Episode 3 - The Power of Clarity

Welcome everyone to episode three of the Leadership Ignition podcast brought to you by the Leadership Ignition team where faith, family, fitness, and finance unite to help you level up your

life. I'm Shane Beckham. And I'm Mike Hough. We're both owners and coaches with the Leadership Ignition team and we're ready to help you get lit. So Mike, with this episode, if you've ever felt stretched too thin, overwhelmed or constantly

busy, not productive, man, how many times have I texted you and told you that I'm all over the place? This episode is for you because we understand. Today we're going to dive in a very popular topic between the two of us, and that is the power of clarity. How it fuels our ability to make confident decisions, lead with purpose, cut through the noise because when you're clear, you move differently, sir. Mike, we could have chosen from a thousand different topics for today. Why Clarity? Why now?

Well, that's a great question, brother. It's because without Clarity, everything else we're ever going to talk about won't matter. You know, Clarity is the, if you don't have a clear picture in your mind of a defined end game, all you're doing is just action. And those actions don't have a defined outcome. There's no point. So you know, before we can talk about any other aspects of achieving the 4F bombs, we have to define what we're actually seeking first with Clarity.

So, that brings us up to our first point. You know, defining the point number one, what is clarity? Now, there could be a million different definitions of this to whoever you are, right? We know that there's different lenses of this, but to me, when I think about clarity, I think back and I say, "Okay, how many times in my life have I found myself stretched super thin?" I don't just mean with time. I mean mentally, emotionally, spiritually, whatever adjective you want to put in there. And unfortunately, through some research, I think that I've even probably possibly altered my brain chemistry and my ability to relax because I've constantly had my brain under a load of stress. Why? You know, to me, that's a problem because I'm not finding that clarity because when that happens, it's like a ping pong ball. I'm bouncing from one thing to the next, to the next, to the next in my head and that Rolodex is spinning but there's no clear vision which means I'm slower. I'm not getting anything done. I'm never fully stopping. I'm never fully engaging. Always multitasking. We all know people like that. We are all guilty of that. So I know other people have been there. So while I still have a long way to go, Here are some of the things that I've learned to fix this. Now you're going to hear me reference some books throughout this episode. One of the main books that I love and I know you love as well, Mike, is called Atomic Habits. So here's some things straight from that book that I love. Number one, make it, make the invisible visible. Okay, what does that mean? Write it down. Every task, every thought, until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and it will call your fate out. So to me, what does that mean? Making a list, a task list that is tangible that I can put into a schedule, I can put into a calendar. Next thing is I talk about this a lot, habit stacking. It's the micro stack, meaning what? You wanna attach that new clear action to something that you already do. My perfect example is this, is at night, all right? Hopefully most of us brush our teeth before we go to bed. What's the next thing that I can do to stack a habit on top of that? I can set out my gym clothes. They're there, they're ready. Guess what? That's a stackable habit, which is what going to lead to enforcement of something we'll talk more about later, which is discipline. The last thing that I'll talk about right now is something simple that I've started doing in everyday life. I'm not promoting any specific product. Okay, let's be clear here. We're not affiliated. This is Amazon, a timer block, okay? It has different times on it. And what do I do is I sit this on top of my little laptop in front of me. And even though I may not stay exactly within the confines of that time, it gives me something to know that there is a boundary. There is a time limit to this task and I must stay focused on this task. and this task only because I am the world's worst about picking something up and I'm squirreled over here, I'm squirreled over here. So Mike, to me, clarity is not just knowing about your priorities, it's creating an environment to where you can thrive through clarity. How about it, sir? What do you got on this one?

