Creating A Success Mindset with Michael Hyatt

Welcome to Let It Be Easy with Susie Moore.

Susie Moore:

I am so excited to have my friend Michael Hyatt on the podcast today. I've known Michael for years and he's one of my original mentors when it comes to being productive, staying focused. I love his work. I love the work of his company Full Focus. I also love his daughter Megan, who he co-authored his most recent book with Mind Your Mindset. And that is what this conversation, this interview is all about. Here's a latest book, which is all about reexamining reality and using your mind in the most conscious, powerful way possible. If you dunno, Michael, he's the author of several New York Times, wall Street Journal and USA Today bestselling books, and he creates incredible full focus planners that I know so many people are in love with. And there's a goodie for you too. Check out mind your mindset book.com/susie for some bonuses just for us. I think you'll love Michael, what he shares today around focus, around boundaries, about really connecting with your why and what that means for your life, for your business. And I'm thrilled to share someone who's work I love so deeply with you. So here we go, my friends enjoy Mr. Michael Hyatt. Michael Hyatt, welcome to the Let It Be Easy podcast. I'm so happy you're here.

Michael Hyatt:

Thank you, Susie. I'm delighted to be here with you.

Susie Moore:

I would love to congratulate you and Megan on Mind Your Mindset. What a book.

Michael Hyatt:

Thank you.

Susie Moore:

What a book. I thought this book could also be called Reexamining Reality, which is what we can all benefit from sometimes.

Michael Hyatt:

Absolutely not everything you think is real, is real.

Susie Moore:

Oh, I mean, I'd love to just start Michael by asking you this word mindset's thrown around a lot. I feel like everyone is a mindset expert. People say success is just mindset. In the context of this book, because it is scientific, you give so much data, so many pieces of research, what does mindset mean to you in the context of this book?

Michael Hyatt:

Yeah, basically it's the stories that we're telling ourselves about whatever situation we're in. And some of those stories are very empowering and some of those stories are not so empowering. And so that really spells the difference between success and failure. It really starts with our thinking. And the way that we came on this is that I realized years ago, I had an amazing executive coach by the name of Eileen. She would fly into Nashville once a month and she would spend the entire day with me. And so at that point, I was the CEO of Thomas Nelson publishers and I was trying to grow the company. We had grown successfully every year, earnings up, revenue's up, profits up everything for seven years. But then I was kind of out of tricks and we kind of flatlined. So I hired Eileen to come in and coach us and said, how can we get back on a growth trajectory?

And she said, well, your results are basically the result of the actions that you're taking. And most entrepreneurs, people like you, Susie and Heath and us, we have an action bias. We think if we can just work harder, faster, smarter, that somehow we can use brute force and get better results. But what I learned from Eileen is the thing that shapes our actions. So going now further upstream is our thinking. So how we think about the problems we're facing or the frustrations we're experiencing will determine even the range of actions and strategies that are available to us and have a direct correlation with the results we're trying to achieve. So if we want better results in any area of life or in our business, we've got to begin with our thinking.

Susie Moore:

Oh my gosh, yes. And as I read your book, Michael, I'm thinking, gosh, no wonder him and Megan and the team are such good business coaches because you cover so many areas of our thinking, our blind spots, things that we simply haven't considered before. And I remember actually you telling me about Eileen at Blackberry Farm when we had that masterminding lunch and the very powerful question she asked you, which was also of course included in the book here, you had this month in July, it wasn't so great and you weren't happy with the revenue. And then you go straight to there's inflation, gas prices, consumer habits changing, et cetera. And look, no one would say that you were wrong. The average person would go, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, totally. Yeah, yeah. But that's still not satisfactory to you because your job isn't to find all the excuses or to find the reasons why things aren't working as you like. And the question was, would you like to say it or I can read it here. I've got it written perfectly. Yeah, I

Michael Hyatt:

Can say it. I totally can't. It memorized. So yeah. So she said to me after I recounted all these various things that were out there in the external world, she said, well, who was it about your leadership that led to these results? And that was kind of offensive. And I said, Eileen, this has nothing to do with my leadership. I just got done explaining to you why we experienced these results. It's the economy, it's our industry, it's social media and traditional media not working and all that. She said, okay, I get all that. As you said, Susie, those are factors. But she said, what was it about your leadership that led to these results? And I was like, Eileen, it nothing to do with my leadership. And she said, okay, well, clearly you're not getting it.

Susie Moore:

So

Michael Hyatt:

She said, if you could go back 30 days and if you could change anything based on what you know now, would you, and I said, absolutely. She said, like what? I said, well, I probably would've met with the sales team every day for a short standup meeting just to make sure that we were on pace to exceed our budget. She said, okay, good. What else? I said, well, I think that I also would've gone on that sales call with the sales team to Walmart and Target. I think just my presence there as a CEO, I could have pushed in more product into those stores. She said, okay, what else? So I gave her three to five reasons. She looked back, kind of smiled, she said, so what you're telling me is that it was about your leadership. I was like, oh yeah,

Susie Moore:

No, I lean. I know.

