The Hidden Cost of Mediocrity!

[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, grow squad.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hope you're doing good this week.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am Eugene Hamilton.
[SPEAKER_00]: As you very well know, you're a host today.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I hope that as you've tuned in, you're ready for I'm talking about a hot topic today as we move forward as we unpack some things.
[SPEAKER_00]: I hope that we'll unlock some things in your life to prepare you to hire heights.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's pray God.
[SPEAKER_00]: We thank you for today.
[SPEAKER_00]: Bless our conversation.
[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me get right to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have officially lost fifteen pounds.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, that's insignificant, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: For some people that are saying, what should be gold?
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm saying to you right now, in this moment, I've lost fifteen pounds and I'm excited.
[SPEAKER_00]: Forget the fifty, forget the seventy five pounds, forget the thirty five pounds and you did that.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, no, no, no, no.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've lost fifteen pounds and here is why I'm excited about it because I am continuing to go forward.
[SPEAKER_00]: So what do you mean?
[SPEAKER_00]: Typically every year I lose and I gain the same, fifteen pounds because I usually stop at fifteen pounds and celebrate.
[SPEAKER_00]: Have you ever celebrated something that turned into an extended celebration?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Typically I find myself celebrating
[SPEAKER_00]: milestone if you please and that's not a milestone I guess but losing a significant amount of weight and I'll have me a cookie I'll have me whatever it is I want to have and I'll think to myself hmm in the morning let me get on the scale and use them pretty good probably but not have gained anything and I almost like almost like my son let me try it again to see my much I can get away with
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'll eat another cooking next day before you know it, I've gained the fifteen pounds back.
[SPEAKER_00]: And what brought me to a place now where I'm excited about fifteen more and fifteen more and fifteen more is simply this.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am just sticking tired of mediocrity.
[SPEAKER_00]: I realize and recognize, and I've heard my wife is told me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've heard Guru say this.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've heard individuals who are close to me say this, man.
[SPEAKER_00]: Along with being successful in life, in business, whatever thing that whatever you're trying to do, you've got to be intentional about being successful with your health, and so I'm locked in now.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought on January one I was locked in but but but here we are in the midst of the month of August and I'm locked in and I'm not letting go until I reach listen he was why there was a cost of settling for less than you know you're capable of there's a cost
[SPEAKER_00]: And you gotta ask yourself, how much is it costing me to remain the same?
[SPEAKER_00]: Or how much is it costing me to get halfway to the goal and then regress?
[SPEAKER_00]: How much?
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't have a number for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: How much is it costing you to get excited about a goal to put your pedal to the metal or about a goal for a month and then take two months and go all the way back to square one.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just recently heard a podcast by my man Ryan Leak and he talked about falling in love with boring.
[SPEAKER_00]: And most people don't get past a certain point because after a few weeks of doing something, we get bored.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the people that I see that are in the best shape, I don't know if they love boring, but they realize that they've got to allow boring to work for them in order to reach their goals.
[SPEAKER_00]: So they eat the same food every single day.
[SPEAKER_00]: They pull out a scale and they weigh six ounces of protein, four ounces of protein.
[SPEAKER_00]: They count out the number of theparagus they're going to eat.
[SPEAKER_00]: They count out the number of strawberries they're going to consume.
[SPEAKER_00]: They count out the look at how many ounces or gallons of water they're going to drink every single day is sparring.
[SPEAKER_00]: There are people who
[SPEAKER_00]: who get on stage and have glamorous jobs in front of you.
[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, Beyonce is, I don't know if she's still on tour, maybe it's over by now, I don't really keep up with the cowboy card or tour, but what I do know is this.
[SPEAKER_00]: As many times as she has performed throughout that her most recent tour, if she's off tour by now,
[SPEAKER_00]: As many times as you see in their own stage, falling from their Cadillac in the sky, as many times as you see in those cowboy boots, just quadruple the amount of time she's been on stage and she spent that much more time in practice.