- What's funny about that is, you are a little ADHD, but it's also one of your superpowers, right? It allows you to get a lot of things done in a little bit of time. But again, look, it's not like we're asking people or saying, suggesting that the idea is that you should do less. No one's suggesting that. It's like the things that you're doing are achieving the outcome that you're trying to reach for. And man, I live that tension too. I mean, I, younger in particular, I tried to be everything to everyone all the time. In fact, it was just one of my coaching clients, brand new coaching client I was talking to just yesterday. He said, that's his number one biggest issue is he wants to say yes to everyone all the time. And I get it. You know, if you're a people pleaser or you're just somebody who wants to achieve and you wanna get things done, yes is the answer you've got all the time. But eventually it leads to what we all know, burnout, right, man? How many times have you been through that? And you just, there's only so much you can handle for only so long. And then you got to reset and you got to retrench. And that's when you start throwing up. It's kind of like cleaning out the, the fridge, you stack it full of stuff. You think you're going to eat it all. You don't. And so, well, I got to reset. I got to clean it out and start all over and restack the fridge. That's what we're talking about here today. So when that started happening to me, it's one of the things that I learned early on. It was through a lot of books, like what we're talking about atomic habits and talk about some others like essentialism, et cetera, where you learn that you have to get clarity and you gotta get laser focused. And that's when I also heard a great speaker friend of mine, a guy named Doug Hanson, we'll probably talk about Doug a bunch of times. And he taught me the one, I still think the single most important thing that's changed in my life, which is this idea of not what do I want to do. We all have to-do lists. We got the to-do list the wife gives you on the weekend or the stuff you wanna get done that's on your list of things to do. But Shane is the to-be list. Doug said, "Who do you wanna be? What does that person look like? What does your future feel like? Is it five years or 10 years or 50 years from now? Whatever it is. What do you look like in your faith, in your family, in your fitness, in your finance? And that was more than a decade ago that Doug first shared that with me. And I went home that day and I wrote down a to-be list. And that to-be list has remained with me since that day. I go back and check at it a couple times a month and priorities change or circumstances change. And I think about what needs to change in that. But I have been since that time, swear to goodness, driving directly against that to be list this entire time. I deviate, I do some things that don't tie directly to that to be list, but when I do it right, I'm running right down that line the way I want to. And it's who do I wanna be in my beliefs? Who do I wanna be as a husband, a dad, a friend? Who do I wanna be as a business owner, as a leader? And who do I wanna be in my health span, my fitness, my lifestyle, right? So if you can nail down those four things, and I didn't always have them in those buckets, it wasn't until I was with you and other guys that said, there are these four F bombs that we should be thinking about in that way, that I rewrote that to be list that same way. So Shane, if you start your day with identity, all the actions, say this is who I'm going to be, all the actions are very simple. You just do the things that get you closer to it and don't do the things that get you further from it.

