Next Level University

#1485 - How Aligned Is Your Grind?

• Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros

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We all have passions, things we love and would do anything for. But, over time, many of us lose touch with these passions. Today, hosts Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros talk about the concept of an 'aligned grind,' a powerful tool to reconnect with your passions and reignite that initial spark. Often, people lose interest in activities they initially loved due to a lack of alignment in their grind. This misalignment can lead to dissatisfaction, a grind that feels more like a rut than a path to fulfillment. The aligned grind concept helps individuals recognize when to re-align their grind, enhancing productivity and motivation.

Links mentioned:
Podcast Growth University: https://www.nextleveluniverse.com/podcast-growth-university/ 
Next Level Life Coaching with Alan Lazaros, book a 30-minute call NOW: https://bit.ly/3WpxLLo

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Show notes: 
[2:20] Why do some people move away from something they used to love doing?
[9:44] Is your struggle making you more aligned?
[14:14] Jacob shares how group coaching has positively impacted his personal growth in the three areas of life: health, wealth, and love
[15:35] Finding the thing worth grinding for
[21:04] Align your life more effectively
[28:21] Outro

Send a text to Kevin and Alan!

Speaker 1:

Next level nation. Welcome back to another episode of next level university, where we help you level up your life, your love, your health and your wealth. We hope you enjoyed our latest episode, episode number one thousand 484.

Speaker 2:

Why being vulnerable is so hard today for episode number one thousand four hundred eighty five happy Tuesday.

Speaker 1:

How aligned is your grind? Not only does that flow nicely, it rolls off the tongue, but I think it is always a powerful concept for us to talk about. Disclaimer Alan and I have been Working very, very diligently today setting up the next round, round 12, of group coaching. So we are a little bit crispy.

Speaker 2:

I would say we are very tired if you look into my eyes you can tell I was just crying because I was laughing so hard.

Speaker 1:

So I promise all the things are good, but if Alan and I do not look well physically, we are doing just fine. It's been a very, very busy day, slash weekend more for Alan than myself.

Speaker 2:

Okay.

Speaker 1:

I was on a podcast Friday, I think, and this was a really good podcast and it was a podcast that was hosted by a couple. It was a couple who did Relationship coaching, but they also had this podcast. It's like awesome, this is great. And one of the members of the hosts asked me a question. They said, after asking me about purpose and finding your purpose and all that, they said why do you think that Some people, when they get later in life, they move away from the stuff that they used to do? They don't do that stuff anymore, but it's stuff that they used to love doing. They used to work really hard, they used to find purpose in it. Why do they move?

Speaker 2:

away.

Speaker 1:

And I said I can't really give you an answer for everybody, but I would say, from what I've seen, one they started something with the end in mind. So you and I know a lot of people who started podcasts so they could make money and then stop the podcast and that usually doesn't work. That's one. And then I said I think the other thing is Eventually it gets to the point where they're not getting the same thing out of it that they once were, they're not enjoying the process as much as they once were. Maybe they've gotten the result that they wanted and they realized well, I don't really want to put the grind that I used to put in anymore, and that made me think of a Lot of times. When people say what's next for NLU that's a question I get often I always laugh because I say I'm gonna sound, it's gonna sound so cheesy when I say this, but I just I'm more the same. We're gonna get better as podcasters, better, better at speakers, better as coaches, and we want to do what we're doing now.

Speaker 1:

Just on a bigger level more impact, more mastery, more profitability.

Speaker 2:

Continue that cycle forever and I always say I don't plan on retiring. And when I'm 50?

Speaker 1:

I don't plan on retiring when I'm 60 because my Grind is very aligned. I love what I do. I love being on podcasts. I don't love coaching as much as I love being on podcast. Podcast is my number one, but I do love coaching now more than I ever have. So that is kind of why we're doing this episode. You'll hear a lot of people say I don't want to grind, I don't grind, I Work smart, not hard. If you work too much, you're you're kind of giving your life away.

