Every year at the end of the year, my wife and I sit down and prepare our goals for the next year. This year one of the major things we added to our list was cut those around us, each other, and ourselves a little more slack.
Too frequently we wind it so tight and demand such a high level of performance from of ourselves, that we miss the real, joyful opportunities around us.
The reality is no one is perfect.
Each of us makes mistakes–irrespective of trying to do our best. Sometimes we just have to live in this messy imperfect world, bungle a little bit, and accept it. I have found this in business too. I have found this in my spiritual life, and I have found this in my personal life. Often times the biggest tragedy that occurs is being too harsh, too critical, and too demanding on ourselves (and at times, on those around us).
The truth is we actually perform at a much higher level when we take the pressure off a little bit. If we cut ourselves, and those around us a little slack, the end results improve.
Now, I’m not proposing that we subscribe to a level of mediocrity either.
This week there was an event that I became aware of, and one that really drove this point home for me.
A young man that I know is having a couple of small challenges–nothing serious, but still a series of challenges. Recently this brought him to a conversation with two spiritual leaders. When I became aware of this, my heart was instantly frozen and softened simultaneously. This enigma because I know that one of those spiritual leaders is a very harsh, direct, smack-it-down kind of individual, where the other individual is kind, generous, tender, loving, building and supportive.
I was anxious about the implications on this young man’s life. I knew that the first individual would indeed buoy him up, support him, lift him, and help him reach his height, despite several small mistakes. On the other hand, I was afraid that the other individual would want to smack him down, sequester him, and destroy him.
The reality is that at some point we will be in the same position, if we haven’t already been there. Then we all need (and appreciate) people cutting us some slack.
We live in an imperfect world. There are going to be mistakes made. The challenge I give to all of us is…do your very best. The key then, is to is keep things going.
I often tell my team members, “I expect mistakes. Great! Go make mistakes, just don’t make the really big ones.”
I tell my sons the same thing, just don’t make the really big ones! That’s how we learn. If you have team members that are not making mistakes, I would argue that they are not trying hard enough. They are not pushing the envelope enough!
Again I close where I started. Cut me a break, cut yourself a break, and enjoy the moments of life a little bit more.
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On any given night there are anywhere between 5 to 15 young men at our house for dinner. We manage our home not by control systematic mechanisms, but by total chaos. Last night was the ultimate joy and experience of not only chaos, but just a real, joyful experience. All of you who know me, know that I have an incredible, intense passion for Nepal.
There has been one family in particular that I have become very bonded with, to the point that I consider these young men and young women my children. We first went to Nepal in 2001, met our Nuwang, brought her back to the U.S., raised Nuwang Sera Sherpa as our precious daughter.
Several years later we took our oldest sons, John and Matthew, to Nepal. They became dear lifelong friends with Tashi and Tenzing Sherpa. Indeed this week our ultimate dream was realized as Tashi and Tenzing have done very well in school. They have followed my education requirements and are now here in the United States. Tashi arrived about a week ago and was able to come to our home for the first time, last night.
He will be going to Snow College next year with his brother Tenzing. As everybody heard about it, all of our wonderful friends and the wonderful friends of our children gathered together to meet Tashi and Tenzing and to celebrate. At the top of the list were Scott Harward and Wyatt Earnst, who were John’s dearest friends growing up. Our favorite thing was when Scott would fling open the door and say “I’m Home!” that is exactly what he did when he came over.
Last night we had a huge, blow-out game night expecting Tashi to invite a young lady named Lauren to join us along with a handful of friends. What we thought would be five or six individuals turned out to be 19 young men and one young women, Lauren. As each young man would walk in the door my heart would swell with joy knowing that that was a strong, determined, intelligent, capable young man and I would add the count for Lauren saying, “Now you have 12 adoring fans Lauren, 13, 14,” and the count went until we hit 19.
We had a joyful night of eating pizza, playing games, interacting with these young men and I want to say this boldly “I BELIEVE IN THE FUTURE OF OUR YOUTH!” There are more qualified, capable, incredible young men and at least I know 1 young women out there that will make a difference in this world. I know that things are challenging and this diversification into an international economy is tricky and scary for many people, but I want to, with boldness and with confidence say, “I BELIEVE IN OUR YOUTH!”
I believe that there is brightness in store for everyone. I believe that there is enough positive energy and goodness to solve our problems. I think the next major challenge that we have, as a society, is to end poverty–to bring equality to all the world. We can make the world a better place, especially with the positive influence of our youth. I look to the youth with great confidence, because I observe them everyday! I love those 19 young men who gathered in my home last night. And what a delight it was to also have one beautiful young woman join the celebration.
