Tell Me Something That's True, But Nobody Agrees With

 

 

"Tell me something that's true, but nobody agrees with." Peter Thiel

If you don't know Peter Thiel, he along with Elon Musk (Tesla, SolarCity) and Max Levchin (Yelp) created this tiny payment processing company named PayPal. You may have heard of them. They since sold the company to eBay for $1.5 BILLION and all have gone on to start their own billion dollar companies. Peter has written a book "Zero to One" which I would recommend to everyone, not just entrepreneurs. 

This one question gets some context with this statement:

"What great businesses is nobody building? In business, every moment happens only once. The next Mark Zuckerberg won’t be building a social network.”

Whether you interpret this as work in the white space or zig when they zag; it boils down to creating a service or product to disrupt you industry or in other words ALWAYS try to put your competition (and yourself) out of business.

Pancakes: Friend or Foe?

Good enough for The Rock, good enough for me!

The obvious answer: Pancakes in their typical form is not what one would consider to be a health food. Especially if you're consuming them on a regular basis, no matter how delicious they are!

They can be used to enhance metabolic function if used strategically, and I must add, this doesn't necessarily work for everyone. Typically for men around 15% and women hovering slight below 20%.

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Consider the following: a 28 year old, fairly healthy male. Has been lifting weights for 2 years and has a considerable amount of muscle mass and is pretty lean. Let's say he's 14% body fat, which is pretty good. That's the kind of physique where you say "oh yeah, they workout". 

And lets say they want to get to 8%, which is where you start to really lean down and look "jacked". The problem is the nutritional protocol you had in place to get you down to 13-15% isn't going to help you get down to 8%. I mean otherwise you would've already gotten there by simply staying the course, right?

So this is where pancakes fit into the picture. If this individual goes from 70% adherance to 85% of the time, they'll make a lot of progress. After a couple months, they get to 10% but they're still not at their goal. Thus a strategic calorie surplus often helps kickstart the fat loss process again. This "cheat meal" also has a lot of psychological benefits by breaking up the monotony of eating healthy foods 24/7.

Keep this in mind whether you are vegetarian, paleo, ketogenic or a "clean eater": When losing weight, there are many roads that lead to a healthier you, this is simply one way. 

Book to Read: So Good They Can't Ignore You

I often recommend Cal Newport's book to other fitness professionals, but this book can help anyone be the linchpin in their organization and become indispensable. This book is a MUST READ for anyone who hates their current job and wants to do something they're passionate about, but doesn't know where to start. This too, is a fantastic read for anyone who's working hard to build a long career in an industry they love. 

Newport goes to great lengths to explain just how terrible "follow your passion" is as career advice. He argues against the "passion" approach, as it can lead individuals down a road that may not be financially viable; just because you enjoy something doesn't mean that you'll be able to make a living doing it.

(GH Note: If you had the choice between making 100k but being miserable and making 70k but being happy; I would choose the latter and find areas of my life where I can scale back. Being happy needs to be at the top of your to-do list when assessing career options)

There's a few reasons one might fail such as an insufficient demand in the market for your skills, or because you may not have enough "career capital" to be successful in the early stages of your career transition. Career capital is described in the book as a set of rare and valuable skills. So as to say these are traits that greatly define amazing work. With competency comes higher job satisfaction. This key component to happiness even outweighs earning a higher salary alone. 

The author sites several key case studies that backs his career capital theory. Many professionals work long hard hours acquiring rare and valuable skills that will allow them to have more control over their careers by making them indispensable in their field. They are now able to afford to ask for more compensation and flexible schedules but also to take chances on finding a speciality to further enhance their career financially and increase satisfaction. 

Just because you love exercise, don't blow your life savings on a gym when you don't have the rare and valuable skills to succeed in the fitness industry. As it currently stands I believe there's a few reasons why people are so quick to want to jump from behind their desk job to a gym. 

The ease of entry into the field is what makes it so appealing to the workout junkie. You can become a personal trainer RIGHT NOW. You can trade in your suit for dri-fit clothing and get a pretty flexible work schedule. Could you "survive" this transition? Yeah you can but you don't want to only get by, you want to thrive in this or any industry of your choosing. 

So whether you've been contemplating a change of careers or want to get a promotion, Cal Newport's book will help you better understand how to further your career by putting in the work to go from good to GREAT. 

