0:00

up guys? Welcome back to Build and

0:02

today I want to talk about high

0:04

performance and falling apart. I was in

0:06

the gym today and it was a tough

0:08

day. It was a tough day because of

0:10

some changes I had to make on the

0:12

team and some of the conversations I had to

0:14

have to navigate those changes and I was

0:16

just thinking about how those conversations

0:18

would have gone seven years

0:21

ago, eight years ago,

0:23

even in just the beginning of

0:25

my career and I was reflecting

0:27

on resilience and the concept

0:29

of resilience and what that looks like

0:31

when you're a high performer. And I

0:33

wrote down some thoughts that I felt

0:35

like would resonate with people listening to this podcast

0:37

because I think if you listen to my

0:39

podcast, you probably are a high performer,

0:41

want to be a high performer, strive to

0:44

do big things. You're looking to improve yourself

0:46

in some way. And I wrote this

0:48

for myself and also you. You

0:50

know, I think most people misunderstand

0:52

what high performance actually looks like.

0:55

And I think I used to misunderstand

0:57

it because I would listen to people

0:59

who made content and they never talked

1:02

about the failures. They never talked about

1:04

the flaws. They never sounded off par. They

1:06

always sounded perfect. They always sounded

1:08

on. They always sounded like super motivating

1:10

and like well scripted and polished.

1:12

I think that that really threw me

1:14

for a loop when I was first starting off

1:16

in my career because I thought that I had to

1:18

be like that. I thought that that was what good looked

1:20

like. And I think a lot of people look at

1:22

me or they look at other people and they think, wow, she

1:25

or he or they must never get tired. They

1:27

must never crash. They must never have an off

1:29

date. They must never cry. They must never scream.

1:31

They must never, you look at people and think

1:33

that they are inhuman. They are the exception to

1:35

the rule, right? And I'm here to say that

1:37

that could not be further from the truth. What

1:40

I've come to learn in working

1:42

with high performers, helping high performers, speaking

1:44

to hundreds of them every month,

1:46

is that high performers still fall apart.

1:49

In fact, I still fall apart. I still have moments where

1:51

I break down. I still hit my own limits. The

1:54

difference isn't that

1:56

we don't fall apart. The difference is

1:58

that we recover faster. When

2:00

you're a high performer, you don't stay down,

2:02

you don't dwell, you don't spiral for days. And

2:05

that's really because you put

2:07

in place systems, you have the awareness,

2:10

and you have a sense of urgency to bounce back

2:12

because you understand it's actually better for you, not worse.

2:14

And that's really what I want to talk about today. I

2:16

think that a lot of people assume that

2:19

top performers are somehow immune

2:21

to pain, to pressure, or

2:23

failure. And they imagine this

2:25

like upwards curve of success that like

2:27

never did since linear. And I

2:29

think we've all seen that the picture that I've

2:31

seen on social media a million times of entrepreneurship

2:33

and it's like how it looks versus how it

2:35

feels. And it's like it looks like this linear

2:37

line. But what it feels like is this like

2:39

crazy up and down roller coaster that people are going

2:41

on. And that's just the

2:43

truth, right? If you ask any athlete,

2:46

a founder, an operator, an artist,

2:48

a celebrity, they're going to

2:50

all tell you the same thing. There are

2:53

still days when it sucks, where nothing works,

2:55

when you're tired, when you feel fucking stuck,

2:57

or when you're burnt out. And

2:59

I have those days just as much as I have good days.

3:03

And so the moment when

3:05

your mind goes blank

3:07

on the middle of a call, or in

3:09

the middle of the time you're supposed to fire

3:11

somebody, or the moment that you feel like your body is going

3:13

to quit during a lift and you can't do anymore, or the

3:15

moment you walk into the gym and you feel like, fuck, I

3:17

don't want to be here today. The moment where you have to

3:19

get on a call to rally your team and you're like, I

3:21

can't even rally my fucking self. That

3:24

happens to me and us

3:26

too. And you're

3:28

not broken, you're not wrong,

3:30

and you're not inferior if you

3:32

feel that. You're just

3:34

human. The

3:36

only thing that separates Average

3:38

performers from high performers is

3:40

what happens next. Do you

3:42

sit in it for days? Do

3:45

you let it completely do you rail your momentum in

3:47

your life? Or do you feel it? Do

3:49

you face it and do you do something about it? That's

3:52

what defines you. And

3:55

it took me a long time to

3:57

understand this that it's not about

3:59

avoidance of mistakes or about avoidance of failure.

