Too Many Mind
Captain Nathan Algren was beaten by the Samurai and taken captive to their village for the winter.
Algren was accustomed to fighting from a distance with guns. The Samurai fought up close with swords. After being beaten badly by a seasoned warrior during his captivity, he began trying to learn Samurai swordplay, but kept finding himself on the receiving end of another beatdown. Finally a younger warrior pulled Algren aside and addressed the problem.
“Too many mind.”
Algren, confused, repeated the words back as a question, not understanding.
Young Nobutada explained, “Mind the sword. Mind the people watch. Mind the enemy. Too many mind. No mind.”
When Algren cleared his mind and focused only on the next right move at the next right moment, he began to counter, block, and strike, with the next match ending in a draw against the seasoned warrior.
I watched this scene play out both in the theater, and in the work of franchise brokerage.
The scene is from one of my favorite movies, The Last Samurai, and I think it demonstrates clearly what often goes wrong for brokers and agents.
It took me four months to close my first deal. When I finished training and began building my business, I still had a full-time, 40 hour a week job. I had a few difficult things going on in my personal life as well. I tried fitting my brokerage work into a busy schedule, a scattered mind, and a troubled heart and soul. I just couldn’t get traction.
In month three, Quantum Franchise Group became my full-time work. I knew what I wanted to be focusing on daily. I knew how many aspiring entrepreneurs I wanted to help, what kind of income I wanted to earn, and lifestyle I wanted to enjoy, and I fixed my mind and my schedule on the activities necessary to make that happen.
I’ve also seen other brokers finish training, add franchise brokerage to an already full plate, continue adding other things to do and think about, and over the course of the next year never close a deal, never gain traction, and all but give up, wondering why they couldn’t make it work.
Too many mind.
Where does this business fit in the plan for your life?
I think this is the starting point, the first question, for any broker or agent who wants to be wildly successful, according to their own definition of success.
There are some of us who see this as a nice, part-time addition to retirement. They’re content closing 3 or 4 deals a year while focusing most of their time on their families, volunteering, their social life, or traveling the world. That is their definition of success, and that’s amazing! They are doing the work they do so they can live the life they want to live.
Others may want to replace the income of a day job while working on their own terms, not answering to a boss, and are content with closing 10 or 15 deals and earning a couple hundred thousand a year. This is a great business to do just that! They are doing the work they do so they can live the life they want to live.
And there are some brokers who want to build an empire, with a team, closing 50 to 100 deals a year, earning a seven-figure income, and never again having to worry about money. They are doing the work they do so they can live the life they want to live.
Qualitatively, none of these goals is any better or worse than any other. Your definition of success is more important than anyone else’s definition of success. This is your life.
To achieve your goal you may need to remove, restructure, and reorganize what you do and when you do it.
Once you’ve determined what role this business is going to play in your life, you need to give it the proper place in your heart, mind, and daily activities to live and work in alignment with that role.
What should you remove?
Are there things you’re doing that add no real value to your life, are not moving you toward the future you want, and are robbing time from the activities that will make your goal a reality? Stop doing them today. Why keep doing something that adds no value and robs your desired future from you?
What should you restructure?
After you’ve removed what needs to be removed, you may need to restructure what remains to position everything that remains in the right order to be holistically successful and happy.
Maybe you want to be a million dollar broker. You also love visiting several new countries every year, having adventures and experiencing new cultures. Being a million dollar broker will make the latter (and everything else) easier to do. But to achieve million dollar broker status, you may need to visit 6 new countries next year instead of 13.
What should you reorganize?
After removing what no longer belongs in your life and restructuring the way you live your life to achieve your most important goals, you’ll likely need to reorganize your day to day activities.
What will you do from 7am to 9am each morning to live in alignment and achieve your goals? What tasks and activities will you do when? How will you build “focus days” into your week? What networking, or coaching activities should you faithfully participate in to achieve your goals, to give you the life you want?
Stop chasing things and start attracting them.
Every month, when I help train a new class of brokers, I talk about how every human who has ever lived spends every day doing two things: Pursuing pleasure and avoiding pain.
We tend to run in multiple directions, chasing down pleasure. We also tend to run in multiple directions, away from pain. Many of us spend our whole lives, running, frantically, all over the place, hoping to find happiness in pursuit and safety in retreat.
Too many mind.
Stop. Have a seat. Take a breath. Focus. Set your heart and mind on what’s most important, now, and ten years from now. Remove the useless clutter. Restructure your priorities. Reorganize your activities. And I promise, you won’t have to chase the things you want, you’ll attract them!
You got this!