- Good morning, Believe Nation!
Today's message is strive to improve.
Over to you, Karl Lagerfeld.
(rooster crows)
♫ I wake up every morning
♫ Espresso keep me going
♫ I wake up every morning
- I'm never pleased with myself.
I always think I could do better, I could make an effort.
I'm lazy.
I mean, it's ridiculous, I know.
But I have the healthy attitude
and I don't think I should change my state of mind.
Because when people start to think about their past,
their art, and all this, it's very dangerous.
I do a kind of applied art, don't be pretentious.
And the good thing is that I could never,
like the old Rolling Stones song,
any satisfaction of what I'm doing.
Always think it could improve, I could do better,
and I could do more.
That's ridiculous, but it's very healthy, I think.
- I think that is a trait that you will see
across all successful people, that it's never good enough,
that they want to improve, that they want to get better,
that they're always looking for feedback and criticism
on what they could do better,
and they are their worst critic.
No matter what you say, how you try to tear somebody down,
they are harder on themselves.
Successful people are harder on themselves
than anything that you could throw at them,
and that's what leads to their success.
I've been thinking a lot about celebration recently,
because I don't celebrate a lot
and probably don't celebrate enough.
And as I research it more,
you see that the most successful people
don't actually celebrate a lot.
They don't celebrate a ton,
because what they're doing is not good enough
in their mind yet, right?
I'm wearing a Blue Jay cap.
And here we go, go, Jays, go.
- Go, Jays, go.
- I love baseball.
For some people, just getting to the Major Leagues,
that's a win.
That's a win.
Like, "I made it.
"I made it to the Major Leagues.
"I hit my goal."
And for some people, playing a full season is their goal,
and they hit a win.
And for some people, just make it into the playoffs.
They can say, "I made it to the playoffs."
And for some people, just playing in the World Series.
"I played in the World Series."
That's a win for them.
But there are other people
who want to be one of the greatest of all time.
They want to be one of the greats of the great.
In their head, even if it's delusional,
in their head they see themselves winning five, six,
seven, 10 World Series.
That's where they want to get.
Unless they get that, they're not satisfied
so they're striving to improve.
Improve themselves, improve their teammates,
improve their strategy, improve to get to that point.
Because in their mind they're winning five, six,
seven, eight, nine, 10 World Series
And so if they win one, great.
It's a win, hey, good.
Celebrate one day, awesome, good.
But it's only a step along the way.
'Cause in their mind they want to be one
of the greatest of all time.
And so one World Series is not enough.
They want to get better and improve.
And it doesn't have to be from an ego point of view,
like I want to be the best.
It could also be from an impact point of view.
One of the things I remind myself every day
is I have the ability to change the world
and it's my responsibility to do so.
It's my responsibility to get better at what I do
to serve more people, to help more entrepreneurs.
I need to get better at my videos.
Great, we crossed half a million subscribers.
Amazing, quick celebration, but let's go.
That's not enough.
A million, five million, 10 million.
It's not about hitting those numbers.
It's about the impact that it can have.
It's about reaching people with a positive,
inspiring, empowering message
for them to go and do something amazing
instead of wasting their time watching gag videos, right?
Instead of escaping your world,
instead of escaping your job
and having to turn to watching funny videos
or trying to go on vacation as an escape,
I want you to not want to escape your life.
I want you to live a life with purpose
and passion and meaning.
And that's on me to get better
to reach more people to do it.
A lot of you guys are already onboard
and you're already taking steps
and you resonate strongly with the message.
There's a lot of people who don't get it
and I'm not good enough yet
to be able to reach all of those people
and I need to get better.
That's how I see it.
I need to get better.
Every day I need to improve.
I want to have that kind of impact
where I'm winning the five, six, seven,
eight, nine, 10 World Series,
so hitting one isn't enough.
And that's why the big time winners,
the guys and girls who are having that big impact,
they can't relate to the person who their biggest moment
in their life was getting to the game,
to playing their first game in the Major Leagues.
If that's your ceiling,
that's the ceiling that you imposed on yourself.
That's the biggest win in your life, getting there.
You just can't relate.
I don't want to celebrate that.
I want to celebrate doing much bigger things.
And so I think having that mindset of striving to improve,
of it never being good enough,
about there always being a way to make it better,
about taking the personal responsibility, right?
If I look at my videos, there's a team of people around me
who are helping me make these,
and it's on all of them to get better too,
but it's not their fault for not getting better,
it's my fault.
