focus focus stay focus focus focus focus
focus stay focused
hello believe nation my name is Evan
Carmichael my one word is believe and I
believe the entrepreneurs are going to
solve all of the world’s major problems
so to help you on your journey today
we’re going to talk about how you can be
focused and as always as you’re watching
if you hear something that really
resonates with you please leave it down
the comments below and put quotes around
it to other people can be inspired and
when you write it down it’s much more
likely to stick with yourself as well
joy everyone in this room knows how to
create you’re not a manager of your life
you’re a creator of your life or you
wouldn’t be in this room how do you
create your life you get hungry for
something don’t you who has done
something in your life that once seemed
difficult or impossible and now it’s
part of your life who’s got something in
your life is there and say I how did you
do it you created it three ways number
one you decided there’s something you
wanted so bad that you unleashed all
your desire you became obsessed with it
if it was a business or a car or a
relationship or transformation in your
body if there’s something you once
envisioned and now it’s real it’s
because you didn’t just envision it you
brought so much emotion to it then now
it’s in your life it was once a dream it
was once a goal and now it’s in your
life how many have something like that
in your life now say I you may take it
for granted now hopefully not but it was
once just a vision may have seemed
impossible at one time so how did you do
it you started with a concrete vision of
what you wanted and you focused on it
continuously didn’t you
whatever focus goes energy flows you
envision something you got clear about
it and then you started thinking about
all the reasons why you wanted it you
got excited about it
so this is what’s next for me now I want
this you may have dreamed about it
thought about and talked about it but
when you focus on something continuously
something magical happens you get
insights don’t you you overhear a
conversation you hear something you
wouldn’t have heard if you didn’t have
that outcome or goal that you wanted so
badly who’s ever come up with something
obsessed about it didn’t even know how
to do it and it just happened and it
came together who’s that that experience
say I so why don’t we happen to that
power now for your business in life I
realized that when we tend to have the
level of success that I want to have
it’s difficult to spread it out and do
multiple things you know it’s in order
to to be world-class and I’ve made a
decision I want to be world-class and it
just it takes such a desperate obsessive
focus to to excel on assert honor on the
level that I want to make movies you
know I was a Star Wars when I was young
i sat in the movie theater and watch
Star Wars and I just couldn’t believe
that that movie made me feel like that
just floored and just stunned by the
creativity and just I’m realizing that
in order to move people in that way in
order to touch people in that way
you really gotta focus with all of your
fiber and all your heart and all your
creativity you want to make a dream come
true you got to stay focused some people
rather get even than get ahead stay
focus on where you want to go I just
kept on doing what I was supposed to do
and so I was driving to the radio
station my opponent had over $20,000 I
had less than $800 as I was in the radio
station the guy said you’re going to
make a commercial I said yes he’s got a
better build good one because that money
can’t go put it fall here
and I said they’re in the middle control
room and I was thinking and here’s what
happens when you get still stuff will
start coming something said call you
mama used to talk about your mother on
the air all the time ask her to say a
few words for you that would be a
different kind of political spa so I
call my mama and I had a gospel record
playing in the background
and then I had my mother say hello this
is mrs. Mamie brown when I raise my sons
I raised them to be good children when
they got out of hand I’d beat them
behind and made them go right please
vote for my son he’s a football
usually the state representative race
maybe three or four thousand people will
come out to vote in a primary and that
primary race over 27,000 people came out
and voted said I’m voting for Less
Branca this moment say he’s a good boy I
won ladies and gentlemen i won
so you’ve got to be willing to say focus
to be creative to be relentless because
things are going to happen to you when
you’re working on your dream
what kind of business ideas have you
said no – I’m saying no to a lot of
ideas because as a CEO I have to see no
two opportunities because if I say yes I
probably get a 5,000 opportunities every
day but where the years are no
everything based on the mission that
were helping is doing business easier if
it’s on that we’ll consider if somebody
come in saying can you we will have the
list you will make a lot of money I’m
not interested it’s easy to discard say
10 terrible ideas and go after the one
good idea but when you start to get a
little bit of momentum you can drown
yourself in good opportunities that
aren’t great opportunities and if you
scatter your focus you try to do 17
different product lines you can kill
your business really easily particularly
when you have a small team so I think
asking yourself repeatedly what is the
one project the one initiative the one
campaign that if successful will render
the rest of these things either
unnecessary or much much easier what is
that what is that one step and you know
I’ve called this lead Domino before but
what is the one thing on this list of
seven different campaigns that will make
all the other ones are relevant or much
easy how do you I mean that’s a tough
answer isn’t it because they all sound
good yeah I think they can and I think
that what it comes down to often times
is it returns back to measurements so
how are we defining success like if we
want to grow the company let’s just say
what does that mean in three months six
months what are we measuring why are we
measuring those things and you know what
is a sort of a comfort goal meaning like