Michael Hyatt:

I think most people have had an experience like that where they have this story where they're the victim and the problem is out there. The problem is as long as the problem is out there, you can't do anything. You're just a victim. You have no agency. But once I accepted responsibility for the results, it admitted that my leadership is what led to those results. The good news was all the power came back to me. Now I could lead in a different way, which I did and got much better results, but I had to own that story. I had to be conscious of that story and intentionally change it.

Susie Moore:

It's interesting, isn't it, Michael, because we are so reluctant sometimes to accept responsibility and we're so quick as humans to defend ourselves. And like you said, the story is partially true, the external factors, but that's always been the story. I mean that always been, it's as old as time. It's as old as time, all the things that are going wrong and why you can't complete the things or do the things the way that you want to. What I love about this story is of course, the blind spots that were uncovered for you. And I think that you've used this so many times to help people understand the power that they have within them because we are so quick to just abdicate just, and like you said, it was like a bit of a dagger. Why is she asking me this? I've already explained it to her. And is this a question that you keep coming back to again and again?

Michael Hyatt:

Yes, absolutely. I use this in my coaching all the time, and of course my clients make fun of me. Now tell me some story and they'll just say, I know, I know. What was it about my leadership? So they get it. But I learned that from Eileen and it's very powerful. But the problem is it's very difficult for us and even for me sometimes, even to this day, knowing what I know, it's very difficult to be self-aware of our stories because we confuse our stories with reality. We say, no, no, no, that's the way it happened. But we know based on the brain research that we did for the book, that up to 20% of our memories are false, as in they never happened. We just made it up. Now, we didn't do that at a conscious level, but somehow we got two and two and got five or six, and we tried to add those two numbers together.

Up to 70% of our memories are distorted in some significant way. So this is not intended to cause us to question reality in a negative way, but at least open us up to the possibility that there might be another way of understanding what happened that would be more empowering. So there's always the facts of what happened to us, and then there's the meaning that we assign to it, and the brain is like that. It cannot exist without meaning. So it's always taking the facts and trying to assemble them together like logos or legos, and it's trying to assemble them into a story. And the problem is it often gets it wrong. So we have to separate the facts from the story, and once we can become self-aware, then we can go, oh, there may be another way to tell that story in a way that will lead to better results.

Susie Moore:

I love in the book, Michael, how you use the Adam and Eve story to differentiate the what and the why and how this so succinctly essentially encapsulates what we do as humans a fact. What's the neutral facts, objectively speaking, and then how we create a story instantly. It's just what our brains do. Could you share it with us?

Michael Hyatt:

Yeah. So this is a story that whether you're Christian or Muslim or Jewish, this is a familiar common story that we all have in the book of Genesis, and it's the story of Adam and Eve. And God has told them that they're in the garden and there's one particular tree that they're not to eat from, and they do eat from it. Eve takes this fruit and she asks Adam to eat from it, and he eats from it, and then they instantly know that they're naked, and so they hide from God. So God comes to them, and in the narrative, in the book of Genesis, he comes to them and he says, Adam, where are you now? That's simply a question about location. Where are you? And I mean, the proper answer would be, I'm behind the third tree on your left or whatever.

But he doesn't answer that way. He answers with a why question. He says, well, I ate the fruit that the woman you gave me gave to me. So he's already blame shifting. And so then he turns to the woman and he says, what have you done? And she could have answered just given the facts, but no, she gave a story and she said, well, it was the serpent. The serpent made me do it. So this blame shifting is going on and on down the line, and it just goes to show how quickly we are to jump to a story to try to explain our actions. And we do it every sphere of life. We do it in relationships, we do it in our businesses, we do it with our health, we do it with all kinds of things. But jumping to that story and answering the why question too early is not helpful.

Susie Moore:

And you explained in the book too, you highlight something called the invisible step, right? Because as you said, especially people who are real go-getters, we go straight from problem to strategy. It's like something's not right, fix it. But you explained that the invisible step is the problem, the story, examine the story and then go to the strategy. And you say that there are three steps to be able to do that. So identifying the problem and the story attached, interrogating the story, I'm obsessed with that. And then imagining something that works better. And it's so practical, the advice and the questions you put in the book here. Could you take us through those steps, Michael, and maybe, okay, so I'll give you an example. There's someone who I've been working with who hasn't been happy with her revenue, say like the last maybe year or so. She's like, Facebook ads aren't what they used to be. And that's it. And that's where it ends, right? That's kind of where her frustration has been. So how would you maybe take it through those three steps? So identify the problem of the story, interrogate the story, and then imagine something that works

Michael Hyatt:

Better. Repeat to me, what does she say? What is her story?

Susie Moore:

Well, her story is that the Facebook ads have changed, which is also a fact since the iOS updates. It's a different way of working now with Facebook ads. And she's like, well, that's it. I guess that I'm then a victim of those shifts and my return isn't great, and so my business isn't doing well.

