WS1947 10X Is Easier Than 2x | Highlights Whitney Sewell

Join host Whitney Sewell on The Real Estate Syndication Show as he dives into the transformative power of 10x thinking. Learn how setting ambitious, seemingly impossible goals can unlock exponential growth in your business and personal life.

Drawing inspiration from Dan Sullivan and Benjamin Hardy's groundbreaking book "10x is Easier Than 2x", Whitney reveals:

• Why aiming for 10x is less competitive and leads to breakthrough results.
• How to identify the 20% of actions that drive 80% of your success.
• Real-life examples of 10x thinking in action, from launching a daily podcast to securing a $20 million syndication deal.
• The key to overcoming limiting beliefs and shedding your "2x identity".
• How 10x goals foster leadership, teamwork, and nonlinear thinking.

Discover:

• Why small improvements can lead to massive results.
• How to delegate effectively and focus on your zone of genius.
• The courage and commitment it takes to achieve 10x.

Ready to build wealth through real estate? Head to lifebridgecapital.com and start investing with Whitney's team today!

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Transcript

Whitney Sewell: This is your daily real estate syndication show. I'm your host, Whitney Sewell. Today, we've packed a number of shows together to give you some highlights. I know you're going to enjoy the show. Thank you for being with us today. Very few pathways create 10x. And that's what I want to jump into today. 10x, man, it seems crazy to think about setting a 10x goal, right? Many of you may have thought through that or been motivated to do that at some point. And then maybe you get pushed back, right, from friends, family, other people in your network. They think you're crazy, right, for trying to do that. That has been me before. I'm going to talk about a little bit of that today. And actually, I'm going to go through just a few highlights from a recent book. You've probably heard of it. I hope you have by now. And if not, I hope that you will listen or read this book soon. It is one that has challenged me. in a big way. And it's called 10x is easier than 2x. It's by Dan Sullivan and Benjamin Hardy. I really enjoy a number of their books. They, you know, I've actually did a few podcasts on who not how that was when they wrote a year or two ago or maybe longer. And man, a great read as well, which I would highly encourage. There's another one. Actually, they've done a few. But I would encourage you to look them up and because these are, they're very practical stuff to, or they lay out some things that, that help you to actually implement some of these things as well, which I appreciate, but they make me think and think differently often. And so I, I enjoy that kind of reading, but that's what we're going to get into today on your daily real estate syndication show. I'm your host, Whitney Sewell. Well, in the introduction, which I also encourage you not to skip, he dives into the life of Michelangelo and the hardships and the risks that Michelangelo had to take to get to the next level. And he 10X'd time and time and time again. I won't go through all that today. I want you to go and listen to that or read it because it's encouraging. And I was sharing that with our family and my boys. I want them to just think that way, right, even from a young age and just talking through and what he did, Michelangelo, to 10X again and again and again. So, but getting on to chapter one, two, we'll go through a couple of them today. And again, this is 10X is easier than 2X. Man, think through that, even just that title for a minute. and how to implement that, because that is just completely against what we would typically think, right? But he says, seemingly impossible goals are more practical than possible goals, because impossible goals force you outside of your current level of knowledge and assumptions. I mean, that is such a big part of the book, just that one sentence. You know, one way we have applied that, or I did early on, is the podcast, which you all know, you know, doing seven times what most other people are doing. And I was called crazy by a number of people, people that I respected and trusted. And it made me question, you know, should I really do this? Should I do a seven day a week? Is that just insanity? You know, and I get more questions now, you know, has it been worth it? And, you know, if you look at the projectory of our business, you know, it's, it should be pretty obvious it's been worth it. But it hasn't been easy. That's for sure. However, what it did early on is it made me think differently, right? I knew doing seven days a week, there was no way that I was going to be able to do everything. And if I'd been doing a weekly show, I would have tried to have done everything, the show notes, the editing, you know, I said, Oh, you know what, I can save the money, I'll go get it done. And I guarantee you, I would have gotten so behind that we would have quit. And, but instead, since we 7x at the time, right, or at least the number of podcasts, It made me think different. There was no way possible that I could do all those things. So I didn't even try. I didn't try to learn how to do the show notes. I didn't try to learn how to edit the audio or video or whatever. I knew that I had to go find people to do that. It was just there was no way around it. So it made me think differently from the very beginning. just in that regard whatsoever. And then the first deal that my business partner Sam and I did was a $20 million community. And I, man, you know, it made, we