How to Sharpen Your Focus to Achieve Your Goals

0:0010 years ago, I made the decision to build my personal brand that was elevated, yet approachable, and reflected who I was, not just what I did. I created my website with ShowIt because it's true drag and drop freedom so you can easily build and update your site. Plus, their real human support team, game changer. Want to try it for yourself? Head to jasminestar.com forward slash ShowIt for a 14-day free trial and first month free when you subscribe. Welcome to the Jasmine Star Show where we talk about business and today, mixing marketing with love and obsession. Oh yes, We're starting there. This is kind of like a little bit of an origin story, and I'm about to share the tea, but because it ended up favorably for me, I'm just going to dive right in.

0:44And so back, goodness gracious, I started dating my husband, business partner, first love of my life, high school sweetheart, like married out of my league. I say it all the time, and I'm not even saying it to be nice. It's something that my family and his family has all agreed to be true, and I'm okay with it. So it didn't always start as good as it is now. I have a fantastic relationship with my in-laws. JD has four sisters and I love them all. Not like my own, because they are my own. And his parents are just good salt of the earth people. Now, JD and I met 16 or 17 years old. We were in high school.

1:20We hadn't even started our senior year yet. And so we met and I was smitten with him. I mean, just talking to him. And let me just go back and picture yourself when you're 16 and 17, and then you come across somebody who's like a good person. I met JD and we spoke probably, goodness gracious, at minimum 30 minutes, just he and I. And I knew that there was something different about him. And so much so that the first time we ever spoke on the phone. Now, gosh, I'm going to date myself, but this is where you would have a cordless phone in your house. And then I would be hiding in my closet. And then my mom would pick up a phone somewhere else in the house and be like, Jasmine, it's time for you to stop talking.

2:03Because the first time that JD and I spoke, it was close to three hours. I just liked him. We didn't run out of things to say. So we immediately hit the ground running. Like we were fast friends. And we spoke to each other every single day. Now, sometime after we had graduated high school, we decided that we were going to date long distance. Now, JD did break up with me. We're not even going to talk about this at this point in the story. He made a very mature adult decision. And he said, well, if we're going to be going to different schools, he went to school in the Bay Area. And so it was about like a six, seven hour drive between us.

2:37And he says, like, maybe we should do life on our own and kind of figure out like us as friends. And of course, I was heartbroken. I couldn't get out of bed for weeks. I mean, this guy just broke my heart. Anyway, he realized what he done last. Like, homeboy, be calling me. No, but really, he did. He did realize what a good thing was. I will tell you, the grass isn't always greener in the Bay Area, honey. Anyway, we get back together. We broke up for about two or three months. And so we get back together. And that's when he and I knew, like, we are all in. We dated long distance. and he would call me from a payphone outside of his dorm.

3:15I know, it's like people are listening, they're like, what's a payphone? It is this device where you put quarters and nickels in, except for the fact that we were so, y 'all, like when people ask like, how tough were those times? He would call me collect. Then he would say, hey, it's JD. And so then I would call back from my cell phone, I would call back the payphone because a payphone actually had a number. I would call him back on the payphone and he'd be sitting on his pay phone. Anyway, it's neither here nor there. We built a strong friendship and we built strong lines of communication. And when JD came back during the holidays to visit, one of those holidays, it was Christmas.

3:55And I walk into his room and on his drawer, there is a book. And the title of the book was, Is It Love or Obsession? And I pick it up and I'm like, this is a weird book. And then he had said, my dad had given it to me. and I was like wait does your dad not think that we're in love like does your dad think that we're obsessed with each other and JD who's just so nice so nice listen you can have him in a headlock and he still would not say anything disparaging to anybody at any given time and he's like well you know it's just a book and I thought to myself oh I was embarrassed I felt really misunderstood.

4:38And maybe looking back as an adult, I could see how his parents might think I was obsessed with him. Never mind the fact that I would hand write him a letter every single week when we were in college and mail it to him. Never mind the fact that I would bake him cookies and I mailed him cookies. Never mind the fact that I would, yeah, call him on a payphone and yeah, spend hours of my day talking to him. He was the best thing and still remains the best thing to have ever happened to me. So do I see like now as an adult, like how a parent could be a little bit concerned about their child? Yeah. But I will tell you that when I saw that book, I interpreted it like it was a bad thing.