[SPEAKER_00]: How boring is that?
[SPEAKER_00]: to practice the same routine over and over again until you get it right to practice your same mistakes over and over again to you find a solution to your mistakes to practice over and over again now she loves dancing of course she loves performing but there's a part of what she has to do to get ready for the performance that very well is not glamorous and most people want to look good but what's
[SPEAKER_00]: Unsexy.
[SPEAKER_00]: What doesn't feel good is driving by crispy cream and decided not to go in.
[SPEAKER_00]: What doesn't feel good is saying no to your friends who they're going out, but it's just seeing your in high school.
[SPEAKER_00]: You got a book or down and ensure that your GPA reflects where you're trying to go.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just said some
[SPEAKER_00]: And so you've had to say no to parties.
[SPEAKER_00]: You've had to say no to outage.
[SPEAKER_00]: You had to say no to church because number one, you ain't got no money, but number two, most importantly, it doesn't align with your goals.
[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't align with your dreams.
[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't align with where you're trying to go.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so you've got to ask yourself, in life, what's keeping me where I am?
[SPEAKER_00]: What is it?
[SPEAKER_00]: What am I free of?
[SPEAKER_00]: And man, I had a conversation.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, my man, listen, at a conversation with someone I long ago, and they said these words to me.
[SPEAKER_00]: He said to me,
[SPEAKER_00]: Eugene, you've had the law, you've got to learn how as much as you've been blessed, as much as God has done for you with all the things that he has entrusted you with, you've got to start trusting yourself to go higher, where he was saying what's this.
[SPEAKER_00]: He went on to say, oftentimes you think you're waiting on God.
[SPEAKER_00]: and you forget that God is waiting on you.
[SPEAKER_00]: So whether it be a journey to enhance your mind, to think about, to go higher, to just start a business, to plough for that promotion, to get ready for whatever it is, you think you're waiting on God.
[SPEAKER_00]: God, like not hard and gave you the tools.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've already given you what you need.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm waiting on, I'm waiting on you to trust you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm waiting on you.
[SPEAKER_00]: She oftentimes, it's a cop-out.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are afraid to move forward, oftentimes, especially in religious circles, people often say, I'm waiting on God.
[SPEAKER_00]: And for so many, that is the biggest slap in the face to God.
[SPEAKER_00]: This guy's like, what are you talking about?
[SPEAKER_00]: I am waiting on you.
[SPEAKER_00]: So what is it?
[SPEAKER_00]: that you're riding right there, just under the above average sign.
[SPEAKER_00]: What is it that's stopping you from moving toward a moving through the next threshold in so much as you find yourself thriving and not just surviving?
[SPEAKER_00]: What we gotta learn?
[SPEAKER_00]: What we must learn.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is not a suggestion.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am telling you for will.
[SPEAKER_00]: We've got to learn the impact of comfort zones.
[SPEAKER_00]: Staying in your comfort zone absolutely positively stifles your growth both professionally and personally.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then your comfort zone almost rocks you to sleep.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's almost like having a young infant, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: If you rock the baby too hard, the baby not going to sleep.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't rock them hard enough, the baby is not going to sleep.
[SPEAKER_00]: But you get right there and that look, that, that, get them in that comfort zone, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where you're not rocking too hard, you're not rocking too safely.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's too softly, rather, you're right in that comfort zone.
[SPEAKER_00]: It rocks them to sleep.
[SPEAKER_00]: The same thing happens in your life, both professionally and personally.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you are in that comfort zone too long, you get comfortable.
[SPEAKER_00]: You think that you've arrived.
[SPEAKER_00]: You think that there's nothing left for you to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: You think that there's no more, no mountain that you can climb anymore.
[SPEAKER_00]: Listen, when you find yourself being okay with where you are,
[SPEAKER_00]: It's time to do a heap check.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's time for you to figure out why am I so comfortable here.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why am I?
