Train Your Brain for Grit, Then Supercharge It with AI: The Path to Unstoppable Performance with Jairek Robbins

0:01Boom! Shake the room, Fire Nation. JLD here and welcome to Entrepreneurs on Fire. brought to you by High Level, the all-in-one sales and marketing platform. Today, we'll be breaking down how to train your brain for grit, then supercharge it with AI, the path to unstoppable performance. To drop these value bombs, I brought Jarek Robbins into EO Fire Studios. Jarek is a performance coach, investor, board member, and bestselling author. As the founder of Performance Coach University, he empowers leaders worldwide to achieve purpose-driven success in business and life. And today, we'll talk about some strategies to build mental toughness, integrating AI to enhance both our personal and professional performance.

0:39Also, a common misconception entrepreneurs have when it comes to resilience and high performance and oh, so much more. And a big thank you for sponsoring today's episode goes to Jarek and our sponsors. Are you ready for the ultimate all-in-one platform for entrepreneurs, marketers, coaches, and agencies? Build funnels, automate follow-ups, manage clients, and even white-label your own software. Say hello to our featured partner, High Level, and visit highlevelfire.com to start your free trial today. Fire Nation, it's time to stop guessing and start winning with a proven playbook. Inside the Freedom Circle, you'll have access to my step-by-step systems for creating offers, building processes, and driving traffic, all in just 90 days.

1:26Ready for freedom? Visit freedom-circle.com to learn more. Jarek, say what's up to Fire Nation and share something that you believe about becoming successful that most people disagree with. What's up, Fire Nation? So I was talking to a private equity guy the other day when we were, we took a couple of weeks in Aspen for my birthday, and we were talking to this friend or a friend of a friend. And he said, listen, I love your family. I love what you guys are about. I've been to a billion years of seminars. They're awesome. And he's like, but I feel like there's just a better way to go make a billion dollars.

2:04Like you don't have to wake up and be perfect for this huge morning routine and have this perfect day and these perfect things and hour by hour, minute by minute. And I started laughing and I said, you know, as weird as this sounds, I have something I've wanted to prove true and I'm not there yet. I have about six plus deals I'm working on right now that are the size of the deals are going to be in the 7 billion plus range per deal. And when and if I think 10 of these come together, I'll have enough earning power to look back at dad and say, see, I told you more sleep and meditation was the key to all this.

2:49But I'm not quite there yet. And so when I say more sleep, I don't mean, you know, Michael Phelps, 12 hours a night or LeBron or any of those guys. I mean, you know, eight hours of rock solid, 20 % REM, 20 % deep sleep mixed with some really solid hour and a half meditation of just stillness and silence to kick off the day. I was reading a book called Deep Work by Cal Newport, I think it was. And he talked about all the major discoveries have been found of people willing to sit in silence and meditate on one single thought or question for a prolonged period of time. I really believe that to be true.

3:24Fire Nation, you can tell why this title of the episode is Train Your Brain for Grit, then supercharge it with AI, The Path to Unstoppable Performance. And Jarek will be laying it out here today because entrepreneurs, that's you, Fire Nation, will inevitably face challenges and setbacks. So Jarek, how can we develop grit and resilience to navigate these obstacles properly. I think most entrepreneurs think grit is something you're born with. Science tells us it's trainable. And so grit isn't just about pushing yourself through pain. It's about rewiring your brain to prefer challenge over comfort.

4:00And so the part of your brain responsible for this is called the anterior mid-singular cortex, AMCC for short, literally grows stronger with resistance, just like a muscle. So every time you push through discomfort, whether it's a tough conversation, finishing a late night project, or staying focused under pressure, you're literally building the biological foundation of resilience itself. And so the key is consistent reps, not occasional hero moments. And so it's figuring out how do you stay in it? How do you get to that point? And I'm practicing this concept regularly, whether it's, you know, having a bunch of friends over on Saturday and we're having a competition on the ski erg, which JLD, I'll throw you some numbers.