okay we think we can easily hit this
number what is a stretch and what is
like Oh hallelujah we threaded a needle
and and then come up with a really
concrete number to tackle and once you
have that number then you can look at
those five and say all right which of
those are going to serve us right now
and I’m dealing with that increasingly
so because I have all these different
branches of
content and activities in angel
investing and so on it’s very easy for
me to get scattered it’s never been
easier so I have to continually ask that
type of question what’s your main focus
now if you had a boil it down to one
my main focus right now is building the
pod cat building my podcasts and fair
show up to a point where it’s
consistently in the top ten to fifteen
on iTunes so that I can establish a
presence and name recognition in
Hollywood and Entertainment which I can
leverage then for the TV show and film
projects that I’ll be expanding into the
next three to nine months and
specifically what that means is targeted
advertising for the podcast specifically
towards people who are producers agents
actors directors in Hollywood in New
York City all of that can be quantified
the one thing that I feel deeply about
and this is something like I’ll feel
people about what I leave leave leave
government is stuff gets better if we
work at it and we stay focused on where
we’re going it doesn’t immediately get
all solved and I warned against this
when I was running for office because
everybody had the hope posters and the
best and that everybody was feeling like
hey they can make those you may know
no no no I was away from you it was a
nice place no what I’m saying is is that
the if you look at what I said at the
time I said this is going to be an
ongoing project and it’s a project of
citizens it’s not just fix it it’s how
do we work together to get things done
and it will be imperfect yes over time
is it better and here’s the thing I can
say John yeah I can say this
unequivocally the VA is better now than
when I came into office it is better now
than when I came into office government
works better than when I came into
office the economy by every metric is
better than when I came into office and
so the reason I can sleep at night as I
saw myself you know what it’s not not am
I satisfied with it no and should voters
be satisfied with it absolutely not
because otherwise you know if we get
complacent lazy then stuff does happen
losing focus is another way that
founders get off track I actually think
this is a symptom of burnout when you
get really burned out on running the
business you want to do easier things or
sort of more gratifying things you want
to go to conferences and have people
tell you how great you are you know you
want to do all these things that are not
actually building the business and the
most common post YC failure case for the
companies we fund is that they’re
incredibly focused during YC on their
company and then after they start doing
a lot of other things you know they they
advise companies they go to conferences
whatever focus is what made it
successful in the first place there are
a lot of reasons people lose focus but
fight against that really really hard
what the reason I made is because I knew
exactly what I wanted to do that’s the
thing I’ve seen with a lot of people
nowadays they became huge yeah they
don’t really have a clear quick concise
they don’t have that one thing that they
feel that they’re good at so they don’t
try to master that I’m reading a book
right now called the Matthew by Robert
Greene and it’s basically taking that
whole 10,000 hours Theory like you’re
not a master at something so you put in
turns out now so it’s like you gotta
find there one thing to put in that time
with and everything else was proud for
me my radio is my thing that I’m lucky
they always use an radio like what it’s
like I don’t know you know I’ve tried to
keep my focus on the music that I was
making I tried not to get distracted I
had a lot of models who came before me
where I could see where people made
mistakes and nobody’s perfect you make
mistakes you know and you know it’s just
a part of human life you know but but I
think that but the kind of mistakes
where you lose your Center and you lose
track of the work that you’re doing and
the music you’re making and you lose you
lose the ability to be relevant into
your fans and keep to the community that
you’re working for I’ve just done my
best with them you know I I’d be the
last person to claim any any make any
claim on I’m getting it getting a
completely right or perfect but but I’ve
I’ve I’ve tried to do it well enough to
where I continue to have a voice for my
my fans and I’m able to look into the
world and experience experience and
translate what I see in a in a
productive fashion well when you’re
doing the TV show you know every day is
a different day in the sense that it’s
never the same and you might be shooting
two scenes you might have one scene you
might have five scenes so your level of
preparation is different every time
generally I’m up early I exercise I run
I do whatever it is I’m doing in terms
of my physical life other than playing
tennis which I I you know stack up
during the course of a week quite a lot
of if I can and you know get to set
depending on your call time but very
often is very
really and then you you know try to be
there and be alert and awake and alive
and ready to go every hour of the day
and if you work 12 hours then you have
to be alert every one of those hours
it’s it’s an important time to stay
focused thank you guys so much for
watching I hope you enjoyed I’d love to
know what did you take from this video
that you are going to immediately now
apply to your life or your business
somehow please leave it down the
comments below
I’m really curious to find out I also
want to give a quick shout to Derrick
Kui of a pronounced at okay there thank
you so much for picking up a copy of my
book your one word I really really
really appreciate the support man and I
hope you’re enjoying the read thank you
guys again for watching I believe in you
I hope you continue to believe in
yourself and whatever your one word is
much love I’ll see you soon
