Advice from a Millionaire… Which Hat Are You Wearing?

If you’re working to become a millionaire, or become financially free…  If you’ve got a big goal you’re trying to accomplish…  I want to give you some advice.  

Sitting behind everything you do is an identity within you pushing you TOWARD or AGAINST your goals.

And which “hat” you’re wearing will determine whether or not your goal ever comes true. 

The faster you spot and correct the enemy identities, the faster that you actually attain your goals. It’s not so much about time. It’s about how many barriers or stoppers you can remove from in between where you are and where your goal is. That’s what I’m going to be talking about today.

This is the first of a three-part series. Previous videos that I’ve done have to do with enemy actions toward your goals: procrastination, distractions, lack of motivation, lack of resources, and hoping instead of controlling your business.

This one is about friendly actions and identities. The purpose of the full series is to catch enemy identities and replace them with friendly identities, really quick.

Let me give you a little bit of orientation as to where we are. We’re on what’s called “the bridge to the pipeline.”

The pipeline is how you acquire customers. It’s how you acquire a sales team. It’s how you acquire votes if you’re a politician. It’s how you get clients if you’re an attorney. It’s how you get patients if you’re a doctor. Everybody has to do these steps in any acquisition process.

I’m building a bridge to it, which involves what you need to be and do in order to be successful at this. We’re right now on the steps of carve out the space in your life in order to do it and then make the time for it. That’s where we are, just on an orientation basis.

The Two Hats You Wear Every Day

So far today…

I assumed the identity of an early riser. As soon as I woke up, I jumped up and got dressed.

I assumed the identity of a healthy eater.

I assumed the identity of a helpful dad. I’m helping my kids and my wife getting ready for school.

I assumed the identity of a helpful husband.

I assumed the identity of an author. I sat down and I wrote this up.

I assumed the identity of a weightlifter. I lifted weights.

I assumed the identity of a weightlifting spotter with my wife, because my wife and I are partners in weight training.

I assumed the identity of a presenter. And that’s where I am right now.

I want you to get this idea, and more than anything else I want to pass on to you this concept. I want to make sure that you really understand where and what this identity thing is all about, because it’s not a common conversation.

Here are two hats. One of them is a black hat and one of them is a white hat. 

It has a military type of a phenomenon with it because there are black hat operations and white hat operations. Let’s just say that the white hat operations are the ones that are going to get you to your goals, and black hat operations are those that are going to prevent you from getting to your goals.

Now that you’ve got this idea, you can picture putting on a black hat right in the middle of trying to get your goals. Maybe it’s procrastination, maybe it’s confusion, or maybe it’s distraction.

Most people don’t know what the white hats are. They know that they procrastinate, go into confusion, or get distracted, but they don’t know which hat to put on instead. That’s what’s going on.

Here’s an example to help give you a feeling of this:

The Black Hat at the Buffet

Let’s say that you are on a diet and you’ve established how many calories you’re going to eat or how much you’re going to exercise, and then you get invited to come to a buffet, maybe for a Sunday brunch. It’s one of those big spreads.

You’re saying, “I’m going to eat what is on my list.”

That’s a white hat identity that you’ve got going on here. As soon as you come in and you start going through there and saying, “Nope, nope, nope,” you are wearing a white hat.

I want you to get that feeling of this white hat saying, “No, no, no, no, no, no, no.” 

You’re turning away from these bad foods. Then all of a sudden you see something that you really, really want. You feel yourself looking back. You are slowly putting on the black hat. You’re not fully committed to the white hat right now. You’re now easing into, “Well, it really wouldn’t hurt that bad. I’ve been really so good for the last two weeks.” You’re putting that black hat on.

The Black Hat of the Cheating Spouse

You could also take up the idea of a husband or a wife who is committed to their spouse. They find themselves somewhere, and then a guy or a girl comes up and starts talking to them, and they slowly reach down and start taking off their wedding band.

What’s happening here? They are being the white hat identity, then this thing starts to change and a new black hat identity comes in, taking on the identity of a cheater, ignoring that long-term effect of what that’s going to look like.

If that happens, you better snap to really quick, and put it right. You better find a white hat real fast because the long-term effects, especially having to do with kids, can be devastating.

You Can’t Afford the Black Hats

A lot of times when people are in that moment, they always have this weird idea that comes in that says, “Oh, it won’t be that bad of a mistake.”

When it comes to goals and earning money, you can’t afford these black hats. They’re unforgiving. They’re just unforgiving because they become easy. They become the default.

I want to really get you to get this identity concept before I move forward, because then you’ll really understand why this is so important.

All of these identities are friends of my goals. They’re friends of my goals. They are in cooperation with my goals.