- I loved when you brought up the to be list and some of our calls that we were on in the past, and that's just, there's a lot of power in that. It's who do you want to be? And it goes into your legacy of life. It's not allowing the distractions and the noise in and being very granular and specific about that list. So I love that you shared that. And I think it's a wonderful way to approach this. So let's take that a step further. Let's drill in and say, okay, we know we have the four F-bombs. So how do we, you and I, apply certain things to them what is our clarity in each one of these? Now, this is a short answer for each one, but these are just some things that we have talked about, what it means to us. So let's define each F bomb in this manner. So to me, I want to start with faith. Okay, let's start with faith. To me, faith is a very important thing. Again, you and I have talked about this, regardless of what you believe, it's still important. Now, what does that mean to me? Importance means peace. Faith to me is the peace element of the four F-bombs. So what does that mean? It means, all right, to me, I do believe in the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. That's who my superpower is. And I believe that knowing that I have that guidance from someone above, that I have a co-pilot in this journey called life, that can give me that inner peace. Now when you talk about clarity and faith, how often do we get ourselves in situations to where something goes wrong and what do we do? "Lord, get me out of this. Lord, help me." Are we just doing that in times of tragedy or are we doing that all the time? Because if you want to be clear about something and have clarity, guess what? You're not always just seeking help when the shit hits the fan, right? You are actively being clear with that inner peace. This is just a piece of that pie, no pun intended, but we want to find clarity. So to me, when I do find myself going off the rails or doing things I probably shouldn't, guess what? I probably have stopped listening to that peace, to that voice. So one of my favorite Bible verses, Proverbs 27, 17, is "Iron sharpens irons, so one person sharpens another." Okay, I don't know exactly. There's many translations of that verse. That's my favorite translation. That goes back to the faith and also with you and I, even though we may not believe exactly the same, we hold each other accountable in that faith. And that keeps us sharp. We know that I know if I do something that's out of line in the world of faith, you're going to say, "Hey man, what are you doing?" That doesn't align with your to be list in faith. That is not who you want to be right now. And I'm like, "Gosh dang it, he's right." So to me, that's how I handle faith with clarity. So let's take that into the next one, which is family. Okay. Now, to me, what does family mean when it comes to clarity? It's being present. I found myself going back to the jumbled up mess of not being a little bit out of whack here there everywhere. It's cost me a lot of pain and it's caused my family a lot of pain as well. Why? Because I've not always been there. I've not always been present. I'm not always been the best dad, the best family man. I own it. I've been divorced twice. That's hard to admit, but a lot of that was because I was climbing a ladder that was leaning up against the wrong wall. Guess what happens when you do that? It falls down and it's painful. And you would think that one would learn after once, but nope, I'm hardheaded. It takes me more than once often to learn. So getting clear with my family, That means I have to be present. So now I have a deeper appreciation for my children. Now, even though they're gotten a little older, still have one that's young, but my appreciation has shifted so much to where I'm so fond to spend time with them. My wife, everything about it, you know, you have to find that clarity because clarity is knowing when to hustle when it comes to family, but also knowing when to pause and be with your people. Okay? So that's my clarity in family. So let's move to one of the most important ones. They're all important. Fitness. Man, I'll get hyped up on fitness. My voice goes up. My heart rate goes up. You know why? Because fitness is my gateway, man. That is how I perform the best. When I work on myself externally, sun's out, guns out, it makes who I am a better person internally, right? If you're stuck in a brain fog, if something's not going right, what can you do? You get up and go for a walk. How often does that solve the problem? If you'll just take the time to find that mental clarity and remove yourself from the problem, oftentimes it will solve itself. So let a walk be your therapy. Sweat therapy, man, equals sweat equity, sweat therapy, however you wanna put it. Have that structure and fitness. Let that gym be your clarity through therapy. All right, wrapping it up with finance. I laugh a little bit here 'cause Mike and I have been talking a lot about this lately And me personally with finance, fully transparent, I've lost everything I've owned twice. Everything. Like I was baking cinnamon rolls in the tops of a lid for that I bought from the dollar store, right? I didn't have anything. I was in a chair with a milk crate as my coffee table. That's okay, 'cause you know what? It still didn't taste good, but I'm still here. I'm still building, I'm still risking, I'm still learning because I found more clarity in the decisions make moving forward. That's why I want to go on hard business now because I know wealth can be rebuilt. I'm sorry. Here's a quote that I came up with, Mike, and I actually love it. It is "Wealth can be recreated, time can't." So when it comes to finance, you can rebuild, but you have to make smart, clear, effective decisions. Now that doesn't mean that you can't take risks. Trust me, I do plenty of that. However, be clear, precise with your planning and don't do the reckless things that can put yourself in jeopardy financially. That's just a clarity piece of those four F-bombs. That's my take on that. I'd love to hear yours, Mike, what you got, brother.