4:44You're in there. But we're just competing for fun. And there's a moment where we accidentally committed ourselves to a 15, no, 14 ,000 meter row or pole on the ski erg. And what inevitably has landed up happening, so it was seven people, each of us were going to get 2 ,000 meters, rotate every 1 ,000 meters. So each of us gets two rounds. about 4 ,000 meters into it, two people had to go because they had to run a mother-in-law to the airport. So all of a sudden we're down to five people with a big chunk of the meters going about halfway through, I think my wife and one other person dropped out.

5:28And inevitably we got down to like the last 4 ,000 meters and there was two of us left. And we looked at each other as we were going and we're like, should we stop? And we have one rule, which is whatever competition we start, no matter if it's one person keeling over and throwing up, it doesn't matter. We have to finish. And so two of us have finished a substantially long row multiple times. And we always laugh and we say, you know, we're training our brain. We're training our brain to get to the point where it feels like you have no more. And then we go a little bit further. I picked up on this a long time ago.

6:04I was doing some training for the special operators in the air force. And one of the things they look for, I said, how do you pan, how do you pick who's going to make it and who's not? And he said, the number one thing we look for is resilience was the thing they looked for. And they said, how we find it is it's the person when we say, Hey, go swim, go swim 25 laps. And on lap 24 mentally, they're like, gosh, just one more. I'm done. We go do 15 more. And we watch how they all respond. And the one that just goes, okay, and keeps going, usually going to be our guy. Because it's the ability that when you're in a place where you feel like you're completely maxing out, you're doing exactly what you said you were going to do.

6:51And life says, give me 15 more. You go, sure. And just keep moving. That's the key. That's the practice, they said. And that's also one of the major indicators of who actually falls into that special ops position. I mean, that brings me back to my army bootcamp days. We did a 37 pound, 37 mile rucksack and we were just dead at the end. And they said, all right, turn around and go back. And we're like, what? Like we did not know that was coming. And it was like, it broke people. You literally looked left and right and just saw people break in half mentally. And it just, it showed you a lot. And military stuff or professional athletes, we've had a chance to have through one of our training programs, a gentleman from the New Orleans Saints who came through wanting to be a better coach.

7:34So we were training him. And so athletes, special operators, corporate executives, all these people, it's like, oh yeah, gritty, resilient. I think of a mom or a dad at 2 a.m. Like you thought you were getting eight hours of sleep and you have a little human who decided to wake up, throw up, poop its pants and start crying at 2 a.m. That's resilience. yeah like do you cry if you just sit there and give up or do you do what most parents do is you stand up and find a way and then the question is how do you approach the next day are you just frustrated to be frustrated or you still choose to make it a great day even though you know the two-year-old poop throw up and cry situation royally kicked your butt that night and so you know people look external in life of something they're going to go do climb mount everest be a special operator, build a business.

8:25I tell you, it's going to get you internally too. You know, having a child is, I think, the ultimate endurance sport and the ultimate resilience test because they take away your core foundational things, sleep, nutrition, exercise, the simple stuff, but it puts you in a position where you have to build this level of grit in order to be a great parent. Yeah. And you and I are actually chatting pre-chat about our sons and how they're going to be using AI against us before we know it because you've seen it. Like You believe that integrating AI is actually going to enhance our personal and professional performance.

8:58Tell us more. What's interesting about this is I just saw a study and I'm going back and forth on this. I am an avid user of this. What the study said, I think it was Google that just released it. I have to double check who released the study. What they were saying, people who are overusing it, they're using it for everything, every email, every paper, every thought, every response, every text, like they're using it for everything. They're stopped using their own brain and thought process. And so their cognitive performance is actually massively declining according to this small research study they did.

9:34On the flip side, people who use it to start the idea, give them a good idea, give them an insight, and then take it and expand it with their own thoughts are actually enhancing performance. and so it depends on how you use it if you try to substitute thinking and you just say i'm i'm just gonna let it become me and do everything for me your brain performance goes down if you use it as an enhancement to the way you think meaning give me a good question let me think about it let me give you a response and then you enhance my response and then i'll enhance that and you pitch and catch with it that's where i think the real magic is and so i i think it eliminates the friction that causes inconsistency.