4:01

It's about what you do in response

4:03

to those things. And

4:06

I think oftentimes that then leads

4:08

to, okay, what does recovering

4:11

from adversity, recovering from

4:13

a bad day, a bad moment, a slip up, a

4:15

mistake, a failure really look like? Okay,

4:18

recovery is not about waiting

4:20

for motivation. That's a

4:22

fucking myth. I'm just gonna be

4:24

real with you guys. Like, I have lost

4:26

over 100 pounds. I've gone from drinking

4:28

and drugs to sober and having a great

4:30

life. I've gone from being friends with

4:32

fucking shitheads to friends with amazing people who

4:34

are changing the world. I've gone from

4:36

having no business to running a multi -hundred

4:38

million dollar business. I

4:40

can tell you, I'm still waiting

4:42

for this motivation. I'm still

4:45

waiting. I'm still fucking waiting. Because

4:47

there are days when I feel motivated,

4:49

but it is so far and few between. Like,

4:52

it really is. It's not

4:54

about waiting for that motivation. It's

4:56

also not, you know, scrolling

4:59

on Instagram, looking at Facebook, you know,

5:01

scrolling your calendar, avoiding emails, hoping that

5:03

you're just going to bounce back. Oh,

5:05

I hope somebody finds a solution for

5:07

me. I hope somebody can solve this

5:09

problem for me. You know, I hope

5:11

somebody's going to help me with this

5:13

problem I have. It's like, no,

5:16

real recovery from adversity

5:18

is intentional and it's

5:20

disciplined. Okay, it's choosing

5:22

to put the reps back in, even when

5:24

you don't want to put the fucking

5:26

reps in. And it's rebuilding

5:28

yourself piece by fucking piece. Returning to the

5:31

basics, whatever that might be, and maybe it's

5:33

food, it's sleep, it's training, it's priorities, it's

5:35

being fucking nice to people, whatever it might

5:37

be. It's returning

5:39

back to baseline, okay?

