19 Brutal Lessons For Leaders in Their 20s

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0:39In a crude laboratory in the basement of his home.

0:55Today I'm going to share 17 harsh lessons that I wish I knew in my 20s. As of recording this, I am 43 going on 44. I'll be 44 in two weeks. And as birthdays tend to do, you reflect on where you are, what are the ideas that are driving you as a person today, and you think back to where you came from. And I did not come from a household, from a family that taught these lessons. We came from a small town. My mother was a receptionist. My father was a laborer. They were great parents, showed me tons of love. But we were just trying to get by day to day. And I didn't have a playbook coming out of my teens into my 20s that allowed me to be successful.

1:36So what you're going to learn today are directly lessons that come directly from the beats of my own career, from trying things and failing and trying and failing and learning each step of the way on how to get better at what I do, how to get better as a person and how to set my life up for the success that I enjoy today. And I want to share those with you because that's what we do here. If you see a lesson, hear a lesson that makes sense or doesn't make sense, something that you disagree with, or you just like us to expand on, leave it in the comments below. I'd like to know which lesson hits you the hardest, which one maybe you struggle to implement in your life.

2:15Leave those comments in the YouTube comment section. I respond to every one of them. I read every one of them. If you're listening to the audio podcast, Spotify, Apple, wherever, make sure you head over to YouTube and leave your comments there. And I will make sure that we, you know, dig into those. And if there's any that warrant expansion in a future episode, we'll make sure we get that done as well. Okay. Lesson number one, what you focus on is who you become. This is a core mantra to my life. It is number one for a reason. It is a defining principle in who I am and how I run my life. Because three years ago, I was diagnosed with hyperactive bipolar, which means at any given moment, I am bouncing between manic and hyper manic, which means at all moments of the day, I am out over my skis going 100 miles an hour mentally.

3:02I have had to build into my life systems, processes, mantras, etc. that allow me to stay focused because anything that doesn't drop a massive amount of dopamine to my system immediately gets disregarded. And for a long time, I thought that this was just who I was. I was scatterbrained or, you know, I was, you know, high energy or, you know, whatever label or moniker you wanted to put on it. The lesson came in the form of understanding the true impact of my inability to stay consistently focused on a single topic without these systems or processes in place. It takes on average, our brain 23 minutes to regain full focus on a topic when we switch our focus.

3:50So if you are working on a major project and get distracted easily by a Netflix show you want to watch or video games or text messages or, you know, scrolling through Instagram or TikTok, and then you try to come back to that major project, it is going to take your brain 23 minutes before you regain your full focus. That is a massive loss in output and productivity. And this was something I experienced for a very long time until I started to implement processes in my life. The most powerful was time blocking. I am a major proponent of time blocking. My calendar dictates my life. And by doing that, I am able to dictate what things I focus on and where my energy goes.

4:36So working out is incredibly important to me. If I don't use my body physically in some way, then I have massive amounts of energy reserves that then get dissipated through, you know, jumping from topic to topic, from thing to thing. And I ultimately don't get the level of output that I would like. Time blocking allows me to determine who I want to be. I want to be a high performer in terms of the work that I do. I want to create incredibly valuable content like what we're watching right now. and I want to be physically fit. Additionally, I am hyper-focused on being a present father in my children's lives.

5:15Therefore, I time block every event of theirs that I want or need to go to and make sure that if something else comes up, I am scheduling around those moments because priority number one in my life before anything else that I do is being present for my children. So if I want to be a present dad, a high performer and physically fit, the only way to guarantee that that is a reality is to time block. There are many other systems and processes that I put in place. I've done some other episodes for the show that you can kind of scroll back through on focus if you want more information on those. And if you would like to know some of the other systems and processes that I use, just leave a comment below and I'm happy to share those with you as well.

5:57Lesson number two, life is not fair. This is one of the major issues that I have, particularly with individuals who come to me and ask questions. They'll say, I should have gotten this promotion. It's not fair. I should be selling more in this product that I created. It's not fair. Right. Why does this person, you know, this person started with money. I didn't. I had to bootstrap. This person has some particular experience that allows them to gain more attention. That's not fair. Sorry. None of that matters. Right. Like life is not fair. Get over it. The minute you stop thinking in terms of fair, you can start focusing on the things that you need to do to reach your goal.