Speaker 1:

I don't think that's true, especially if your grind is aligned and it's something that you really really, really enjoy doing. Imagine you're someone who enjoys Painting and it takes you let's just say it takes you a hundred hours to do a painting. That's a grind, but for you, if that's something you really enjoy and you love it and it fills you up and it- Gives you more energy and it energizes you, and it's something that you can't imagine your life without.

Speaker 2:

I would say your grind Is very aligned and you're more likely to stick with that for a long enough period of time to actually see some sort of result.

Speaker 3:

I Keep talking about this adventure at John C Speek because it's such a good example of this. The climb up that Mountain was really difficult. It was a grind, it was wet out, the rocks were sharp. I was trying not to hurt my ankles. It was a little bit of a trudge. You know, we kept stopping to take photos, which was nice, but then the the but. The whole experience was super fulfilling, and I think that that's the difference. Here is how aligned is your grind.

Speaker 3:

I'm convinced that everyone has Struggles behind the scenes, no matter what you're doing. You know, even if you're playing your favorite sport professionally, you still have to go to practice. You still have to. I always say no one likes the stair master. It's kind of a joke that I use because it doesn't matter how wealthy you are, it doesn't matter how healthy you are, it doesn't matter how in love you are, the stair master sucks the same amount for all of us and I guess if you're a little healthier it'll suck a little less because you'll have better cardiovascular and be able to do it better. But the point is is the stair master always sucks and it's always gonna suck, and I just think that's a good analogy for life. It's. It's kind of like the stairs that you're climbing in life are necessary to get to the next level. But when you do get to the next level, was it worth it? I Was on book club on Saturday and I said we can all have one of two beliefs, and these are unconscious beliefs, but we're gonna talk about them because we're reading a book called limitless by Jim quick and it's all about belief systems and we actually were on a chapter called flow.

Speaker 3:

It's about flow, getting in the zone and I don't know how this came up. But essentially, the two beliefs that I do believe, we all have Unconsciously, beliefs we believe I believe too many, too many beliefs in there. There's a lot of beliefs in. There is one of two things, I think that you either believe that life is a struggle and you can also make something magnificent out of that struggle and it can be meaningful and positive because of what you make of it. Or you have an unconscious belief that life should be easy and anytime life isn't easy, you think something's wrong with you or wrong with the world, and that second one, I think, is really dangerous.

Speaker 3:

I Talk often about how I was born into a very painful situation because my dad dad when I was two and my mom and my sister had a really really hard time with that. I didn't really know him because I was so young, so I only saw the the indirect pain of that. So I Everything after that was uphill kind of, even though it was really really challenging. My therapist you know, statistically speaking said that she's never seen someone with more trauma Chronic trauma so.

Speaker 3:

Chronic, meaning over a long period of time, but the point is is it's always been uphill. It's always been next level, next level, next level. It's always been trending up, and there is definitely dark times that were down, but overall it's been trending up and I think that that's Something really powerful here. So what I want to share with everybody is which of those beliefs do you have? That question first, do you believe that life is supposed to be challenging, but you can also make something?

Speaker 3:

of that, or Do you believe it's supposed to be easy? And every time it's not easy, you think something's wrong with you or wrong with your life, or wrong with the world because of what you see on social media. And then, more importantly, back to the original point of this episode. That's gonna determine how aligned your grind is, because, whether your or I remember middle school, high school, college, corporate Entrepreneurship all of it was a grind, all of it has always been a grind and it always will be.

Speaker 3:

Trying to be in shape is always gonna be brutal, it's always gonna be tough, but Is it more aligned than it used to be? Are you living more in your passions than you used to? Are you living more on purpose than you used to? Are you more profitable than you used to be? I made seven dollars and 25 cents an hour when I was a teenager and I joke and I say I wasn't worth a dime more because I'm a teenager and that's okay, but I, if I still made seven dollars and 25 cents, that would be. It means I'm not getting more valuable. That would be a big mirror. So the question isn't whether or not life is going to be a struggle. I think that it's going to be no matter what, especially if you want to get to the next level. The question is whether or not that struggle is getting you more and more and more aligned or not.

