AP 0213: How Do You Find the Right Mindset to Stay Motivated?

AskPat 213 Episode Transcript

Pat: What's up, everybody? Pat Flynn here, and welcome to Episode 213. Regulators of AskPat. If you know what that reference is from, use the #AskPat213 and let me know. Anyway, I'm so happy you're here with me today with a great question from Trends.

But before we get to that, I do want to thank today's sponsor, which is FreshBooks.com. Super easy-to-use cloud accounting solution that's helping you keep track of all of your financials for your business. Join millions of other small business owners, including myself, who have used FreshBooks.com to help them with their business.

They have an award-winning mobile app so you can keep track on-the-go and you can professionally invoice your clients as well. If you want to get FreshBooks for free, and check it out for a free trial, go to FreshBooks.com/AskPat, and enter “AskPat” in the “how did you hear about us?” section.

Sweet. Now let's get to today's question from Trends.

Trends: Hey Pat. This is Leon, also known as Trends from MasteringEvents.com. First of all, thank you for everything you do, all you provide us with on AskPat.com and also through Smart Passive Income.

My question for you today is as a blogger, speaker, podcaster, product creator, app developer, writer, and just all around rockstar guy. Pat, how do you keep motivated to take your business to the next level time after time? I'm always inspired by your level of production and just wondered how you stay motivated to elevate your game? Anyways, thanks again Pat for all you do. Look forward to your response. Bye.

Pat Flynn: Trends, thank you so much for the question. I really appreciate it and all the kind words you said. Just hearing you list off all of those things that you know that I do. First and foremost, that's what's motivating to me. The fact that there are people out there like yourself, like everybody listening, who is watching me and who sees what I do. And hopefully if I do things well, and I report things that are helpful, other people will do things well and be helpful to other people too.

I feel like I have the ability to be a catalyst for all these amazing things to happen. And we all have that same ability with the internet and with the ability to reach anybody, really. It's just amazing what we can do and so all of you out there listening right now, Trends, everybody out there listening, Sarah.

There's probably a Sarah out there. If I called your name, and you're like, whoa, that'd be kind of cool. How about you, John? Anyway, I've always wanted to do that, so I think this would be a good time.

But anyway, all of you out there, I mean my audience is one of the most motivating factors in all of this. Obviously if I didn't have an audience, I wouldn't keep going.

If I didn't have anybody listening to the show, I wouldn't have any questions. Therefore this show wouldn't exist. So hearing these questions come in all the time, and the interactions I get with people and just hearing things like that. Like what you said in your question is just, man, how could I not keep going right?

It's not about me. There are some things are motivating, personally for me, that I'll get to in a second. But what we do is not necessarily about us. It's about who we are affecting and I know I'm having an affect on people. When I go to conferences, they come up to me and they just tell me these stories about the first time they listened to the show on their lawn mower and what that did for them and how their lives have changed since then.

I mean that, oh man, it's just so cool. And I hope that's motivating for you to hear. And if you're not there yet, if you're not at a point where you're getting thanked for what you do, you will. You will. Just keep going. There are people out there who need your help as Seth Godin would say, “We need you to lead.” That's from his book, Tribes, which is a great one.

Now there's a lot of other motivating things in my life. I think a lot of you know that my kids are of utmost importance to me in my life. And I feel like they're at an age now. They know what daddy is doing, and I want to be a good example for them.

I remember going to school to drop off my son and my wife and I both were there. And we were the only couple that was there dropping our kids off. Everybody else was just mostly moms, but some dads, too, but not really both. And I'm just so thankful that I have the ability based on what I do to have this sort of unique experience with my kids.

And again, I want that experience for everybody else out there as well, but I know my kids are watching. They know. They ask. “Wow, why are you both here and not so and so's mom and dad there?”

And it's kind of sad. There's nothing I want more than everybody's parents to be there of course. But my kids, man, I mean they're so motivating to me. They're so motivating. And I get to hang out with them every single day, and it's just more fuel for the fire. And so when they go to bed, I am just like, right now, it's 12:06 a.m., and we put them to sleep a few hours ago. And, like I get so fired up to work, immediately after I put them down because I've played all day with them, and now's my time to work, so I'm sort of anxious to get to work.

Okay, I'm motivated because I hadn't been able to work all day. But I'm also working knowing that I get to spend my time with them tomorrow, so that's what keeps me motivated: my audience, my kids.