One of my favorite books of all time is Viktor Frankl’s Man Search for Meaning. Although he covers two or three major concepts in the book, one of the major themes he discusses is that we all collaborate on a conscious or subconscious level.
I’m a Christian. I deeply believe that God has purpose for us in our lives. I think he has a bit of a sense of humor. And I think that oftentimes the alignment of happenings and circumstances in our lives are not just coincidental. I firmly believe that.
Although I’m a Christian, my mentor is an atheist who believes in the power of the universe. I also have dear friends who are Jewish and Hindu. Irrespective of beliefs and views, I think that we can all see that indeed, God, or the Universe, or whatever power we seek from; allows us amazing, unique, and beautiful opportunities.
I had such an event happen to me this weekend. Tenzing Norbu Sherpa is an amazing young man who has come over to the U.S. from Nepal this past year. We’ve been working with him on his college education, and we enjoyed having him join us for Thanksgiving dinner.
As we were down in St. George, Utah this weekend, we took a few minutes for a stop at the visitor center. All of the sudden, in walks my dear friend Roger Reid. Roger is a successful high school and college basketball coach.
For years Roger had been sharing with our family a story about an amazing woman from Hoang Jo, China. He tells about how when he spent time in China he and his family had a tender, wonderful relationship with this young woman. They spent time discussing both religious freedom and personal freedoms that she was not afforded. In the past Roger had shared how deeply his family longed for this young lady to come to America.
Finally this young woman had come for Thanksgiving with the Reid family. So here we were: old friends with our amazing young international friends enjoying the holiday weekend. And to top it off at that very moment, in walks a woman who had a very profound effect on Tenzing’s life his first year of college. She helped him really live life with hope and optimism and belief.
It was serendipity.
Two minutes in the other direction and all of us would have missed each other. We had a delightful, joyful reunion. We gave hugs, we took pictures, and then we went our separate ways.
As for me and my house, I believe that God is in the details of our lives. I believe the universe does give us what we seek. Indeed as Victor Frankl points out, on a conscious or subconscious level we all collaborate.
It’s important to put positive energy into the universe and expect good things to occur. I think the energy is one part (not the only part) but one part of the equation that allows us to find success in our lives.
I’m so thankful in my life for these joyful, little, serendipitous events.
I keep two pictures in my office to remind me of what it takes to be an entrepreneur. Both of these pictures are of beautiful and awe-inspiring places in nature. I enjoy hiking and I really appreciate how the analogies of hiking through some rough parts of nature are so closely aligned with what it takes to be an entrepreneur. The similarities are almost unbelievable.
In life and in business as an entrepreneur, much of what we face is hard. Sometimes all you can do is grit your teeth and use your determination to work your way through without forgetting to look up and enjoy the beauty.
Please enjoy this video and my thoughts about a recent trip through the magnificent Zion Narrows in Zion National Park in Southern Utah.
One of the most frequent questions I’m asked is, “How do you ensure that you’ll be a successful entrepreneur?” Many people think that it requires a high degree of intelligence or some great insight or an extensive network. I continually tell people the number one factor in business, and I think in life in general, is unalterable determination—or in other words, looking your dragons in the eye and spitting on them, despite the fact that they are trying to eat you up.
I love the movie Cinderella Man. The story is of a man who is a professional fighter. He’d previously given up fighting, but because his family is starving, he goes back and faces a Goliath in his life.
There comes a point in the movie where he’s facing the most formidable opposition. This particular opponent is actually known for killing people in the ring. The protagonist takes several hard body blows…and then there comes a point during the fight where he turns and shouts “Hit me! Hit me! Is that all you have?”
He takes blow after blow until he ends up winning the fight despite the brutal beating. Sometimes we have to face such dragons.
Last week I found myself in a tough situation as I was preparing myself for a little respite I’m going to be taking with my wife. I really found myself in an impossible situation, with some factors in my life attempting to dish out every body blow that I could possibly take.
Then I experienced an interesting change that came over me halfway through the week. This change was similar to the change in Cinderella Man.
My approach and my attitude toward my conflicts became. “Is that all you have? Bring it, bring it!” Then I had to proceed to face those dragons and stare them in the eye.
Indeed we will all have intense challenges in our life, but particularly as you face entrepreneurship. The biggest challenge I leave to you is this: As crazy as it sounds, embrace those body blows! Look them in the eye. Fight the dragons. You will reach a level of exhilaration when you get through the challenge. Then go forward, prosper, and enjoy the wonderful ride and life of becoming a small business owner.
Today I took a young man named Landon Swenson and my dear friend Ellis Taylor up golfing at one of my favorite golf courses, Wasatch State Park. The outing was in celebration of Landon leaving for a couple of years to serve an LDS mission in the Philippines.