also had to think differently, right, to make that happen. That was a major step for us, you know, at the time. And I think for most, right, to do that, your first, really your first syndication to be that big. And so that seems crazy, right, to most, but that's 10Xing. That's more than 10Xing, right, where most people are encouraging you to buy a single-family home, right, to rent it out or maybe renovate it. and then maybe get a duplex, and then a few duplexes, and a fourplex, right? We just skipped that and said, you know what? We're going to go after it, and we're going to create a much bigger goal here. And it made us think and do things differently. So Dan also says, very few pathways create 10x. With genuine reflection, a 10x target spotlights the few pathways, the high leverage strategies, and relationships with extreme upside. So, this was helpful for me to think through, right? And it becomes a – when you start thinking this way, and I have to remind myself every day nearly just to think this way, but it becomes a filter, right? And that's what I like about this thinking is that it becomes a filter when you can start to set that 10x goal. you know, when something comes in your path, right, we all have shiny object syndrome, I feel like, you know, it's a constant battle, I feel like as an entrepreneur, like, oh, I could go do that, I could go do that. But when you are thinking 10x, you can quickly use that as a filter to think, okay, is that, is that going to help me get to 10x? Because if you're thinking 2x, a lot of these things could do that. Right? A lot of things could help you 2x, you can just go work a lot harder, and probably 2x. But it's not about working harder. It's about working easier. I mean, having easier work, but more focused, right? And so 10x goals, it just enables you to clearly identify the 20% of things and people in your life that are producing most of the results, and the 80% of things and people in your life that are holding you back. And so it does. It becomes that filter that helps you think through that. Going for 2x growth means you can keep 80% of your existing clients, roles, behaviors, and mindsets. Only minor tweaks are needed. So you don't have to change a whole lot to go 2x. But going 10x means you must eliminate the 80% of your existing clients, roles, behaviors, and mindsets. 10X requires a full-scale transformation of yourself as well as everyone and everything around you. And that's Dan Sullivan or Benjamin Hardy there saying that you have to eliminate that 80% of all those things. And I struggle with that in a big way. Obviously, I have a number of friends that I'm not going to eliminate the friendships. I'm just not. But, however, you know, going back to the podcast example here, for me, you know, think about I'd never really spoken into a mic before, and then started a daily podcast. And so it was a major jump for me. It was thinking 10 X, it was pushing my, myself in a massive way out of my comfort zone. And even the thought of starting a podcast about real estate syndication and had never syndicated a deal, right. People thought I was crazy. Right. I mean, it was just called credit. So think about that. Right. I couldn't care about what other people thought. I just had to jump in and do it. And so, I agree with a lot of this. I don't agree with eliminating 80% of your current relationships, but I do understand what he means here. And so, I would agree with shifting the focus, right? More on the 20% of your network and increasing that 20% in a big way, right? And constantly thinking that way, right? You're going to keep taking that 20%. And as it continues to grow, you're going to keep figuring out okay what's the 20% now right you may do this every year or every six months or every three months you know you're thinking through hey what's the 80 20 here you know what's the 80% and we'll get into this that we're going to delegate right we're going to give to somebody else so you have to be thinking that often But, you know, you have to think about, like, 2x is linear, right? And just, you know, growing, to continue growing, right, it requires a lot of effort, right? You're going to work a lot harder often just to 2x, and it's just working harder, not smarter, often. He says it is quantitatively focused, right? just doing more of what you're doing now, right, without respect to quality, uniqueness, or transformation is what he says. So, I like thinking about that, like, what am I doing? That's 2x thinking, right, versus 10x, which is non-linear, right? It's enormous growth, does not require typically more effort often, you know, like the podcast did require a lot more effort from me. However, there's it could have required even more if I hadn't have built a team if it hadn't made me think differently, like, like we talked about, like I already mentioned, but it often requires less, but better, right? It's qualitatively focused is what he says, you've elevated your vision, your focus, such that you're now transforming the value and impact of what you do for increasingly specific people. So, you know, you're thinking very different at this level, right? You're not thinking like you used to think. And that is such a hard part for me for, I think, for everybody, right? I have to, like I mentioned, I have to continually remind myself to think this way. and to use it as a filter. And so every time you make a 10x jump, you do so by letting go of so many things that were in that 80%, right? And then going deeper into, you know, just a more concentrated 20%, right? The 20% that you are uniquely really good