5:42

And so resiliency is how

5:44

fast you can return back

5:46

to baseline, right? So

5:48

I'll give you an example of this right

5:51

now. I have gone through so much health stuff

5:53

in the last four months. You know, one

5:55

infection turns into three more turns into a million

5:57

doctors turns in all this shit that happens in

5:59

my body because one thing affects another. And

6:02

I have not been in my tip

6:04

top shape. I have not, I haven't,

6:06

I didn't until three days ago. Hadn't

6:08

worked out in three months. I

6:10

don't even, the last time I didn't work out in three months. I

6:12

hadn't been walking as much. I hadn't been able to spend as much

6:14

time with my husband. I hadn't been able to spend as much time with

6:16

my friends. I hadn't been able to travel as much. I hadn't been

6:18

able to do as much content. I

6:20

felt like shit when I was showing up for

6:22

my team. I felt like I needed help, but

6:25

help wasn't there. And

6:27

rather than sit and dwell on

6:30

how bad I feel, I

6:32

just kept asking myself, what

6:35

is one fucking thing I can

6:37

control? What is one thing that

6:39

I can do in this moment

6:41

that I have power over to take a

6:43

step forward, to take a step away from

6:45

the pain into my future? And

6:48

that is what has gotten me through these last few

6:50

months. You're just like, what's one thing? No,

6:52

I don't like what's happening right now. No, I don't like

6:54

how I feel right now. No, I have no fucking motivation

6:56

to do these things. But what

6:58

is one thing that I can do right

7:00

now that is under my control? It's

7:04

not me waiting on somebody else to bring me

7:06

the thing. It's not me waiting on somebody else to

7:08

bring the solution. What I've

7:10

learned over time is I'm my own best

7:12

advocate. You have to advocate

7:14

for your life. When you fail, when you

7:16

make a mistake, when you fall down, there's nobody

7:18

coming to pick you fucking up. And

7:21

every time you do let somebody pick you back up,

7:24

rather than help you back up, right? You want

7:26

people cheering you on, but you don't want them picking

7:28

you back up from the floor. You've got to do

7:30

that for yourself. Otherwise you lose respect

7:32

for yourself. And I think

7:34

more importantly, you have

7:36

to decide that a setback doesn't

7:38

get to rewrite your identity. It

7:41

doesn't rewrite your identity. It is not who

7:43

you are. Right. You might feel like

7:45

a mess for a day. Right. But you

7:47

act like a professional. That

7:50

is high performance. That is

7:52

recovery. Right.

7:54

And there's a quote that I really love. My

7:57

engine stalls too. I just

7:59

refuel faster. And I've

8:01

always resonated with that, which is like, that's

8:04

my mentality. It takes fucking

8:06

practice guys. Like I will

8:08

have days where say I know I

8:10

have a tough week ahead and I'm like, man,

8:12

this is going to be tough mentally, physically. from

8:14

a time perspective, but I'm going to tackle it.

8:16

And then that week comes, and then I get

8:18

thrown two more curveballs that I couldn't have even

8:20

anticipated. I'm like, Mother of God,

8:23

how am I going to find the energy to handle

8:25

all of this? And I sit

8:27

there, and sometimes I'll have a moment. I had

8:29

a moment about a week ago, and the

8:31

overwhelm washed over me when

8:33

I was solving one problem that

8:35

was important, and then an urgent problem

8:37

that I needed to solve in the next hour

8:40

hit me. And for

8:42

two seconds, I just started crying at

8:44

my desk. I was just like, oh my God, it's

8:47

all on me. And I knew in that moment, was like,

8:49

I don't have help. This is

8:51

me. I have to solve this. And for a

8:53

moment there, for two minutes, I let it

8:55

wash over me. I felt overwhelmed. I cried at

8:57

my desk. And then I said, OK,

9:01

let's do something about this. You can

9:04

do this. You can fucking do this,

9:06

Leila. You can figure this out. And if you don't

9:08

figure it out, What's the worst -case scenario?

9:10

Okay, this happens. Okay, you know what?

9:12

You'll live through it. You'll be better for

9:14

it. You've never not been better for bad

9:16

situations. And guys, that

9:18

right there is the difference between when

9:20

I wasn't a high performer and

9:22

now when I am. Because

9:25

when I wasn't, I thought that

9:27

making mistakes made me not a high

9:29

performer. I thought that when I

9:31

made a mistake or when something bad

9:33

happened that the problem was the

9:35

problem, not my reaction to the problem.

9:38

But you see in those two minutes

9:40

when I cried at my desk that

9:42

would have been days

9:44

15 years ago 15 years

9:46

ago. I would have been like fuck

9:49

everything. I want to quit. I

9:51

don't want to do this What does this mean

9:53

about me for how I feel right now?

9:55

Maybe it means this isn't what I should be

9:57

doing with my life. I would make it

9:59

mean all sorts of things Rather

10:01

than lots of things happen at

10:03

the same time. I had a moment of overwhelm.

10:05

Yes, I cried. I'm a fucking human There's

10:08

nothing wrong with that. But

10:10

I'm telling you, this is where you have to

10:12

practice. And

10:14

now here's where most people get stuck. They

10:18

expect that resilience

10:20

is to be automatic.

10:23

They think, I'm smart.

10:25

I'm successful. I've accomplished

10:27

all these things. I should just bounce

10:29

back. They're like, I am all

10:31

these things. Why is this not working? Why

10:33

am I not bouncing back fast? And

10:36

I have this come to me a lot where people say,

10:38

like, I just can't seem to get myself out of this funk.