You could say the black hat or the enemy hat would be out of cooperation. They’re trying to destroy the progress toward the goal.

Catch Yourself Putting on the Enemy Jacket

We can call it a hat, or we can call it a jacket. If you’re not frequently putting on a hat, think about putting on a jacket. The black jacket could be that evil identity and the white jacket could be the good identity. It’s just putting it on and wrapping it around you and becoming that. That’s the concept of identity.

Get the idea of putting on an enemy jacket or hat. 

Procrastination (and other Common Enemy Identities)

• Procrastination

“I’ve done enough. I called one prospect today. It’s not what I said I would do. I said I would call three, but I’m just going to call one today. It’s all right. It’s not that big of a deal. They’re probably not home anyway.”

See all those black jacket things coming on? They just slip in there.

• Distractions
• Hanging on to old habits and routines
• Confusions
• No motivation, victim of no resources

“Well, I don’t have any money, so I can’t do it. I don’t have any time, so I can’t do it.” These are black hat operations.

• Hoping, instead of controlling your business

Where Does Procrastination Come From?

• Lack of ownership of actions or identities. You’re not owning it and that’s the reason that you would procrastinate.
• Lack of accountability. I didn’t get done what I said I was going to get done.
• Lack of discipline. That’s just self-discipline.

Discipline comes in when you keep on speeding and you can’t slow your lead foot. You keep driving faster and faster all the time, and you can’t control your own discipline. Now the police have to come in and discipline you.

Self-discipline is when you control what you do. Discipline is when you get in trouble and end up in court, getting fined.

• Fear of failing self, another or others

This fear of failing causes procrastination. What hat would you have to put on in order to say, “I fear failing?” Who are you being?

You’re projecting forward failure. It’s the only way that that could happen.

• Lack of clarity (clear vision and plan, and where you are in the plan)
• Lack of motivation

What a hat! “I don’t have any motivation today.” Who’s saying that? You are, but you’ve got a black hat on when you’re saying it.

• Lack of implementing and executing a new routine

That’s steering out of the groove that you’ve carved in. When you get all your habits and routines down, real pat and solid, and they cut grooves into your life and they project grooves, you can predict your future that way.

If you’ve decided that you need to cut into that groove and up and out and head in a different direction, you have to cut a new groove. When you start steering into that, then you’re going to run into those old habits and routines, and now they’re black hats to you, and you’ve got to drive on through them.

• Hesitating due to desire/obsession to be perfect

I assure you, you’re not going to be perfect. Not yet. Especially if you’re not even trying. Yes, it’s going to be horrible.

I sucked really bad when I started. So what? What’s the big deal? It was weeks. Then I went on for 34 years to where I perfected and perfected and perfected and perfected. Everybody, when they start, do that.

These items I listed above are enemy identities. If they’re there, what has been omitted?

That’s what I want you to always ask yourself. If you’re procrastinating, which of these have been omitted? Friendly identities, ally identities, cooperation. Where are your friends? Where are your white hats? That’s what’s going on here.

Distractions, Old Habits, and Playing Victim

Now I’m going to expand on some of the common enemy actions or identities I mentioned above.

Under distractions are things like chasing shiny objects, disorganization of the desk and computer browser tabs, weak accountability to self, weak commitment to self, weak ownership of your circumstances and vision (there’s a big excuse-manufacturing machine sitting right underneath this one), time wasters, useless action, failure to decide priorities, failure to put lower priorities into buckets and say, “Hey, I’ll do this someday later or I’m going to hire somebody to do these things. I’m going to get this out of my life, my sight, so that I can focus and build my business.”

That’s the whole operation there. Other ones are hanging onto old habits and routines, yearning or longing for the old days the way it used to be, and playing victim.

Playing victim is saying, “Oh my gosh, I can’t do this because of this condition. My husband left me, or my wife left me. I have the kids to take care of.” All of these things, which are playing victim to something. “My upline’s not helping me, so I’m not going to do anything.”

All of the things that turn up here are common enemies.

Confusion and Complacency

The common enemy of confusion is caused by no vision or a non-compelling vision. Your vision isn’t motivating you, driving you.

I see this a lot. A person has the money, has the time, but they got so used to things the ways they are, that they don’t change.

I remember a person that I knew who had gone to jail, and he got so used to that routine that he didn’t want out.

He said, “Hey man, we get three squares a day (meaning food). We get to go out and play in the yard for a little while every day. I mean, I don’t think it’s any better outside.”

His wings had literally been clipped and he forgot that he and had wings of freedom. He got complacent. He got used to it.

When you write a vision, if you’ve written a lot of visions, a lot of goals, and you’ve not ever attained any of them, then you have this thought, “Because he’s saying to write a vision, I’ll write a vision,” but you’re not really even there. You’re not in the future saying, “I’m going to have this,” while you’re writing it.