5:21Like being obsessed was a bad thing. And I was immediately embarrassed about it. But I, years later, have realized that one of my greatest assets is to become obsessed with things. And so you want to know what I did? I have reclaimed that word called obsession, and I have decided to call it and make it my own. Y 'all, your girl is nothing but obsessed. And it has been obsession that has driven me to new heights, and it has been obsession that has driven me forward. So what I'm going to do for the sake of this podcast is ask you straight out, have you ever been obsessed? Or what are you obsessed with right now?

6:04At the beginning of 2024, I was listening to a podcast called My First Million, and they were talking about this idea that whenever you get an idea or this question, or can I be good at this, the goal would be to become obsessed. Because when you're obsessed, yeah, you're working harder than you've ever worked before, but when you're obsessed, it's like you're excited to wake up in the morning and work on it. And even during the hard times, you're just like, nah, I'm going to get into this and I'm going to do this. Like when you're obsessed, you find yourself in states of flow where you pick up your head and you're like, where did the last four hours go?

6:36That my friends is obsession. And I think in the past, when I was asking myself at the beginning of 2024, for, what are you obsessed with? And I'm just going to be honest. I had a hard time just saying, oh, well, golly gee willikers, this is my obsession. Nothing was in me at the moment. And in the past, when I think about when I've been obsessed, it's almost like it descended upon me. Like I couldn't help being obsessed with it. And when I started this year, having not had that, I asked myself, well, if it didn't come to me, if it hasn't descended on me, is there a possibility of me choosing an obsession.

7:15So before I tell you about the obsession that I chose, and now, you know, months later, I'm being like, it is possible to choose an obsession, even if it doesn't come to you. But we're going to get to that in a second. So when I look back at the five periods of my life that really derived from obsession that then led to success, I saw it happen to me in five distinct ways. Number one was law school. So prior to me being 24 years old, I had just been an achiever. I would figure out, okay, the things that I would want and how do I get those things. And when I went to law school, I realized that I had to become, and I became obsessed with getting into law school and obsessed with getting into the top 1 % of law schools.

8:02The second period of my life when it kind of derived from obsession was photography. It came to me like it hit me like a mad truck. I became so obsessed with photography that it literally oozed out. The only thing I wanted to do was figure out how to become a photographer. The next period of obsession came for me in the form of content. I started realizing goodness this was like 2008-2009. I realized that being good at content set you apart from 98 % of business owners. But being great at content just didn't set you apart. It opened doors that you would never have access to. So I became obsessed, figuring out the nuances of how to create content in a way that got people's attention.

8:49My next obsession that hit me was the fact that I was compounding businesses. I was creating businesses and I was using content to magnify those businesses. But my next obsession became digital marketing. Because up into this point, I had a business online. I didn't have an online business. Now, the difference between the two is my business being online was people would be able to book or buy something for me from online. That's having my business online. But having an online business was having a complete mechanism to grow and scale the business without a direct proportion from me. This wasn't an input output is that digital marketing and having an online business was empowering me to grow a business without direct synergy, without direct hard work, without hours for hours.

9:34I wasn't trading hours for dollars. That became the biggest difference. And I became obsessed. I wanted to learn everything about digital marketing. And then my next obsession came around 2021 and I became obsessed with technology, obsessed to seeing if I would be able to build a technologically based company. Could we have our own tech stack? Could I figure out how to create a SaaS offering? I became obsessed for years. It consumed me. And then in 2024, I'll never forget, we were on vacation and kind of just using it as downtime, like my brain. And that question was asked, what are you obsessed with.

10:18And I'm just going to be honest, I wasn't really obsessed with anything. And so that leads us to now my sixth period of obsession. And that started at the beginning of 2024. And I decided I was going to become obsessed with this podcast. And y 'all know for a while, I have been sharing that I've been trying to do new and different things with this podcast, because the podcast has always been a labor of love. It's been a form of creativity. And everything I do is very visual. All the marketing I had ever done was very visual. And so the podcast became an opportunity for me to not be visual and to only be audio.

