that if I actually had somebody in front of me, they'd start squirming, right? If I said the first thing, right? Like you have nothing to lose." And then cuz then they do have something to lose and I have to name them. And be like, "Okay, who's the person in your mind? Who's the voice?" It's like blah blah blah six questions deep. "It's my uncle." Okay. "Why like Let me state it this way. Will your belief that you're going to be viewed as a failure by your uncle be the sole reason that you live the rest of your life below your potential and regret everything that you don't do because of Uncle Tom?"

3:48That's the wrong one. Uncle Harry. >> [laughter] >> When you say it like that, all of a sudden they're like, "I don't want to let Uncle Harry have that kind of power." And then all of a sudden it breaks and then they like get free of it. And so I think it's getting really specific and really narrow on the cuz people say it's society, it's other people. It's like it's usually one or two voices. And if you can get really specific on whose voice it is, then you can name it and then like I think I'm a big believer in like shame only exists in the shadows, which is like once you put it in the light, you look at it and you're like, "My mom? That was really it?" Like when I really think about it, it's because it's not even just my mom, it's my mom in this circumstance. When I come back home for Thanksgiving, I just am so afraid of the comment that she's going to make. It's like, "Well, what if we confront that?" Okay, your mom, you sit down at Thanksgiving dinner and you haven't made money yet and you quit your job. Now what?

4:37Is that better than you spending the next 60 years hating her or resenting her for the fact that she held you back? And then it's like when you give the real scenario, they're like, "Well, shit." And then like this weight comes off and they're like, "Fuck, I guess I should do this." And you're like, "Yeah." >> Shame only exists in the shadows is nice. I like that. And it it definitely is cleansing to just be like, "Look, here it is out in front of you." And it real you realize just how irrational it is. >> Cuz we don't want to look at it. >> Yeah. >> Because it's in the shadow and we put it in the shadows because of how it makes us feel about ourselves, in my opinion.

5:05>> Mhm. >> And so it's it's so scary, we avoid it. We avoid it, we avoid it, avoid it. But it's like I think the faster you can kind of build that muscle of like, "Huh, I've got this hesitation. What is the real reason?" Because like logically you I can do that whole thing. Cool, you have nothing to lose. You're poor. Great. Zero, right? Okay, but then what is it that I'm that I do have something to lose? It's relational capital, it's status within my tiny micro community that doesn't matter, but like my perceived status. Okay, name the names.

5:33And but but by pulling it out from the shadows, it all but like that confrontation from here to here is I think where all the fear is. Because it's embarrassing. To be like, "It's my mom." >> The other perfect thing or great realization I think for anybody that's starting out and is feeling self-conscious about what other people are going to think is when you're starting out by design there are so few people looking at you that even if you do fail no one [ __ ] sees, right? So this is something we realized when we were running nightclubs that we would try and launch a new event around freshers week in September and we would we would have this great idea and it would be everything would be about flamingos or everything would be it would be a smart night on a Tuesday so people could go out after they've been to sports club or whatever it was and then it would flop, right? And we'd do 150 people and all of the guys that work for us would be stood outside looking destitute and upset and they'd go it's so embarrassing.

6:24>> there so it looks like there's more room. >> we had so many tricks. We'd pump the pump the room full of smoke. We would pad the back off so that everyone had to go to the front. We'd get the DJ to play music all sorts of [ __ ] But all of the boys would be like [ __ ] this makes us look so bad. Everyone's going to think that we're [ __ ] I was like no no no no no. 150 people are going to think that we're [ __ ] Like the advantage of running a [ __ ] business that doesn't reach many people is that not many people saw your [ __ ] business. >> [laughter] >> And that's when you're starting out.

6:50People that are concerned about becoming a content creator I I'm worried about starting a podcast cuz what if everyone sees how [ __ ] my podcast is? It's like dude no one's going to see your [ __ ] podcast. >> [laughter] >> It took me three year three and a half years to get even an appreciable amount of people listening to this show and it was effort three times a week. No one cares when you start. So you can be liberated from that as well and it's just objection handling objection handling objection handling all the way down. >> I know a lot of I think a couple frames that are just different frames around content making since we're on the topic um that helped me was one is seeing it as practice rather than the game.

7:24So like when we're doing a podcast if you start it's like hey we're I'm going to do a podcast I'm going to post it's practice for me getting better for future me rather than like I'm like this is the main game. It's like no the game is the whole thing and this is just like we're still in preseason. Like these these these scores these touchdowns don't even matter yet, right? Now you can say yet even though like I can still feel like I'm in preseason, but I think from a mental framework, it actually decreases the stakes associated with doing it. And I think that's been helpful for me, especially it was in the earlier days. The other one was um kind of the equal opposite of this problem, which is not wanting to start because no one's watching. Because it feels like you're doing all this work. What's the point? And so, I actually the little mental trick that I had was um one, I track lots of stuff. And the more ways you track, the more ways you can win. And so, that's a little thing that I found out. So, like if you track 100 sats, then you only need one of them to go up, so you feel like you made some progress. So, that's like an easy one.

8:16And the second thing around the tracking is that I would look at like the biggest possible number. So, a lot of times you can see like the impressions of, you know, a post that you make. Even if you only got like 16 likes, like I got like 100 impressions. And I thought to myself, I was like, well, if there was a a room of 100 people, I'd be stoked. Like that would be awesome. Especially in the early days, I was like, that would be I would totally feel like that was worthwhile. And so, taking those little impression numbers and pretending that they were like micro events that I was making the work or the content for, all of a sudden made it feel worth it for me.

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