Confusion is also caused by no plan and by non- or poor prioritization. I did a whole video on this. I really recommend that you watch that video because it’s about how you can’t make decisions on a day-to-day basis without looking through the lens or compass of your vision. That is how you set priorities in your life.

Confusion is caused by indecision. Indecision is when you’ve got two things that have about the same amount of weight to them, and you can’t decide on one or the other. You can get in a habit of indecision, and this is just horrible. You just go back and forth and back and forth and back and forth.

Knock it off. Just decide which one’s got a little bit heavier weight on it and go with that one and get it done.

Confusion is caused by overwhelm. You just keep on adding and adding and adding and adding stuff. It’s like some of these people who are packrats. They just keep on adding stuff and adding stuff, and they just never made a decision to throw some things away.

If you find yourself in that, just throw it all away. You’ll be a whole lot better off because now you’re free. I know it’s difficult for people to catch that as a concept.

The last common enemy actions and identities that I’ll mention here are lack of motivation, lack of resources (time, money, or knowledge), and hoping instead of doing actions.

Sometimes lack of motivation has to do with your personal health. Sometimes It has to do with you just getting in a rut.

With hope, as soon as you start hoping your downline builds your business for you, you’re in trouble, you’ve lost control. You have completely surrendered your ability to cause actions. Hoping is not where you want to be.

What I’ve been talking about here are enemy identities. In future parts of this series, I will not go through all of these enemies. I will just reference them. I’ll abbreviate them in the next two parts.

What has been omitted? The friendly identities, the ally identities.

Friendly Identities You Must Have

What friendly identities must you have?

They must become character traits. You are not born with these. They are built.

They’re not just given to you. They are words that everybody knows, but don’t know how to apply. And they don’t apply them.

The first two are responsibility and ownership. Each of these have a similar ideology.

Sometimes it’s hard to differentiate between responsibility and ownership. They’re similar in ideology, but different in how you execute them.

These are required identities to push out all enemy identities and attain your goal.

When I started today, I talked about waking up early. Just waking up and getting after what I need to get done.

That’s the way that you want to picture that you’re going to establish a perfect day, and you’re going to win that day. Then you do that every day and you win that week. Then you do that every week and you win that month. You’re going to build on these things.

Responsibility – The Most Important Identity

I’m just going to say it right now: this is it. This is the most important thing that you take on as the white hat, or the white jacket. It’s just something very, very important.

What is responsibility?

It’s the total reason something happens or does not happen.

Be the reason you learn the pipeline (for example).

If I’m going to take responsibility for my desk, then I’m going to be the total reason that something happens on or to the desk, or does not happen. If I’m a little bit concerned about my five-year-old running around in the studio, and there’s a laptop and a glass and other breakable things on my desk, then what would I do to make sure that something does not happen to the desk? I’m probably going to step out from the desk and make sure that my kid doesn’t run into it or throw a ball across it or something.

I am responsible when I’m driving in the car. I have a responsibility to get to the destination, whether it be a basketball game or a jujitsu tournament or whatever it is, with my kids. But don’t I also have the responsibility to not have a wreck?

When we talk about responsibility, we’re talking about both sides of this thing. We’re getting on it and evaluating, projecting and saying, “What could happen?” Not being a worrywart, but just making sure that something doesn’t happen, or making sure that something does happen.

That’s the application that you have here. You have to be the reason that you learn the pipeline, be the reason you generate a lead, be the reason you contact the lead. Be the reason you set an appointment to see a presentation, be the reason you follow up and/or follow through.

Sometimes you follow up and they don’t reply to you. Very good. Give them one final call, leave a message. Tell them you won’t be calling again. Or if they say, “Yes, I’m very, very interested in this,” then you’re going to follow through and help them get whatever it is that they stated that they wanted.

If you’re not doing these things, you’re the reason those things did not happen.

That’s the part nobody ever thinks about, so they become the whipping boy. They put on a black hat, and they look at, “If you’re not doing those things, you’re the reason those things did not happen.” 

Then the white hat becomes a whipping boy because it’s the not doing it, but you’re wearing the black hat when you’re doing the whipping. It’s just sort of a really odd thing.

Once you really see this, you will see that you can take on multiple identities. You have to watch it and decide based on the priority of your compelling vision, which identity you want. You can choose to win, or you can choose to lose.

Responsibility is the total reason something happens or does not happen, no matter how good the excuse is. Everybody has an excuse.

Everybody has an excuse, but what you’ve got to go for and be is: “I did it because of the excuse to fail, but I didn’t fail.”

