#66: How To Stop Self-Sabotage with Dane Maxwell

[00:00:00] Hala Taha: You're listening to YAP. Young And Profiting Podcast, a place where you can listen, learn, and profit. Welcome to the show. I'm your host and executive producer, Hala Taha, and on Young And Profiting Podcast, we investigate a new topic each week and interview some of the brightest minds in the world. My goal is to turn their wisdom into actionable advice that you can use in your everyday life.

[00:00:25] No matter your age profession, or industry. There's no fluff on this podcast and that's on purpose. I'm here to uncover value from my guests by doing the proper research and asking the right questions. If you're new to the show, we've chatted with the likes of negotiation experts, Harvard professors, self-made billionaires, sleep psychologist,

[00:00:45] CEOs, and best-selling authors. Our subject matter ranges from enhancing productivity, entrepreneurship, the art of side hustles, and more. If you're smart and like to continually improve yourself, hit the subscribe button because you'll love it [00:01:00] here at Young And Profiting Podcast. Today on the show, we're chatting with serial entrepreneur, Dane Maxwell, Dane started five successful software companies with many of them becoming multimillion dollar businesses.

[00:01:13] His companies include the foundation which specializes in training people to start a business from scratch, swipe my ideas, which gives away profitable business ideas and paperless pipeline, a real estate transaction management software. Dane never has to work another day again, in his life, he's created so many passive income streams, but he still works tirelessly to help other entrepreneurs become as successful as he has through his content and platforms.

[00:01:40] In fact, he's created over 15 millionaires with his teachings thus far, Dane recently put out a book called Start From Zero, which outlines how to build the brain of an entrepreneur and start meaningful businesses and income streams from scratch. In this episode, we discuss how self-sabotage can manifest itself and how

[00:02:00] to stop this from happening.

[00:02:01] Why using your intuition is an important skill to learn and how your future wealth all starts with solving problems for people and not your expertise. Today's show is a bit different. My father passed away last week. God bless his soul. And so I have Peter Sumpton covered for me on the interview.

[00:02:19] Peter is one of my YAP researchers and host of his own podcast Marketing Study Lab. I would highly encourage you to check out his podcast if you enjoyed the conversation. You can find it on Apple Podcast or wherever you like to listen to your podcast. I was actually featured on Marketing Study Lab for episode number 62.

[00:02:37] If you want to learn more about me and my career journey, and don't worry, I'll be back in action on YAP next week. Enjoy the show and thanks for covering for me, Peter.

[00:02:46] Peter Sumpton: Dane welcome to Young And

[00:02:48] Profiting Podcast.

[00:02:50] Dane Maxwell: I was doing something.

[00:02:52] Peter Sumpton: Absolutely!

[00:02:52] Thank you so much for joining me. I know Hala was gutted to be missing this and you and me both wish our family well at

[00:03:00] this time, I know she's raring to get back onto the podcast, life throws you things that are far more important than that, but she'll be back as soon as possible.

[00:03:07] I know. So Dane, just a quick intro to yourself very early on in life, you had a number of businesses which led to a number of failures. But from these, you learn what worked and what didn't fast forward in your life. And you now have multiple successful profitable businesses that allow you to never have to work again.

[00:03:30] Not that you do there as you're still very active with projects such as the foundation, your company that specializes in training people to start a business from scratch away from. Those businesses and that one in particular that you have your own podcast SF set, start from zero and have authored a book of the same title.

[00:03:49] So before we dive into any of that, I'd love to know what life was like. Growing up pre entrepreneur success for you.

[00:03:58] Dane Maxwell: Infinitely

[00:04:00] creative, taking apart, remote control cars, building force underneath the deck. Really experiential with my hands. Not gifted in the classroom.

[00:04:11] Peter Sumpton: Okay, cool.

[00:04:12] So that's a bit of a crazy way to start building businesses, but you built the companies that you own without any prior knowledge of what you were selling.

[00:04:24] That worked in terms of the software and how it was built and all those kinds of things. And now, like we're saying through the foundation, which is one of your companies, you help people do the same, be successful within business. All this started for you at a very early age. So what interested you in entrepreneurship?

[00:04:42] Dane Maxwell: It's may have started at an early age, but I got brainwashed by society into thinking that an employee was the holy grail. So I got brainwashed and then it wasn't until I realized that as an employee,

[00:05:00] the more successful I became, the more trapped I would be because the more promotions I would have and the more demands would be on my time, I made a very conscious choice to say. The more successful I become the more free I want to be.

[00:05:16] Peter Sumpton: That's cool.

[00:05:16] Just to put some context behind that when you were in a career as such how far or high up did you actually go and how trapped to did you actually feel.

[00:05:29] But that made you feel trapped enough to to want to not do it at all.

[00:05:33] Dane Maxwell: My first day on the job.

[00:05:34] Peter Sumpton: Fantastic. Brilliant. I'm sure a lot of people can appreciate that and associate themselves with that as well.

[00:05:40] Dane Maxwell: I wanted to say if you're clear on what you want without any internal shame, what's important to me is that the more successful I become, the more free I want to become.

[00:05:53] And you resolve that right in the center of your spiral cord. Beyond your mind down into your spine

[00:06:00] and the nerve endings of your spine, like really embodied the more successful I want to become the more free I want to become at that point. You'll begin looking at options and you'll match those options against your very clear intention.