6:42Fair is just a distraction. Going back to lesson one, this idea of fair. Do not assume that anything is going to be fair. And the flip side of that coin is you should not act in a fair way. If you have a competitive advantage, you should leverage that competitive advantage. I don't mean screwing people. I don't mean lying. I don't mean bait and switch offers. None. That's not what I'm talking about. If you're an incredible copywriter who can get people to click through or to buy a thing, but then the thing is terrible. That is not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about competitive advantages you may have.

7:20You may not have kids, which gives you a massive advantage over people that do simply by the amount of time that kids take out of your life. Leverage that advantage, right? You may have, you may come from a family with money and be able and have reserves that you can pull from to seed a business. Leverage that competitive advantage. There is, there's nobody, nobody who matters cares what competitive advantages you come to the game with they only respect your execution of the thing you're trying to do so do not expect life to be fair additionally do not play too fair if you have a way to step out ahead of your competition that is unfair but hopefully morally okay leverage that unfairness because the world the universe isn't fair.

8:13So just remove fair as an idea from your mindset and just assume everything is unfair so that you can focus on what you need to do in order to move forward in your life and whatever that goal is that you're trying to pursue. Number three, operate in reality. We see this all the time with political discussions, right? Well, well, this is what should happen or you know this is the way things are supposed no reality is reality what is happening on the ground right now and how do you need to respond to that reality in order to stay safe stay secure create financial freedom hit your goals grow your business be a better partner be a better husband father whatever it is that you're trying to do operate in reality you cannot change people, right?

9:05You cannot change the way reality has set the table. And it may force you to make decisions you don't want to make. It may force you to operate in a way that you'd rather not operate. However, if that's what reality dictates, that's what you have to do. This goes back to lesson number two about being fair, right? What is happening is what is happening. And far too often when people come to me and, you know, they have questions or they want, you know, They're looking for a coaching or mentorship relationship. They're talking about the world that doesn't actually exist. People buy not because your product is good, but because of what your product does for them and how that makes them feel and how it makes them look to other people in their peer group.

9:49Just because you have a good product doesn't mean it's going to sell. We have to operate in reality. Operate in reality. Do not make up these utopian scenarios of the way the world should work and try to build for those. Build for the way the world actually works and the reality that you are presented with at the current moment. Lesson number four, you are going to lose friends. I wish that I knew this in my early 20s because I have lost so many friends throughout my life for so many different reasons. And I don't mean that in a bad way, right? Some of those friends I just grew apart from. Some of those friends moved away physically and just we didn't have a connection that yielded us to continue to be connected.

10:36Some of those friends I, you know, just disagree with philosophically and we have split apart. Some of those friends haven't appreciated certain levels of success that I've hit and have become, you know, kind of bitter or resentful in the way that they communicate or passive aggressive and I've distanced myself from them. At the same time, you are going to gain, especially if you are focused on the things that matter to you, friends who align with the new version of yourself. If you are consistently growing, if you are consistently trying to get better, if you are consistently reaching new goals, new heights, new levels in your work, in your personal development, in your relationships, you're going to lose the people who don't want to follow along.

11:27and you're going to gain people who align with this new version of yourself. And oftentimes, these friendships that we make later in life are some of the most enduring and meaningful relationships we've ever had. Because many of our early relationships are based on proximity or based on things that don't necessarily matter to us as we grow and mature in our lives, right? You have how many friends in your late teens and your early 20s that are simply based on partying, right? You go out to these bars, you like to drink or you like whatever the thing is that you like to do. And that's a they're fun to have as friends at that moment in your life.

12:03But as you mature and you move out of that stage of your life and you want to become more professional and you want to work more on your business and you want to work more on your physical fitness, those friends who want to go and eat crappy food and drink tons of beers, they might not be aligned with this new version of you who doesn't want to do those things and certainly don't want to do those things as often. It is okay to lose friends who no longer align with where you are in the current stage of your life. Because I promise you, you will backfill those friends with new people who do align with you.

12:37And what I've found over the course of my life is that those new friends are often deeper, richer, more meaningful relationships. Lesson number five, your health is not a luxury. You have to focus on your health. American society is fat as foals. I recently had a guest on the show who shared that 88 % of Americans have metabolic syndrome, which essentially means they either have diabetes or they're overweight or, you know, they have some other form of debilitating issue that keeps them from being max energy every day. And in order to be the most successful, the most purpose-driven, meaningful, happy version of yourself, you want to be at max energy every day.