Michael Hyatt:

Yeah, okay, awesome. Okay, so step one, identify the story. So you kind of did that. You put it out there for us. There's another component that's important under this heading that we have to understand, and that's the role of something that Megan and I refer to as the narrator. Now, this is the personification of the kind of thinking that's going on inside of our head. We've given it a name. This is the villain in this story. It's that voice inside our head that's constantly commenting on the things that we experience. It talks nonstop. It's in our own voice, and we assume that it's reality. So back in the early nineties, I had a business that for five years was unbelievable, did incredibly well. And then for reasons I won't get into it, we basically failed. The business fell apart. We got into a relationship with a distributor that essentially we were destroyed in the process. And I developed this thought, and it was something that I had thought to myself periodically, but never gave voice to, but I came to this conclusion, I'm not very good with money.

Then a couple years I'm sitting on an airplane with one of my good friends and he is hearing me recount some of the aspects of this story. And he says, sounds to me like you're not very good with money. Now, he was basically restating what the narrator was already saying in my head, and because he was somebody I really esteemed and valued, it gave it even more authority. So I just assumed that that story was the truth, that I wasn't very good with money. And because I made that assumption, because I had that story that I spent the next 10 years proving it, proving that I wasn't very good with money. So I made bad investments, acquired way too much debt, just went through a whole series of financial issues until I got the story, until I interrogated it and got a better story. But I had to recognize that story to start with.

So I think in your friend's case, it's simply explaining that concept and asking the question, okay, so what's the story? Okay, Facebook ads aren't working, what else? And maybe she says, well, there's somewhere in this. She's thinking there's nothing I can do about it. That's the only avenue that I can use. That's the only part of my business that it really requires Facebook ads. And if there are no Facebook ads, then I'm done. Now, if you think about that, people that have achieved amazing things are unwilling to accept those kind of conclusions, like Facebook ads are the only way to win. You think of Apollo 13, on the backside of the moon explosion, it would've been easy just to assume, look, there's just no way those astronauts are getting home. We just need to face the inevitable, write 'em off, get to the next thing.

They're dead. And yet the flight controller in Houston said, no, failure is not an option. We have to come up with a solution. So the first step is identifying that story and then to interrogate the story. And this is where we have to separate what are the real facts. And one of the real facts would be yes, and I've experienced this, you probably have too. Facebook ads are not working. They used to, part of that's because Apple changed the settings. So that tracking is not as easy as it once was. And so it's hard to make those Facebook ads perform in the way that they did. But that's the fact the story is therefore I'm dead in the water. Yes. Right. Well, in interrogating the story, there's so many different avenues here, but we've got to separate the fact from the fiction and hold ourselves to the possibility that maybe there's a different way or a different story that we could tell that would be more empowering.

And that's where it comes to step three. And that's to imagine a better story. So maybe in this case, to ask your client, is there any other possible way to understand that? For example, you might say something as simple Facebook ads aren't working the way they used to. I guess I'll have to find another way to reach perspective customers. So that's a different story. It's not maybe the best story, but at least opens you to the possibility that maybe success is still possible. Or maybe you could say something. And this question is in the book too. Facebook ads aren't working. They used to, what does this make possible? Well, maybe it would make possible creating a business that's not so darn reliant on Facebook. Maybe we could find other avenues of marketing here if we just stay with it and work that would make our business less dependent on one avenue for success and make it more resilient and more recession proof or whatever. So that's even a better story, but we get to choose,

Susie Moore:

Oh my gosh, I absolutely agree. And don't you think, Michael, too, that whenever we examine our options, I mean most people just, they're so quick to say, I'm stuck, or something's not working, and there's no option examination that's happening, it's just, well, so this happened then that and straight to a negative emotion, and then often no action. But don't you think that when we explore our options, we go, what else? You said, what else? Such a great question. What else is there? There's affiliates, there's media, there's all sorts of organic. I mean, there are always, and this is just in one small business context, don't you find that when you put it out there or when you have fun playing the game of the options that abound or that could be there, that we find out that there's always this abundance somehow that we can tune into that we've totally overlooked?

Michael Hyatt:

Yes. And I think that one of the things we have to realize is the incredible power of our brains, like our brains, all the neurons that make up our brain and all the possible neural connections create a neural network that is 10 times bigger than the worldwide web. So we have this amazing source of possibility and options, and yet we explore a few. And again, we have to understand that the brain's job is to keep us safe.

Our brain is very good at pattern recognition, but it doesn't always work with a big sample set. So we have one negative experience like Facebook ads, were working now, they're not working. And so I guess I'm done very small sample set only my experience, and then I draw this universal conclusion. It's not possible to succeed without Facebook ads. And that's where we have to ask the question, well, but what does this make possible? That kind of turns it on its head and it takes an adversity and it says, ah, maybe this is an opportunity. Maybe there's something really good here that could strengthen my business and give me even more of what I want.

Susie Moore:

And also if just say, Facebook ads aren't working like the story, Facebook ads have changed. That's a reality. But Facebook ads aren't working. Say that's a story attached. And then the negative consequences follow, that's also an opportunity because that's probably true for everybody then. Or everyone's experiencing a shift. Who's going to stick in it? Who's going to be creative, who's going to persevere? Often? I always find that when there's a downturn or when something unexpected happens that creates unwanted outcomes, that's good. If I'm standing, if I'm willing to test, if I'm willing to go, oh, okay, so what can this reveal to us? But don't you think that we're so quick to just write things off versus be almost like, do you ever bring this element or this energy of being playful? Even with problems like, oh, well, often because they're not in isolation for one person. If we're speaking generally about cultural shifts or even what's going on with certain platforms, it's not just targeting you. This is the reality for a lot of people. So that's also something fun to play with, don't you think?