[00:06:19] And it will no longer be what can I do or what can't I do, or what am I born for? What am I not boring for? It'll be more, what's my really tender, but solid, consistent desire. And then how can I build my skillset to put myself into a vehicle that will provide for that desire? So it becomes. Internally directed you're within first and you make a very clear statement and has no ego.

[00:06:54] It's not to be better than anybody else. It's not to look better than anyone else. And it's certainly not

[00:07:00] to fill a wound within you. It's just, this is where my joy is an XYZ, that desire. So when I did that, I said, the more successful I become, the more free I want to become, I then started attracting into my life.

[00:07:18] A set of skills that were not skills that you would do to exchange time for money. And I had to almost go against the wiring of my whole nervous system because I had spent 18 to 20 years. Learning skills that would require me to exchange time for money, but I was clear more success. It was more freedom.

[00:07:40] So then with that in mind, I attracted a whole new skill set of skills that I can do that free me from exchanging time for money. And when I would actually engage in those skills, it almost felt as difficult as trying to breathe underwater. It was that difficult.

[00:08:00] And it's interesting. So let's just take a very tangible skill.

[00:08:03] Let's say now you don't make a lot of money doing this, but this would be a very easy skill to understand writing a book, right? You put your time into writing a book and then it sells without your time afterwards. It's a passive product. Now, if you monetize the back end of the book, if you have additional offers on the backend of the book, and those are all products, and those are all videos and letters that people can go watch, read, and buy without you having to be there.

[00:08:31] Those are then more skills that do not require exchanging time for money. So I would call them asset creation skills, where you're engaged in creating an asset. Now, when I write a book, it was really challenging. Like it almost made me cry. Like it was so much work because now if something is going to exist without my time, my, what I've noticed is it's going to require all of

[00:09:00] my energy coming out of my system, into this book.

[00:09:03] So now it can live without me, and it requires a different kind of energetic output. Then just working to exchange time for money. Now, if you start to look and say, okay, this is. The more successful I become the more free I want to be. And you don't explain that to your parents. You don't explain that to anybody.

[00:09:25] You don't explain that to your dog. This is for you for your life, for your enjoyment for you and you alone, and without any explanation, without having to justify your decision to anybody you just live it. Now at that point, you're now emitting from inside your, the center of your core. You're now emitting this desire.

[00:09:48] Now let's say someone says, Hey, Peter could you make a website for me?

[00:09:53] Peter Sumpton: You're like that's exchanging time for money.

[00:09:55] Dane Maxwell: Sorry. No, I can't do that. Then someone says, Hey, Peter, can you help

[00:10:00] solve my my parent bites me a lot and it cusses around my kids and it's really painful.

[00:10:05] And you said, Yeah. Yeah, I can solve that. And so now we'll jump to a context that makes assets easy in business. Easy, like very easy relative to a business. Normally is here's that context it's called this. I call it the starter context and it's people. First problem. Second sales, third outsource product creation to an expert.

[00:10:34] Fourth get a result with your first customer, fifth and then scale to others six. Now, if, and we'll go through this a bunch. Now, if you look at the traditional business context, here it is expertise first. What am I an expert at website? Second product, third random acts of marketing, forth to a random set of

[00:11:00] people.

[00:11:00] Give up and call business risky. Then advise everybody else that business is risky sixth. Now business is not risky. When you follow a starter context, risky is buying equipment, buying an expensive domain, buying a building when really the most significant and valuable act of any business is the customer giving you money.

[00:11:25] That is where a business begins, but yet. We don't focus on that. We focus on expertise. We focus on domain. We focus on when you don't even need expertise and you don't even need a domain. So let's go to this parrot example you say? Yeah. So tell me the most important issues. Okay. Bites you, and it costs us.

[00:11:44] Okay, great. So now Peter, you go and you look up a parrot store and Liverpool UK, or maybe you call into a man . And you start asking, Hey, do you have a pair of trainers on staff? And they say, sure, you find a pair of trainer. You ask, if you could speak to them, the pair of trainers says, hello, and you say, Hey, I'm Peter.

[00:11:59] And I've got some

[00:12:00] clients in mind. Their parents have behavioral issues. They're cussing around the kids and they're biting and that's very painful. Do you know how to solve these behavioral issues? And the penetrator says yes, absolutely. So now you say, okay, great. Would you like to use your iPhone and record me a little course that I can then give to my clients?

[00:12:18] And I will give you 20% of the profit of this business. And all you have to do is teach your expertise. And then the parent owner says, or the pair of trainers has absolutely. So they record the videos on an iPhone. They send them to you in Dropbox or Google drive. And then you share that with your friend.

[00:12:35] Is that the parrot problem now? They watched the videos and they have a question. So they email it to you. You give it to the pair of trainer, the pair of train of records, another video answering that question, sends the video back. Boom. Now that person who owns that parrot to pair it stops cussing and stops by.

[00:12:52] Now you've got a result. You're at number five because remember people first problem. Second with the parent, you sold them. Third, you outsource to a pair of trainer

[00:13:00] fourth. Now fifth, you've got a result with them. Now you've got a testimonials for just like before my pair of bit me now, my parents didn't you got a testimonial and a sale.

[00:13:08] You don't even have a website. You don't even have expertise. They sent the money to you on Paypal. Because you're like your parents are biting you and cussing on your kids. You ask them a simple question you say, is this problem painful enough that you would pay to solve it? And they're like, oh God, yes, I would.