When you’re down there in the weeds and there’s barbed wire wrapped around your legs, and everything in the world that could have gone wrong did go wrong, and you come out of it, you won.

Have a good enough reason to succeed instead of a good enough reason to fail.

 Ownership – The Breadth of What You Assume Responsibility For

“Ownership” is one of those words that people know they’ve heard, but they don’t apply it. What does it look like?

Ownership:

• Be responsible for everything that impacts your business. This is the breadth of what you assume responsibility for.

I can have responsibility (ownership) of a pen. That’s one breadth. I could have responsibility for a computer. That’s a breadth wider than the pen. I can have the breadth of the desk.

Ownership has to do with what you wrap your area of responsibility around. That is the ownership.

What do I mean when I’m talking about everything that impacts your business? Well, what impacts your business?

I was just looking at the inflation rate over the last year and four months, and I was thinking, “Have I created that much extra income per month?”

Because I don’t want to be the effect of inflation.

Those of you who don’t know what inflation is, it’s the things that you commonly buy. Let’s just say that I bought a bottle of water for $3.00, and now it’s $3.50, and then the next year, it’s $5.50. The increase in price of the common goods that you buy is called inflation.

That means that you’re going to have to have that much more income. And if the inflation rate truly has increased 100%, then you would’ve needed to double your income to have the same lifestyle as you did last year.

Inflation impacts my business. I have to be responsible for that. How do I be responsible?

Well, I can’t go to the Federal Reserve and say, “Hey, knock it off. Quit playing these stupid games hurting us.”

I just make more money, and I teach people to make more money because that is the only way that I can throw a punch back.

Steps to Take Full Ownership

1. Take ownership of your day. That’s the first thing you’ve got to do. Drive out less productive actions, and replace them with income-producing actions. That’s the first place where you get ownership. You say, “All right, number one is I’m going to own my day.”
2. Be the reason (responsible) you make time to learn the pipeline and do the pipeline.
3. Acknowledge every mistake and admit failures, take ownership of all of them. (No excuses or “why.” You do not need to explain why you failed or why you made a mistake. You just take ownership of it.) Develop a plan, execute the plan and win against mistakes and failures.

As you begin to do this, each time you fail or make a mistake, you’re going to get really familiar with that moment of going from wearing the white hat, to putting on the black hat. There’s some point where you’re doing fine and then you chose to put on the black hat.

I want you to get this real sweet spot in the moment. Instead of letting the black hat come on, say, “No, no, no, no, no. I don’t want to have to acknowledge and repair my mistakes ten times a day. I’ll just keep my white hat on.”

Ownership is a very big part of that.

What Taking Ownership Looks Like

I’ll give you some examples here.

Oftentimes people say, “I don’t have time to do the business.”

What that most often means is that they’re just too busy with $50,000-a-year things to make $1,000,000 a year, or $200,000 a year.

They have these things grooved in and they say, “This is what I do.”

They’re not able to look at it newly and say, “Wait a minute. Now I do this instead, or in addition.”

So you go through the “seven-day reveal,” where you just write down what you did every 30 minutes. I like to do it frequently so that I sharpen my game. Then I spot things that I’m going to have to delegate to somebody else. It’s not working out. I just don’t get any return from clearing my email and my Skype.

I do have a Telegram channel and you can join it. I answer Telegram messages, but I’m not going to answer emails. I just find them a complete and utter waste because I’ll spend two hours on them and there’s no value there.

Each one of these things I spotted on my seven-day reveal, I’ll move aside and say, “I don’t really need that in my life. I mean it’s fine, but it doesn’t give me a return like I can get if I’m doing the pipeline.”

Then you replace that time with time doing actions that are going to yield higher income.

You’ve got to be the reason the income-producing actions happen, and you’ve got to be the reason why the time-wasting actions don’t keep going.

Catch Yourself Putting on the Enemy Jacket:

• Procrastination
• Distraction
• Hanging on to old habits and routines
• Confusion
• No motivation, victim of no resources, hope

Instead, put on the responsibility and ownership jacket.

Advice from a Millionaire’s Perspective

The value of this information, from a millionaire’s perspective, is far superior to any other videos that I’ve ever done. That’s the level of value that you should probably place on it, because it’s that big.

Have you ever experienced a time you were really, really responsible for something? What was the outcome? Did you control it?

Have you experienced a time you took full ownership of something? What was that outcome?

Do you see that these are identities you put on or take off? Do you get that whole idea where you can feel it in the moment? When you can feel it in the moment, you can stop right there. You’ll catch it. Need help with your message? Here’s my training for what to say and how to say it. If you don’t have a team or haven’t recruited anyone (or less than 10 people), this is THE course you should get – Network Marketing Training Course