Warum das Leben nicht fair kämpft

0:00I hate to use the word motivation, but at this point in your life, Alex, what motivates you? Pain or pleasure? Neither. Um I do what I've been rewarded for doing in the past. And I think I mean I think the heart of the question is why do you do what you do? Why do you still do what you do? Um why do you still cold works are hard? Uh I'll give a an answer that people will not like. But um I took a year off in 2021 and basically didn't work.

0:34Um and what's interesting about that year is that it was one of the most depressed years of my life. But looking back on the year, so I remember it differently than I experienced it. And so the thing with memory is that um it's tricky cuz it doesn't actually like work like a computer. Uh you selectively remember the good things and you don't remember the bad. And so what's interesting about reward and punishment is that punishment fades.

0:59Reward sticks. So for example, like the reason that the morning after you're hungover, you're like I'm never going to drink again. And then 7 days later you're out you're out of the bars and drinking again. It's because the punishment of the drinking fades, but the reward stays the same. And it works across everything. So the reason that you break up with a girlfriend and then a few months later you're like missing her is because the reward is still there. And you and the the the pain associated with the person fades.

1:24And so this is why like some people like so many long and continue these cycles of getting back together and breaking up, getting back together and breaking up is because one of these sticks and the other one basically renews and then disappears then renews and disappears. And so if you want to continually punish someone, uh you have to vary the intensity and style of punishment so that it stays novel. Otherwise they habituate. Weird, right? And so uh to go back to the original question is like why do you do what you do? Um I one, I don't think anyone can really answer the question in general. I think people can create a narrative. Like I could tell you a story my dad didn't hug me enough or there's there's, you know, this big big pie in the sky thing that I really want to accomplish and I think humanity needs it. Like these are all really compelling narratives and they've been repeated a lot of times. I don't think I think they're just answers to questions. I don't know if they're actually reality. And so when I think about that, it's like I I behave this way because I've been rewarded for behaving this way. And to close the loop on that year that I took off, um I have had days that I have good days and I have days that I have bad days.

2:28And I have suffered during the year that I was off and I have suffered during the years that I work a lot. And so my objective experience hasn't really dramatically changed year to year. I think it's slightly improved more so because of my basically just skills have improved in terms of like how I can reframe reality. That's gotten a lot better.

2:52But by and large, like if all of our experiences how we choose to perceive the world, then like it's all in our heads anyways. And so it's like really just trying to flex that muscle more over time. And so why do I do what I do now? Because what else would I do? And if I did something different, I probably enjoyed it about the same anyways. And so it's like I I would say that right now I stick I seek stimulation probably above everything else.

3:20Um and so there's few things that stimulate me more than the work that I do. Um I have a note on my wall of like the three activities that I enjoy most in life. Um which I think is a really good activity for anybody. Two things. Two activities that I've done lately that have Well, the first one I've done for a long time. The second one I did lately. Um The first one was uh I had this boss. I've told the story before, but it was it was meaningful for me. So I had this boss, first boss, second boss. Well, first adult boss I had.

3:50Um and I had had some good weekend. And I came back and she was like, "You seem happy." And she said, "You must have had a good weekend." And I was like, "Yeah, um, I did." And she said, "I'm pretty sure the secret to happiness is living as many days in a row like that as you can." And it was actually a pretty operationalized definition for me. I was like, "Huh, I can do that. Like, what is one day that I like? How do I live that day as many times in a row as I can?"

4:17And that's actually been a pretty like probably the most operationalized way of trying to live my life that I've I still do to this day. And the thing is is that I think that day can change. And so, what are the components of that day? And I'll bet you the things that I wanted to do as my perfect day when I was 20 are different than what they are at 36 and they'll be different when I'm at 56. And so, doing that exercise of what is the perfect day for me now, and then how can I maximize the likelihood that I live that day over and over and over again? And I think that has been a really, really powerful recipe for me for quote happiness.

4:50Um, the second frame that's been really helpful for me in terms of uh reframing suffering um, has been uh a couple things. But, um, I'll give you two frames. One is, when things are really good in business, I'm typically suffering because growth pains are painful. Uh, if things are plateauing, I'm usually suffering because plateaus are painful cuz you don't know like why are we stagnating? What's going on?

5:16And if you're declining, it's really painful. And so, it's just like life is painful. And so, pain in and of itself is not an indication that there's something wrong. Suffering is not an indication that there's something wrong. It's just It's just feedback. It's a signal. And so, that's been helpful for me. The second is, um, I actually ranked my last, basically my all my adult years. So, I say post college, all the years that I've lived, actually just force ranked them. I was like, "What was my What What was my best year objectively?"