Yeah. You know, Shane, I think rather than go through each of the F-bombs, all you've done that I want to shift gears just a minute, because I think you cover that perfectly well. You know, I will just add that the, in terms of creating this idea of a to-be list around the F-bombs, it has to be something that is aspirational. It can't be something that you're doing today. It has to be, you know, the light at the top of the hill, and you've gotta be racing up that hill all day long. And here's the other thing that, one of the reasons we did this podcast is because we want to reach behind us and help those who are also on that journey, right? So one of the greatest lessons of leadership around clarity in particular is that as you start to get more clear, as you start to see the way and the path, what happens to your friends around you, Shane? What happens when you start to move down your path? Often you're left alone. You're left alone. You're left alone because people don't understand it or it scares them or they don't have the discipline themselves. You know, we were having this conversation with another friend of ours over socials this last week. I think you saw that with our friend George. And you know, he was talking about what it's like to reach a new level plateau in the physical fitness world, right? And all the questions and naysayers at the beginning and now all the doubters where he is Can you maintain it? And then my comment back was yeah and all the people who say when are you gonna slow down? When are you gonna just ease up a little bit? I'm not easing up brother. I'm just getting started And so that's what this is all about is when you get a gain that clarity But guess what anyone who wants to do this with me? I will grab your hand and I'll bring you along Let's go do it together And so, you know one of the things that was was hardest for me along this path that we talked about it a little bit earlier, and I'm going to have you talk about here again in a second too, is this idea of how not to say yes to everything. So once you set that path, you build that clarity. You can't say yes to everything because you can, you cannot do everything at all times, right? It took me years to figure this out. I thought saying yes made me a good leader. If I could say yes to everything and I could eventually get it all done, that'd be awesome. I thought it made me a good friend. Sure. I'll help you move. I'll help, whatever. A good dad. But in reality, saying yes to everything just may be distracted and ineffective. You can't do everything. It's impossible. So when you start saying yes to everything, you have to then figure out, well, what am I actually going to do? What are the things that I said yesterday that I'm not going to do? And how good is that for relationships? When you start saying yes to people and then you don't follow through. So you just can't do that. You've got to set a clear boundary and a clear guideline. So I had to start saying no to things like late night calls that drain family time. I guarantee whatever that topic was, whatever that issue was, could have been and handled the next day just fine. But at the time that I was addicted to the outcome and trying to drive performance and career, I didn't believe that. I believe that I had to handle whatever that was right now 'cause that's who people saw me as. And if I stopped being that person, then who was I really as a leader? And so I had to start to figure out that that really wasn't true and I needed to slow down a little bit. And then projects and groups and community events and things that just weren't adding value, that were things that I was committing to that I just had to realize that did not align with my purpose, I needed to stop saying yes to them. And then here's the best one. People who only pulled and never poured, right? We know about those people. People who wanna drain things from you, but they never wanna pour anything back into you. And thank God I've got you and other guys like you, 'cause that's not who we are, right? We're pulling and pouring all the time. It goes both ways. But the people who are just draining your spirit, your aura, those are the people that you gotta say no to. You just gotta move on. But the people that fill your cup, Man, fill up theirs too and hang on to them like gold. Saying no does not make you selfish, an important point. It makes you strategic. And when people start wondering why you're doing less, you say, because I'm working on a new version of me. Every yes has a cost. Most of us are going broke with our time and energy. Like you just said before, right? You can always rebuild your wealth, but you can never remake your time. And boundaries are how you build a legacy. Saying no is how you say yes to what matters the most. critically important point. I'm not saying don't say yes to things that lead you down the path. I'm saying, you know, Shane, we've been through my background before. And I think one of my key selling points to young leaders coming up is say yes to everything that moves you closer to your goal. But say no to everything that doesn't get you closer to your goal. So you get a new opportunity that comes up and it's a little scary, too bad. Say yes and go figure it out. I'm not saying don't say yes to the things that get you get you value, but say no to all those things that don't. If they align with your to be list, you say yes. But Shane, if you're not actively saying yes, then you have to say...