at, and then letting go of that 80%, you know, and hiring those who's, right? Go back to who, not how. And I would encourage you to read that book or even look at the podcast that I did, you know, just reviewing that book. But I couldn't recommend them enough. to go through these books, but Benjamin Harding, Dan Sullivan, but you need to hire the hoos, right? And that was what we did in the podcast, you know, seven versus one. I knew I could not do it all. I had to hire people. So I hired numerous team members, even within LifeBridge Capital, we've hired, you know, many people who are, I mean, everybody, right? They either are when they're hired or they become better at their specific tasks. than I am at doing their tasks, where I used to do all those things, or Sam used to do all those things. It was pretty much split up between he and I for a long time. And then we start hiring people that are much better with specific skill sets or experience than we have. And that's how we've continued to grow. That's how we've just gotten better over and over. But every time you go 10x, by letting go the 80% and going all in, On your desired 20%, you dramatically increase the quality and quantity of your freedoms as a person, which are time, money, relationships, and purpose. And I can look back and think, no doubt that happened in my life by thinking this way, by pushing in a way. And obviously, I had not read this book at that time. I wasn't really thinking that way, but what I knew is I'd seen this work for different people, right? And I thought, OK, I'm just going to go do it. We're going to go make it happen. It was a mindset shift for myself thinking I can make this happen versus being scared to go make it happen. right, or backing down when other people thought I was crazy or say, you know, don't do that, Whitney. You should never do a daily podcast. That's way too much effort. You're going to quit, right? You're going to, you know, whatever, all those pushbacks that are received. And, you know, and I would also mention that at that time, you know, I had a mentor, and he, Joe Fairless, he's a good friend of mine now. And, you know, even then, it was so crucial to have somebody in my life that was already thinking this way. And again, it was just the Lord providing somebody like that in my life. But I remember going to Joe at this time and thinking, well, and this is very early on, before we launched the podcast, and telling him about what these other people were saying. And again, these were two or three people that were highly respected in our industry that probably most all of you have heard of. And who said, Whitney, you're crazy. Don't do that. Don't do that. And so I talked to Joe about it. And Joe immediately said, well, that's why you have to do it. Right. That's why you have to do it because it's too much work for everybody else. Right. And so it was a lot more work, but it wasn't 10x in my work as far as me trying to do all the parts of the podcast. Right. It has been a ton of work. But back to the mentoring, you know, it's I already had somebody. Right. That was already thinking that way. And so that, if not for that, I may have backed off and thought, you know what? I shouldn't do that. I should listen to these people who care about me. They did. They were speaking into my life. and trying to protect me. But I needed people who were already thinking at a much bigger scale. And Joe was that person at the time, and still is. Still is. Great mentor, still to this day, and friend. And so can't say enough good things about him. But I would say it's still a struggle, even now, to just maintain that vision of how to 10x, and again and again. And if you read that about Michelangelo, you'll see how he did that time and time and time again. But he had to take big risk. big risk. I encourage you to listen to that. But it's so easy to get trapped in 2x thinking. It's so easy to do that. And often, I'm telling people, they tell me, well, how can I get more done, Whitney? Or what am I going to do to scale? And I just ask them, well, who's on your team? Oftentimes, they haven't hired their first assistant. They haven't hired the first person to start taking anything off their plate. And then they push back and say, well, it's just not going to work. I'm just going to have to train them. And then they're going to quit. I'm going to train somebody else. Well, of course you are. Of course you are. But it's too ex-thinking to think that you're going to continue doing everything. And so, yes, that's just one example. But I've had numerous assistants, right? And I have grown as I've hired different assistants and trained them and whatnot. And they've gotten better every time. And they've got higher paid every time as well, right? And actually, as we've grown, they're doing a lot more things for me, right? That 80%, they're doing more and more. And I have to continually, like I said, remind myself of this, to think that way and use that as a filter. It's a constant battle not to think, I'll just work harder. I'll just work harder and make it happen. Or yeah, to increase my income or increase whatever you're trying to do. I'll just go work harder. It's a constant battle to think, differently. Continuing our series today in 10X is easier than 2X. You know, going 10X involves a continuous process of increasing the quality and decreasing the quantity of everything you do. So think about that, right? A continuous process. It's not a one thought and done, right? It's not a check the box and it's done even, it's a continuous process. And like I said, I have to remind myself