[00:13:26] That's your sale. That's all a sale needs to be. So now you go and scale to other pair of trainers, six, you have yourself, a business and you did people. First problem. Second sales, third outsource product creation, expert fourth, get a result fifth and then sixth scale to other. So you tell me where is the risk?

[00:13:49] Peter Sumpton: Absolutely. I think that the problem would be that. People don't necessarily see it like that. A lot of people would not see it like that. And that, that goes

[00:14:00] way, way back to the schooling and the education. And historically what parents have taught and done are a lot of parents have taught, have done, but I think one thing that sticks out amongst others is that you wrote about the enable.

[00:14:14] Comes up during the implementation stage of a business and about how we like to sabotage our own selves, analysis paralysis, start, stop, overwhelm fear and things like that. So if we find something that we want to do or we're good at or passionate at, and we start it and then this starts to the sabotage comes in, How do we stop doing that?

[00:14:38] Dane Maxwell: Yeah. There is going to be challenged. Real challenge on any path that we choose to walk down, like real challenge. And a lot of us are looking for a path that's challenged free in some way, or oh, I just want it to be easy. And we, and then we buy into believing that. So if we're on a path and there's a lot of challenge and maybe we start looking, [00:15:00] so because there's challenge on any path.

[00:15:06] It becomes very important that you're extremely clear about what you want and that clarity is, listen, I want to be successful. And as it becomes successful, I want to be more free. As an example, other things are, I want to be able to be with my family every day after 2:00 PM. That's another thing you're very clear on you begin there.

[00:15:27] You don't look at careers or businesses first. You can, and that does work, but if you want the real power, where you're your tree rooted in the ground, first, we come to this kind of clarity because now in self-sabotage comes up, self sabotage is so sneaky that it will sabotage you and you don't even know it's happening.

[00:15:53] It's wild, right? Part of me wonders because I reached a critical mass of fame

[00:16:00] in my niche and business around the age of 30. And I had an internal belief that I am very ugly, but I didn't have that consciously. It was unconscious that I believed I was ugly. So what's a 30 year old who gets all this attention who actually believes he's ugly, going to end up doing.

[00:16:23] It's going to hide. He's going to try to subtly sabotage his way out of the spotlight. Cause he doesn't like everybody looking at someone that he thinks is ugly. So what I did is I went into music because I, when I went into music, I could be invisible again because I had no talent really in music to speak up.

[00:16:46] I had a little bit, or I had a lot, but it still wasn't enough to get the attention. That I had in business at the time. So I told myself that going into

[00:17:00] music was the right move. It was the great idea. This is my life path. This is my destiny because the challenge of being seen was so difficult for someone that believed he was ugly, that I wanted to go to a place where I could be hidden.

[00:17:15] So that's what I did now. I also had many other motivations for music. One of which was to prove to myself that I could do it. And these other things for myself personally, and to try and let hearts know they're loves through my voice and singing. These are there's there's more than one yet.

[00:17:39] One of the loudest things was get the F out of the spotlight. And so that self sabotage, I didn't even know. That's what's going on and that's what was going on. So self-sabotage is so powerful and so clever that we don't know

[00:18:00] what's happening. And because I encountered so much challenge in business, I got up to 30 years old and I got to this pinnacle for myself.

[00:18:08] And because challenge was so challenging at 30, I was like, there's no way it should be this hard. And so I left. So there is a self-image inside of me that resonates so deeply with feeling ugly, feeling worthless, and it's become an unconscious automatic response. And it's absolutely powerful if I don't notice it.

[00:18:35] So interestingly enough, I saw, so I got to the pinnacle of business at 30 for myself, my own definition. I backed off. I started at music and when I got into music, I was at the bottom of skill as I raised up in music. And then I remember I released my third album and I had critics that were like, who

[00:19:00] is this kid in Iowa?

[00:19:02] He's going places. Who is this kid in Des Moines? He's going to be a worldwide sensation. I have these critics saying this about one, like one of my songs. And that was after three or four years of very hard work. And when I got to that point, I realized, okay, this is done. Music is complete. I just did what I never thought I could do.

[00:19:30] And then a book publisher contacted me and asked me if I'd write a book. And I said, yes, This is a little bit of the journey that's big. Self-sabotage, there's small. Self-sabotage like getting on a sales call to talks and right before the sales call, like you got to go to the bathroom and you're going to be late to the call, man.

[00:19:55] Physiologically your body's like unsafe sales call danger

[00:20:00] sales, bad sales, evil, guilty for asking for money. Two to two very simple language. It's just pounding in your unconscious that you can't hear, but all of a sudden physiological you're uncomfortable and you got to go to the bathroom.

[00:20:12] Like before you're playing a sport in high school or something, before games, you get nervous. This is self sabotage on smaller scales. Then there's even the more subtle forms of self-sabotage, but here is the breakthrough to it all. So for example, if I ask myself out loud and please ask yourself the same thing while you're listening, what do I secretly believe of myself?

[00:20:36] What do I secretly believe in myself for me? I hear ugly now here's the most powerful thing because I've got tears in my eyes. As I say this, that answer is not. Now oddly, we'll try to say yes, Dane. Yes. Yes. You're ugly. Yes. Every time you look in the mirror. Yes.