10:40

I just can't seem to figure this out. I just can't

10:42

seem to navigate this correctly. I just can't seem, Layla, to

10:44

get back to what I was doing. I can't seem to

10:46

get back to that baseline. Here's

10:49

the thing, OK? Bouncing

10:51

back is a skill. Resiliency is

10:53

a skill. And if you've not built

10:55

that skill, you crumble when you're under the

10:57

pressure. And when you have to be put

10:59

in a situation where you have to be

11:02

resilient, you're like, oh, shit, I'm actually not

11:04

that resilient. And you might not say the

11:06

word resiliency, but that's what it is. And

11:09

this is what I see happen over and over. What

11:12

happens is that people say, they

11:14

personalize the failure. They say, Leila,

11:16

you don't understand. I'm fucking weak.

11:18

I can't do this. I

11:20

need somebody stronger. I need to hire someone to

11:22

do this. I think I need to sell

11:24

my company. I need to. What? It's

11:27

like you take it so personally. Oh

11:30

my gosh. You are so special that you

11:32

failed in a way that is

11:34

so unique to this universe that there's

11:36

no coming back from it. Nobody has failed

11:38

to this degree before. Nobody has failed

11:40

similarly to you before. You're so special that

11:42

you are the only person on this

11:44

earth that can't figure this out. And

11:46

that must need help. And

11:48

it's funny because I know what I'm saying, but

11:50

this is how I say it to myself.

11:53

People have had these situations

11:55

before, and they've overcome them

11:57

before. And if they

11:59

have, then so can I. So

12:01

can I. Right,

12:03

and here's the thing. The next thing

12:05

people do is they wait for

12:07

inspiration instead of taking action. Listen, if

12:09

you're sad, depressed, frustrated,

12:11

angry, you're laying

12:14

in bed, you're watching Netflix, you're

12:16

avoiding life and responsibilities because of something

12:18

bad that happened, I

12:20

am fucking here to tell

12:22

you that that's not gonna help. Okay,

12:25

taking action will help you.

12:28

Waiting. Waiting to feel

12:30

inspired. Waiting to feel motivated. It's not

12:32

gonna help. It is not going

12:34

to help you. It will only make things worse. You

12:37

are making it poor when it

12:39

just rained. Now, there's a fucking hurricane.

12:42

I can't tell you the amount of people that reach out

12:44

to me and they're like, Lila, I'm depressed. And

12:46

I'm like, heard. I've been there

12:48

before. What are you doing? And

12:51

they're like, I'm in bed all day. I'm doing

12:53

this. I can't seem to get out of bed. Your

12:56

legs work, right? You can get out

12:58

of bed. What are you saying? The way

13:00

that you're talking to yourself is the problem.

13:02

The way that you're responding to sadness and frustration

13:04

and moments of depression is the problem. Guys,

13:07

I remember being there. I would say, I

13:09

can't get out of bed. I'd be in

13:11

bed all day. The blinds are closed. I'm

13:13

so depressed. But

13:15

I didn't make it any better. And

13:18

same with being angry. Same with

13:20

being frustrated. It's like, oh

13:22

gosh, well, I don't want to take action until

13:24

the feeling goes away. If you take action, the

13:26

feeling will go away. It's

13:28

not the other way around. You must

13:30

take action first. Emotion

13:33

follows motion. If

13:35

you get up and you move your body, if you get up and you

13:37

do things, if you get up and you see friends, I

13:40

will tell you this. You

13:43

will feel better whether you

13:45

want to or not because that's how the brain

13:47

and the physiology of our bodies work. So

13:50

you can't wait for inspiration. You

13:52

have to take action before you feel inspired. There's

13:55

no inspired action happening here. Now,

14:00

the third thing I see is

14:02

that people go into isolation instead of

14:04

leaning for people on support. I

14:07

will tell you this, when I

14:09

am facing adversity, when I'm having a hard time,

14:12

the hardest thing I've had to learn is how

14:14

to lean on people, how to

14:16

ask for help, how to call for

14:18

people to support me during that time. Even

14:21

just the other day, I had to have a

14:23

series of really tough conversations and I was

14:25

working on some really Just

14:27

nasty issues and I had to

14:29

make a couple phone calls and I said to Alex I

14:31

said can you come into my office and he came in there?