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's not even just about money or status.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's about impact.
[SPEAKER_00]: Who is being impacted positively by me being in this comfort zone?
[SPEAKER_00]: If two people are being impacted, oh man, I am grateful for that.
[SPEAKER_00]: But if you realize and recognize that two plus two four people can be killed, you can double that impact.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you get out of your confidence home, then you should do more.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's an eye.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm often amazed because I wrote a children's book.
[SPEAKER_00]: By the way, hand-hint.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm writing a second one.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I wrote a children's book and Someone asked me about the sales of it That's it all man At that time it was dried up And they said well, how much are you advertising and I say I'll stop I figured out I put it out there a couple days and
[SPEAKER_00]: Sales were great and then, you know, I gotta keep doing that.
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you believe in it, you gotta keep, you gotta keep at it.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can depend on Amazon, you can depend on this platform to promote your stuff.
[SPEAKER_00]: Nobody will promote your stuff the way you promote your stuff.
[SPEAKER_00]: I got comfortable.
[SPEAKER_00]: Had a few sales.
[SPEAKER_00]: I said, oh man, this is catching on.
[SPEAKER_00]: I hit number one on Amazon, which is pretty hard to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm not even trying to be funny.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't even try to do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I said to myself, wow, it's selling itself.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right?
[SPEAKER_00]: There's some things that we're in place, but I'm saying I didn't spend any money trying to put my stuff on more top-wreck.
[SPEAKER_00]: I do better that.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, no, no, no.
[SPEAKER_00]: But then I got comfortable.
[SPEAKER_00]: After it reached its height,
[SPEAKER_00]: Here it is.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's what I'm saying.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want you to sit down and ask yourself, am I in my comfort zone right now?
[SPEAKER_00]: Have I said to myself, this is all I can accomplish in twenty twenty five.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll wait to twenty twenty six to kick it in gear again.
[SPEAKER_00]: If that's where you are, I don't want to say shame on you would shame on you.
[SPEAKER_00]: You too gifted, you too talented.
[SPEAKER_00]: You have so much to offer to the world to just sit down, rest on your hands and coached through the rest of the year because you think you've done all that you've been called to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would challenge you on that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Even if you're not in a place where you're creating new ideas or creating new, whatever, whatever you've already packaged, more people need it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you gotta ask yourself, how can I not so much go back to the drawing board and start building something from the ground up?
[SPEAKER_00]: How can I use this?
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm asking myself right now, you've got a book out there, you're sort of writing a second book, but how many more people don't know about the first book?
[SPEAKER_00]: To the conference on, we have you delusional.
[SPEAKER_00]: The conference on, we have you thinking, oh, the world knows about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not even a fraction of the world knows about my impact, what I've done or my book.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not even a fraction.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes what rocks us to sleep is arrogance.
[SPEAKER_00]: that somebody can be arrogant enough to believe.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because a certain segment of people know about what your offerings are, know about your presence that the whole world knows.
[SPEAKER_00]: At least the part of the world that you will born to impact, you think all of them know already?
[SPEAKER_00]: I doubt it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So here's what I want you to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want you to examine yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't self-diagnosed, but ask yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I said this at the very beginning of this episode.
[SPEAKER_00]: What does it cost me to stay right where I am?
[SPEAKER_00]: What does it cost me to stay right where I am?
[SPEAKER_00]: not growing, not moving forward, just being stagnant and comfortable.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when I figure out what it's costing me, I gotta ask myself, well, what am I going to do about it?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because you haven't dug deep enough, if you've examined yourself, if you've asked yourself what it's costing you, and you still aren't moved to move further, you haven't dug deep enough.
[SPEAKER_00]: You haven't gotten to a place where it's that important for you to go back to the drawing board and see how I can have greater impact.
[SPEAKER_00]: So one of the things, in fact, I spoke at a church not long ago.
