If You Want the Exceptional Life Rather Than the Average Life, You Have to Have a SYSTEM for Intelligently and Purposely Leading Yourself

Welcome to The Missing Secret podcast. I'm Kelly Hatfield.

Hey, and I'm John Mitchell. So, here's the topic today. You have to have a system to intelligently and purposely lead your life if you want the exceptional life rather than the average life. You buy that?

I buy it. Preach. I can't wait to hear to dig more into this. This is such a an important topic and absolutely, I 100% buy it.

Right, right. You know, I wonder how I would how I would take that if I didn't know what I I know. Do you think I think that people probably think that makes sense. If I want to have the exceptional life rather than the average life, then it would make sense to have a system for intelligently and purposely leading yourself, right? I mean, just pure logic, right?

Yeah, it's definitely logic, but common common sense isn't necessarily always common practice. Right. Right. Yeah.

Well, I I sort of chose this topic because next week I I graduate to to teaching MBAs the Advanced Leadership of Self Methodology versus undergraduates, and and I'm I'm trying to think of of how to present it from a like a 30,000-foot view, a big big picture for for people that that, you know, aren't familiar with it. And I am so taken by the Atomic Habits quote from James Clear that, You don't rise to the level of your goals; you sink to the level of your systems. Does that resonate with you?

It does now. You know, definitely knowing what I know now, it absolutely does. I get it. I don't know whether at the time, if I had heard that 15 or 20 years ago, I'm not really even sure I would have really understood what that, you know, meant. Like even when you were talking about having a system, you know, and we as we kind of led into this and it seems logical, it goes back to what we've talked about before, which is just so many people aren't thinking about that at all. You know, so when you say something like that, it's like, huh, you know, what does that mean? Because I I wasn't thinking deeply about my life at that point, or, you know, thinking about system, I was just moving through life, you know, and dealing with what came at me. So, yeah. Right, right.

Right. Well, you know, I I have the perspective of like when I was in my 50s and I had started applying this to myself, I'm like, what a difference this makes. I mean, it would not just in the results, and and maybe more significantly, I could see why the results were were happening. I saw why my income went up by 25 times. You know, I had was feeding the succinct articulation of my desired life to myself each day, and I'm and in that that process, I'm defining the right actions to take, and I'm I'm refining my understanding of what the right actions are, and by feeding it to myself every day, that's made the right actions happen consistently rather than sporadically. And and I was, you know, deep thinking two times a week, which was impacting my understanding of what the right actions are, and and is my direction exactly right, or do I need to tweak my directions? And and the other thing that was hugely pivotal was I became a conduit of learning in my 50s in in a way that I've never been before, and just have having the wisdom of experts coming into my head in areas that were strategic relative to what I wanted to accomplish. And and again, that was happening with a system. It was a system within a system. And and one of the things that I've I've been thinking with with MBAs, and again, they're at at such a perfect inflection point in their life in that they're 28. And you know, at 28, you think back how you were like when you were 21, you know, it seems like a you know, a whole lifetime ago and how how naive you were. And and you know, again, the way our system works is we're asking, you know, 20-year-olds essentially to figure out your major and figure out what you want to do with your life, and it's impossible. You don't You don't have the the maturity. You don't have the real-world experience. And so, they do the best they can. But you flip over to MBAs, they have had to go into the real world for five years to get into the MBA program. At

28, they're way more mature than they were when they were 20. And and so now, all of a sudden, they plop themselves in my class, and I go, Okay, I'm going to teach you advanced leadership of self. And my essentially my pitch to them is is first of all, doesn't it make sense, if you want the exceptional life rather than the average life, to proactively and and intentionally lead yourself with a system? And I roll into the James Clear quote. And and, you know, by and large, they'll go, Yeah. Okay. Yeah, certainly makes sense. I don't know fully what you mean by this, but but conceptually, it it makes sense. And then then I sort of am going to evolve into saying, Well, you only have to make a couple of things happen. I mean, the the reality is you're going to be successful if you know the right actions to take and you take them consistently. I mean, success isn't any more complicated than that. But when you're winging life, those two things don't really happen very often. I mean, you don't know the right actions to take, and the right actions you think you should take, you can't do them consistently. And so, that's what I found when when in my 50s that wasn't happening in my 30s and 40s. I bet you had sort of the same experience, right?