Speaker 1:

I got a message from one of the gentlemen I used to work with back in my retrofitting days, my weatherization days and my man Ray my man, ray Ray Ray, good dude. What a good dude he is. He called me and I my I never have my phone on noise so I didn't even see it, but then, when I saw a missed call, I looked.

Speaker 2:

And it had a number that I didn't see, I didn't recognize it.

Speaker 1:

I was like, oh whatever, it's probably spam.

Speaker 2:

And then, when I looked later, I think it was like the apple, apple upgraded something and it had his name under it.

Speaker 1:

So it's almost like now I have caller id. It was like all right cool.

Speaker 2:

And I messaged him and I said hey, man, did you call me everything good. And he just he's like yeah, man.

Speaker 1:

I was thinking of you and I was thinking of the old times and all that stuff. How are you? It's been a long time and I was like dude.

Speaker 2:

It's so Interesting that you say that, because I've been thinking about our old times too.

Speaker 1:

One of the reasons I have such a good amount of respect for Ray and a good relationship with Ray is he made my grind more aligned. When, when?

Speaker 2:

we would go into buildings.

Speaker 1:

So just for context for those who don't know what I used to do, we used to do what was called weatherization, so we would work predominantly in schools, and we would work above the drop ceilings. Believe it or not, most schools have really big attics too, that you can go up to go up into. We would work on the windows, we'd work on the doors and some of the stuff would be outside and I remember Ray and I were working outside. New Jersey and we were putting these giant Weathers stripping things on garage doors.

Speaker 1:

And we both had our car heart jackets on and we were freezing and it was our Friday and it was just brutal. It was a terrible day, but we used to just make each other laugh and we would just have, we would just have fun, we would have fun. And then we'd go to the casino after we'd go to apple D's or whatever, and and one of the reasons nice little friday.

Speaker 3:

It was a nice little friday.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, one of the reasons I lasted as long as I did at that job was because ray helped make it aligned. I mean, imagine, imagine this. Imagine working with someone that you have never met before. You meet At the office. You get in a van together, then you drive six hours with this person who you may have never met before. Then you stay in the same hotel room as this person for the entire week and then you work five, eight hour shifts and then you drive home with this person, if you don't have somebody positive.

Speaker 1:

It's really gonna suck, and that's that's what I found with ray he was my favorite person to work with bar none, so we were just reminiscing on some of the garbage Jobs we had to be on. But I think one of the reasons we have such a good relationship is because I helped make the grind a little bit more aligned and he helped make the grind a little bit more aligned for me and we would just laugh our butts off and have good times.

Speaker 1:

The year that I worked the most Was the year that I was most focused on money. So me, I'll never forget this. This was like one of the longest days ever, you know so ellen and I live. Ellen lives in massachusetts, I live in new hampshire.

Speaker 2:

There's a six flags in massachusetts.

Speaker 1:

That's way out there it's way out in western mass. I was working there Right next.

Speaker 2:

I could see six flags from the place we were working and we worked an eight hour day, so it was like a two hour drive from where we were my boss called me when we were like seven hours in. He said hey, I need you guys to go to New.

Speaker 1:

York tonight and we were like, okay, we don't have stuff to stay over.

Speaker 2:

We don't have the right equipment so we're gonna have to go back to the office.

Speaker 1:

So two hours to this job site, work an eight hour day, two hours back to the office, an hour to my house because I had to get my clothes and stuff, an hour back to the office and then six hours to New York. But when?

Speaker 2:

I was doing that it was like oh nice.

Speaker 1:

I think we're gonna make like 75, 80 bucks per hour in New York. Awesome, let's do it when the result of the grind is aligned with the result that you're looking to achieve. I think that's another way to make the grind aligned. So if you're looking to impact more people, you're probably gonna be willing to do more things in different ways. The real next level nugget for me in this episode is.