Michael Hyatt:

It is. And part of what makes it fun is that if you can get a breakthrough on your thinking, you're going to be very unique because most people are not. Most people are going to just give up and walk off the field, but if you can persevere and find another solution, incredible things can happen. But this is sort of the difference. Carol Dweck talks about this in her book mindset, a fixed mindset and a growth mindset. But think of Steve Jobs back in 2007 when they're beginning to cook up the iPhone. It would be introduced I think in 2009. But imagine here he is introducing a new cell phone in a market that the technology industry and all the pundits said was totally saturated. Everything that could be invented with regard to cell phones has been done. There's no room for innovation. This is a closed system. And Bill Gates said after the iPhone was introduced, bill Gates, the main competitor to Apple, said, I give it a year. He said, nobody needs another cell phone. And yet Microsoft totally struck out when it came to the mobile and the cell phone market, they introduced a phone too late. It wasn't successful. They're still not in that game till today. Meanwhile, Apple's a trillion plus dollar company largely on the back of the iPhone. So there's a guy that thought differently, and it's pretty interesting. If you go back to Apples origins, you remember that big ad campaign they had think different. So thinking's, everything.

Susie Moore:

It reminds me of too, what Henry Ford said, he is like, if I asked my friends what they needed, they'd say a faster horse. Exactly. But human ingenuity, this is kind what I think, Michael. It's like, isn't this the fun, the reason we're all here? The problems are never going to end, right? It's not like, oh, made it great year. Next year's going to be great next year, next year. I think so much of how we approach this and then of course reading a book like Mind Your Mindset, it allows us to just, it opens us up to so much. And one chapter I love in the book is around intuition and how it's sometimes a little overrated, especially as a sole source of guidance. And the reason I love that you brought this up in the book is because I think there's a lot of people who say, just trust your intuition.

I just feel like this is the right price, or this is the right move. And look, there is value. There is so much inner guidance that is to be revered. But sometimes, and this has happened to me in business before, which is why I love working with Heath, who's so data-driven. We've even tested higher prices on products, and when we actually go to a lower price, it's more revenue and more net profit at a lower, but that goes against conventional wisdom. It's like increase your prices. It's like, actually, no, we do it our way. And it's just based on the numbers. Could you speak a bit about intuition and reason and the ups and downs of intuition?

Michael Hyatt:

Yeah, intuition is a remarkable thing, and it's primarily designed again to keep us safe. So much of our brain is designed to do, but what it is is essentially our brain at very fast speeds, recognizes a pattern it's seen before, and we come to a conclusion seemingly without thinking, we're bypassing the executive function of our brain. And so we have this sense that something is right or wrong. We tell the story in the book about this race car driver, and he's speeding up this hill, and all of a sudden he feels compelled to hit the brakes. He doesn't know why, but he doesn't. What he couldn't see on the other side of the hill was this multi-car pile up. And if he had gone into that at the speed he was traveling, he probably would've been killed, most certainly would've killed somebody else, but he hits the brakes.

So when they were trying to deconstruct that, well, why did you have this intuition? Well, the pattern that he recognized that was unconscious to him was out of the periphery of his vision. He saw that the crowd was looking over the hill, not at him, but over the hill, because they could see what he couldn't see, which was the pile up on the other side of the hill. So he recognized the pattern and came to that conclusion. So that's good. I mean, when intuition works like that, that's awesome. But when the intuition has a limited set of experiences and has intuitions, like for example, in your friend's case, we keep going back to on the Facebook ads, the pattern that they've seen is put some money to Facebook, run some ads, get some sales. And so it'd be really easy for them to come to the conclusion that without Facebook just intuitively, there's nothing else.

There's nothing else. And so what we have to recognize is that intuition is limited because it can only work with the patterns that's been given. So that if you have limited experience, if you have broader experience, that's awesome because that's raw material for intuition to work. But we ought to always verify the intuition with data when we can, so we don't have to just embrace it because that's our intuition, and we think it's infallible. Now have this intuition. Now let's just interrogate the intuition and see if it's based on a limited pattern set or if it's something bigger. We talk about this story in the book about the correlation between shark bites and ice cream sales.

So literally in the summer, there's a high correlation between ice cream sales and shark bites. And if you're not careful, a lot of people would jump because of the pattern recognition would jump to the conclusion that eating ice cream leads to shark attacks. So evidently sharks like humans that have been eating ice cream, no, no, no. That's just correlation. They both happen in the summer. So shark bites go up because more people are swimming. Ice cream sales go up because more people are hot. So there's no causation there. It's merely correlation. So we wouldn't want to take our pattern recognition and the intuition and infer something that in fact is unwarranted. So we got to test it with the facts.

Susie Moore:

Michael, when it comes to making business decisions for you, I mean, of course there are always so many ways you can go, right? You can invest here, you could expand here, you could maybe drop this or reimagine something in your business. Is there a practice that you have? Is there a structure, a way of thinking that you constantly come back to when it comes to making big decisions?