Yeah, I definitely had the same experience, and but I will I'm going to take a a kind of a different vantage point on this because I absolutely felt feel everything that you're talking about right now. But the, you think think think the biggest benefit for me was how I was experiencing life. So because I had these systems, the system that I was like you don't think of, and I know we talked about the benefits of it, about about having a system, you know, to have the extraordinary life. But I didn't really realize what that meant until I installed the system, so to speak.

Right, right.

Whereas, you know, I've talked about this before. When you're just moving through life and you're it's kind of in black and white, what happens by having a system is it moves into that Technicolor, right? Because you're experiencing life so much more, so differently than the way you're experiencing it when you're just moving through life and letting things happen. There's a tremendous amount of confidence, amount of peace, amount of that comes from having a system, you know? And and so, you know, yes, obviously taking the right actions, and but again, that's where that confidence, you know, as a result of taking the right actions and knowing how you're going to move through each day and who you're becoming and striving to become, and just life is so much more. You get so much more excited about life versus not thinking versus not thinking really about it at all. You know, cause you're just kind of winging it, going through the motions. That's what's so exciting about this system, too, that I think is under that to me is the benefit more, you know, than anything that was just an unexpected benefit that came from having the system was the way in which I was experiencing life and moving through life.

Well, you know, it's it's just like what you and I were talking about before we went on the air about social media and how how it's it's gearing you to be, you know, fear-based and and all the negative things that are sort of flowing through people because of social media. Boy, you've got to you've got to have something that overrides it, and that that's what the system does. And, you know, I think back when I was in my 30s and 40s, you know, I became an entrepreneur when I was 30, and I was in seven different businesses. But literally for two decades, I'm just winging life, and I see how inadequate that was. You know, I never could find a business that I I really was passionate about until I found the reverse mortgage business, and and I was passionate about that because I saw how people selling financial products to my mom, who was a widow, tried to take advantage of her. And so when I discovered the reverse mortgage business, I'm like, good. I'm just going to take care of every customer like they were my own mom. So it was easy to, you know, get into that, but in my 30s and 40s, in seven different businesses, there was no coherent, intelligent plan, that I got to think, if if I had started doing this when I was 30 and I made myself articulate, here's where I want to be three years from now, here's the the milestones to get there, here's my strategy for success, here's my business plan, you know, even if I had a lousy plan and I started reading it, I would quickly see it's a lousy plan, and I would refine it, and and you know, if I'm doing thinking sessions, which I certainly never was doing in my 30s and 40s, I'd go, John, what the hell are you doing? Let's think this thing through and have a coherent plan, and might be a good idea to play into your strengths. I knew what my strengths were. I could make the complex simple. But but, you know, I just see how how inadequate I was in my 30s and 40s from not having a system for doing life, and

once I had a system, how transformative it was. So,

Yeah. Nope, agreed, 100%. And, you know, I've been doing this for with you for eight years or so, you know, when I was introduced to this. It's been about eight years. You know, and I do. I think about the, you know, difference between, you know, before John Mitchell and after John Mitchell.

A lot of people have that same experience. Not always good, though. I'm sure. I'm glad yours was good.

Totally. But But But literally, I It feels It felt like the veil was lifted. You know, the fog, the you know, just having a really clear vision, plan, and then and then executing on that each day, and every day reminding yourself about what you were so excited about, what you're moving toward, and what It just changes the way that you experience life. So I I do. I think about that before, and then I think about the eight years since, and and, you know, how my life has changed in so many ways in those eight years as a result of having a system, you know, for for for doing life versus just winging it.

Right. You know, I had a I had an interesting experience. I I taught my one Well, t- I taught my class last semester this idea of doing a video resume. And so I do it with my favorite student. I really leaned on her. She I mean, she was just the best. And like every day after class, she would come up and want to talk more about what we were talking about, and she'd walk to my car with me. I mean, it was and and and she just loved her to death. And and so I'm like, Olivia, I want you to do this video resume. We're going to do it. And she of course, she needed to get a job. She was graduating. And it worked like a charm. She got two job offers. We sent it to six people and bypassed the whole HR department, by the way.

Nice.

Mhm. And and but and so we just ended up doing a video together explaining what happened and and how how well it worked and why it worked. But she was telling me she says, You know, when I when I first took your class and you said 12 minutes a day, sh- she's like, 12 minutes a day? How How can that affect you that much? Mhm. And and I'm like Of course, I'm so close to it, and and it's basically exactly what you said at at first.

Mhm.

And and so I went and I asked Claude. I said, So what's the response to that? What do you think the response? And it came up with a great response. It says, Yeah, it's 12 minutes a day, but it's directing the other 16 hours a day you're awake,

Mhm.