10:55But if you're watching this on YouTube right now, and if you're not watching the podcast on YouTube and you want to check it out, YouTube, y 'all, YouTube, we are living and we are thriving on YouTube. And for people who are watching this video, y 'all can clown on my mic. This is a new mic that we're testing. The team is all about it because the audio is it's cleaner, it's crisper. You know, we're not getting a lot of it doesn't matter, right? I was like, y 'all, like y 'all just must hate me. I'm literally talking into I think the diameter of this thing is like 12 inches, like a foot, kind of a diffuser for a mic.

11:28Anyway, the obsession became how do we make the audio better? How do we make better content? How do we make content quicker? How do we make it more engaging? And more than anything, how do we add a visual component? Because if we add a visual component, we can now leverage the podcast as marketing on social platforms. That all came on the back of deciding I was going to approach my obsession differently. So when I think about being obsessed both times when it hit me like a Mack truck and when I had to chase obsession, like I was chasing a Mack truck filled with mac and cheese, I thought to myself, when I look back and I started dissecting, what were the key factors of obsession?

12:05I noticed that there were four key factors because I said, if obsession wasn't going going to hit me and I was going to hit it. I had to understand those elements so I could see if I could duplicate them and replicate them now in my business. Yes and amen. So if you are currently obsessed or if you are finding something to be obsessed with, here are four things that I think are going to change your perspective on your obsession. Number one is determination. Number two was reprioritization. Number three is investing in help. And then number four was the willingness to do anything. Y 'all know that we build out frameworks because frameworks help me learn and And I hope that they help you learn as well.

12:40So we're now going to break these down each individually. So key factor in obsession, number one, determination. Now, determination is simply in the most easiest terms for me to say, I am going to choose to figure it out at all costs. So if you become obsessed with learning another language, if you become obsessed with learning digital marketing, if you become obsessed with losing weight, anything you decide to become obsessed with, then the number one thing is you have to make the decision to be determined. But what does that actually mean in the most simplest terms? I'm going to choose to figure it out at all costs.

13:18In fact, I will not rest. I will not say I am finished. I will not say it is done. I need to say I have figured out what I need to know at all costs. There's no excuses and there is no stopping. And I'm making notes here because I'm looking over my 12-inch diameter of a microphone and I'm like trying to see my notebook. But I made a note and put a little star by it. No matter how hard. No matter how hard. I think back to when we were building on a tech platform, and I've said it plenty of times on the podcast. I have never felt more inadequate. I have never felt more drug underwater. I have never felt more nervous than I had doing that.

13:56But in similar ways, I look at the first iterations of my career. When I was building an online store to sell educational resources to photographers, I had never understood what that was when I was learning how to make sales calls for high ticket items when I was making high ticket item offers. I had never done that. I was wildly intimidated. And I look back at the things that were the hardest for me to learn, the hardest for me to figure out. And I take the most pride in those things. So I'm going to tell you, if you're in a place and you are obsessed and you're determined to figure it out and you're at a really hard spot, don't worry.

14:27If you decide not to quit, you are going to be so proud at who you become in the process and what you figure out. Now, when things got very expensive, when they got very time-consuming, and when I truly lacked patience, I had to remind myself that the number one thing, the number one cost, the number one factor that I must invest in, the thing I must pay, the rent that I must pay every day for being obsessed, is to be determined. So somebody once said, as you are choosing to be determined in relation to things that we're obsessed with is part of the reason why we feel so nervous trying something new is that we always make a decision.

15:07So you make a decision between the devil you know and the devil you don't know. Because the devil you know is currently staying when you are. And if you're unfulfilled, well, that's the devil you know. Because you've got to deal with the devil of looking yourself in the mirror saying, I'm actually not that happy and I'm not fulfilled. That's the devil you know. But do you have the courage to pick the devil you don't know and say, I'm going to dance here. Instead of being safe, I'm going to do something that requires me to become a different person in the process. Friends, that is sheer and utter determination.