Michael Hyatt:

Well, I'd say I tend to rely on the data. I always want to see the numbers. A good example of this would be, let's say that you have multiple products in your business that you're selling, and at the same time you've noticed that your profitability is decreasing and you want to get back to better profit margins. And so one of the things you could do, you might have an intuition that product A is just not working like it should, or product B is not working like it should. But if you do, for example, what we would call in our coaching practice, the segmentation analysis, where you look at the profitability by product, you might be surprised. You might be surprised to find out that big thing, and this has happened to us in that big thing that you were investing so much time and energy and consumed all the resources of your team is barely profitable.

And if you just cut that or sold it, sunsetted it wherever the profitability of your business would automatically improve. This happened to me back in the book publishing business, and this was crazy because we were publishing about 120 books a year in the business unit I was responsible for, and our profitability was, we were unprofitable. Intuition would say, well, if you want to be more profitable, you got to publish more books. And I said, no, I just think we need to cu out of this whole mix of 120 books the Losers and focus more on the books that had better potential and we could apply more of our resources to. So we went literally from 120 books a year to 48 books a year and almost doubled our profit. But that's what the data told us.

Susie Moore:

And of course, you have the full focus planner, the free to focus book and so forth. But do you think that so much of, because I've always admired how you make decisions and execute, it's like Michael's changing things up and it just happens and it just feels like, Ooh, that's the right thing. Do you feel like focus is something that is not really valued so much? Or there's something, I remember Ray Dalio saying something like, the thing that's missing in the world is focus. People just don't focus. I'd love to hear you speak about focus for a moment because I think it doesn't get airtime. It's like volume, create more like hustle work till your eyes bleed. We can always be doing more. More isn't the problem. And I would say that most creative people who are ambitious, we're happy to do more. More isn't the issue, but it just feels like it's a, it's not being directed in the right way. Our energies.

Michael Hyatt:

It's not. I think it was David Allen that said, you can do anything you want. You just can't do everything you want. Not all tasks, not all projects, not opportunity. Not all opportunities are created equal.

And I really subscribe, and this is counterintuitive, but I really subscribe to the maxim that you could achieve more by doing less if you focus on the right things. So in other words, if I will take, and part of the full focus system that we have in the planner, full focus planner is this idea of the daily big three. And when people hear about that, like, okay, I got to identify three tasks and only three tasks for the day, there's no way I could run my business on that because I got 15 or 20 or 30 tasks that I need to get done every day. And of course, we always ask the question, how often are you successful with that? Well, never. That's exactly right. Because not all tasks are created equal. Not all tasks move you towards your goal. Not all tasks are part of an important project, but if you can reduce it to the, that really are the ones that really are the high leverage opportunities that you execute against and you focus on just those, your business is going to do great and you're going to have a life.

Susie Moore:

I know, and I feel like almost Michael, you're the original advocate for having a life, right? And I love the way that Megan, how she structures her week, I've learned so much from you both around how she has her cutoff, how she has her life set up specifically to support her, to focus in her genius zone. If there were two or three things that you think are missing most from the kind of overcrowded, noisy, try this, try that, these tips, this advice, no, this is a new strategy. We will need this new shiny object over here, have to implement it. Now you're losing millions of dollars. What are the two or three core truths and principles you always come back to as a CEO?

Michael Hyatt:

Yeah, kind of to come back to where we started a few moments ago, I think focus is a superpower, and it's very, very difficult in the distraction economy because there are companies that have multi-billion dollar research centers that are basically fighting for your attention. They figured out Facebook knows more about psychology than you'll ever learn. Same thing with Twitter, same thing with LinkedIn and their intent on interrupting you and stealing your focus. Why? Because they're trying to resell it to advertisers. That's the entire model. So I think it's imperative that we get really good at focusing, and I think there's some tools that we can do that coming up with a daily big three is one thing. I think the biggest hack I got, Susie was an executive coach that told me, they said, your biggest problem. This was after I'd gone through turning a division around at this corporation and earning this big bonus check, but working 70 to 80 hours a week.

And Gail's saying to me, having a really strong conversation with me where she said, look, I'm tired of being essentially a single mom. And she said, something's got to change. And so I hired an executive coach, first executive coach I ever hired, and I said, buddy, I need some help because I'm being very successful at work. I'm killing it at work. I turned this one division around going from number, the 14th worst performing division in the company. There were only 14 divisions to getting to number one, but at considerable cost to me and to my family. And so my executive coach said to me, you don't have any boundaries.

You work all day. You work into the evening, you work on the weekends, you work on your vacations, and as a result of that, you're doing a ton of stuff that in the end doesn't matter. And that kind of took me back and he said, well, think of it this way on that Friday before you go on a two week vacation, how productive are you? I said, oh my God. I'm like uber productive. I get a week's worth of work done on that Friday before I go on a vacation. He said, exactly, you know why? Because you have hard boundaries. You're flying out the next morning, you got to get it done. And so yeah, you've got a hard boundary. So he said to me, he said, what does your day look like now? And I said, well, I usually get into the office at about six, this is 20 years ago.