You got to say no, my friend. And that is an excellent summary. And the pool poor, I love that. I don't know that I've actually heard you quite use it in that context or say it that way. I'm going to steal that by the way. I like that a lot. But one of the things that I truly believe is one of the leadership superpowers that's not used enough is the word no. And why do I say that? Well, I'm sorry I can't remember the book, might have been essentialism, but if it's not 100% hell yes, then it's 100% hell no. And how many of us lead that way? I find myself struggling in the hiring process that way, or if I bring on someone that I might have been wrong about and I know that I need to cut ties, right? You know, higher, slow, fire, fast. How often do I just keep saying no to myself, it's going to work out or saying, yes, it's going to be okay, instead of just saying, nope, this is wrong, we have to move forward. So it's exactly like you said, it does not make you a weak leader. Again, I'm embarrassed, I can't remember the name name of this book I read recently is about the CEO and held on to too much, finally removed some of the things. It's the same author that wrote Five Dysfunctions of a Team. I can't place the name of the book, but it was a wonderful book and it was great for me because I have a hard time letting go of the buy-in. And with that, it also can lead me to say yes to too many things at once because I feel like if I'm the best one that can do it, then I have to say yes to everything. your point, Mike, it has to be times that you say no. Why? Because that is how you find peace. You have to protect your peace. And how do you protect your peace? By using the word no. So, point being is every time that we say yes to something, to your point, we are diluting our purpose. Meaning, we drain our energy. We undermine our authority. We're always saying yes. Think about our kids. You know, if we say yes to everything they want, what happens? They're not learning boundaries. They're learning entitlements, you know, and they're just going to keep carrying that on and throughout their life until they get into the workforce where they feel entitled. Like we're setting them up for failure by not saying the word no. Could be the same thing with coworkers.

And let me just let me just chime in there, Shane. It could because it ties what you said first, which is if you're not 100 percent Yes, you have to be 100% no. And with kids in particular, we're not great at that as a society. We're no, me, I don't think so, not right now. Maybe tomorrow.

- That or we barter, right?

- Well, right, we barter or the kid barters and they keep begging and they get on your nerves and you ultimately say, yes, you just lost. You lost 'cause you're not 100% no.

- It is a very easy to say, very hard to do. But to your point, that's why I like to have this vision of clarity between you and I and have this conversation. We talk about coaching and coaching programs in general. We coach each other all the time. I value what you say to me, and I take that and listen. And if you don't have that, then you're loose. You're not going to set these boundaries at work. And then you're probably not going to have boundaries at home. Like even your wife, you can't say yes to everything. You have to be able to defend your position and say no. So I completely agree. You know, it's a clear no can be more graceful than a noncommittal yes. Sometimes how often do we say yes and not mean it just to get somebody to shut up? That's not good. But man, we all do it. Or maybe when you really mean no. Or maybe that's an excellent point. And maybe I can make that work out in the back of your mind. There's not a hundred percent chance in snowballs hell I'm going to do this. Right. So learning how to be more present and eloquent with how you say it can mean a lot to it. So that kind of brings us into our next point. And you talk about this a lot. You can do anything but not everything. And to me, I struggle with this. You know, I've had a vast life. I've done a lot of different things. I could be you could call me a, you know, jack of all trades, master of none. But when it comes to clarity, it took me a long time to figure out what my true purpose is. And maybe I still haven't found it. I think I have. But I had to get clear on that vision. And what do I mean by that? What am I truly good at? If I can do anything but not everything, and I keep trying to do everything, what's the one thing that I'm the best at? So I feel like right now-- I don't even know if I want to say right now-- I am best at helping others become better human beings or helping them find their gift. You know, that's why I own a gym. It gives me that opportunity to help other human beings. That's why we have this leadership ignition team because we want to coach and help other human beings get better. Mine is, I have a lot of mistakes that I've made over the course of my life and I can really lean in and pour and say, "Look, I'm a normal guy that's made all these mistakes. I'm not saying that I can keep you from that, but I can sure as hell tell you what not to do in this situation if you'll just listen." So I feel like that's one of the clear things that's come to me that's helped me say, "Okay, Shane, this is what you need to be doing and putting your energy into so you're not draining it everywhere else and becoming clear on that vision with that clarity and say, I'm going all in on this to help other human beings." Same thing, you know, going in last example on this. I see a lot of this happening at the gym and you talk about doing anything over everything. What I mean by that is going back to the book Atomic Habits, which says focus on your systems over your goals. Okay, so if your goal is to be all these things, you need to get more granular. All right, so what is your system processes look like to get you to that goal? I don't want to get too deep in the weeds because it's a whole nother episode, but my point is this, think about weight loss. Weight loss is a tricky subject, especially when it comes to women, okay? And that's primarily what I deal with at work. Now, when I have a meeting with them, I'll say this, what is your goal? Tell me what your goals are, you know, most likely someone's got a weight loss goal, which I love and respect. Yes, let's honor that goal. However, what is the systems in place to get there is what I want to know next. And then are you going to become fixated so much on a number that you forget to recognize all the change that you're having in your body because the goal becomes more important than anything else. That to me is the danger and clarity of trying to do too much, aka everything, instead of being specific and just doing the one thing that can get you there. So if your body composition is changing and the weight on the scale is not moving, but you are becoming a better, healthier human being that looks better, has more stamina, more endurance. I still see long faces. I still see fat. You know why? Because you get locked into that goal. Dangerous territory, Mike. It can happen with a lot of things, but that's just something that's fresh with me that when you want to be clear about something, make sure you don't get lost on one thing.