[00:20:58] All look at your love handles. Yes. Yes.

[00:21:00] I'll get out for, get out of the, or no. Don't let women look at you. No, you're in the spot I get out. That's how real it is, but it's silent. It's not actually happening publicly. But now that I've done the work that I need to do, here's the critical distinction instead of believing that.

[00:21:16] I just noticed it instead. It's called notice instead of belief. So now the critical difference here, instead of me trying to be handsome, or instead of me trying to clear, ugly, what do I do instead is I allow and welcome ugly, and I sit with it to surrender to it until it becomes completely okay. That it's there.

[00:21:38] And when it's completely okay, that ugly is there. That's when it no longer matters. So it's like we fight. So if you're young, like twenties and going up, like you're going to be motivated by different identities, different internal characters. Say, I must prove myself. I must write the wrongs that were done to

[00:22:00] me.

[00:22:00] And you don't want to be motivated by that. I assure you because you will achieve limited. Even if you can become a millionaire, if it's motivated from a wound, you could actually have 10 or 20 million. If you're a motivated by love and love is cool and the love is powerful. So here's what we do with something like this.

[00:22:21] What do I secretly believe in myself? And then say ugly comes up notice instead of believe, and then declare with powerful thought that is not. And you'll start to notice that you're so much more than this limited thought because you know what ugly is. It's a thought. And the thing that notices that thought is not ugly.

[00:22:46] So this is how identity works, internal thoughts of who we think we are. They are not us. Now. As you get this, you can side step years of therapy and healing. Potentially.

[00:23:00] You could even do it in a moment. Granted some miracle happens and you're able to break this identification with a thought like that, but I don't think there's any reason why not.

[00:23:10] So you ask yourself, what do I secretly believe about myself? And you get hideous piece of that comes up and you feel it, let it come, notice it in your experience of your body and then say was so much strength that is not. And you'll start to chisel away. You'll start to see it as a thought. That's not you, it's just a thought.

[00:23:33] Okay. So this is the critical thing, because it's one of the critical things. Now next with self-sabotage. If we are motivated by internal identities, our motivation will wax and wane. And flip-flop now this is probably. The most, if not, I don't want to say it was such black and white narrative.

[00:23:56] This is very important.

[00:24:00] So instead of being motivated by an identity let's say you start getting fat by your own definition. You're like, you know what? I'm fat. So you start to work out because you feel fat now as you work out and stuff, Feeling fat. The motivation to work out is going to wane and you will stop working out because the motivation that's there has changed.

[00:24:25] And it's when you're motivated by an identity, that identity is vulnerable. You want the kind of rock solid conviction to live that is not dependent on an identity because identities don't make us happy. We see that when we look at celebrities, who've built golden identities, mass, sexual attention, mass sexual validation, beautiful homes, beautiful cars, all this attention.

[00:24:52] And yet many still become miserable and private. That is because working to improve our identities does

[00:25:00] not make us happy and we are transfixed. And to believe that improving our identity is what will make us happy. I will tell you rightnow. We are already happy. We are already free. That is who we are on the deepest level.

[00:25:14] We just forget it because we've been brainwashed. And there's a part of you that believes this. And there's probably a part of you that does not and says, no, I need that business. I need that sale. I need that girl. I need that guy. I need that money, but I tell you what identity doesn't make you happy being happy makes you happy.

[00:25:34] So now that we look at this here, The magic, define your daily values. So my daily values are connection creation, family, wealth, play, and feeling great in my body. And I can look at these and continue to refine them until I really feel

[00:26:00] like I'm living in joy. Now, the thing about these values is they're independent of identity.

[00:26:05] These don't change nearly as often if ever, but identities can change. So what I do is I define these values clearly, and then I make the decision to live these every day. It becomes a decision. So for connection, I'll speak to a potential customer and ask them how they're doing. I'll ask them their problems.

[00:26:23] We'll ask them the thoughts that are going on in their head. I'll listen through connection. Through creation, I'll build a product that serves them, whether I outsource it to the parent trainer, or I know how to build it myself, particularly, I love building software companies. So I hire software developers and become the business.

[00:26:40] I can give a software developer a percentage or pay them just like you do the pair of trainer. So connection, talk to a customer creation, create what they need. Wealth, sell it in a system. I sell it as an, in a system, not dependent on me for family.

[00:27:00] I have scheduled time in my calendar for family every day at one o'clock.

[00:27:04] I spend an hour with my daughter. At eight 30, the phone is off at six 30. We usually have dinner. I say usually because that's not actually in my calendar, like the other things. So there's an opportunity for me to improve with the value of family. I tend to be a lot of work and little play. Now, if you go to play, because work is so fun, by the way, I'm not like punishing myself at work.

[00:27:27] Work is so pleasurable. So now play that is either playing hockey or video games. So I'll actually schedule. And, I haven't done this because I've had so much shame about it, but I'm just now finally getting ready to schedule video game time in my calendar with the intention of living the value of play.

[00:27:45] So now I'll show up to that game to slaughter people for fun, and it's a pure present intention, not a place to distract myself. So now then we have looking and feeling great in my life. Looking

[00:28:00] is there, but it's really more about feeling great in my body because I'm the one in it and I can't see it.