Get into the office at about six. I work 12 hours. At six o'clock. I go home, I eat a quick dinner with the family, and I have five daughters. And so 30 minute dinner, and then I crack open my laptop and I'm back at work, and then I go to bed at about 10 or 11 at night. He said, well, what about the weekends? I said, well, I'm always at the office on Saturday, as is every other executive in this company. That's just part of our culture. I usually work Sunday night, getting ready for the next week. He said, what about vacations? And I said, well, I get up early in the morning on my vacations to pound through some email before the family gets up so I don't fall behind. He said, okay, are you willing to establish hard boundaries and create margin? He said, I promise you you're going to see your productivity go up. I said, okay. So he said, what about your day? I said, well, I'm willing to quit at six and not open my laptop. And he said, great. He said, what about the weekends? I said, I'm willing to outwork on the weekends. He said, what about vacations? I'm willing to unplug on my vacations. He said, great. He said, then I'm sure you won't mind if I call Gail periodically to check in on you and see how you're doing.

Susie Moore:

Yes.

Michael Hyatt:

Well, that was the exact accountability that I needed. And so what I found out was that I could be more productive because my previous life, I'd be working on some projects and I'd go, if I don't finish by six, no big deal. I could work on it tonight or I could work on it this weekend, or I'll get to that on my vacation. But now I didn't have that luxury, so I had to get really focused on the high leverage activities, say no to the distractions and really focus. This happened to my company in the Pandemic. We have all these young families with kids Underfoot, and so we decided that we were going to go to a six hour work day just so that these parents could get some relief, and we said, let's just try this experiment for two weeks. If we can maintain our productivity, we won't change anybody's pay. We'll continue to pay 'em for full-time, or we're going to work 30 hours a week, not 40 hours a week after two weeks, got the managers together. How's it going, guys? We can't tell any difference. We're still as productive as we've ever been. So we said, well, let's try it through this summer. This was the summer of 2020, and same thing. So we said, okay, we're going to continue this. And this to this day is still one of the benefits of working at Full Focus is we have a 30 hour work week.

Susie Moore:

So focus and boundaries, these are the two game changing. These are the two game changing strategy techniques, realities that you've implemented. So focusing on what's important, of course, like revenue, et cetera, and then the bound, and then, because most people would think if you lowered work hours that it would absolutely, the reverse would happen. It would be, oh my gosh, everyone falling behind or everyone dropping the ball. But it's the reverse because there isn't sloppy thinking, oh, I'll pick that up later. Would it be as simple as that? Yeah,

Michael Hyatt:

It is. I mean, if you think about it, there may be a phone call that you make that takes 15 minutes that absolutely changes the trajectory of your business.

So there's not a correlation or at least causation between the amount of time you spend working and the results that you get. And back to mind your mindset. This is why our thinking is so important is because it's not how much we get done is what we get done. And because not all tasks are created equal, the really important ones are the place where we need to focus and let all that other stuff. A lot of stuff is just busy work. It's fake work. It's stuff we do when we're kind of stuck. And again, our brain is trying to keep us safe. So we'll go back to the familiar stuff. The stuff that requires no risk, requires no courage, and we just stay focused in that little zone where we feel comfortable and familiar. But if we're going to grow not only our businesses, but ourselves, we've got to be willing to be courageous and do the things, have the thoughts we've never had before, do the things we've never done before to get the results we've never experienced before.

Susie Moore:

I completely agree. And Michael, I always thought, look, if success were hard, work, work, work, work, then a lot of people who work hard would have a lot more to show for it, because so many people are hardworking without getting the results that they deserve, without getting the results. A fair reflection of that hard work. And speaking of thinking differently, and of course executive coaching, as you said, and looping in others almost you share in the book the value of connecting with others who just welcome different, but something that just could never have occurred to you, like an idea, like a suggestion. Maybe they make a correlation with something in your business or your life that you've never even thought of. Could you speak to that for a moment? The value of masterminding, getting the right people around you?

Michael Hyatt:

Yeah, this is a major strategy for influencing our thinking. We've all heard the Jim Roan quote that you're like the five people you spend the most time with. Lemme tell you something. You think like the five people you spend the most time with, you adopt their attitudes, their way of thinking, their presuppositions, their assumptions. And that's why it's important to get around people that you really want to emulate because so much of this is caught not taught. So if you're around people, for example, that are addicted to drama, they've always got some bad thing that's happened in their life, and no sooner do they solve that problem and they got some other bad thing. And then you realize this person is just addicted to their drama, and it's not really helping me either. Unfortunately, sometimes we can't get rid of those people because married to 'em, or they're our kids or our parents or whatever.

But to the extent that you can got to strategically surround yourself with people that are committed to your ultimate good, to your ultimate growth, are willing to speak truth to you when you need it the most. And Megan sometimes says somebody that will take you by the hand and lead you back to your true self. And I think that's so important. Other people can see things that we can't see. The story I gave about Eileen, she could see in my thinking something that ultimately wasn't serving me. It was going to be uncomfortable to change my thinking because the thinking that I had adopted made me safe. It's just that my business wasn't growing. So you have a choice. Do you want to stay safe in familiar territory, or are you willing to be called out challenged led by the people that are closest in your life to become your best self? And to me, a definition of a true friend is somebody that makes you believe in yourself even when you can't believe in yourself, and to surround yourself with friends like that. That's true wealth.

