[MUSIC PLAYING]
People ask me often why was my company successful, and I say,
it wasn't necessarily that we were smarter or richer than everybody else.
We were just able to hang in there long enough to become successful.
It's a cliche to say that running a business
or embarking on any professional adventure is ultimately a marathon,
it's not a sprint, but finding a way to replenish yourself, to stay fresh,
to stay inspired, it's absolutely critical.
There's been research done around what makes champion athletes.
Now you may think that champion athletes are 100% better than everybody else.
But the main difference that they discovered
was simply champion athletes' ability to both recover and to replenish.
So rest was every bit as important as activity.
So during your journey, whatever you're doing-- whether it's your career,
your band, a business you just started-- one of the rituals
that it's important for you to develop is how do you learn how to replenish?
Staying energized for an entrepreneur is really essential,
and that same trait in entrepreneurs that make
them somewhat unstoppable, and always on, and always having to keep pushing
can also be really grating on their emotional life or their overall energy.
Sometimes you fall off a cliff when you realize
you've been doing that for so long.
So getting an entrepreneur to figure out just how hard to push him or herself
and how to keep renewing that energy is really important,
and also to refreshing the perspective.
Often for me simple adventures in nature.
I love the woods, and animals, and things,
and I don't think you have to have an exotic hobby or distraction.
But just being willing to take a break from your normal perspective
and go look at something else different, and be fascinated by
it is often a source of rejuvenation for me.
I'm a passionate soccer or football fan, as they say where I come from.
I'm a passionate supporter of Arsenal.
I also love to cook, and I love to exercise.
Now, you may think these are unrelated to what I do on a daily level,
but the truth is that I find inspiration, and sometimes even
derive new insights from these disciplines.
I learn a lot about team organization when I watch football.
When it comes to cooking, I learn a lot about experimentation, improvisation.
With exercise, I learned about discipline,
and what it's like just doing something every single day.
So finding your own way to escape, finding your own way to replenish,
seeking inspiration, often by going in environments that are new,
is absolutely important to keep at it for the long term.
I'm working on the new EP now and I found
that I started finding similarities between each of the song
and I freaked out, and I'm like, oh, my god I'm in a rut.
Like, how do I create something even I haven't-- you know,
something new that I haven't written before.
So it's just about forgetting about the music for a bit, you know?
I went back to Mexico a couple of-- I think it was a month ago?
And we went to Akumal, which is close to Playa del Carmen.
And I got to meet actual Mayan dancers.
I don't know, it just sparked in me again that kind of like-- you
have to find yourself again.
My friends and family are nauseous most days of all of my new business ideas
and I'm on all of these tangents.
So for me it's not about finding more inspirations,
it's about trying to silence some of the noise.
So I generally go out cycling.
I keep cycling until all I'm concentrating on
is are my legs moving in the white line on the road, and that's it.
Because then at that moment I get some level of clarity,
and I come back and now I'm clear in my thoughts
and that's when I start to then categorize and put
all these thoughts in place.
Versus the kind of messy ball of yarn that's going on sometimes.
I like to create something new or fix something that's broke.
I think you have to find those things that you really-- that you like to do.
It can be your passion, and you realize when
you're starting to get a little tired, and you're
starting to get a little restless, it's because, me, I'm
not creating anything new, and I'm not extend something that's broke.
So one of the challenges I said is write yourself a pink slip.
If you were to fire yourself, what would you tell yourself?
Dear Karen, you know, it's come to our attention
you've grown a little distracted.
When you're not into it you're not happy,
and you're ultimately not performing.
Being able to keep at it for the long term is absolutely important.
Ted Turner, the founder of CNN, among other things,
famously said about his biggest mistake that it was not taking enough time off.
But if he had learned to take more time off, he would've made better decisions
and he termed one of the worst decisions he made
was selling his company to Time Warner.
And he says, if I had only taken more weekends off,
then I would have been able to have more clarity of thought
when it came to making that decision.
So keep that in mind.
Keep this concept of staying fresh, taking time off, as a critical part
to entrepreneurial success.