Yeah. You know, two things that you said there that I want to touch back on. I'll move on on to the next topic, but the first is you're talking about when you made a bad decision. We all do. You cannot tell who everyone is when you're hiring somebody through an interview. A resume is nothing but a stack of lies that you're trying to sort through where the true points are. And so, you know, you hire people who you think you've got connection with, who you think, at least that's what we do in my organization, is we look for people who've got the character and what we think is the discipline. And people can make you feel just about anything if they're good enough actors. So you make mistakes. But one of the things that I tell all my leaders every single time is when you know, you know, and do not wait one second longer, because the biggest mistake you can make is when you know you're on the wrong path and you keep thinking that path is going to get better by loving it more or by talking to it more or whatever it is, whether that be in business or at home, it doesn't, it never gets better. It only gets worse. And it becomes this cancer, this, this forest fire that continues to burn everything around it deeper and deeper into your, into your organization or your family or your fitness goals or whatever it is, and you know better. And the other thing that you talked about that I wanted to cover off on was, you know, you put it in the gym context of losing weight, but as a business leader, uh, as a unit manager or a CEO or whatever, right, you cannot become so fixated on the, whatever it is, financial target, the growth goal, the KPI, whatever it is that you forget about the process that gets you to that target, right? It's like what you talked about in the gym. You have to love the process. You have to love going every day. You have to love in my case, putting super heavy weights on your back and squatting down until you can't anymore. You have to love picking big gigantic objects off off the ground, because I'm never going to get to my end goals if I don't love the pain of the process. And, and the business world is exact same way. And how many times do you see, you know, something happened, some macroeconomic event comes in, or you get an injury in the gym, something happens that's outside of your control, maybe the injury wasn't my control, uh, and, and now you got to navigate that. Well, what do people often do? They change everything. They change the process. They change the people they change because they're scared about this thing has just now happened versus no, no. If we have the discipline to stay down the path that we were on to achieve the goal, we'll get there. May take us a little longer than we thought it would have otherwise, but we can get there. We can solve that. And man, I'll just say it again. Yep. Thanks. And I'll just say it again. At that point you made, you can do anything. And I'm a firm believer in this. I think any human being of average intelligence or greater can do anything. Maybe not dunk a basketball from the free throw line, but within reason, but not everything. You can't do everything. If you focus on the things that matter most, you can get there. And I do live by that now. Uh, when I was building businesses young and I was trying to build a career and a family, man, 80 plus hour work weeks, I was doing everything, nothing very well. And so now I just run everything through that one filter. Is this aligned with my goal? Is this aligned with my to be list? The answer is no. It's out. It doesn't matter how shiny it looks. You know, I learned to trade hype for health, right? So all that stuff you talked about, fad diets and, uh, you know, drinking this powder or doing this workout or changing this, I did all, did it all, didn't work. And then I realized consistency and discipline in the outcome got, got me there. Urgency for clarity. So instead of trying to do so many things so fast today, it's what do I do today to set up for the longterm? And then pressure for purpose, you know? Uh, you can put a lot of pressure on a lot of people to get things done and they will in the short run, but guess what happens in the long run, they burn out too, because you can do anything, but you can't do everything. So, you know, maybe we talk for a minute about boundaries. So you mentioned it earlier that boundaries are important. I think I said something about that too. And boundaries truly are the fences that protect your purpose, right? You don't set the boundary. Somebody else is going to do it. somebody else is going to set your schedule and run your life. But I guarantee you it's probably happened in at least one of your 48 marriages. It's it happens. It happens in mine that if you don't set up clear expectations about tomorrow or next week or how it's going to go, somebody else can do that for you. And not that you have to you have to negotiate that in that context. So make sure you're both aligned. But it's true at work, right? It's true. Think about friendships. You know, there are people who are willing to run you over if you let them. It's true in every walk of life. So you have to have the power to establish boundaries and not allow noise. Just think about in society, what are you willing to accept? We talked about this example before about people leaving, um, grocery carts in the parking lot or, you know, people who, uh, funny, we were floating down the lake yesterday. My, my nephew and I, and my wife and his mom, and just out for a sunset cruise. And he's, he's fishing a little bit and the little guy looks up and he saw a pop can floating in the lake. He's like, "Uncle Mike, we got to go back and get that pop can." I said, "Yes, sir, we do." And so we circled back around, he grabbed the net, we grabbed the pop can. Because his father set boundaries for him that said that that's not who we are. We're not going to allow somebody else's mess to reside if we can do something about it. And that's like all of us, right? What boundaries do you have in society, not just amongst your family and at work? And so from Atomic Habits, they say quite plainly, your environment has to be designed to protect your habits, your energy, and your clarity. And so, you know, what I love about Atomic Habits is this idea that's really, it's really quite simple. You just choose a path and you pick one thing and you tie that one thing to something else you already do. And then once that thing becomes a habit, you pick another little thing. And that's why they're called Atomic because they're tiny, but they stack up to be something really exciting. So let me just break this down into practical concept, Shane, and then we'll get back to some of your thoughts on this. But, okay. So what do boundaries actually look like? So let's talk about business first. They look like time blocking and setting response hours. So your calendar should be clearly articulated from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to bed. I know that sounds pedantic, but if you look at mine, it is maybe one day we'll share that. And maybe I'll block out some of the things we shouldn't be sharing on the screen. But you know, what time am I going to wake up? What am I going to do for the first 15 minutes after that? What happens between that? That I got to drive to work if I'm if I'm in Atlanta or wherever I'm going to the office. And then what's the first 15 minutes look like there? and who am I meeting with for the next two hours? What meetings do I have in the day? When am I called? So at the end of the day, what time am I leaving to go to the gym? When I go to the gym, what am I doing after that? It's very, very clear in your calendar. And when in business, when you ask for something to be done, a team or you've got something you've got to do, you must time bound it. You have to say how long the expectation is for the response or the action or the whatever. I think we all get that, but sometimes we're pretty weak about it. We just say, well, do this thing. And then we're upset when it's not done Okay, so boundaries and fitness means committing to non-negotiables. Everyone's got them. If you build a proper fitness program, you'll have them. Mine is I will work out six days a week and I will strength train at least five of those days. And if I can work out a seventh day and it feels more like fun, then I'll do it. And I also make sure that my diet is dialed in and I'm set up for the entire week to make sure that my diet's dialed in. In relationships, it's carving out sacred time. One of the things I didn't talk about that's in my calendar is when I'm going to reach out to my kids by a text or call. When I'm, if I'm on the road, which I am a lot, what, what am I going to reach out to Michelle? What are we going to talk about? And so planning that stuff. And then, you know, if an event comes up and I think it'd be really fun for me and one of my kids or multiple, multiple of my kids to do, I will reach out to them immediately. And if they say yes, I'm putting that in my calendar. Uh, I had a little error in a friend of mine who invited me on a trip in a two weeks. And then I said, yes, to, and didn't put it in my calendar. Sorry again about that Shane, we'll talk about that later. But if you don't, if you don't block this time out, then you'll screw up and you'll miss it. And so that's why these boundaries are critically important. Boundaries aren't walls to keep people out their fences to keep your purpose in. Think about that for a minute. Boundaries are not trying to keep everyone blocked out from you. It's trying to make sure that the things that you said were in your to be list get accomplished. You don't owe everyone access to you. You don't I know you feel like you do because you want to be a I know I do you want to be a cooperative, respectful human being, but your energy, your peace, they're yours. Don't give it away for free. Get clear on who and what gets a yes from you. It can't be everything. Protect that like your mission depends on it. And I think we want to issue a challenge this week. Don't we? I, what's our challenge we want to issue this week to our team?