Speaker 1:

I don't want you to get lost in the potentially misleading garbage on social media that says I worked eight years to make a million dollars and I'm gonna teach you how to do it in eight seconds.

Speaker 2:

That's not real.

Speaker 1:

That's layer one. That's layer one of me saying I can eat whatever I want and still be in shape. Can I do that? To a degree? Yes, but that's based on me working out for the last 15 years and having an understanding, intuitively, of how many calories are in what, and I exercise really hard and I'm good at suffering and I drink a lot of water. There's layers under that, so I don't want you to hear the word grind or hear the word struggle or sacrifice or any of those things and automatically jump to. I don't do that type of thing because you might not have found the thing worth grinding for yet, and that's totally okay. If you asked me to go back to my old job, there is no way I would grind the way I do with what we're doing.

Speaker 2:

I couldn't. It's not the same. I'm not getting the same result. It's not fulfilling, it doesn't give me energy, it doesn't fulfill me. It's not something I'm proud of.

Speaker 1:

but if you have all those things, I would say your grind is very aligned and you're more likely to work long enough to get the result you're after I think underneath all that.

Speaker 3:

It's just not worth it, it's fair. Yeah, it's not worth it.

Speaker 1:

Maybe that's a piece of alignment is the result, aligned with the effort you must put in to get it.

Speaker 2:

Human beings will do unbelievable things when the end result is worth it. Yeah, If there's someone that you love and I say what would you do?

Speaker 3:

for them if they were in trouble your brain probably says just about anything that's because it's worth it. I feel like one of the tough things about human beings is that we stay in our comfort zone unless we're forced out of it. Almost all of us, I mean. You know we can get at it a little bit, but it's not until we're really back into our corner that we fully ignite. And whether it's a tough deadline I mean everyone studies right before the test- I mean, it just is what it is.

Speaker 2:

It's human nature. It's human nature. I've tried to overcome it my whole life. It's very challenging. And the point of this is that when the grind is worth it, you will do the most unbelievable things, and then you'll believe in yourself more. But if you don't have enough.

Speaker 3:

Why power Emilia, bianca Emilia is my intimate partner for the new listeners and her business partner, bianca. They had a podcast. They started it two and a half three years ago and it was called the why power podcast. They since rebranded to evolve ventures. Evolve ventures technologies. They're actually a client of our production company but.

Speaker 2:

I remember thinking that's a best name ever.

Speaker 3:

Why power?

Speaker 2:

Now the reason why I love that name is because why are you doing what you're?

Speaker 3:

doing when Kev was focused on money and New York job was $85 an hour. Regardless of how brutal the job was, it was more worth it. So one of the things we do at NLU is we do something called Listener Success Stories and every other week we have a team, huddle with the whole team and we talk about the success stories of the community. We talk about who's winning and why and how NLU changed their life, and the reason why is because I don't want anyone of us, including myself, to forget why we're doing what we're doing.

Speaker 3:

We're not here to just make money. We're not here to just wait. What we're doing matters. It matters, and if you don't remember that every day, the grind is just not going to be worth it. You know, I have stories that I could tell you of people that I met six years ago, and their whole life is so transformed that they literally wouldn't even recognize themselves. They would be so blown away if they could meet the old version of them, and a lot of that has been attributed to NLU or to my coaching or to Kevin.

Speaker 3:

That's the difference we're making here, and if we don't wake up every day with that attitude, it's going to be really hard to grind it out. And I remember when I was working in corporate, I got to the point where I was punching my ceiling one time because I was so sick and tired of being on the road, I was so sick and tired of traveling, I was so sick and tired of all the potholes in Connecticut and I just was punching my ceiling like I'm done. I don't want to do this anymore. This isn't worth it to me anymore. I was called to something more.

