Never Stop Building
Sam Kaufman, an accomplished entrepreneur and thought leader, brings his wealth of experience and expertise to the forefront in each episode. With a captivating voice and a genuine passion for building, Sam creates a welcoming and dynamic atmosphere that draws in listeners from all walks of life.
In "Never Stop Building," Sam dives deep into the stories and journeys of remarkable individuals who have achieved great success in various industries. From startup founders and CEOs to creative artists and social entrepreneurs, Sam explores their triumphs, failures, and the lessons they learned along the way. Each episode is a captivating blend of personal anecdotes, valuable insights, and practical strategies that listeners can implement in their own lives.
What sets "Never Stop Building" apart is Sam's ability to extract powerful wisdom and actionable advice from his guests. He skillfully guides conversations, asking thought-provoking questions that delve into the mindset, strategies, and core principles behind their achievements. Listeners can expect to gain a deeper understanding of what it truly takes to overcome obstacles, cultivate resilience, and create impactful change.
Beyond interviews, "Never Stop Building" also features solo episodes where Sam shares his own perspectives, reflections, and strategies for personal and professional growth. His relatable storytelling style and ability to distill complex ideas into actionable steps make these episodes highly engaging and accessible.
Whether you're an aspiring entrepreneur, a creative professional, or simply someone seeking inspiration and guidance, "Never Stop Building" offers a wealth of knowledge and inspiration to help you on your own journey. It's a podcast that encourages listeners to embrace their entrepreneurial spirit, embrace continuous learning, and never stop building their dreams.
Never Stop Building
Building Momentum for an Extraordinary 2024 | Ep 95
Ready to start living your best year yet? Your journey begins here, on Never Stop Building with me, Sam Kaufman. As we approach 2024, we're not just waiting for it to roll around - we're taking action now. Let's commit to refining our behaviors and habits to align with our aspirations, and tackling everything from health and finance to relationships. If 2023 wasn't your best, let's make sure we don't repeat the same patterns. Instead, we’ll talk about how to hit the ground running and build momentum towards an extraordinary 2024.
Have you ever considered having a 'word for the year'? A word that embodies your intentions, aspirations, and the theme of your year? We dive into this concept, exploring how choosing and committing to this word can shape your year and your decisions. This isn't about just having a 'good enough' year. With your chosen word guiding you, we're aiming for a truly fulfilling and successful year. So, tune in as we take proactive steps towards 2024 - because it's never too early to start building a remarkable year.
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Welcome to Never Stop Building, where we discuss all things business, growth and leveling up to become the most elite version of yourself. We're here to challenge fear and, shattered out, let's dive in. What is up everybody. Welcome back to Never Stop Building. I'm your host, sam Kaufman. As always, I'm excited to be here with you today.
Speaker 1:You're going to be hearing this on the first Tuesday of December, and so this episode is all about building momentum as you go into 2024. Look, I love yearly initiatives. I love initiatives in general. I love making a plan. I don't like the idea of just setting random goals. I certainly don't like New Year's resolutions. I think, if you were going to do anything, I don't think that going from December 31st to January 1st is going to make really a damn bit of difference In your commitment level, your discipline level. It might give you a little boost of motivation, but I think that'll be about it. But as we talk about yearly planning, it is December and you should have a good idea of what you want to accomplish in 2024. And December is not the time to take a month off. The reason this episode is coming out on the first Tuesday in December and not the last Tuesday in December is because I want this episode to encourage you to start building momentum right now. You have an entire month to start trickling in some habits, some behaviors and some disciplines towards the things that you want to accomplish for 2024. If you wait till January 1st, you're 30 to 60 days behind the curve already Already. You can't just have momentum out of nowhere. That is not how objects start to go into motion, and so I want you to take December and I want to encourage you to take this time to start building momentum towards the things that you really want to accomplish, and you do know what some of them are.
Speaker 1:Maybe you've got a weight loss goal that's just been killing you in 2023 was going to be the year that you were going to lose 25 pounds, and maybe you lost a few in the beginning and then you screwed it up after a few weeks and then maybe even gained weight this year instead of lost where you wanted. Maybe you've got all the excuses that everybody else has oh, I was stressed, or my business was a lot, my kids needed a lot, I've got this lower back injury, or you know, my shoulder has been hurting and that hasn't prevented you from eating well, or in a calorie deficit. That hasn't prevented you from taking walks. That hasn't prevented you from doing something every single day, consistently, to be better. You just haven't taken the action. So to think that you're going to go overnight at the snap of a finger and start taking action is ridiculous. Start today, take a walk today, your next meal. Make it cleaner. Don't need anything fried. Whatever you think the right portion size is, cut 25% off of it. Neat that instead, just start making small, incremental, healthy habits.