What's one thing you need to say no to this week and it can be anything. And I want to, I want to touch back on a, on a point you made a couple, actually. You can't, you can't, maybe you can maybe you can re quote about giving yourself to everybody. You can't do that. And I'm the world's worst about that goes back to the word no. And, you know, being purposeful with that not not ill willed or not angry but your piece is yours and you must protect it and I thought that was clutch that, you know, just because someone wants to do something or needs your attention or time doesn't mean you have to give it to them. You can be very respectful and say, "Hey, listen, I appreciate that, but I don't have time for that." And I've gotten way better at that. Essentialism is a critical book to read when it comes to that. And I think there can be extremes there too. I think you can take that too far to where you can shut people out of your life that you probably shouldn't. And maybe that's a little loose, but you can take things to extremes, find that happy medium. So I love that point. The second point I wanted to make is about your schedule. So when we do share this, you're going to be amazed at Mike's schedule. Like, he's not kidding. Everything is accounted for except the trip we were supposed to take together, which apparently was not important enough to make it to the calendar. In fact, I want to tell a funny story. When Mike says lock something in, it means it, right? So I don't bring it up anymore. He went back and look, I knew he was going to go back in those text messages because he wasn't convinced he told me to lock it in. He did find that he did, by the way. I most certainly did. Sorry, I didn't mean to call you out.