10:16It's something we started to do with our programs where one of the challenges I was having as a coach is I was educating someone on what to do. I was walking them through the process and then giving them an assignment to go do it. A day, week, or month will go by between the session. We meet again and they mostly did it or gave it a go or tried their best. And this is just a few clients. Most of them kick ass and do it right. But some of them struggled. And so I said, could I use AI to help bridge the process, to help move them through the tool, to get them to fully apply it, not just kind of try.

10:53And so that's been wildly effective. And it's been wildly effective with tracking habits, setting triggers, optimizing workflows. I always say, imagine, you know, instead of in my world, everything's coaching. So we coach business owners, coach all these people. But instead of meeting with your coach every couple weeks, imagine having one at your, your access 24 hours a day. Like you can set up your GPT. So literally it's, there is a digital coach reminding you of your daily goals, recapping your wins, tracking your patterns, giving you insight to your mindset, offering you feedback 24 seven. And it's actually available right now.

11:29Like you can do it on your own. Don't charge anything. You can, there's people creating these that have been asked to invest in a bunch of them, but you can train your own GPT. If you have just a normal 20 buck a month account or even a free one. And so this thought is how do you use it to enhance what you're doing, not replace the process of thinking? Because again, if you replace the process of thinking, your mental performance actually falls off a cliff. If you use it to enhance the process of going through and building your vision or building your plan or building your map or checking in, then your performance actually multiplies.

12:03It goes up two, three, four, five times. And so my belief is when we can blend this properly into what we do, it's amazing at how much more productive people are and how much more they can get done and how much more effective they are. I was talking to a client earlier today and someone asked me, we were coming up with a profit sharing plan for one of their top employees. And normally we would send this to an analyst in their company. And three, four hours later, we get an output, we were able to download all the key information into one of the LLMs and the, you know, the AI, and it pumped us back out a pivot table within 30 seconds.

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14:41On top of it all, their support team is second to none and has your back every step of the way. Seriously, every question that pops up, they will have your answer waiting. And if you visit my special partnership link, you'll get a free trial. So visit highlevelfire.com to start your free trial and see why thousands of businesses are switching. That's highlevelfire.com, where marketing, sales, and automation finally come together. High level, join the revolution. So Jerick, let's talk about resilience and high performance. I mean, this has been a theme of our conversation thus far, but what's a common misconception that entrepreneurs have around resilience, around high performance?

15:20So I think the biggest myth is the burnout is a badge of honor. I don't know about you. My wife used to work in big corporate America. I worked there for a little bit, but she worked there for a significant period of time. And she said, you don't realize how many people would brag about how busy they are, not how effective they are, not how much they got actually accomplished, not how many outcomes they hit, just how busy they are. And they'd show you their calendar and be like, look, I'm booked from 6 a.m. to 12 midnight. Like that's not something to be proud of. Like, golly. And so I think too many entrepreneurs think suffering equals success.

15:57But true resilience isn't about pushing nonstop. It's about training smarter and recovering well. Another misconception is that high performers rely only on motivation. They're just hyped all the time. Not true. They don't. They rely on systems. That's where AI fits in beautifully. it's not about working harder. It's about working wiser and aligning your biology, psychology, and technology all together. I think one of the major keys with that, if you think about it, I had a chance to speak at an event and there was a gentleman speaking there also named David Goggins. And I remember sitting with David after, I think it was two in the morning, we wrapped up and I, you know, he had a flight at 6 AM and I was like, Oh, are you going to go get sleep?

16:35And he's like, I'm going for a run. I'm going to go, I'm going to go flight. I was like, wow, this guy's really committed. And I remember asking him, I said, Hey, you know, you've accomplished a lot. And you did, I mean, Navy SEAL, the most pull-ups in the world until this new young guy just got them. But like you did all these things that a lot of people ask you for help along the way. And I always look at it from a coaching perspective and he's like, of course they did. And I was like, did you help him? And I don't know if you need to bleep this part out, but this is what David said. He's like, no, I told him, fuck you.