14:33

I'm on the phone. I'm handling convo He's not talking and

14:35

he says he's like why am I in here? Like what do

14:37

you need me for and I was like honestly? Honestly

14:40

so seldom but like right

14:42

now honestly emotional emotional support I just

14:44

need support. I just need you here. You

14:46

make me feel good. I love you. You make

14:48

me feel safe I just want you here

14:50

while I'm doing this and I'm having these conversations

14:52

and he was like, okay, that's great. I'll

14:54

do that for sweetie and That was

14:56

something that used to be so hard for me to

14:59

do. Because I felt like what

15:01

a waste of time, what a waste of

15:03

this, but I'd rather be honest up front with

15:05

people like where I could use support to do

15:07

something that's better for all of us. And

15:10

if you're leading a family, if you're

15:12

leading a team, if you're leading, then

15:14

you doing well for that team, you

15:16

doing well in general as an individual

15:18

helps the whole team. And so

15:20

there's going to be times where you want to lean on other

15:23

people to help you. And

15:25

for me, I've realized

15:27

that these are times when we

15:29

fall, when we slip up, when we make a mistake.

15:32

Learning to be resilient, part of that is

15:34

learning how to use your support network. It's

15:37

learning to lean on people and allow

15:39

them to help you, allow them to

15:41

allow yourself to lean on other people at times. And

15:44

I will say, it's still probably the hardest thing

15:46

for me to do to date because for most

15:49

of my life, since I was a kid, I

15:51

had to lean on myself. I didn't even have

15:53

a mother to lean on. I

15:55

learned to just take care of myself,

15:57

just handle it myself, handle my feelings,

15:59

handle my responsibilities,

16:02

handle my life on my own. But

16:04

man, does it feel nice when you

16:06

finally just relax and say, you

16:08

know what, I can have other people

16:10

help me carry the load. I

16:13

don't need to carry it on my own. And

16:15

here's the thing, when people repeat

16:17

these patterns, you know, they

16:19

personalize the failure, they wait to be

16:21

inspired before taking action, and they go

16:23

into isolation, This cycle

16:25

just repeats,

16:27

right? And what you see is if

16:29

you look at people who are high performers, is you'll

16:31

notice that they don't live there. They

16:34

don't live in that spot. I

16:36

call it the valley, like the valley of despair.

16:38

They don't live in the valley of despair. They

16:40

don't do that. They don't waste their time wondering

16:42

what it is all mean. They

16:44

just do something about it. They say, fuck it.

16:46

Let me take one step forward. Let me try

16:48

one thing. Let me see if I can push

16:50

one thing forward, which

16:54

brings me to this. How

16:56

do you actually build that skill? How

16:58

do you become resilient? How do you bounce back?

17:01

Right? The first thing is

17:03

that you have to re -anchor to structure. Okay,

17:06

the fastest way to build momentum is

17:08

to go back to non -negotiables. Maybe

17:11

that means wake up at the same time, move

17:13

your fucking body, eat well,

17:15

track your work, set one

17:17

thing to do for the day and get that shit

17:19

done. Structure is

17:21

an anecdote for spiraling. It

17:24

forces you to act your way

17:26

back into confidence. Because remember, confidence

17:28

is an output, not an input.

17:31

Action is the input to confidence. And

17:33

so you're not going to think your way out of this.

17:35

You're going to act your way out. You don't need to feel

17:37

good to take action. You don't need to

17:39

even think the thoughts to take action. You just need

17:41

to get your body to do the thing, to take

17:43

the step, to do the rep, to eat the food,

17:46

whatever it is. You will feel better

17:48

as a consequence. That's it. Your

17:50

job right now is to get your body

17:52

to move. to do these things. Wake

17:54

up at the same time, move your body,

17:56

eat clean, track your work, set a

17:58

win. I don't need you to

18:00

feel good, and I don't even need you to think good thoughts.