[00:28:06] So what I do is I do I work out on a treadmill for about 20, 30 minutes, burned about 200 calories. First thing in the morning to burn most of the fat stores. Then what I'll do is I'll do 17 minutes of yoga because that's about all I can handle and I'll do it with a metronome at 40 beats per minute, three, four time.

[00:28:24] So the metronome goes.

[00:28:30] Then for three and out for three. And that metronome keeps me in transit and focused enough to do the yoga for 17 minutes. So now what I do is I wake up, I do this, I'll read, I'll do journaling. Then I'll wear my workout. Now I've already got the feeling great in my body. And you know what? I should also add the value of contemplation and clarity because that's what happens before the workout.

[00:28:49] Then I go on, I live the rest of those values every day. If I live those values every day. So really darn good day. And now I'm happy now living my values now,

[00:29:00] not waiting in the future. Now, when you're working on things, you're consciously working on something, but you are probably emitting something energetically, right?

[00:29:10] Emotionally from your stomach and heart, from the center of your being, you're likely emitting something very different than the task that you're working on. Many people as they're working on things. What we do is we admit this is not possible. So while you're working on it, you've got this very strong emission saying it's not possible.

[00:29:29] It's not possible. It's not possible. It's not possible. It's not possible. It's not possible, but you're not aware of it. It's just happening. So while you're building a business or starting a business, and you're like, oh, I've only got one chance to make this work. I've only got one chance to get a business, right?

[00:29:41] When, lo and behold, there, you need tens and hundreds of chances sometimes, but it all takes us one. And you can reduce your risk greatly using that starter context that we talked about. You can reduce your risk completely because you're selling a product before you ever build it. So your risk is the emotional rejection asking for a sale, which isn't even

[00:30:00] that hard to saying, is this a problem that's serious enough that you pay to solve it?

[00:30:03] No. Okay, cool. You don't even have to risk that much rejection. Now you do this. You ask yourself what you secretly believe and you get the answer. You declare internally, that's not me. And you start to break away from being identified that as you, then you start defining your daily values and you make the decision to live those every day.

[00:30:22] And then you live that now, then you start to see that happiness is available right now by living your life. But no, for no reason at all, you can choose to be happy and that's a choice and it's a powerful choice. And if you can do that with your mind, That's what I'm that's my battle is choosing happiness.

[00:30:40] Cause I got my mind built on a lot of sadness growing up. So I've been reconditioning my mind to a happy one. To what it normally is now, what are we emitting as we're working? So as we're working. If you're working at it, like I'm a fat person, I'm a fat person. I'm a fat person as you're working out versus my desire is to

[00:31:00] feel great in my body, my desires, to feel great in my body.

[00:31:03] That kind of self-talk that kind of kindness to yourself while very challenging for many of us is a huge ingredient with how long you'll laugh. Cause we're all. We're just looking for reasons to beat ourselves up. POS is difficult. I must be a piece of crap. Oh, this is difficult. I must be stupid. So hard to work out.

[00:31:21] I must really be lazy. Now, if we get all these things and this is what I've been really dedicating myself to, and we look at what we're emitting while we're working on something like what are we actually sending out to the world as we're doing it, I'm going to get rejected. This business.

[00:31:37] Isn't going to work out. My family doesn't deserve wealth and neither do I. And we're admitting that as we're working I like to tell people and I'm telling you more and more now is listen. Many of us fail before we even start, because one we're motivated by an identity too. We're not clear on our daily values.

[00:31:59]

[00:32:00] Three. We don't have a clear and potent schedule that we put together. We made the schedule ourself. We decide what we do. And when no one else is telling us how to live our schedule, we make it ourselves. You can create the most bad-ass schedule in the world that makes you happy every day you live it.

[00:32:15] You say what would be a schedule. I'd be thrilled to live every day. And you actually schedule that out. And then your mind is turned off because decision fatigue is a very real thing. If you're trying to decide what to do every day, that's decision power, that your brain only has so much up before it goes asleep.

[00:32:31] Again, you want to give your greatest gift to the world. You want to love others. You want to serve from such a deep place. You want to protect your mind. So your resources are given the most that it can give, which means you don't want to fatigue it with what decisions you're going to live that day. So what I do for my schedule.

[00:32:49] Is I set a timer for 10 minutes and I use my phone because man, when I scheduled my brain freaked out, it's what are you doing? Don't track yourself. Don't do this. And was really fine.

[00:33:00] I set a timer for 10 minutes on my phone and I answer three or four questions. What's the most important activity I should do this week.

[00:33:07] What's the most difficult thing I should do this week. What activity can I do this week? That will still matter one year from now. And I answered those three questions. Usually it takes four to five minutes. Then when I'm done with that, I open up my Google calendar and I look at those answers and I plug those answers into a calendar.

[00:33:24] That includes when I'm waking up, when I'm eating, when I'm, what, to be honest, I really only have the critical things in there because I can remember what I need to eat and stuff. But so some people really like to have that scheduled in there, but then I put those three, the most difficult thing, the most important thing.

[00:33:41] And the thing that will still matter a year from now, So now when you talk about living a profitable life, that'll come from how you feel right now in this moment that fulfillment isn't felt in the future fulfillment is felt right now, fulfillment is a present moment experience. So [00:34:00] that's how I would answer.