17:14I had to figure it out. So you figure it out. And then I walked away. I was like, wow, that's rough. What a mentor you were. And he started laughing. And I said, what do you tell him now? And he goes, now I guide people. Now I'm open to it. And the interesting part was when I was trying to figure out why would he be so aggressive towards screw you, you figure it out on your own. And it's his story. It was honestly because he had to grind it out. He didn't have a choice. That was his path. That was his only option to get to where he wanted to go. Therefore, that was his truth. Then I went back to the private equity guy I was talking to in Aspen a few weeks ago.

17:54And that statement we started with was, I feel like there's a better way to go make a billion dollars. You don't have to be working 24 hours a day, seven days a week with absolute and total intensity to make it. He's like, I feel like you can do it really intelligently if you're using all the things around you to your advantage. And I think that was a key statement my brain highlighted in what he said. If you're using all the things around you to your advantage, and AI is one of those tools. But again, going back, biology, psychology, and technology, can you get all three to work in your favor.

18:28Jarek, take us home. We've talked about the mental toughness. We've talked about resilience, grits, misconceptions that entrepreneurs have around this. What is the single takeaway that you want our listeners to get from our conversation today? How can we connect with you to learn more around this topic? And then we'll say goodbye. Great question. I'll break it down to three steps. Number one, let's put this in the motion. We talked about it, but my thought is let's do something about it. And so what can you do? You can track your daily resistance wins. So we actually have a sheet that shows you the different four levels that exist.

19:02But every time you choose effort over ease, track it. It starts to build awareness, but it also starts to build motivation where you see yourself doing it and give yourself the dopamine release and the emotional reward of, hey, I'm doing this. I'm pushing myself. I am growing this AMCC part of my brain. So start to actually track it and celebrate as you're making progress. Number two, schedule your recovery like a pro athlete. Grit grows in recovery, not in burnout. I always give people the silly example of if you want to be a, you know, 1995 Chrysler minivan, then you need an oil change once a year and just about any mechanic can do it in a couple hours.

19:42If you want to operate like an F1 race car, you're going to need 22 people who are on your pit crew and it's going to take 1.8 seconds to get you back to full. So the key here is recover like a pro athlete or recover like an F1 race car where you build a pit crew that actually keeps you at your best in a very short period of time. Number three, set up an AI co-pilot. Whether it's ChatGPT or one of the other ones, use it to set daily prompts, goal reminders, journaling habits. Use it like your digital assistant or personal coach that keeps you at your absolute highest and best self. You do those three things, you're going to put this stuff to work.

20:22Jarek, how do we connect with you? I'm actually going to set up a link for you. Everything we've talked about, I have some free worksheets for you. If you go to jarekrobbins.com forward slash EO fire, and we'll have some free gifts for you waiting there. Fire Nation, you're the average of the five people you spend the most time with. And hello, you've been hanging out with JR and JLD today. So keep up the heat. And for links to everything that we talked about, visit eofire.com. Just type Jarek, J-A-I-R-E-K in the search bar. The show notes page will pop right up. Jarek, thank you for sharing your truth, your knowledge, your value with Fire Nation.

20:56For that, we salute you and we'll catch you on the flip side. Goodbye, Fire Nation. Stay lit. Hey, Fire Nation, a huge Thank you to our sponsors and Jarek for sponsoring today's episode. And Fire Nation, are you an entrepreneur on fire who's looking to share your amazing message with the world? If yes, we are now accepting applications for entrepreneurs on fire. To learn more about becoming a guest, visit eofire.com slash guest. And I'll catch you there or on the flip side. Are you ready for the ultimate all-in-one platform for entrepreneurs, marketers, coaches, and agencies? build funnels, automate follow-ups, manage clients, and even white label your own software, say hello to our featured partner, High Level, and visit highlevelfire.com to start your free trial today.

21:44Fire Nation, it's time to stop guessing and start winning with a proven playbook. Inside the Freedom Circle, you'll have access to my step-by-step systems for creating offers, building processes and driving traffic all in just 90 days. Ready for freedom? Visit freedom-circle.com to learn more.