13:18And the only way to do that is to focus on your health. It is not health is not a luxury. And you may be saying, well, Ryan, you don't understand. I just started a startup and I don't have time. Time block in physical fitness into your day. Time block in eating a healthy lunch. If that's what you need to do, if it's that hard for you, literally create a 15 minute calendar invite only to yourself that says eat a salad or whatever that healthy thing is that you need to eat. Right. Or time block in intermittent fasting. If that's something that you like to do. Time block in the health and wellness things that are important to you being max energy because that startup that you're using as an excuse for not going to the gym, you're going to fade, you're going to make mistakes, you're going to procrastinate, you're going to get lazy because you're not going to be at max energy.

14:13Being at max energy, which means focusing on your health, is a core part of a startup. This is something no one talks about in the entrepreneurial space. Your health is part of the startup. Because if you're not at max energy, if you have brain fog as the founder, how are you going to make the decisions? How are you going to do the work that's necessary to get that startup past startup mode into escape velocity? It's not going to happen. And I'd like to put a particular point on building strength. And this goes for men and women, not a fitness guru, although I've had many on the show in the past.

14:48So you can go back and look at those episodes. Strength training one to three times a week. You know, I don't mean just going out for a run. I mean, lifting something, pushing something, moving iron strength training is core because of the chemicals that strength training releases into your body. And the earlier in the day you can get your strength training done, the better. Okay, guys, because we're talking about health and wellness right now, it seems like the perfect time to talk about our newest sponsor and partner of the show, and that is Mando. Mando is the number one odor control product in the market today, right?

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17:25No one wants to stink. No one wants to be around someone that stinks. Mando is your odor control partner. Use this sound code Ryan at checkout shopmando.com. Okay, let's get back to the episode. All right. Lesson number six, mental health is a practice. I'm going to go back to thinking about this from the standpoint of like a startup founder, because I know a lot of you are in business that listen to this show or are considering side hustles, et cetera. If you're not, if your mental health isn't in a good place, it's almost impossible to get these things done, right? This was a hard lesson for me because I just always thought I had good mental health until like really bad shit started to happen, like getting fired from a job that I loved.

18:08I had a startup that I, that I, you know, worked on and launched and it just didn't go anywhere. And the reason it didn't go anywhere wasn't because the product was bad or because I had bad strategies and tactics because I wasn't here, right? I didn't have the mental health to push through those hard times. I started having all these limiting beliefs, all these negative thoughts starting running through my brain. I hadn't yet fully understood how the voice in your head isn't you and how that voice is often not helping you move forward in your life. And there's all these little aspects of mental health that, you know, we can dive into this in future episodes as well.

18:44We've talked a lot about it on the show in the past. We will continue to because this is such an important topic to our success. Mental health is a practice. So all that being said, taking out the specifics of mental health, I want to focus on this idea of practice because this is the lesson. You don't go see a counselor or therapist one time and get fixed. That's not the way it works. The best advice that's ever been given to me by a mentor was this. Find a counselor, make a recurring meeting with them every two weeks for the rest of your life, and just consider it a life expense because mental health is a practice, right?

19:18It is about consistency. It's about doing the work. It's about tiny incremental gains. It's about learning how not to react, how to manifest things in your life, how to reinforce good ideas, good thoughts, good beliefs. That mental health is something we need to constantly be working on. And early in my life, I may have a problem, talk to someone, feel like I'm fixed, and And then that same exact thing happens again because I didn't consistently work on the concept. I didn't consistently work to get better. I didn't see it as a practice. I saw it as like, you know, fixing the leg of a chair that breaks, right?

19:58You fix it once and you're back in business. That's not the case with our mental health. It is something we will be working on our entire lives. And if you truly want to be successful in whatever it is that you're trying to do, we must focus on our mental health and we must think of it as a practice, not as something we can patch and fix and move on. Lesson number seven, there are seasons to life. If you can understand that everything in your life is a season, it is way easier to get through the bad seasons and way easier to prepare yourself for bad seasons when you're in a good season. What does that mean?

20:36It means that early in your life, you most likely will not be making the amount of money you want to be making. You most likely will not have the network that you want. You most likely. So what does this idea of seasons actually mean? It means everything has a season. Again, going back to our analogy with the startup founder there, the first season when you create a startup and launch that business is going to be you grinding 10, 12, 16 hours or more a day. It's just the nature of getting a business up off the ground. And it's going to burn you out unless you can understand that that is a season that you just have to get through.