It's my fault for not coaching them, for training them,
for improving them, for getting them the mindset
and motivation to get better.
And it's on me.
I'm doing the product.
It's on me to get better.
This conversation has to get better,
has to be more impactful.
And so I think if you look at any successful person,
people who have reached the heights that they're at,
they don't just sit back.
They'll recognize it for a little bit,
but then let's move forward.
Let's make this better.
How do we improve?
How do we have a bigger impact on this planet?
And I sincerely hope that for you as well.
So the question of the day today is I'm curious,
how much time do you spend celebrating?
Leave it in the comments below.
I'm going to join in the discussion.
I also want to give a quick shout-out
to William from nucor.com.
William, thank you so much
for picking up a copy of my book, Your One Word.
It really, really, really means a lot to me, man.
I appreciate the support.
Thank you guys again for watching.
I believe in you.
I hope you continue to believe in yourself
and whatever your one word is.
Much love, and I'll see you again tomorrow morning
for another shot of Entspresso.
♫ I wake up every morning
♫ Espresso keep me going
- Hey, Believe Nation, if you want some more videos
on striving to improve
to really lock in that message in here,
I think you're going to enjoy these bonus clips.
- Boy, this is the first time in years. (laughs)
Doing this all from memory.
This is hard to remember an old computer language.
(gentle piano music)
I not only designed this,
every little metal trace that you see on here,
I strapped onto a drafting table
and I built this whole board myself
because I wanted the chips in the ultimate perfect position.
I worked for a couple of weeks every night
till about four in the morning,
laying out the little things on a big drafting table
that would eventually become this board.
And when I got done,
I realized I had to drill eight holes in the board,
and I said, "You know what?
"If I had only designed it a little bit differently,
"then I would've only had five holes."
I tore apart my entire design,
and for another two weeks,
every night till four in the morning
to get it just that perfect with only five holes
so you wouldn't ever see the three missing.
It had to be that artistically perfect to me,
because it represents yourself when you do a great design.
- Whatever you really, really, really want, you get.
And whatever you really, really, really don't want, you get.
Because whatever your mind is focusing on,
you pull these things into your life.
So your perspective is so important.
And for me it was a slow, slow, slow, slow build,
but I got me out of that depression
and really lifted me up.
And I don't lose, you go like this, you know?
It's not just a straight, you know?
But I've always kept that desire, you know what I mean?
And it's a sincere desire.
And when you ask for something like that,
you start seeing things about yourself.
Because really the way the world is relative.
It's the way you see yourself that shapes the world.
It doesn't shape the world,
it shapes your perspective on the world.
So if you want to continually change,
you have to have that desire.
I can pinpoint certain points in my life
where you have these moments of clarity.
I was talking about the academic portion,
the clarity of the guitar.
We all have these very subtle, intuitive moments
of clarity, but you have to want them.
If you're stuck in a particular way of thinking
for your whole life, you're not going to get them.
- [Interviewer] You have to see them.
- You have to want to be.
You have to want to improve yourself as a person.
- Well, it's not about not killing.
It's about doing the best show that you can do
and it's about staying at the edge of your ability.
I want to do a better show every time I'm onstage.
I mean, part of it is that I want
what I do to keep getting better.
Unless you're think you're the best comedian
that ever could possibly,
like your perfect, crystalline diamond of a comedian
that couldn't possibly be improved upon.
Every molecule has been compressed together
to the point there's no air in it.
You're a black hole of a comic.
There's just no room for improvement.
You folded the samurai sword 1,000 times,
then just can't fold anymore.
No, so you got to keep trying.
I mean, I think a lot of people in show business,
and comedy even especially, are very lazy
and they just sort of think that you just get up there
and then you wait for your manager to get you a better one,
a better shot.
But it's something you got to really,
to me, I mean, for me I just want to keep working at it.
Yeah, I wouldn't like it if I stopped trying really hard.
It isn't a neurosis like, "Oh, geez, I hope they like me."
It's this is what I do,
I got to do it really well.
- For me, I would say it's all driven by curiosity
and the desire to be personally challenged.
Those two things.
I can sum it all up.
And i don't know if it's a formula for success,
it's just what drives me.
I'm very curious, I want to know more.
I chose projects that I'm going to learn from.
I choose projects that are challenging.
I don't want to do the same thing twice.
So I think personal challenge,
trying to strive for excellence.
And to me, in filmmaking the excellence is
how excellent can the entertainment experience be
for the audience?
I'll pull out all stops.