Speaker 1:If you have a savings goal, you didn't save the money you wanted to save this year Start now. Start putting 5% 10% of every dollar that comes into your bank account into a savings account that you can't touch. Start now. These things don't have to wait. If you have business goals you got a big sales initiative for 2024, start organizing your sales pipeline now. Start calling people that could be potential leads for you for next year. Now Start developing the relationships for some key customers, some referral partners, some big repeat business that you may want to bring on next year. Now.
Speaker 1:Everybody always focuses on this retroactive. It's Q1 in the middle of Q1 and I'm not going to make my Q1 goal. I'm going to go really hard now for the next seven weeks. Man, that is not necessary. Man like so much change for me when consistency and proactive action became a part of my life. You don't have to wait until you're already not going to hit the target to start trying to aim for the target. You start now. Small, incremental change. Make three extra calls next week if you're in sales. Make three extra pieces of content if you are in marketing or content creation. Maybe you need to focus on your marriage or your parenting, the relationship with your kids. Why wait till January? Schedule a date night for December. Schedule a movie night with the kiddos for December, not the week between Christmas and New Year's, when everybody thinks that they're making up for lost time by taking six days off. You're not. December is your month. December is the month for you to get things rolling in a positive direction. Don't make 2024 a repeat of 2023. This is going to be my year and look, I want to say some of you, there's a flip side to everything I'm saying right now, because some of you absolutely crushed it in 2023. You just refused to acknowledge it or can't see it.
Speaker 1:For a lot of people, 2023 was a survival year and in business specifically, 2023 was a survival year, and surviving was the metric, not quitting was the data point. If you were in sales and home services in 2023, this was a hard year. If you were the CEO or business owner in home services in 2023, this was a really hard year. And if you were those things and a husband and a parent and trying to get fit and doing all this was a. This was an extremely challenging year, but there are people who took this year and won at very high levels. There are people who took those difficulties and still lost the weight they wanted, still went on the date nights they committed to, still did the travel that they said that they would, still took care of themselves, still put out content, still recorded those podcasts, still showed up for themselves, still pursued a dream. So I'm not negating the fact that it was hard. I'm not taking that away from anybody. It was hard for everybody. This year was hard as fuck.
Speaker 1:For me, 2023 was one of the probably the toughest year in business I've ever had in my almost decade long career in sales and entrepreneurship. And yet here I am setting the standard and being the example. Here I am attacking my initiatives head down, focused on who I am what I want to be known for, the man I'm becoming and being 1% better every single day. I was more focused this year on being 1% better every day than I have ever been in my entire life, and 2023 has probably changed my life for things beyond my wildest imagination forever, because I did the work that other people don't want to do every day, I made the content. I hit the gym, I took the walk, I chose the clean meal, I smiled with my kids even when I was exhausted. I took the risk, even when I had so much to lose. I walked the walk. I didn't just talk the talk. A lot of work got done this year and a lot of work is going to get done in 2024.
Speaker 1:The reason I'm sharing that with you is not to not to brag to you that I did more than I even imagined I could over the last 12 months, but to explain to you that I am just an ordinary dude who is choosing to do extraordinary things, and so, if you are just an ordinary guy or gal, you and I are the same. I have nothing special that you don't have. I have every disadvantage that you have. I have every feeling that you feel. I feel tiredness and laziness and procrastination. I feel doubt and the fear of failure. I feel scared, anxious. All of those things happen. I want to quit. I don't feel like it. I stare in the pantry. Sometimes I just want to stuff my face with crap food.