Susie Moore:

It feels like the highest swim of love almost in a way, because not all love is romantic love, even though that's often how it's defined. I remember CS Lewis said that love isn't an affectionate feeling. It's wanting the highest good for that person, however that person defines it. It's really good. It's just a beautiful thing. And so how do you do it in your personal life, Michael, and know you've got lots of friends, you've got lots of positive influences in your life. Who would you go to if you're like, oh, I dunno what to do about this, or Big question's been going through my mind?

Michael Hyatt:

Well, this is kind of my go-to, but it's my family. We are all committed to personal growth, and that's really fun, and it's been a joy to see that. But all five of my grown daughters live within 30 minutes of me. The three daughters that have all my grandchildren and I have 10 grandchildren are all within five minutes of me. So I was just with one of them and my youngest grandson right before we got on to record this podcast interview. But those people are the people that know what I'm committed to. They also know our work and what we do at full focus. So for example, my youngest daughter, Marissa, she's the most vocal, and she will call me out on stuff. So Marissa, because she's been to your program.

And so Marissa will sometimes say to me, if I say, well, I could never imagine myself doing X, she'll say, well, if you say so, because there's this powerful correlation between our language and our thinking, there's a reciprocal relationship. Sometimes we think of our language as just, it just expresses our thinking, but the words we use actually shape our thinking. So if I say to myself, well, I could never do that, that will become my reality. Because the creative process, the process of change and growth begins with our thinking and begins with our words. That's how you create anything. And so to get a group of people around you and my family has, they're not impressed with me. So they will happily challenge me on anything. And that's exactly what I need.

Susie Moore:

I just had something come to mind, a story that you told me, Michael, about you were going to, I think, run a marathon and then you didn't feel, well, do you remember this story? I do. And then your daughter was like, well, could you tell? Because I remember it was just so good. And I was like, where am I just giving up too soon? I'd love you to share if you're willing.

Michael Hyatt:

Yeah, I wish I had the letter that, or the email that my daughter sent me. This was Megan. So Megan's my oldest daughter. She's the CEO of Full Focus now and

Susie Moore:

Co-author of Mind Your Mindset.

Michael Hyatt:

Yes, that's right. And my partner in crime, this goes back about 15 years, and I was going to run a half marathon, and Megan was signed up to run the same half marathon. She was working for a nonprofit, and I had 70 people at my company who, because of my influence, had signed up to run the half marathon, and we were all running in order to raise money for this school for which Megan was the development director.

So we're training, we're training, we're training, everything's going great. And then I get a really bad cold maybe the week before we're supposed to run the race. And it's one of those colds that lingers, it doesn't get any better. And so after a while, I don't know if it was flu or whatever, but it was more than just a head cold. So I went to my doctor and I thought, okay, I just need to check in with my doctor and make sure that is he going to green light me to run this race? That was kind of the story I was telling myself. But I think what I was really hoping was that he would say, no, no, whatever you do, do not run this half marathon. You're too thick.

Susie Moore:

Yes. And

Michael Hyatt:

That would give me a pass, right?

Susie Moore:

I wouldn't have to do this. Oh my God, hug my doctor. Yeah.

Michael Hyatt:

Yeah. I don't have a choice. The doctor said, I can't do it. So I went into the doctor, and little did I know this was at an urgent care, so this wasn't my regular doctor, and he's a runner,

And he ran half marathons and marathons. So he checks me out. He says, lemme tell you something. One of the best things you can do in your condition is run this half marathon. I was like, oh my gosh. Well, right before that, before I went into the doctor, I'd gotten this email from Megan, and she said to me, she said, dad, look, I know you're sick. And I was supposed to fly to California literally the afternoon after I ran the half marathon in the morning for a series of speaking engagements. And she says, look, I know given all that you've got going on and everything, that you don't want to run this. And she said, I respect that, and if that's what you decide to do, I'll be in your corner. But she said, I just got to tell you, I think you may be given up too early.

And she said, I want you to consider what this will mean for your leadership. Because if you ask people to do hard things in the future, and their last memory was when you bailed on a hard thing, then it's going to give them an excuse. And I think you're all about integrity and doing what you say you're going to do. And I just think I would just pause, and I'm not trying to shame you. And again, whatever you decide, I'm going to be supportive. But I think you ought to think through it again and ask yourself the question, what's this going to mean for your leadership? And then I get my doctor's response and I go, okay, I'm running this. Well, I ran it, and it was a little bit tough at the first, but then it's like the symptoms went away. And by the time I was done with the half marathon, I felt great. I got on the airplane that afternoon, flew to California from Nashville, had no symptoms thereafter. So the doctor was right. Megan was right, but left to my own devices. I would've quit too soon.

Susie Moore:

This could be in the book Mind Your Mindset. It could be. It really could be. Isn't it incredible what some information from someone who's, because it was, I'm sure Megan in that moment was maybe a bit uncomfortable going, Hey, look, I don't want to make you feel bad. And sometimes it's a risk that someone takes your family. So that's always a blessing. But sometimes it's like a risk when someone says, Hey, I know this is where you're leaning, but I have a thought about it. And when you share in the book the importance of having different people in your world who can maybe give you these offerings, have you think differently, maybe in an entirely different direction, it's important that we remain open to that and not so close, which is always just our default setting.