[00:34:01] Self-sabotage

[00:34:03] Peter Sumpton: Sure. That's

[00:34:04] So comprehensive, so many things in there and yeah. Massive value. Thank you so much for answering that in, in so much detail. One thing that you've said is that many people, including yourself, fall prey to putting their worth on the line. For example, I know you were left with about $123 after being scammed by buying a website for, I think it's 12,000.

[00:34:28] But you also say that it's the best $12,000 you ever spent, because it was the launch pad for your first six figure product. So for a lot of people listening, this'll sound like a step too far, quite a steep learning curve. How do you suggest people don't allow this to happen? Yeah. You allow yourself to make the mistakes you need to learn and

[00:34:48] succeed.

[00:34:49] Dane Maxwell: I'll say something very clearly. You are not. Your mistakes, breathe

[00:35:00] that in many of us had parents that would punish us if we didn't get things right. The first time school certainly punished us by giving us one chance to get something right on a test. So it makes no surprise that we would be a frayed to make a mistake and think that we are our.

[00:35:23] When we're actually wired to learn best through mistake through failure. When we go to work out, we push our muscles to failure to grow, then we must fail. So you're not your mistakes now in terms of what I'm talking about. If you listen to what I just shared and you're like, oh my God, that's way too much for me.

[00:35:48] How the heck I'm ever going to do any of that? See if you can turn it off. An aspect of your mind that says, what's just one thing that I could implement that Dana said,

[00:36:00] what's just one thing. Maybe you schedule only one hour a day on your calendar at first, just one hour and you pick it on the difficult thing.

[00:36:14] The thing you need the most help with is your thing. You guys schedule one thing one hour per day on your count. You do that for a couple of weeks and then you up it to two, then three, et cetera, you sit down with a 10 minute timer and ask yourself, what do I secretly believe about myself? And no one gets to notice, no one needs to know this, but you write out an answer and you look at all that and you contemplate how, not even that as you and you be gentle because when you're like, wait, I'm not these things.

[00:36:44] And the personality was built on some of this stuff. It can be pretty overwhelming to realize how beautiful we are, but inside of you is something so loving,

[00:37:00] so caring that wants to look people in the eye and say, I care about you possibly. I love it. And even constantly, I would do anything to help you.

[00:37:16] And if you can find those places in you where you're waking up to serve from that place, and you talk to people that have parrot problems and you realize you can outsource those things to experts, there's no limit to who you can help. And I've struggled to believe in myself through this whole journey.

[00:37:36] So the interesting thing with not believing in oneself, let's say I don't believe in myself. I can say that it's I don't believe in myself and be like, the interesting thing about that is that too is just a thought and you can actually hold that thought with love. Whereas I don't believe in myself, you just hold it without trying to change it with love.

[00:37:57] And you're like, dang, what is belief? Even me, I

[00:38:00] just want to do stuff.

[00:38:01] Peter Sumpton: Yeah, I completely agree with that slightly different context and slightly dominant down a little, but I'm a firm believer of that if it's physically possible or all that it is stopping you, is that mental block, even down to the point of view of, if you wake up your alarm clock goes off and you think way too tired to get up, you probably not.

[00:38:22] Cause it's physically possible unless you're absolutely exhausted, but it's just that psychological mindset that you need to break through, which is basically what you see in there.

[00:38:31] Dane Maxwell: The difference is not that we're going to use these thoughts and break through them and use willpower muscle.

[00:38:37] What we're actually going to do is hold them with compassion and still do it. So it's really interesting. We teach people this it's so powerful. Someone will actually hold their procrastination. While going to the gym. Does that make sense?

[00:38:55] Peter Sumpton: Yeah. Oh, Absolutely. Yeah.

[00:38:56] Dane Maxwell: So imagine the thing that you want to do the least, and

[00:39:00] actually then hold that you don't want to do it while doing it, but hold it at the same time.

[00:39:08] It's mindblowing.

[00:39:11] Peter Sumpton: And I suppose a lot of people just put that to the back of their mind or block it out rather than

[00:39:15] hold it.

[00:39:16] Dane Maxwell: They fight themselves and they ended up getting exhausted and only last two months in entrepreneurship because they've been fighting their psyche the whole time, instead of just making friends with their mind exactly.

[00:39:26] As it is.

[00:39:27] Peter Sumpton: I want to put some physical context to this. In America, And I don't, I think this stat will be massively inflated now, but roundabout 74% live paycheck to paycheck. And I'll be surprised if that's not higher at this moment in time. Many people will have these limiting beliefs like we spoke about, and they probably don't have the money, especially now to start a business or feel the need money to start a business, which leads nicely onto your book.

[00:39:55] Start from zero. Can you tell us why you wrote the book and what we should

[00:40:00] expect from reading it?

[00:40:01] Dane Maxwell: Yeah. I wrote the book to show people that it's possible to start a business without anything. That's what I was like. Listen, you guys, you don't need anything to start off with. And they're like, what do you mean?

[00:40:13] That seems crazy. So I just tons of examples and methods so people could see, dude, I don't actually need anything. Why have I been an employee this whole time? If they've if people have chosen employee, because that's what they just thought was possible, then there's people, who's totally happy being employees.

[00:40:33] It's amazing. But that's. Why I wrote it to reach the hearts of people that think they need something to start a business. That's why it's called star firms.

[00:40:45] Peter Sumpton: I think in the book you've got, is it 15 examples of students or at least some examples of students? Can you provide some of those examples for us without giving the game away?