But that's right. Totally worth it.

But your point on that is my point on that is this, not to get long winded on the subject, but it means something to me. It's made me do more of that. But here's the thing that I correlate with. It's like nutrition. OK, not to all my nutritionist clients. You are the puppet master. You control everything that you do. Right. So that means just like your life schedule, Mike, you have a clarity, clear plan of what your day looks like from the time you get out of bed to the time you go to sleep. Now, are there going to be things that come up and happen? Yes, you have the ability and the power to shift. You know how to do that. However, you're very clear in that schedule. You know exactly what you're going to do. Tie that back to what I deal with in the world of nutrition. If you are not proactively taking the time to put the stuff in the day before, Guess what? You are chasing a moving target that you can never hit. And that goes back to your point about life and scheduling. If you want to be clear, you want to be focused, you want to be essential, you want to do all the things that we've talked about so far, stop mouth-servicing, write it down and put it in your schedule. And when you start doing that, then you will get better. Sorry, I went on a little tangent there, but I just wanted to go back to what you talked about. Hey Mike, I know we have gotten excited about this so far, but I truly believe to give everybody what they want, we need to probably break this into a two-part series. So what do you say we wrap this first session up? Any final thoughts here on the clarity piece before we move into the essential piece? Yeah, it's been fun to get so deep into this that we have to do it in two.

So no, I think we should just remind folks to subscribe and follow, come to our website, join us at leadershipignitionteam.com, find us on Facebook and Instagram and check us out Shane.

That's right. Share us with everybody. You know, we want to continue to spread this word We love everybody that gives us feedback and listening. So, you know what? Thank you for listening. Thank you for being a part of this podcast Thank you for trusting us. And as always stay focused stay fierce and and Speaker 3 baby