As we started out the day I had a beautiful fairway drive. I got up on the drain three feet from the pin. Then I got a little awkward and ended up missing the three foot birdie putt. That mess up got embedded so deeply in my mind that throughout the rest of the day, every single three-foot putt was a mess.
Each time I got wobbly kneed, crooked, and started thinking, “Don’t miss it, don’t miss it!” Then…panic! I ended up missing almost every three-foot putt that I had today. By the time I got done I had counted seven putts. I put in an incredible round, but I couldn’t hit the easiest shot that there was.
As I thought about this, I realized how frequently I have done that in business. Sometimes I have a straightforward, simple task to do in business, something I just need to finalize it and put it to bed, but I over think it. I get too stressed out. I get too tied up in it, and I end up over-contriving and jimmy-rigging the thing until it ends up a failure.
When you are in business, go with your gut intuition. Don’t put every little thing through too much brain processing. When you have something difficult, go forward with confidence. You will have a much higher probability of success and you won’t miss all your three-foot putts.
Due to the high amount of wind atop a 12,169-foot mountain, this video is a bit hard to hear. Below is the transcription of the audio. I hope you enjoy the view from the top as well as the inspiration I enjoy while working with these young Boy Scouts.
Richard: Alright everyone…we are on top of Delano, which is a 12,200 feet peak in the Tushar Mountain range in Utah. We’re here with the Boy Scouts.
(To the Boy Scouts) Guys this is the most important talk we will have had this entire trip. So, who thought the hike up was a little tough?
(Boy Scouts agreeing it was difficult.)
That is an important life lesson. Nothing in life that is worth having is easy. Throughout your entire life you will face dragons. Remember when we were looking at the Devil’s Tooth and everyone started saying, “Ah! I can’t do this, I’m really nervous.”
There are a lot of moments in life that are scary and the reality is that the number one thing anything worth having in life is hard, and it takes hard work. If something is easy then everyone else has done it and it’s not worth having.
The second point is we zig zagged all the way up here. What if we would have headed straight up that mountain? What do you think would have happened?
A Boy Scout: “We would have died!”
Richard: We would not have made it. We would have fallen off those cliffs. So indeed we have proven again today that Zig Zag is a fundamental true principle.
Everyone: It’s AWESOME! We can make it ANYWHERE!
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Also follow Rich and The Zig Zag Principle on Twitter and Facebook.
In preparation for submitting the book (Bootstrapped: A No Bull Solution For Business Success) to our publisher, I have been calling all of the individuals I have quoted or told stories about. Today I was able to have a great discussion with Ed Viesturs. One of the chapters in the book is titled Climb High Sleep Low. In this chapter I contrast parallels between mountain climbing and what it takes to succeed in starting a business. (See excerpt from the actual chapter of what I said about Ed in this chapter.)
As we were comparing notes, Ed made a statement relating to mountain climbing that I had to write down and share. He used the term The Currency of Toil. If that does not describe the GRIT or tenacity to succeed in a start up business I do not know what does. I love that phrase Currency of Toil.
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Ed Viesturs, one of my personal heroes, was the first American to climb all 14 of the world’s 8,000-meter summits. He accomplished this remarkable success without the use of supplemental oxygen. Only those who have confronted high altitudes understand the super-human ability required to accomplish this task.
I identify with Ed for two primary reasons:
1) His work ethic and attitude on the mountain.
Countless times he sacrificed his own summit bid in order to rescue others. How Ed climbs the mountain is as important to him as climbing it. Ed was a member of the IMAX team and one of the major heroes in the rescue attempt that occurred in the infamous 1996 Everest disaster.
2) His climbing philosophy.
When Ed is acclimatized and the conditions are right, he goes for it. When the conditions are not right or he considers the venture an unacceptable risk, he has the courage to back off and go back to the tent. Sometimes this frustrates others around him, but he does not let peer pressure push him to climb a mountain when it does not feel right.
In an article about his third attempt to summit Annapurna, Veisters said:
Veikka and I will approach this attempt the same way we have all our other climbs. I’m quite prepared to just turn around and come home if conditions are as dicey as they were on previous attempts. I admit to being pretty motivated to reach my goal of climbing all 14 peaks, but I’m not going to take unreasonable risks to do so. No mountain, no summit, is worth dying for. I do this for fun, not because I have to. I do this for me, and I do it my way.