focus stay focused
hello believe nation my name is Evan
Carmichael my one word is believe and I
believe the entrepreneurs are going to
solve all of the world’s major problems
so to help you on your journey today
we’re going to talk about how you can be
focused and as always as you’re watching
if you hear something that really
resonates with you please leave it down
the comments below and put quotes around
it to other people can be inspired and
when you write it down it’s much more
likely to stick with yourself as well
joy everyone in this room knows how to
create you’re not a manager of your life
you’re a creator of your life or you
wouldn’t be in this room how do you
create your life you get hungry for
something don’t you who has done
something in your life that once seemed
difficult or impossible and now it’s
part of your life who’s got something in
your life is there and say I how did you
do it you created it three ways number
one you decided there’s something you
wanted so bad that you unleashed all
your desire you became obsessed with it
if it was a business or a car or a
relationship or transformation in your
body if there’s something you once
envisioned and now it’s real it’s
because you didn’t just envision it you
brought so much emotion to it then now
it’s in your life it was once a dream it
was once a goal and now it’s in your
life how many have something like that
in your life now say I you may take it
for granted now hopefully not but it was
once just a vision may have seemed
impossible at one time so how did you do
it you started with a concrete vision of
what you wanted and you focused on it
continuously didn’t you
whatever focus goes energy flows you
envision something you got clear about
it and then you started thinking about
all the reasons why you wanted it you
got excited about it
so this is what’s next for me now I want
this you may have dreamed about it
thought about and talked about it but
when you focus on something continuously
something magical happens you get
insights don’t you you overhear a
conversation you hear something you
wouldn’t have heard if you didn’t have
that outcome or goal that you wanted so
badly who’s ever come up with something
obsessed about it didn’t even know how
to do it and it just happened and it
came together who’s that that experience
say I so why don’t we happen to that
power now for your business in life I
realized that when we tend to have the
level of success that I want to have
it’s difficult to spread it out and do
multiple things you know it’s in order
to to be world-class and I’ve made a
decision I want to be world-class and it
just it takes such a desperate obsessive
focus to to excel on assert honor on the
level that I want to make movies you
know I was a Star Wars when I was young
i sat in the movie theater and watch
Star Wars and I just couldn’t believe
that that movie made me feel like that
just floored and just stunned by the
creativity and just I’m realizing that
in order to move people in that way in
order to touch people in that way
you really gotta focus with all of your
fiber and all your heart and all your
creativity you want to make a dream come
true you got to stay focused some people
rather get even than get ahead stay
focus on where you want to go I just
kept on doing what I was supposed to do
and so I was driving to the radio
station my opponent had over $20,000 I
had less than $800 as I was in the radio
station the guy said you’re going to
make a commercial I said yes he’s got a
better build good one because that money
can’t go put it fall here
and I said they’re in the middle control
room and I was thinking and here’s what
happens when you get still stuff will
start coming something said call you
mama used to talk about your mother on
the air all the time ask her to say a
few words for you that would be a
different kind of political spa so I
call my mama and I had a gospel record
playing in the background
and then I had my mother say hello this
is mrs. Mamie brown when I raise my sons
I raised them to be good children when
they got out of hand I’d beat them
behind and made them go right please
vote for my son he’s a football
usually the state representative race
maybe three or four thousand people will
come out to vote in a primary and that
primary race over 27,000 people came out
and voted said I’m voting for Less
Branca this moment say he’s a good boy I
won ladies and gentlemen i won
so you’ve got to be willing to say focus
to be creative to be relentless because
things are going to happen to you when
you’re working on your dream
what kind of business ideas have you
said no – I’m saying no to a lot of
ideas because as a CEO I have to see no
two opportunities because if I say yes I
probably get a 5,000 opportunities every
day but where the years are no
everything based on the mission that
were helping is doing business easier if
it’s on that we’ll consider if somebody
come in saying can you we will have the
list you will make a lot of money I’m
not interested it’s easy to discard say
10 terrible ideas and go after the one
good idea but when you start to get a
little bit of momentum you can drown
yourself in good opportunities that
aren’t great opportunities and if you
scatter your focus you try to do 17
different product lines you can kill
your business really easily particularly
when you have a small team so I think
asking yourself repeatedly what is the
one project the one initiative the one
campaign that if successful will render
the rest of these things either
unnecessary or much much easier what is
that what is that one step and you know
I’ve called this lead Domino before but
what is the one thing on this list of
seven different campaigns that will make
all the other ones are relevant or much
easy how do you I mean that’s a tough
answer isn’t it because they all sound
good yeah I think they can and I think
that what it comes down to often times
is it returns back to measurements so
how are we defining success like if we
want to grow the company let’s just say
what does that mean in three months six
months what are we measuring why are we
measuring those things and you know what
is a sort of a comfort goal meaning like
okay we think we can easily hit this
