Hey whats up— it’s Dave,

Today I’m getting a bit into mindset and entrepreneurship.

I had two mental breakthroughs this week that I want to talk about.

These ideas have been searing in my brain like a steak on a hot pan.

The two ideas are interconnected— I’m going to explain each one, and try to make my case at the end on why both are crucial to running a business. The ideas also apply if you’re an employee, so read on if you’re not a business owner.

How it started

It started with an interview that I watched on Monday night on Scott Braun—most famously known for discovering Justin Bieber at the age of 10, and now worth over a billion dollars. Yes, with a B.

Scott went from being a club promoter in Atlanta to managing the biggest music stars in the world, all before turning 40.

He said something that I haven’t been able to get out of my head. It goes something like this:

It really struck a chord with me. I went to sleep and woke up thinking about it.

I knew my answer before even having to ask myself:

Yeah, I’m absolutely thinking too small.

This opened the door to my first realization.

First “Aha” moment

The next morning, my brain felt as if two Tetris blocks had fallen perfectly and cleared a whole layer.

Something just made sense.

Yes, I was making the mistake of thinking too small about my business and career. But the quote alone wasn’t the “aha moment.” It’s what followed:

That I subconsciously have had these limiting beliefs about myself my whole life, since I was a kid.

Here’s the thing though — I don’t go walking around thinking “I want to think small.”

No. In fact, if you know me, you know that I generally have a positive outlook and I truly think that I’m going to have a pretty good business and career.

For the most part, I’m a glass-is-half-full type of guy.

Except this wasn’t a surface-level realization.

The “aha moment” dug deep into my subconscious. As if it dug through multiple layers in the earth, got down to the core, found a faulty code, and brought it to the surface to expose it to the world for the first time.

Something clicked.

As I’m writing this, I’m finding difficulty articulating the realization, but here’s my best attempt, while sticking with the earth analogy.

I realized that my limiting beliefs are buried in my Inner Core— so deep, I didn’t even know they existed. Exposing them made me realize that the beliefs in your Inner Core dictate everything that rises to the surface: your thoughts, your decisions, your physical reality.

That’s why people debate Free Will. But I’ll save that rabbit hole for another time.

To put it into perspective of my business — the business will only grow as far as the limit of my belief system, deeply rooted in the Inner Core. The business will never grow higher than the upper limit of my belief-system— that’s a truth.

That “aha moment” felt like shattering the first of many layers.

Second “Aha Moment”

The first “Aha Moment” sparked a ridiculously productive week — I don’t think I’ve been this productive since I started my entrepreneurial journey. It completely impacted the way I went about my business— which then resulted in a second, totally different, yet equally-powerful realization.

It was this:

If you have a new business, and you’re NOT absolutely laser-focused, you’re fu****. You’re going to lose.

You see, what this week revealed was a few things:

One:

You can work insanely hard, be extremely focused, and the needle may only move forward a little bit. To really move the needle forward, you need months upon months (if not years) with laser-focus.

Two:

Hard work and extreme focus are table stakes. As in, that’s the minimum requirement to play this game of entrepreneurship. Even with these two attributes, wealth and success aren’t guaranteed at the end.

The one outcome that is guaranteed if you don’t work hard and have extreme focus: failure.

Three:

If you don’t have extreme focus, you can’t possibly grow your business fast enough to keep it alive.The slower you go, the higher the mountain top gets.

Not moving with extreme focus and speed in a new business is like trying to get a fire going and not giving it the oxygen it needs. Speed is to a business what oxygen is to a fire.

So what now?

I’m trying my absolute hardest to hang on to these mental breakthroughs.

This is what I’m doing:

1. Writing this and blasting it to the world right now

2. Consciously thinking about it every day, and planning my days in accordance with this shift in thinking, and following through.

These moments of realization are few and far between— and unfortunately, fleeting.

The mind is easy to forget. By default, it wants to forget—especially thoughts that require us to break life-long habits. We hate change.

The only way to change though, is through physical action.

What I executed this week:

Here’s a screenshot of what I accomplished in my business roadmap this month. This doesn’t include the actual admin and day-to-day operations of the business. This is more big picture — strategy and direction of the business.

Taking this same fire to next week.