Now, you have to keep in mind that Ed had already attempted this climb twice, and backed off both times. This was the last 8,000-meter peak he had left to conquer before attaining his goal of summiting all 14 peaks. Annapurna is arguably the most dangerous and most difficult of all of the 8,000 meter peaks, with the possible exception of K2. He had already tried and backed off twice. Ed’s team chose a route that required them to be above 26,000 feet, the death zone, for an extended period of time. However, taking this route allowed them to avoid the huge avalanche-prone faces of the foreboding mountain. Well into their summit bid they came to a corniced face that “just did not feel right.” Ed and Veikka chose to go back down the mountain, but two other climbing partners decided to press forward. In an amazing climb these two reached the summit successfully. Some people watching called Ed and Veikka weak-kneed, and they received an enormous amount of criticism. However, they did not waver and offered no regrets. They had the courage and fortitude to “go to the tent” despite peer pressure, despite it being the final summit, and despite the world watching.
Ed said: “For me and the people I care about, my style of climbing is the right style. Getting to the top is optional, but getting back down is mandatory.” In mountain climbing, it is not enough just to get to the top of the mountain. The goal must be to get to the top and return home safely. In business you must plan for the difficult times. As you reap the rewards of your hard work, build a financial buffer for your future.
The beginning of this past summer I committed to myself to begin teaching my three oldest sons fundamental business principles. I decided the best way to do this would to actually build a businesses together. Each Saturday and Sunday afternoon my three sons and I would go down in my office and have a “board meeting”.
The first few meetings began as a brainstorm where we would discuss potential businesses. Nothing was off the table. We had some real interesting ideas pop up (particularly from my 11 year old Nathan). After several weeks we narrowed down the business options and informally discussed the pro’s and con’s using the Porter Model. What did we settle on? A website focusing on How To Tie a Tie. Why you ask? Well in our research we discovered that the 4th most searched “How To” phrase on the internet is How to tie a tie. There are over 2,000 searched a day on this term. Once decided we were off and running to the races. It has been a rather slow moving project, but one that has simply been life changing for my boys.
I am thrilled today to announce that last week we formally launched our website www.2tieatie.com. So why was this so important to me? The primary reason I wanted to do this with my sons was to give them a feel early in their life of what it took to create a business. I also wanted them to live the process not just talk about it. I also wanted them to take some ownership in saving and preparing for college in a manner different than just getting a job. Not that I don’t want them to also have a job and work hard, I do. But I want them in the mindset of creating assets rather than working a job. There has been one huge side benefit from this project that I had not pre-mediated. It has been the process of exposing my sons to the global economy. As we were discussing the project last night it was pointed out that:
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The project plan and specification had been put together by us in Utah.
The initial site design was done in Ahmedabad India. With over 10 back and forth iterations of the design.
The witting of the step by step instructions done initially by a writer in Eastern Europe (and failed).
We then engaged a professional witter in the USA that I had previously worked with
The picture diagrams were done by a talented diagrammer in in Pakistan
The Assembly of the Pictures and Steps were then returned to India for build out and engineering
The Quality assurance and debug of the site done by my sons back in Utah
The online store is being done using Amazon.com which is located in New York
The Video diagrams is being outsourced to my oldest sons 17 year old friends Scott and Wyatt
The ties that we will eventually sell on the website will come from Thailand and Korea
We engaged several link building efforts with two different firms, one in Southern India and the other in Romania
We also did a press announcement which was distributed out of Washington State
Wow, that is quite the world tour for a eleven year old. The reality is, we live in a global economy and the only way our children will thrive is to learn to dance in this world. I am so proud of how my sons have interacted and embraced this experience. All said, I think the experience interacting and coordinating the efforts all around the world proved to be of more value than the business experience.
This past week there has been quite the stir in our neighborhood. Through the block we have some neighbors that have a beautiful yard. This yard is meticulously groomed and each fall planters full of Canna lily flowers make a magnificent showing. This yard truly is amazing and there is with out question significant effort that takes place to keep this yard a show piece. this being said, my gardening neighbors really lost sign of reality.
I do not know the specific dog(s) that promoted the infamous “Signs” to be posted, but this past week 3 professionally created signs appeared in the front of their yard. The signs read:
“KEEP DOG(S) OFF GRASS”
“THIS YARD IS NOT A TOILET FOR YOUR DOG(S)”
“KEEP DOG(S) OFF GRASS”
The following day in the neighbors yard directly across the street a poster board sign with lettering in magic marker placed in the gourd with a shovel appeared. Keep in mind that this neighbor does not own a dog. The sign reads:
“DOG’S CAN’T READ”
There are so many management metaphors associated with this little story I don’t even know where begin so in spirit of allowing you to simply have a really good belly laugh like I did, we will simply leave it with this. Next time you feel inclined to do something really absurd in your business, remember
“DOG’S CANT READ!