constantly to have this filter, like we talked about last time. And it's really a filter, what I find that a focus, right? And a focus is so crucially important to scale and to do big things. I was thinking about, actually it reminded me, there's a story about when Warren Buffett and Bill Gates met. And I think it was a meeting that maybe Bill Gates' father somehow set up with Warren Buffett. I don't know the whole story behind it, but ultimately they met. You've probably heard the story about how, I think it was Bill Gates asked Warren Buffett one word. to describe his success or how he got there or something like that. And actually, they both wrote down this word, a word, on a piece of paper, turned it over, and then they both turned their paper over and they both said, focus. So I don't know if you've heard that before, but man, I do believe there is a lot of truth in, in that and being able to focus and thinking through this book has helped me to, I think focus more. And I have to continually remind myself and I think you probably do as well. But obviously, you've probably heard the saying, too, how you do everything, anything is how you do everything. And again, I think personally, I struggle with that statement because there are some things that I'm not as particular about. But there's a lot of things i'm very particular about so i you know i maybe the way it's done or the way a job is done or expectations about different things you know i some ways i wish i was more particular about certain areas of my life for habits what not but. Shedding your 2X identity can be difficult because as people, we have the tendency to avoid loss, overvalue what we currently own, and desire to be seen as consistent. So I find often you're still surrounded by those same people or the same expectations. And often, they may not even be expectations, actual expectations of the people around you, but it's what you're assuming. are the expectations of the people around you and you're trying to still meet that that expectation right and it may not even be a true expectation, and it may be at times but often you know it's because you know you're not changing right who you're surrounding yourself with. And who are those people that are at the level that you're trying to get to? And we've talked about that so many times on the show. How are you working on that and changing that? And so you are shedding that 2x identity. But you're ultimately surrounding yourself with people that are 10xers, that are not just doing it, or not just thinking it, but actually doing it. And I think thinking it is the first key. Your identity is the story you believe about yourself and the standards you hold for yourself. So what do you believe about yourself? So where does your confidence come from? And I hope most of you know this, but the Lord is my confidence. And I have to remind myself of that also. He's been faithful every time in the past forever. And there's never been a time He has not been faithful. And so, I, you know, against what every, most self-help books and, you know, entrepreneurial books would tell you, or 10X books or 100X books or whatever, you know, when they're trying to get you to think that way, right, they're going to tell you to love yourself, believe in yourself, all those things. Well, I think most of that is, there is a lot to the mindset there, but it's, I think, Because the Lord is my confidence and he is the only reason that I've been able to do any of this stuff in real estate and have the stamina to keep going is only because of him. But I quickly feel like I can do it on my own and move away and quit thinking about the Lord is my strength and my help. So I hope he's yours as well. But defining and choosing your own minimum standards, no matter how seemingly impossible to yourself and others, is fundamental to experiencing a 10x transformation. So think about how you know, defining and choosing your own minimum standards. What is that for you? Have you have you been purposeful enough to even think through that, much less write some of those standards down and and to have, you know, almost reverse engineered, right? How to get there. We've talked about that as well. But how do you do that? Right. Well, start thinking about it. Right. And maybe by the end of the week, you're going to write some things down around that specific thing so that, you know, the standards you believe We talked about this a little bit earlier, but that you believe others have for you, right? It's a hard part to think through or to move away from. Others project their standards on your whole life, and eventually you have to be willing. to not care about what others think or about it. And you have to set that standard for yourself. And if you're still around the same friends you had in high school, there's a good chance that they're not thinking this way, or maybe they've not pushed or grown themselves, pushed to grow themselves in this way. And so you have to think through, Ben, what is pushing you? Who are you surrounding yourself by? It is so important. I've seen it personally time and time and time again. And I've had to, you know, I've been a part of masterminds where, you know, I've kind of outgrew them. Right. And but they were really good for me at that stage, potentially in my growth and in my entrepreneurial journey. And I actually have met there's there's guys that I was in a mastermind with six or seven years ago that when we met, We were at very different levels. They were, this guy was, uh, when I was thinking one guy specifically way ahead of me, uh, and I just talked to him