Speaker 3:

I was called to help people with personal development and so now my whole life is designed around that, and when it gets hard, which it does, I have to remember what it was like traveling all over New England, driving up to Vermont, driving to Connecticut four, four lane highways, potholes, you know, snow banks. Can't see the signs, you know, in my terrible car and just hating my life.

Speaker 3:

You have to remember that when you remember the tough times it's a lot easier to get up and remember how, how blessed you are. So maybe you're in the tough times now, I don't know, but hopefully over time. I think we're born into this world and we're young, we're ignorant, we don't know much, we don't know who we are. Yet you know we're born into whatever circumstance and then I think we get older and wiser and we learn and we have experiences and we face our fears and we get outside our comfort zone and we grow and then, hopefully, our life becomes more and more and more aligned, not less and less and less aligned, and that's really what we talk about in our use.

Speaker 3:

My next level nugget is no, your life is not as aligned as you want it to be no one's is, but it hopefully, is more aligned than it used to be and hopefully not as aligned as it's going to be a year from now or five years from now or 10 years from now. So that's it, it's just. Are you working hard each day to become better so that you can align your life more and more and more effectively? Are you getting to know yourself at a deeper level so that you can figure out what is more aligned and what isn't? And I think that if our 80 year old selves or 90 year old selves in the future could talk to us, they would say listen, a lot of the stuff you're doing right now you think is aligned and it's not.

Speaker 3:

You know. Take that leap of faith. Stop hang out with that toxic person. Stop doing that toxic habit. You know your health is going to suffer if you don't change this. We all have those whispers and the problem is we don't usually listen to them until the pain is great enough and that goes back to the back being against the wall type of thing. But hopefully what you can do is put your back up against the wall in advance, metaphorically, and try to make some of those changes now next level nation.

Speaker 2:

I was gonna say this before, before we transition. When you go with the current, you go faster with the same effort when you go against the current, you go way slower with even more effort. So again, I'm not saying it's gonna be easy, but Alan and I doing seven episodes a week is drastically different than you doing seven episodes a week. If you don't like speaking, being on camera or podcasting, I thoroughly. I mean at this point we've done it so often where I don't really think about I'm wearing a beanie and my eyes are half closed.

Speaker 2:

It is what it is just part of the course at this point, but when you're going with the flow, with the current, it's easier, it's still hard, it's still challenging, but when I say how aligned is your grind, that's what I mean. If you're going against the current, you're already dealing with more resistance based on the fact that you don't want to be doing what you're doing. So I want to make sure I wrap that up with a bow next level nation. One of the other questions I get asked very often is what books?

Speaker 2:

have you read coaching programs, mentors and I always say Alan doesn't know this, he doesn't want to say this. I always say I have had a built-in mentor since day one. Without Alan, I don't know where I would be.

Speaker 1:

I would probably be wildly successful, for sure just probably not.

Speaker 2:

No, I'm just kidding. Not the same way I am today.

Speaker 1:

I always give as much credit as I can to Alan, because without Alan I would not be the man I am today and we wouldn't have the amazing team we have and we wouldn't have the amazing business we have. So if you are out there and you have been thinking yourself. I've never had a coach, but I really think I'd benefit from one.

Speaker 2:

That's one thought. Or I've had a lot of coaches, but I've never really found one that works really really well with me. I would suggest giving Alan a shot because, it doesn't matter if you're a dream chaser.

Speaker 3:

It doesn't matter if you're a business owner. It doesn't matter if you need help in a relationship.

Speaker 1:

Alan has many of the answers to the problems that you might be dealing with and we have a lot of testimonials that come through, based on the amazing clients we've had the opportunity to serve, but I am another testimonial and I'm going to do it live right now.

Speaker 3:

I appreciate that, brother, you're very welcome. Thank you. You're very welcome. What I can promise you is that I will believe in you, I will see potential in you and I will pour into that potential.

Speaker 2:

It's my favorite thing in the world to do.

Speaker 3:

And yeah, please reach out. I just got a little emotional. I've said enough on other shows.

Speaker 2:

At least I can do a save here.