21:21You just have to get through that season from launch to escape velocity where you are grinding every minute of every day. It's all encompassing. Maybe you're letting relationships go. Maybe you're struggling in other places because you have to get through this season of getting your business to a place where you can move on to the next season, which is starting to bring in employees, starting to bring in new systems, new processes, maybe tools that you can afford at that point that are going to help you systematize, build process, build consistency in your business that will allow you to work less hours, but reap more benefit.

22:00It's a season, right? You have seasons of your marriage. You have seasons of your relationship with your children. You have seasons with friends. You have seasons with everything. And framing where you are as a season allows you to emotionally rationalize the things that you're doing at this moment so that you can set yourself up to move beyond that season to where you ultimately want to be. For so long, I didn't understand this concept. This is one of the lessons that I've learned very recently in my life. I would launch businesses and get so frustrated by the just constant unending grind, knowing that that was what was required, but not understanding that someday that was going to have to turn.

22:46And I would just keep grinding and keep grinding, even though we would be hiring people and even though we would be bringing in new tools and building new systems. I would keep grinding and grinding until I had someone literally grab me and shake me at a conference when I was complaining about this and say, this is just a season. Move on. When I started to research this topic, I started to understand what they meant, and it gave me some emotional release. It allowed me to say, okay, I'm in this grinding season. How do I move on to the next one? And that thought gave me the light at the end of the tunnel to realize that I hadn't given up a corporate job to become an entrepreneur, to only work twice as many hours, twice as hard, you know, without seeing the benefit.

23:30and that this concept of seasons was a game changer for me and I highly recommend you dig into it and spend some time thinking about what season you're currently in and where you want to get to lesson number eight give no fucks I have a little wood sculpture that one of the audience members here is made for me uh when I talked about this concept the first time on the show right here made for me right here thank you Gordon for making this for me sits right sits right back over my shoulder, reminder every day to give no fucks. And what that means is believe in yourself, not in the opinions and expectations of others.

24:06If someone's got a comment, let them have a comment. Use it as a data point. Use every comment, every negative piece of feedback that you get, every, you don't have the resources, you don't have the knowledge, you'll never, you don't have enough, you're not capable. Whatever those negative things are that people put into your world, use them as data points, but ultimately give no fucks. If you believe in your path, believe in your path, push forward. And that's all that matters. It's the only way to get to where you want to go because your path is your path. GNF, give no fucks. Lesson number 10, you cannot improve everything all at once.

24:46Pick one thing, master that thing, execute that thing, improve that thing, systematize that thing, build that thing, then move on to the next thing. The more projects you have going on at the same time, the less successful you will be in any one of those projects. And the longer all of those projects will take to complete. The reality, again, going back to a previous lesson around living in reality, is that we can't always only have one thing going on in order to move our business forward. However, we can have one primary focus. And if we give as much or the majority of our focus to one thing at a time, we will be the best that we can be at that thing.

25:26We will get it done the fastest and we'll be able to move on and then do the same for the next major priority task, et cetera, that we have to achieve. But too often we, you know, hit this, you know, all of a sudden I want to become a better person or I want to be, you know, a successful entrepreneur. And we put 10, 15, 20 different priorities on our table and try to execute them all at once. And ultimately none of them are as good as we could have possibly done if we had just focused on them. And many of them don't ever get done because we just don't have the brainpower to scale ourselves over that many different priorities at one time.

26:01Do one thing at a time and be incredibly good at that one thing. That way you can give your best effort, produce your best product, and do it in the most efficient way possible, and then move on to the next thing. Number 11, be proud of your faith, whatever that is. For so long, I did not talk about my faith. I'm a firm believer in God. I have my own relationship with God and Christianity. I was raised a Catholic. I've kind of moved a little away from the Catholic Church. However, I still very much practice Christianity. I read the Bible and I often on this show will quote biblical verses. My faith is important to me and it's a driving force in how I live my life and who I am as a person.

26:40You don't have to agree with my faith, but in order for you to understand who I am and what guides me as a person and the ideas, concepts, strategies that I share with you on this show, my faith is a big part of it. And maybe that turns you off and that's okay. Then that means that this isn't the best place for you. And thinking through your own life, whatever your faith is, right, it is okay to share that because it is an upfront filter for the people who are not going to be good partners, good friends, good prospects, good customers. Sharing who we are and the things that drive our core values, they're not detractors, right?