18:02

I just need you to do it. That's

18:05

the first thing. The

18:07

second thing is that I

18:09

want you to set, this is going to sound weird, a

18:12

minimum viable identity. What

18:14

does that mean? You're like, what? Okay,

18:17

when you feel off, you do

18:19

not need to be your best self. you

18:21

just need to be your baseline self.

18:24

Okay, and so this is a trick I've got, which is like, I

18:26

ask myself, what would the disciplined

18:29

version of me do right now,

18:31

even at 50 % capacity? Okay,

18:34

and so what that means is that I'm still gonna

18:36

show up, even if I'm not at 100%. So

18:38

what's that look like for me? Maybe I'm not gonna

18:40

work out, but I am gonna go on a

18:42

walk. Maybe I'm not gonna

18:44

eat two a tea as I plan to,

18:46

but I'm gonna eat two out of three meals like

18:49

I planned. Maybe I'm

18:51

not going to get all the work done and

18:53

want to this week, but I'm going to tackle

18:55

this one project. So

18:57

if you're a leader, go

18:59

communicate something to your team. Go support somebody

19:01

on your team. If you're an athlete, do

19:04

a minimum viable workout. Get some reps in,

19:06

even if they're light. And

19:08

if you're building something right now, go

19:11

make progress on that project and ship

19:13

that shit. The

19:15

point is that you

19:17

need to set a minimum viable identity

19:19

for yourself. Even on your worst days,

19:21

these things happen. I know

19:23

for me, anchoring in somewhat

19:26

of routine, even on the days

19:28

I'm sick, I'm tired, I've

19:30

had something terrible happen, it

19:32

helps me get back to my baseline. It

19:35

helps me do better. And the last

19:37

thing I will say is this, the third thing

19:39

you do is you create a bounce

19:41

back ritual. Okay, this is

19:43

a personal system for when you fall apart. So

19:45

when you're like, holy shit, I do not feel good.

19:48

This is not good. I do not like

19:50

what's happening right now. This might look something

19:52

like you take a 10 -minute walk in silence.

19:54

It might look something like you're going to call a

19:56

friend or a mentor. Literally

19:58

just write down three things that you

20:00

could do that will help you bounce back.

20:04

It might mean that you need to go listen to

20:06

a book or listen to a certain podcast. It should

20:08

be something that's automatic and easy for you to do. And

20:11

so the moment that you realize that you're slipping, you execute

20:13

it. I know I've got at least

20:15

two books that when I feel like I'm slipping up,

20:17

when I feel like I'm about to have a moment,

20:19

when I feel like I'm, oh, I'm off balance, things

20:21

aren't feeling good. I have a book

20:23

that I'm gonna listen to, and I know that when

20:25

I listen to that book, it helps me re -center

20:27

myself and really refocus. My favorite thing to

20:29

do is listen to that book when I'm taking a walk. I

20:32

always feel better after. So,

20:34

here's the thing. High

20:36

performers are not robots,

20:39

and they're not super humans, right? They

20:41

are just obsessed with getting up

20:43

faster. And so we don't

20:45

waste our time pitting ourselves. We

20:47

don't let fear or

20:50

shame or exhaustion dictate

20:52

what we do. We don't.

20:54

We act, we adjust,

20:57

and we reload. So

21:00

what that means is that you are

21:03

allowed to fall apart. You are allowed to slip up.

21:05

You are allowed to make mistakes. You are allowed to fail.

21:07

That's OK. Tell yourself that. You

21:09

just don't allow yourself to stay there. You

21:11

don't allow yourself to live in the valley. And

21:15

so the next time that you feel that way,

21:17

and you've stalled, and you're like,

21:19

I need to be resilient. I need to do it later

21:21

this time. Ask yourself, what's

21:23

my structure I can go back to? What

21:26

identity can I have from? And

21:28

what can I do today right

21:30

now to bounce back faster? Okay,

21:33

and that is the difference between average and elite. Elite

21:36

is not perfect.

21:38

Elite, practice.