Speaker 1:

I appreciate it.

Speaker 3:

It's nice to hear how does it feel. How does it feel to hear all that Good, really?

Speaker 2:

good, it makes no worth it.

Speaker 1:

I know you've been working through compliments and stuff. So that's a little behind the scenes.

Speaker 3:

I would say it's really nice because you put in so much grind and you put in so much work and you put in so much effort. You know, I think, spiritually, you know that you're making a big difference, but it's nice to, I think, emotionally it doesn't always land.

Speaker 2:

So it was really nice. Appreciate it Appreciate it.

Speaker 3:

So I also want to show Kevin out as well and yeah, I guess we didn't really plan it to be this kind of thing right now, but quite frankly, there is no one I'd rather you go to if you want to start, grow or monetize a show. So Kevin went from a pretty misaligned, very challenging job although obviously he loved some of the people he worked with to turning his passion into purpose and his purpose into profit. Now, that was a messy journey, that was a challenging journey and he's not going to tell you that you're going to start a podcast and hit it big or go viral or any of that.

Speaker 2:

Now, is that possible? Yes, is it probable.

Speaker 3:

No, the answer is no. But if you do want to do what he did and turn your passion into purpose and purpose into profit, he's the best person to reach out to, particularly when it comes to podcasting. So what I tell my clients is I've done 4500 sessions. This you thing that you think is a you thing is not a you thing. It's a human thing and I can help you with it because I've seen it so many times. Kev's same deal with podcasting. The challenges you're going to face, the fears you're going to have to face within yourself, the not wanting to hear your own voice he can help you through all that stuff. So any equipment to buy, all of it I would. I would send you to him over everybody. We've had every challenge you can think of between us and our clients.

Speaker 2:

So he's the guy to go to when your car breaks down, you go to the mechanic. When your podcast breaks down.

Speaker 3:

You go to Kevin and I do mean that. So the link to the landing page will be in the show notes Sure.

Speaker 2:

He also has a podcast called podcast growth university. So if you aren't ready to start your show yet, but you're thinking about, it go on that journey with Kev. Start with episode one, if you want and learn about it before you jump in.

Speaker 1:

Thank you, appreciate that very much You're welcome.

Speaker 3:

It's interesting.

Speaker 2:

A lot of my coaching clients recently have been like therapy sessions. So if you need it's a balance. It's a balance of podcasting and self-proven, depending on the day. So, yeah, I'm excited to work with any of you who are interested in podcast growth. You is free if you want some free value as well. Tomorrow for episode number 1486, when I was doing this week's episodes and numbers. I was like oh, we're going to cross fortune 90 very soon, which means we're almost at 1500 wild times, are you?

Speaker 1:

self-sabotaging your own success Whoa, 1500.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, we're coming up with 1500. I just realized that's a big milestone.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, whoa, yeah we're going to buy you a giraffe.

Speaker 3:

Oh, excellent, nice, you think I'll have longer legs than it Probably maybe If we start a baby giraffe.

Speaker 2:

Maybe we'll do something special for 1500. I don't know what. Maybe we'll do a top 10 lessons for 1500 or something.

Speaker 3:

I don't know, we'll figure it out. That's a lot of episodes.

Speaker 2:

I love it. That's a lot of episodes, but we're going to do an episode tomorrow for 1486. Are you self-sabotaging your own success? When we are working on the next round of group coaching, we're having a lot of conversations with people and a lot of what we hear are people self-sabotaging without even knowing it.

Speaker 1:

So I thought that would be a really powerful episode to talk through and hopefully you'll find value in it tomorrow when we do it.

Speaker 2:

As always, we love you. We appreciate you, grateful for each and every one of you and LU. We're trying to fans.

Speaker 3:

We have family. We will talk to you all tomorrow. Keep aligning your grind. Thanks for the money.

Speaker 1:

Nice, not bad for two cooked GIFs.

People on this episode

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Alan Lazaros

Host
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Kevin Palmieri

Host