And that's leverage. You know, that's pretty good, isn't it?

Yeah. No, absolutely. That's excellent. Yeah. Cause people don't Yeah, you hear 12 minutes a day, too, and you think you know, How is that possible? You know, How is that? you know, and and I love, too, when people and it's so funny, isn't it, too, John, where people like still 12 minutes a day is like too much. Yeah, right. You know, I I don't have

12 minutes a day. That is way too much for me. Exactly.

I'll spend hours, you know, mindlessly anesthetizing myself with social media and being online and streaming, but 12 minutes a day for me and the quality of my life and living, Right. too too big of a burden to bear. Well,

I always like it when people go, Well, I really don't have 12 minutes a day for this. I'm like, You're right. You don't. Yeah. Not for you.

It's totally true.

And not even get into a dialogue. Totally. They're like, What? What? What? What? If you don't

You've got 12 minutes a day. If you don't have 12 minutes a day, then, yeah, there's Well, you

know, Tony Robbins has a great line and he his essentially his line is, If you don't have 12 minutes a day, you don't have a life. Mhm. Yeah. Boy, that's that's right. Yeah. That is right. if

you don't have 12 minutes a day, then you really need this methodology. Like, you know what I mean? Like if you don't have 12 minutes a day, then then there's some, you know, you've got some things that you get need to get dialed in for sure.

Well, you know, but but let me let me take the contrary to that. Literally, if if you say I don't have 12 minutes a day, this really isn't for you. There's not There's not even any any sense in arguing it, trying to convince them. If If that's where their head is at, I wish them the best of luck. And you know, as as we sort of maybe wrap this up today, one of the things I I see, you know, it's every once in a while a someone that listens to our podcast will send me an email, which which I love to get. And there's a lot of people I see that are doing our our methodology, and a lot of them often times are people that are in their second career or the second half of their life. They've They've worked in corporate America and now they're they're doing their own thing. They're in their 50s or 60s, and they're reimagining their life, and of course this is perfect for for that. And they're operating in this this new life way different than than they did in their prior life. And you know, I I love to hear people doing that and and and the impact it has on them to to do this new way of life. And And then we also have people who are new to all of this. They don't really know what this is or not doing the the 12 minute a day, and so they're on the other end of the spectrum. Now Now I would dare say most people that are listening to this are already embracing the the methodology, but it's sort of cool to have both ends of the spectrum. And And there the people that aren't doing it will very quickly go, Wow, these these people seem to be onto something here. You know, maybe I should. And so, I don't know, I just like that today it works that way.

Yeah. No, it's it's exciting and and it really is life changing. Yeah. And if you, you know, 12 minutes a day too, it's just like, you're worth 12 minutes a day. I would certainly hope your quality of life and this precious life that you have is worth 12 minutes a day.

Well, but I would also say the 12 minutes a day is the easy part. Let's Let's be candid about it. it. Taking the time to to create immense clarity about your life is is critical. And and one of the things, one of the subtle things I have come to appreciate is when people do the methodology, they answer the questionnaire in the algorithm, and then the algorithm customizes it to their life, and then it generates it, and then you have to take it and and tweak it and refine it, but it's it's 90% right on, so you have to , you know, tweak it the the final 10%. And and one of the things that also happens is the system will generate the quality control form that that I that I really just changed this not too long ago because I saw that that some of this stuff that people would have was not thought out nearly to the degree I wanted them to think it out. Like the example I've mentioned this before, strategy for success, would would they'd give an answer that just was not very well thought out. And and so now I see and I'm trying to stress it to everybody, if you're doing the methodology, you got to look at that quality control checklist and make sure the key stuff you're feeding yourself is good and well thought out because garbage in, garbage out. If you're if you're not feeding yourself the right stuff at with at the right level of thinking, then it's not going to impact you. So it's going to only impact you as good as the information you're feeding yourself. And so I suspect at some point I'll have the quality control checklist on the website, which which, by the way, you know, the new website that I operate from is centerforadvancedleadershipofself.org, and and so, and that's also my new email, john@centerforadvancedleadershipofself.org. And so if you if you're looking at your visualization and and you're not sure it's as strong as it needs to be, send me an email and I'll send you the QC form that again comes out with the the template, but I think

what oftentimes happens is people create their template, tweak it, throw away the QC form and forget to to run it through it. So, something to think about. So, okay, until next time, we'll see you.