[00:40:56] Because people should read the book just to elaborate on the

[00:41:00] success that you've had with teaching people.

[00:41:02] Dane Maxwell: Yeah. Okay. There's so many examples. So I'll just, I'll paint this song in a way where it just lands really well. So we've got 15 millionaires that are graduates from. But I didn't list all the 15 millionaires in the books I wanted.

[00:41:15] We've got stay-at-home moms that make 50 grand a year that are examples. So every income stream that we have is broken down into a customer, a pain, a solution to that pain and an offer. We call that CPSO customer pain solution offer. In fact, that's how you can rapidly break down an income stream customer pain solution offer.

[00:41:38] So we get one of our students. Maxi. She's joins the start from zero. When she's 22, she builds her skills up over a period of a year or two. And when she has the skills in place, things really start clicking. She starts talking to the customer. Remember CPSL the

[00:42:00] customer, community acupuncturists. She asks them what their greatest pains are and they talk about how they're charting software.

[00:42:07] Is ridiculously painful. It becomes take, they spend more time doing charting. They do actually treating patients. Okay. That's a very serious pain. So she creates an automated charting app called happy charting.com. You can go to happy charting.com, check it out. And she built that product. You hired a developer and she built the first version for, I think under five grand, if not under 10 grand at the most, but she had already had money coming.

[00:42:37] Then she released it to people and she's made well over 50 grants cent. Yeah. Selling a charting software that works. And how do you make a software while you listen to the acupuncturist and they tell you exactly what they want it to do. And then you just get a developer to do that because you don't know how to build the product and you don't want to, most developers build products that they think that the customer would use.

[00:42:59] Instead

[00:43:00] of here, you just ask the customer exactly what they want. So that's an example, customer pain solution offer. And then she sold it for, either a thousand dollars a year. Or a thousand dollars for a lifetime membership to the first few people. But she's amazing because she, she actually just got the award for best female actress in a movie.

[00:43:20] And she was able to do that because she had her little software business on the side. Now that's maxi, but that required her having. And, but not much, but let's talk about one that didn't require any money. So now we had another student named Carl and Carl did the customer pain solution offer framework, physical therapists.

[00:43:38] I did the example with you in that paradigm owner, right? So here's physical therapists and he asks them a very interesting question. He says, what are you using? Microsoft Excel for? Because Microsoft Excel is a hotbed for product ideas because people hack it together and creative ways. So he asks him, what do you use Microsoft Excel for?

[00:43:57] And they say we're using it to track all of our metrics because

[00:44:00] QuickBooks, our financial thing doesn't work for physical therapy practices very well. He's asked SML, what are the problems associated with this? And they're like spreadsheets. Get sent around the email and people don't have permissions to edit certain things.

[00:44:12] And so all these issues arise. So he asked him if they would, if this is a problem, severe enough that they pay to solve it. And they said, absolutely. So then he was actually working at Tesla at the time. He now owns his own multi-million dollar business, but he started very small with this product.

[00:44:29] And he told one of his friends who is a developer and the developer said, dude, let me build that for you for free. Just give me 10% of the future revenue. So Carl ended up getting this product built for free. He kept working at Tesla while his product was getting built on the side. He worked on his business for an hour or two first thing in the morning, and then went to work at Tesla all day.

[00:44:50] And didn't think about his business. Just stayed fully focused on Tesla. His other friend, the employee worked on building that product. And then, a year later that product was anywhere

[00:45:00] between five to 15 grand every month. In revenue and it's very stable, very consistent, very reliable income. Now Carl was actually the user interface designer for the checkout process at Tesla.

[00:45:15] So he knew UI really well. So he built the UI himself and then the developer developed behind it. But had he not known the UI, for example I don't know. You will. He could have just hired a UI guy and gave him another 10% of the revenue. And you're able to recruit software developers and user experience people for future revenue.

[00:45:38] When you've got a customer with a pain, that's already said they want by business on the developers are like, great. Right now I'm building two software projects and I don't know how to do it. I can draw on a piece of paper. So I've just hired the UI guys. And now that I have money, I just pay him so I can keep more of the money later.

[00:45:58] But my first few projects, like

[00:46:00] my first software project, I had my first customer pay for all the development. It was like a $3,000 product to get developed. And then I gave, he paid for it and I gave him free the product free for life and just sold it to other people.

[00:46:15] Peter Sumpton: That's cool.

[00:46:16] Dane Maxwell: So you guys, I can give you tangible.

[00:46:19] Whoa, I can give you lots of examples, but these examples are only possible for me to give you because I made a deep declaration within myself. And that deep declaration is what is attracted these amazing methodologies to build remarkable businesses into my life. I didn't get these by having a flimflam desire that oh, I'm a conditional entrepreneur.

[00:46:44] I'm going to be an entrepreneur. If the circumstances are just right, I'm a conditional entrepreneur. I'm going to do it. If I can get an idea first and get money second versus no, dude, the more successful I become, the more free I want. What's one of the only places that can happen in

[00:47:00] entrepreneurship, you could build a YouTube channel, right?

[00:47:04] And you're recording videos and those work without you. That's fine. There are other ways to build assets, but I just want you to know that these tactics I share with you while really exciting are only possible. For the reasons I've said

[00:47:20] Peter Sumpton: I'm conscious, there's a time, but there's one question before we start wrapping up that I really wanted to ask you, and you want stated that you need to learn how to use your intuition as a yardstick to uncover genius by solid fundamentals.