5:43And so, what's interesting is that I have a really good upward curve, but I definitely have local minimums. Um and so like 2025 for me I think is a local minimum. It's probably been the worst year I've had. Uh I think in the last I could look it up, but I think it's about the last 7 or 8 years. Probably the worst year I've had so far. Yeah. Um but and 2024 is my best year of all time. So really really uh but but here's where here's where it's interesting is that this you know 2025 so far uh has been the worst year of last 8 years, but the fifth worst of the last 13.

6:18And so even though it's what feels like a terrible year for me now, um it's still way better than 2013 was. And it's way better than 2016. Those were terrible years. >> [laughter] >> And when I look at them objectively I kind of laugh like the way I have right now. I'm like, "Yeah, those were bad." Right? And so it's like it's weird because I can almost like derive joy from the lack from like this is bad, but it's not as bad as as it has been. And so I'm like, "Well, obviously I'll survive." And so um the idea of like "Man, I I I I can't stand it anymore."

6:47Well, it's like, "Well, you can stand it or you'll die. And if you die, you you won't have to." And so the default the default of all humans is standing it until you don't have to, which I think makes suffering easier to deal with. But I think one of the the greatest sources of suffering is thinking that suffering is a problem. It's that there's something wrong with you for suffering. And the same thing applies to you know anxiety like, "Man, why am I anxious? Why am I stressed?"

7:10It's like, "You're alive." That's all that means. Cuz in all settings you're going to have stress. In good settings you have growth stress, you have stagnation stress, you have decline stress. All of them suck. But you also have good things at all of these times. So life is life. Okay, I was going to ask about the metrics you use to decide uh yeah, what metrics do you use to decide if you've had a good year?

7:37Um so there's probably like a quantitative and a qualitative. Um quantitatively it's just like, you know, what progress did we make you know, in the business and then any other relative, you know, relevant accomplishments like did I publish a book? That's cool. Did we make any acquisitions that were meaningful? That's cool. Did we grow any of those companies? That's cool or interesting. Those would be just kind of like the quantitative side. From qualitative perspective, I would say I would look back on the year and be like, how many days did I live the type of day that I want to live? And there are moments where I'm like, I am sad.

8:11I would prefer to not be this way. What can I change about my conditions to decrease the likelihood I feel this way? And like February was a horrible month for me this year. And so um I was like, okay, I should change something. And so that's what I set out to do. I was like, I'm going to change things. And and I will say April has been better than March and is better than February. Circumstantially, can you speak to the things about February perhaps?

8:38And what what are you most you changed? Well, it's just what are the So I had God, at the beginning of the year I had eight lawsuits that were ongoing, which is a huge mental drain. Um I was able to resolve five of them in February, which is great. So that was a that was a huge kind of load off. Um I had there were some health things that um we were dealing with.

9:02Um so had to deal with those. Those were again like they're like unforced errors of life life. It's like these things occur and I had this really pithy quote that I texted to a friend of mine which is life doesn't fight fair. And so I think that's just like a really interesting reminder for me when like bad things happen. I'm like, oh yeah, like because people want to be like, that's not fair. It's like, well, life doesn't fight fair. Like we have this demand of the universe that it fight fair. It's not going to fight fair. >> [laughter]

9:27>> And so in thinking about that, it's like just a good reminder. Um but you know, it was just a confluence of of just many many negative things. Some of them business related, some of them not business related. Um Um and you know, we were growing really fast at acquisition.com and so there's huge constraints in the business in terms of talent. And so, it's just lots of people very spread thin.

9:51Um and trying to, you know, handle any kind of interpersonal things that come up from that. Um and also while maintaining like cuz I'm I'll I'm spread thin, too. But also being encouraged like being spread thin and then also being um a positive force to the greatest, you know, degree possible within the company and showing up that way uh for the team. So, it's just it's just draining. That's all. Just very draining. Real quick, if you were a business owner and you were not growing as fast as you'd like, I'd like to give you a free gift. So, my team and I put together the 100 million dollar scaling road map, which is basically 200 hours of us looking over all the portfolio companies we've had and what stages of growth they went through and more importantly, where they got stuck and how they got past it. And so, we broke it into these 10 stages and we made this little kind of quiz thing where if you put in your business information, it'll tell you where you're at and the most important part for you, what to do for each of functions of the business across product, marketing, sales, customer success, recruiting, IT, human resources and finance. And so, no matter what you're struggling with, someone else has already struggled with it and solved it. And so, I'd like to give you this thing absolutely free. You can go to acquisition.com/roadmap, plug in your business information and if you want us to actually help you deconstraint the business and you're trying to scale, we'd love to help you out. On the thank you page, you just book a call with my team and we will look at the business, see if we can help and if we can, we'll invite you out to Vegas and we'll do this in person live.