Speaker 1:I wake up really early to work out. I don't feel like working out. I gotta do cardio in the afternoon. I feel like doing cardio. I gotta prep and pack food for an entire week of travel, to speak and work at an event for five days, to come home to run another one, and I don't want to. But God, do I feel good about myself when I'm done? I love doing the things that the old version of me would never do. I love outperforming all of my competition, and all of my competition is just me. Me today is me tomorrow's competitor, and I love waking up tomorrow and outperforming me today. And there are days where I sit down at the end of the day and I go. There is no way I will ever be able to evolve past what I did today. And then a day shows up not too far from there where I go damn bro, there is no way that this has to be the peak, and then there's days where I'm like I could have done better, I could have done more. I could have done. I really could have showed up for myself a little bit better. And those days are becoming fewer and further between because I committed to myself and the big, big major commitment. I'll share this with you guys as you're planning for your 2024.
Speaker 1:My word for 2023 last December, I set my word for 2023. And the word was tunnel and what that? What that did was an encompassed focus and tunnel vision was what that was sort of born off of, and what I decided in December of 22 was I was going to be 100% focused and intentful on everything that I did While I was doing it. When I was in the gym, I was only in the gym. When I was at work, I was only at work. I was with my wife. I was only with my wife when I was executing on a plan. I was executing on a plan.
Speaker 1:See, what I used to do was I would. I would think about or I would make decisions in the moment based on all the other factors that weren't even factors yet. Oh man, you know, if I, like I really, really can't go to the gym this morning because later today I have to blah, blah, blah and I want to have enough energy for that. So I'd be totally unfocused, or I'd be in work completely obsessing about that cardio session later, or I would pick that garbage food. So, man, I just got to. I just got to eat faster because I got too much to do today and my word for 2023 was tunnel.
Speaker 1:I was very intentful because I knew what my weakness was in 22. And I knew what I wanted in 23. I knew what I wanted for my life and I knew that in order to get what I wanted, I needed to fix some things about myself that I didn't want to act on anymore, and being unfocused in every single moment was one of them. And I was always. I always got a lot done. It was good at being busy. I got a lot done, but at the end of 2023, it really wasn't okay. I was. I didn't feel good, got a lot done in 2023.
Speaker 1:Hit almost all the goals I set for 2023. I felt like shit physically. Physically, not just because I was overweight, but because the stress and the anxiety and the sleeplessness and the like I really 2023, I went so hard in a such an unfocused way that it really beat the shit out of me. And in 2024, I said I'm going to. I'm going to figure out how to do all of this and be healthy. I'm going to figure out how to do all of this and be a good husband. I'm going to figure out how to, because I've always been good at compartmentalizing. This isn't the first time that I've been this weight. You know, this isn't the first time I've lost it. This isn't the first time, but every time I did it, I did it at the sacrifice of everything else. I could only do one. I was either all in on business I was growing that or I was all in on health and fitness I was fixing that. I was all in on wife and kids, ignoring everything else.
Speaker 1:I went into 2023 and I said I'm going to tunnel vision the shit out of this. I'm going to harmonize my life. I'm going to harmonize my life. I'm tired of roller coaster. I'm tired of roller coasters and different pillars. And I did it. I did it, and doing that will have changed my life forever, because the version of me that I am right now today this harmonized, focused, dislike I'm setting a standard right now of somebody that I only wished I could ever be, and that didn't happen in just 12 months.
Speaker 1:I mean, I've been working on myself for years, but this year, your 2024, can be just like my 2023, but you need to figure out who you want to be in 12 months. You need to figure out who you want to be and you need to define that, and then you need to pick the word for your year, and every decision that you make needs to be based around that word, that intent, that defined outcome, that version of you, that person, that evolution, that maturity, that every decision that you make needs to get you closer to that desired outcome. That's being focused, that's having intention. I'm not ready to share my word for 2024 yet, but I will on here shortly and you will watch me and every decision that I make be based around that word, that desired outcome, that intent, that that you will watch it. Just like you did in 23, you will watch it in 24.
Speaker 1:What I ask from you is let me watch you do the same. Let your audience watch you do the same. Let your wife watch you or your husband watch you do the same. Let the people who love you and want what's best for you and the ones that admire you and look up to you. Show them what you're capable of. Don't have another 50% year. Don't have another. Good enough, don't have another, okay, have your first. Holy shit, I did it year in 2024. Start building the momentum right now and if you need my help, if you need a call, a zoom call, a few minutes of my time to help you define this, pick a word, set some intentions. I am more than happy to do that for you. Dm me whatever you need. This is why I do this and I will help you, however I can. Happy December.