number what is a stretch and what is
like Oh hallelujah we threaded a needle
and and then come up with a really
concrete number to tackle and once you
have that number then you can look at
those five and say all right which of
those are going to serve us right now
and I’m dealing with that increasingly
so because I have all these different
branches of
content and activities in angel
investing and so on it’s very easy for
me to get scattered it’s never been
easier so I have to continually ask that
type of question what’s your main focus
now if you had a boil it down to one
my main focus right now is building the
pod cat building my podcasts and fair
show up to a point where it’s
consistently in the top ten to fifteen
on iTunes so that I can establish a
presence and name recognition in
Hollywood and Entertainment which I can
leverage then for the TV show and film
projects that I’ll be expanding into the
next three to nine months and
specifically what that means is targeted
advertising for the podcast specifically
towards people who are producers agents
actors directors in Hollywood in New
York City all of that can be quantified
the one thing that I feel deeply about
and this is something like I’ll feel
people about what I leave leave leave
government is stuff gets better if we
work at it and we stay focused on where
we’re going it doesn’t immediately get
all solved and I warned against this
when I was running for office because
everybody had the hope posters and the
best and that everybody was feeling like
hey they can make those you may know
no no no I was away from you it was a
nice place no what I’m saying is is that
the if you look at what I said at the
time I said this is going to be an
ongoing project and it’s a project of
citizens it’s not just fix it it’s how
do we work together to get things done
and it will be imperfect yes over time
is it better and here’s the thing I can
say John yeah I can say this
unequivocally the VA is better now than
when I came into office it is better now
than when I came into office government
works better than when I came into
office the economy by every metric is
better than when I came into office and
so the reason I can sleep at night as I
saw myself you know what it’s not not am
I satisfied with it no and should voters
be satisfied with it absolutely not
because otherwise you know if we get
complacent lazy then stuff does happen
losing focus is another way that
founders get off track I actually think
this is a symptom of burnout when you
get really burned out on running the
business you want to do easier things or
sort of more gratifying things you want
to go to conferences and have people
tell you how great you are you know you
want to do all these things that are not
actually building the business and the
most common post YC failure case for the
companies we fund is that they’re
incredibly focused during YC on their
company and then after they start doing
a lot of other things you know they they
advise companies they go to conferences
whatever focus is what made it
successful in the first place there are
a lot of reasons people lose focus but
fight against that really really hard
what the reason I made is because I knew
exactly what I wanted to do that’s the
thing I’ve seen with a lot of people
nowadays they became huge yeah they
don’t really have a clear quick concise
they don’t have that one thing that they
feel that they’re good at so they don’t
try to master that I’m reading a book
right now called the Matthew by Robert
Greene and it’s basically taking that
whole 10,000 hours Theory like you’re
not a master at something so you put in
turns out now so it’s like you gotta
find there one thing to put in that time
with and everything else was proud for
me my radio is my thing that I’m lucky
they always use an radio like what it’s
like I don’t know you know I’ve tried to
keep my focus on the music that I was
making I tried not to get distracted I
had a lot of models who came before me
where I could see where people made
mistakes and nobody’s perfect you make
mistakes you know and you know it’s just
a part of human life you know but but I
think that but the kind of mistakes
where you lose your Center and you lose
track of the work that you’re doing and
the music you’re making and you lose you
lose the ability to be relevant into
your fans and keep to the community that
you’re working for I’ve just done my
best with them you know I I’d be the
last person to claim any any make any
claim on I’m getting it getting a
completely right or perfect but but I’ve
I’ve I’ve tried to do it well enough to
where I continue to have a voice for my
my fans and I’m able to look into the
world and experience experience and
translate what I see in a in a
productive fashion well when you’re
doing the TV show you know every day is
a different day in the sense that it’s
never the same and you might be shooting
two scenes you might have one scene you
might have five scenes so your level of
preparation is different every time
generally I’m up early I exercise I run
I do whatever it is I’m doing in terms
of my physical life other than playing
tennis which I I you know stack up
during the course of a week quite a lot
of if I can and you know get to set
depending on your call time but very
often is very
really and then you you know try to be
there and be alert and awake and alive
and ready to go every hour of the day
and if you work 12 hours then you have
to be alert every one of those hours
it’s it’s an important time to stay
focused thank you guys so much for
watching I hope you enjoyed I’d love to
know what did you take from this video
that you are going to immediately now
apply to your life or your business
somehow please leave it down the
comments below
I’m really curious to find out I also
want to give a quick shout to Derrick
Kui of a pronounced at okay there thank
you so much for picking up a copy of my
book your one word I really really
really appreciate the support man and I
hope you’re enjoying the read thank you
guys again for watching I believe in you
I hope you continue to believe in
yourself and whatever your one word is
much love I’ll see you soon
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