Michael Hyatt:

Absolutely. And I think evaluating our friends, and especially asking ourselves, am I that kind of friend to the people that I'm around? Am I willing to speak the truth in love when it's required?

Susie Moore:

Yes.

Michael Hyatt:

And I think to go back to Eileen, I asked her one time, I said, how is it that you can go into the C-suites and meet with these high powered CEOs and kind of tell them things that nobody else will tell them?

Susie Moore:

Yeah, it's scary, right? Yeah.

Michael Hyatt:

And she said, well, she said, here's why. Number one, I'm taking a stand for their greatness, not for who they are, but for who they can be. And she said number two, she said, I refuse to believe that people are fragile. And that's the story that most people tell themselves that I can't share this with Susie because she's too fragile. No, people are way stronger than you think. People can process way more than you think. And so to see them as strong and capable and able to change. So she said, that's the second thing that's really important. And then the third thing is that I believe that my intervention will really make a difference. That if I don't speak this truth in the midst of this situation, there's probably nobody else in their life that will, and I would hate to think that they miss the opportunity to get something really meaningful or to accomplish something extraordinary, just because I was too scared to speak.

Susie Moore:

There is something so generous in that isn't there

Michael Hyatt:

Is. And her clients, me, one of 'em, I just talked to her last week. I'm not her client anymore. She's retired. But oh my gosh. I said to her, she said, well, when I got the book and realized that you had dedicated it to me, she said, I cried. And then I called everybody I knew to tell 'em. And I said, well, apparently, Eileen, you have no idea how important you were in my life because you said things to me that I didn't like in the moment, but were absolutely transformative lessons that I still remember and cherish to this day. And she said, yeah, I guess I didn't realize that.

Susie Moore:

And Michael, as I read this book, there's a friend of mine who's going through a personal issue with her health, and I think she's giving up too soon. And I was like, it's not really my business. But then I thought, as I was reading mind mindset, I'm like, you know what? I'm willing to take a risk because it just feels like the right good for Yeah. And it feels mean. It's scary. I could be shut down. She could be offended. She could think that I'm judging and with love in my heart, I'm going to take the risk. Because sometimes I think too, that other people are just deliver it. I always think God works through people. The universe works through people. And that's also a big message I got from your book, mind, your mindset, the power that we have to influence to help how we're just stronger together. I also believe, Michael, do you believe this, that we're here enough with different skills, with different lenses, with which we see the world, and we're here to make life a little easier for each other?

Michael Hyatt:

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I really see the ultimate goal is to serve other people, and I really try to do that the best I can. But yeah, and I think another thing to remember too is that when you're receiving some feedback, some criticism from other people, I think it's important that we push the pause button and think about how we're going to respond. And this is really important for our mindset. If we react negatively, we will get less of that in the future, and it might cut us off from the very thing we need in order to go to the next level. And I think it's important to recognize how much courage that other person has had to summon in order to say that thing, to share that with us. Because the default, the easiest thing to do would be just for them to mind their own business and not make us uncomfortable and not risk the relationship. But we have to honor that. And that's why we have to engage in active listening and write down the comments and really absorb it, and to thank that other person. I want more of that in the future. I want them to feel free because they can see things I can't see.

So yeah, I think it's important to be thoughtful about how we respond.

Susie Moore:

Michael, I could truly keep you. I love speaking to Joey, love speaking to you no matter what. But this book, I really, what's, if you had to say it in a sentence or two, what your goal is or what your mission is, yours and Meghan's with mind, your mindset, what is it with this book right now?

Michael Hyatt:

Yeah. I think my goal is that people would discover the most important lever when it comes to change. And I think it's easy to think if I just work more productively or faster, smarter, whatever, that I can create a different outcome. But I really think the shortcut, the best lever to pull is your thinking. And so I want to help people understand that. Let the science work for 'em and get better results because they're being more mindful of their thinking.

Susie Moore:

Yes. And Michael, where should everyone go to get the book to access your program? There's so much to learn from this, man, my friend. We want to take advantage of Michael Hyatt. Where should we go? Where should everyone, should everyone check out after listening to this interview?

Michael Hyatt:

You can go to mind your mindset book.com/suzy, and if they do that, then there's a bunch of free bonuses, including our Self-coaching tool and the audio version of the book. And you could buy the book from anywhere. Just come back with your receipt, put it in there, and you'll get those bonuses. So mind your mindset book.com/susie.

Susie Moore:

My very own link. Well, Michael Hyatt, what a joy. Spending this time with you, learning from you. I love this book. I love your family. I love your work. Oh my gosh. I'm just sending you everything positive and wonderful for the success of this, the message. It's so valuable, and I'm so grateful to have had this time with you.

Michael Hyatt:

Thank you, Susie. You're one of the most positive people I know, and I love being with you.

Susie Moore:

Oh, thank you, Michael. So until next time, my friends love and ease.

Michael Hyatt:

Same to you.