15:40When I look back at phases of my life where I was determined, I think to myself, well, what did that look like when I was obsessed with getting into law school? Well, I didn't know a single lawyer in my life. I was 24 years old. I didn't have like, oh, like ask Uncle John, ask neighbor Stephanie. Like nobody was in my orbit who had ever gone to law school or was a lawyer. So I was like, how does one figure out like, what is the mystique of law school? And so I started reading blog posts. I became so obsessed. You guys remember back in the day where they have these blog roles, where if you found one blog, they would like link out to other blogs that were similar or their friends that were writing about the same thing.

16:15Well, I became obsessed with blog roles. I started reading and consuming people's law school blogs like it was first season of reality TV of The Real Housewives. Okay, like I was so in it and I was like, oh my gosh, is Amanda from UT Law really going to be wanting to become like the student champion of her civics class, whatever the case may be. I became obsessed. And I remember reaching out to law school administration trying to use verbiage that I was reading in blog posts and asking questions of what might set my applications apart. And I remember that I would email relentlessly. I kept track of what schools I was emailing.

16:58Now, here's the thing. I graduated college with A4.0, but my LSAT score was not great at all. So I knew I was going to have a hard time getting into the top tier schools that I wanted to. But I thought to myself, well, maybe if I'm asking people the right questions, maybe if I figure out the system, maybe if I find a way to make my application, you know, more interesting or more advantageous for admission that they would consider me. And I got a zero response rate. Okay. It was like, I'm trying to use like the numbers, right? It was like 99 % of everybody gave me a zero, right? Like nobody was responding.

17:34And then one day an assistant admin who wasn't even on full-time staff at UCLA responded to one email. And you guys, I sent hundreds of emails. And here was this one person who sent back a two-sentence email in regards to a question. And then I was like, game over. I'm in. Like, I'm in. If he answered me once, he will answer me again. And I had no expectation. I'm like, I don't care if this guy doesn't respond to me in two days or two weeks or two months. I got an in. And if he answered one question, he'll answer another. And I will tell you that this gentleman changed my entire option pool. He was an assistant admin for UCLA admissions office.

18:17And I'm not for sure. I'm not for sure. But I would take a good guess. This kind, good, good man was a black man who went to law school and decided to become on a path of law school admissions. And I think that he saw something in me that maybe just maybe resonated with him. He wanted to help somebody, maybe like himself, an unexpected candidate, get into law school. Not only did I get into UCLA, I got into Berkeley, I got into Chicago, I got to UVA, like really, really amazing schools. And that would not have happened without his just patience and his guidance and his ability. He read my application essay.

19:03He taught me how to write application essays. I would not have gotten where I was. And that was on the back of doing hard things and not taking, you know, zero, like nobody responding to emails and then just being relentless with that. That was the cost. That was the rent of being obsessed and being determined. I saw a similar pattern when it came to photography. I didn't know how to become a photographer. I didn't have a camera. The first camera that I'd ever received was a camera from Best Buy. And I didn't have any gear. Like I didn't have any lenses. I didn't have memory cards. We couldn't afford them.

19:35And so I was renting gear and I would return the gear the next day. And so I was giving myself like projects to do and I didn't know how to get better. And so I became obsessed with photography forums. Again, I went back to blog posts and any photographer that was writing or sharing information, I became obsessed with. And I was studying photography, like reading about it online four or five hours a day. Like it became things that I was doing before work. It became what I wanted to do on my lunch break. It became what I did on the weekends and when I came home. In fact, when people were like, well, when you were so determined, like what really would you do?

20:09There was a photographer who I had met in a photography forum and she was talking about how she had such like a really difficult weekend ahead because she was going to shoot three weddings over a weekend and a light bulb went on. And I was just like, well, if she's like so overwhelmed, would she deny free help? And so I sent her a message and I said, hey, like, I would love to assist you on the wedding day. Let me know. And no strings or expectations. And she was like, wait, so you would fly to Atlanta to shoot the weddings with me? And I was like, absolutely, all three of them. She agreed. And so I was like, man, how am I going to get money to get to Atlanta?