[00:47:34] So why is intuition so important? And do you think that can be caught or caught taught or is it something that we're just born.

[00:47:44] Dane Maxwell: So I'm a friend of mine really fascinated by it. So she did, she interviewed people about intuition and she found there was like three forms of intuition, the inner interviews.

[00:47:53] And there's probably more, but there was a guy who was like a Navy seal sniper, and he would trust the senses [00:48:00] in his body for what to do in combat. So if his body would freeze, he would pause if his body would lean in the direction, he'd go there. And he would like, and you gotta be real in tune your body to do that.

[00:48:13] People like there's this, the concept of oh, life is hard. Life is hard and making decisions as hard as it is. Not life is not hard as a blanket statement. That's not true. Sometimes it is. And sometimes it isn't. And if you're really in tune with your body and you join and work in a job, and the first day on the job you crawl out of your skin, that's the day you should leave.

[00:48:39] But instead you stay and stay for years. And then when you finally leave, it's really difficult. It's really difficult because you didn't listen to your body right away. So if you listen, so first is listening to your body. Now that means you're probably going to need to do like yoga or meditation or go on walks stay on the ground barefoot, put your hand on a tree and taking the energy

[00:49:00] of nature.

[00:49:01] And then like you get in there and place all the attention on one thing I've recently started doing is I've take off my shirt and I lay chest first on the grass. And I consciously feel my beating heart beat against the earth and tell you what you get in tune to that level of nature. That's one fast way to start tapping into your intuitive sense.

[00:49:24] Peter Sumpton: That's interesting. I think that's one thing that I can certainly learn from it is getting more into being more mindful and that mindset and taking the time out to really get in tune with what is going on, Dane.

[00:49:35] Dane Maxwell: Take your most difficult question Peter.

[00:49:37] Peter Sumpton: Yeah,

[00:49:37] Dane Maxwell: Write it down, then go lay on the grass with your chest and your heart beating against the earth and just breathe.

[00:49:43] Peter Sumpton: I think the problem there, Dane is I'm in the UK. So I only get about two days to do that a year. The rest of the time it's freezing cold.

[00:49:51] Dane Maxwell: You can get earthing mats, you can look up and Google earthing mats that are grounded in that. So you can actually lay on. I'm actually standing on one right now.

[00:49:59] Peter Sumpton:

[00:50:00] Ah, I think, you know what you mean on that one?

[00:50:01] Yeah, sure. Yeah excellent.

[00:50:03] Dane Maxwell: There's always a way.

[00:50:04] Peter Sumpton: Yeah, absolutely. I'm with you on that one. So then I just want to wrap up by asking you where can listeners find out more about you or the amazing work that do

[00:50:14] Dane Maxwell: You are worthy of your greatest dreams you're worthy of that thing that you want to do? I hope that the passion that I spoke with broke some stuff loose in you and woke you up to that life that you want to do more with.

[00:50:32] If you resonated with my voice, please pick up a free book excerpt. And if you like the book excerpt, then pick up the book, but you don't need to buy the book until you like it. And you can find out by reading a short five page excerpt, the five page extra. It actually is. There's a process where you'll see me use a five question framework for finding your first business idea.

[00:50:54] And you'll see how I did it on my pregnant girlfriend and the problems she was encountering and how I was going to

[00:51:00] outsource the solution to an acupuncturist or a naturopathic doctor. You'll actually see that all in the five page excerpt, or you can get that as start from zero.com4/five F I V E.

[00:51:10] Start from zero.com4/five. I don't want the best selling book. I want the most read book. So a lot of people buy books. They never do anything with. So you can find out if this will be one of those books by reading the excerpt first start fromzero.com4/five. And then if you want to listen to the podcast where you watch me mentoring people, just rip and write into them and giving them excellent strategies and tips like the real meat tactics that a lot people are hungry for.

[00:51:39] You'll find that over and over again at our podcast. Which is over a hundred plus five star reviews. The podcast is a work of art. It's pretty cool. Pretty cool production.

[00:51:49] Peter Sumpton: Cool. Excellent. So final question. Dane we ask our, all our guests, this, what is your secret to profiting in life?

[00:51:58] Dane Maxwell: If you can just take three

[00:52:00] deep breaths with me right now,

[00:52:09] there's one.

[00:52:22] there's three, kick your hand on your heart with your hand on your heart. Say hello, heart that I love. What do you want to do today?

[00:52:33] Peter Sumpton: A little bit.

[00:52:34] Dane Maxwell: If you can say, if you can start to do that was pretty cool.

[00:52:38] Peter Sumpton: Brilliant. I was actually doing the three breaths as well. I'll be doing that straight after as well, and then writing down my problems and secrets and really thinking about them deeply.

[00:52:47] Dane, thank you so much for joining us today. It's been an absolute pleasure.

[00:52:52] Hala Taha: Thanks for listening to Young And Profiting Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a review on Apple

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[00:53:06] They're the ultimate. Thank you to me and the YAP team. The other way to support us is by word of mouth. Share this podcast with a friend or family member who may find it valuable follow YAP on [email protected]. You can find me on Instagram at YAP with Hala or LinkedIn, just search for my name, Hala Taha until next time, this is Hala signing off.