And here's an interesting one: my layoff.

So I was laid off in 2008 from my architectural position and I think about that day. You know, every once in a while, I have vivid memories of that day, and just how depressing and sort of kick in the gut it was to me. And I don't want that again. And it was not at that moment, but a few days after that, or a couple weeks actually, when I finally made the decision to take control.

And so I want to be in as much control as I can because I don't or I didn't like that moment of my life. Even I had done everything right up to that point. It was just not right. And so I'm doing everything I can now to put as much control in my hands as possible, and that means diversifying my passive income portfolio, trying new things, experimenting, taking risks.

But also being smart with what I do with my money, with what I do next in my business, who I partner with, what I talk about, those types of things.

So that's motivating to me as well. Thinking about that layoff and making sure that something like that doesn't happen again. That's purely motivating to me. The journey, itself, is also motivating. I have a lot of fun trying new things.

I mean remember when Trends listed all those things that I did. I did all those things because they were all new to me, and they were all fun and different. And I continued to be that “crash test dummy” and try new things, and as technology changes, as new things come out, I'm going to continue to try new things. And hopefully be that person who can be there to report on what's working and what's not to help all of you out there make sure that you don't make the same mistakes as I do.

I mean, I'm great at making mistakes, and I don't mind sharing them.

Everything I had already mentioned, my audience, and journey. I mean, it's all about just putting it out there. And the more I do, the more fun I have, and the more I get to share and the more people I get to help, so it's just a cool little feedback. And finally, you know, I'm going to be honest with you. The money is motivating. The money is motivating.

To see the work I do and the hard work I put in, and the time I invest up front to pay off not only in the thanks I get from my audience. I mean I have a whole board in my office that is just full of thank you notes and handwritten letters and that is . . . that is something I look at when I am down or I don't feel motivated to work. Like I'm in that moment, and just like I'm like man, I don't want to do this right now. Or, “Ugh, do I have to do this thing?”

And then I turn around, and there it is, my board of just all these notes from people who have been affected by what I do. And I can't help but turn around and just get back to work. That's completely motivating to me. But a cool byproduct of all of that help I'm giving people is money. And that is motivating too.

And it's not motivating because I just want as much money in the world as possible. That's not really the case. I really just want as much money as I can to live a secure, happy, safe life with my family. But beyond that, now I'm at a point with the income coming in, I'm able to affect families and people who really need it. And so a lot of you know that later this year I'm going to be building a school in Africa. And that's something I've always wanted to do, but never thought I'd be able to do at this age.

I mean I'm 31 now, and I donated money to PencilsofPromise.org to help get a school built in Ghana. And this is what I hope is the first of many of these situations to come in terms of philanthropy. That's motivating to me. So the money is motivating because I can now see what other opportunities I can do to help other people who I cant help through what I do online.

Now I'm able to expand out of the online world and help people in different ways. And of course money is obviously helping that. And so the more money I see, the more excited I get because of these opportunities to help other people as well. Just being honest with you. I mean the money is motivating, but it's not motivating because I want to buy, like, a 75, 100-square foot mansion. Or because I want four Porsches in my garage that actually sinks down into the ground and I can pick the bottom cars up, you know, all this stuff.

No, it's because I can be financially secure, my family can have all the opportunities that we have. But also I can give new opportunities to people who I couldn't reach otherwise. And there you go.

So, Trends, thank you so much for the question. I really appreciate it. An AskPat t-shirt is headed your way for having your question featured here on the show. For those of you listening, if you have a question you'd like potentially featured here on the show, just head on over to AskPat.com. You could ask right there on that page.

And again, I want to thank today's sponsor, which is FreshBooks.com. You know, it's November now. The time of this post, or this publishing. It's only a few months away until tax season, and it's going to be pretty crazy. So I hope you have your financials in order. One of the things that helps me is using tools like FreshBooks.com.

If you want to get a free trial, just all you have to do is go to FreshBooks.com/AskPat and enter “AskPat” in the “how did you hear about us?” section. Awesome, thank you so much. Thank you, Trends, for the question today.

And before I go, I want to end with a quote. And today's quote is from Josh James, CEO of Omniture. He says, “When you find an idea that you just can't stop thinking about, that's probably a good one to pursue.”

Cheers. Take care. And I'll see you in the next episode of AskPat.