[SPEAKER_00]: and I kind of made the analogy of or the connection of people working and serving saying that everybody came to this this worship center having the same set of gifts.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's not much we could do outside of those gifts that everybody has that are the same.
[SPEAKER_00]: But because we are in this assembly and because we've been called to this particular place of worship, all of us have different gifts and it behooves us to operate in those gifts and use those gifts to do exactly what we were born to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: What am I saying to you right now?
[SPEAKER_00]: There's enough people right now copying everybody else.
[SPEAKER_00]: What have you been uniquely called to do?
[SPEAKER_00]: And if it's the same topic as somebody else, what sets you apart?
[SPEAKER_00]: Why is your unique gift, your unique gift?
[SPEAKER_00]: What is the difference between you and the one that's already off and so don't be afraid of the fact that there's some people covering your topping.
[SPEAKER_00]: Listen, just make your topic you.
[SPEAKER_00]: What's the cost in you?
[SPEAKER_00]: Just stay the same.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then lastly, what do I need to do to develop a growth mindset?
[SPEAKER_00]: See this whole idea of adopting a growth mindset shifts your perspective.
[SPEAKER_00]: allows you to understand that in life we should always be in a constant state of growth and development.
[SPEAKER_00]: Always.
[SPEAKER_00]: We should always be looking to learn something from somebody and that somebody oftentimes can be yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: What could I learn from me that didn't work for me last quarter?
[SPEAKER_00]: What could I learn from me that didn't work for me last week?
[SPEAKER_00]: What could I learn from me that I try, that I attempted to do, that I need to do better, differently, or otherwise?
[SPEAKER_00]: What could I learn?
[SPEAKER_00]: So that I can constantly and consistently find myself in the, in a portrait of leveling up because I've decided, that I'm gonna grow.
[SPEAKER_00]: through everything.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let that old saying goes, don't just go through it, grow through it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whatever situations are in front of us, are we growing through those situations?
[SPEAKER_00]: Whatever we are faced with, are we growing?
[SPEAKER_00]: Are we just going through emotions?
[SPEAKER_00]: And you think about the fact that we've got
[SPEAKER_00]: Another quarter in this year left.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this third quarter isn't over.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's still much that you can accomplish.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's still much that we can do to further our call.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I would challenge you to not be comfortable where you are.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would challenge you to revisit
[SPEAKER_00]: your wife, revisit your motivation, revisit your reason and get back to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because if I were to take a wild guess, I guess, I should say, it's costing you a whole lot to remain right there and it costs nothing at all.
[SPEAKER_00]: to tap into what you already have and to move higher.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's cause, it doesn't cause a die for you to tap into your God-giving gifts.
[SPEAKER_00]: Listen, people are always, I think it was Kevin Stays that said, man, listen, one of the things that blows his mind and blows my mind too, when people are trying to become good is something that they're not good at.
[SPEAKER_00]: when they haven't developed fully what they're already good at.
[SPEAKER_00]: They want to develop a whole new set of skills.
[SPEAKER_00]: When you haven't tapped into the skills that you were given at birth, maximize that, maximize what you're already great at, multiply what you're already good at, double down on what you're already good at, and watch things in your life.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not change overnight, but they'll begin to get better.
[SPEAKER_00]: Step by step, moment by moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you so much for tuning in today.
[SPEAKER_00]: Somebody in your life needs to hit this when I promise you.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're causing them, you're nephew, you need to co-worker, your son, your daughter, somebody, your husband, your wife.
[SPEAKER_00]: Somebody needs to hear this episode.
[SPEAKER_00]: So please share this out.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't keep this one to yourself, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Please share it out.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, subscribe.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't forget to subscribe.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we thank you so much for your support.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you so much for tuning in today.
[SPEAKER_00]: And don't forget that as you move forward, every single day, find an opportunity to go, to grow and to grow.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's my time.
[SPEAKER_00]: See you next week.