20:45Well, I was like 26 years old 25 26 years old and I called my dad and I was like dad Can I have some of your airline miles? And he had just enough miles to get me to atl to shoot three weddings I was unpaid I slept on her couch, but you want to know what I turned over all of my images to her and she was so cool She's like hey, I know you're building your portfolio if you want to use a couple of them in your portfolio But if you blog about them because you know, your girl was blogging She's like just make sure that you said that you were shooting for me. I was like, absolutely that is doing what you need to do to be determined.

21:19In fact, there were times where I wanted to go to conferences and I didn't have money to go to these photography conferences, but I knew that that's where the action was. And so in these photography forums, there would be like sponsors or people who had products to sell and they'd be in the photography group. And I volunteered. I said, hey, if I go and sell on the trade show floor, like if I sell your camera bags, if I sell your albums if I sell whatever it was, could I get a pass? And they're like, sure. You know, as vendors, they were giving comped passes. And so they gave me a comped pass. I would go and sell on the trade show floor for like two or three hours.

21:54And then I got to go to these events and hear other photographers and meet other photographers. That is just being determined. That is just saying, I don't know how I'm going to make it, but I'm going to make it into that room. The second key factor of obsession is reprioritization. Now, I feel like this is just a fancy way of saying I'm cutting away. And I know that this right here is where it ruffles a lot of people's feathers. In fact, I know people are going to send me emails and DMs being like, but what about your priorities? And what about your sleep? All those are prioritized. Other things were not.

22:29Okay, I'm going to get into that in a second. So I think that anytime I look back when I became obsessed, it's not as if I got extra hours in my day. It's not as if I had extra money in the bank account. So if I didn't have more of one thing, I would have to cut back of currently what was there. And when people say, oh, I don't have time, I don't have money, I'm deeply empathetic to that. That could be a fact. A fact could be you don't have money. And it could be that your time is super limited. Those are facts. but I also think that when you're obsessed with something and you don't have money and you don't have time you find a way and oftentimes it requires cutting things back I don't have judgment when people say like I don't have time or money I've been there like so many times in fact there will always be a part of that narrative that I think I repeat to myself again and again that I don't have that but one thing I know is that when you're obsessed you're like if I don't have that is there's something I could cut away that gives me time, opportunity, bandwidth, expansiveness to do that next thing.

23:34So I ruthlessly cut away and I've learned to accept it. And I've learned that when I talk about this and share some of these stories that many people are going to have an opinion and that's okay. I've already come to grips and accepted that this is my path. I don't propose it to anybody else, but I will say the more I ruthlessly cut away, the faster I got the result that I wanted. So I had mentioned before, like having an online business versus a business online. And when I got into studying digital marketing, it became an obsession and people were using words and language that I had no idea about, like EPL, CPL, CAC, a pixel, retargeting, funnels.

24:14And I was like, I have no, this is literally learning a different language. And so I would be sitting, I'd be watching videos, I'd be hearing people having conversations, and I would just be writing notes to figure out things that I needed to research when I got back home. Google and me during this time were best friends. I just started reading what did I do? I went back to forums. I went to blog posts. People that were actually talking about this stuff and breaking it down. Your girl is simple. I am not smart. I'm just undaunted when it comes to learning how to figure it out. So I just started reading a bunch.

24:43Now, there was this realization that I had in 2014-15. And that realization was there were levels to the game of entrepreneurship. And the more I learned about the levels, the more I realized that I was proud of the business that I had built, but it didn't tap at all when I could build. And that's what I realized when I became obsessed. And when I became obsessed with cutting things away, I realized that the less time I spent with anything that wasn't taking me to the next level was not the time I wanted to spend doing that. And so there was a big shift in my personal life. I'm not proud and I don't think it's like the cost of entry.

25:28But what I will say was at the time I didn't have any balance. And there was no such thing as like work-life balance or like, what does your balance day look like? There was just none of it. And I was okay with it. I accepted that cost. I chose that. Nobody did it to me. I just said, oh, I'm seeing fragments of the game with a different set of players and how big things could be. There's not going to be balance. I wasn't going out on like girls nights. I wasn't going out on girls trips. I wasn't networking. What was the point of beaming at a networking event if I realized that that networking event was at the lowest rung of the game?