a week or two ago and he's still way ahead of me, but we've both grown a lot, but neither of us are still in that mastermind. Right. We found other places to keep growing, to surround ourselves with people who are way ahead of us. Right. And it is a continual thing of looking and searching for those groups, those people who are going to mentor you and push you and are going to help you to raise your standards. Right. Your minimum standards are going to go higher and higher and higher. I hope they do anyway. Evolving yourself to the level of a higher minimum standard requires commitment and courage, which eventually leads to the development of new capabilities and confidence. No doubt about it. That's exactly what happened. I went to this mastermind. I met all these people. All of a sudden, I'm encouraged. I'm creating different habits in my life because of these people. I'm reading different things because of these people who are pushing me in different ways. I'm performing in different ways in the business because of the things I'm learning, things I'm being pushed by. It's affecting not just me, but my entire family, all of our employees. So it is changing a lot about who we are because of raising that higher minimum standard, taking that courage to do that and committing that level of commitment to raise that standard. So it's crucially important. And then we're going to get in a little bit here to what's called the 80-20 principle. You've probably heard of this. If you've not, I encourage you to look this up. We talked about it maybe in the last segment. But it's worth thinking through and the tasks that you do. So Jimmy Donaldson's three ingredients to his 10x process are number one, thinking exponentially and nonlinear linearly bigger, right? Number two, hyper focusing on quality over quantity. And number three, building a team to handle the 80% So you can focus and improve in your craft. So think through that, building the team, delegating the 80%. And I would ask you, do you even know what the 80% and the 20% are? What is involved in that for you? And one tip I often tell people, even some people I've mentored, You know, it's always an issue of time management for myself as well. It always has been, it probably always will be. It's a fight, right, to keep my calendar, you know, as minimal as possible, right? So I'm still keeping what's most important, right? Being at home and spending time with the kids and my wife and being involved in our church and, you know, those things that, you know, it's so easy for me to quickly fill my schedule up so fast and so much. that the most important thing is really the reason, right? We're, we claim we're doing all this stuff for our family or kids, whatever, but if they're really that important, right, we're going to make time for them as well. You're going to see that time commitment also. But, uh, but I ask you to, uh, guys often, or that I've mentored is like, what's in your 80%. And this week, let's start writing things down. Like throughout the day, what have you done? What are you working on? What are you doing? Or do you know? Most people have no clue. And then we're going to talk through that 20%. What is that 20%? What is that thing that you love to do, that you are passionate about? And let's dive in there on those skills. Even that, we're going to start to cut up into 80-20, and start delegating as well. So we can get hyper-focused, like we've talked about. 10X goals are easier than 2X goals for many reasons. 10X goals are less competitive. Yeah, less competitive. There's so much there we could talk about. 10X goals require you to focus on very few things rather than many, which improves your brain's ability to focus. Research shows that continual task switching makes flow and high performance basically impossible. 10X goals promote nonlinear approaches, which produce novel, and competitive-free or competition-free solutions. So finally, 10x goals foster leadership and teamwork, wherein you stop doing everything yourself, managing others, or, here's a big one, needing to be right. So that's a big one for most leaders, especially when you're so focused on 10x, or if you're that kind of individual, you can think you're always the right one. But if you're going 10x, guess what? You better understand you're going to be wrong often and it's good. Not that you're wrong often, maybe, but that you're trying enough that you are wrong, but also that you're surrounding yourself with a team. People that are doing that 80% maybe even part of that 20% a lot better than you, right? And so hopefully you are wrong in ways that you're pushing forward, right? You're pushing hard for, you know, hard enough that you're making some mistakes. However, you're surrounding yourself with people that can come along beside you. And I've done this and have to do it. I have to know that people around me are better at what they do than I am because that's. That's why I hired them, right? And that's what I need them for. I want them to be so much better at these things than I am, right? Creating 10X results doesn't require you to be 10X better than everyone else, right? Even being 10 to 20% better and different from everything else can produce 10X bigger results than even the outliers of a particular nature field. Thank you for being with us again today. I hope that you have learned a lot from the show. Don't forget to like and subscribe. I hope you're telling your friends about the Real Estate Syndication Show and how they can also build wealth in real estate. You can also go to lifebridgecapital.com and start investing today.