If you found my book recommendation compelling and feel that it might be a read a friend you know needs to get going on, please do share this post. Thanks!

Dad, My Hero & Role Model

Today I turn 30 years old. And while this is a milestone birthday, I also am aware that Sunday is Father's Day. 

So the subject today is one that is very near and dear to my heart, My Father Manuel Heshiki.

While he may never see this, it's important for me to share my thoughts with Father's day right around the corner. My dad came to this country like most parents of first generation born minorities with practically nothing but the clothes on his back. He shared with me how he had been deported TWICE and somehow made his way back. I guess they were a lot less strict about the whole thing back then, if you somehow made it in, they'd let you stay so long as you behaved.

After marrying my mom, my brother was born and he ended up worked two jobs: at a Benihana style Japanese restaurant and at the Ford Motor plant outside of Edison, NJ. After I was born he simply worked two shifts at the Ford plant. I remember growing up and wondering why I never saw my dad and when I would give him a kiss (this is if I somehow managed to stay awake on Friday nights) he always had a really rough face. Later I realized of course he woke up to go to work early in the morning with a clean shaven face with the same disposable Bic razors which he still uses btw, that by the time he came home his beard had started to grow back in. A lot more than a 5 o'clock shadow.

This was my life until we moved out to California in 1991. There my parents both went to work with my Uncle at our family Peruvian restaurant in Los Angeles. This was the beginning of The Bulls dynasty and I was a HUGE Basketball fan. I always wanted to go to the park to play, but my parents were always working. I used to think why can't I go play. Why do I have to spend every moment outside of going to school, here in the back of a restaurant folding menus and eating Peruvian food!?!? (which in hindsight wasn't so bad, Lomo Saltado ftw)

I would whine about not being like every other kid I went to school with. Why did I have to wear Payless shoes and hand-me-down discount clothes. I can never recall my Dad raising his voice or disciplining me about my incessant complaining. (It's quite obvious I was a punk and will pay dearly as a parent in the future) 

Instead on weekends he and I would leave for the restaurant early in the morning and he would take me to shoot around with an $8 plastic basketball from K-Mart. My dad was in his late 50's at this point. He somehow found the energy to work 10 hour days, 6 days a week and then put up with me!

I'll never forget this Basketball

While I of course love my Mom, I'll never forget all the amazing things my Dad has done for me. Not just the insane amount of hours he'd work but how he NEVER complained. A trait that as I turn 30, I wish to emulate moving forward. He always seemed to have a goofy smile and tried making a joke even when I was an annoying moody teenager. Little did I really understand what my Dad did for both my Brother and I. The sacrifices to put us through school, to put food on the table and provide for us what little luxuries we could afford like McDonalds after school on Fridays or nose bleed seats to a Lakers game at The Great Western Forum. 

If you are fortunate to still have your Dad in your life today, give him a hug and tell him you love him. I hope that in my lifetime I can even be half the man my Dad is. I will forever be grateful to him for showing what it is to be a real man and an even better person. 

One Life

Recently in London Gary Vaynerchuk was at Vaynerworld. This was an event organized by CEO of Creative Content Agency Raj Kotecha and Sujan Shah of Rocaba Group who interview Gary over a variety of subjects. While the interview is GOLD, there is one specific part that resonated with me.

Around the 57 minute mark is where he begins his closing statement and the truth hits hard. He discusses spending a large amount of time in his 20's speaking to 90 year old people. He says he was a hungry guy and wanted to hear it from people who had been there and done it. Gary laments that all of them started their life stories with "I wish". Wishing they had worked harder, spent more time with their family, and followed their true passions and not simply do as their parents desired. 

 The biggest poison in us is regret. 

You can tell me why how bad it is and why you can't do it. It's just not true. If anybody ever did it, then you can too. You're not trying to reinvent the wheel. You simply haven't found the one way to bring yourself disproportionate success. It takes time and effort to find it and when you do, go all in. Is it hard work? Yeah big time. And you may find out it was hard because you're actually lazy. Or discover you talk a big game but you're full of it. You need to come to grips with your truth and only then can you move forward. 

Stop making excuses. Stop complaining, nobody's listening. They may pretend like they're listening, the market doesn't care. What you need to do is make one person happy, you. Then you can make everybody else happy. You know why I like making people happy? Because I'm already happy. Understand are you doing the things that are putting you in a position to succeed? Not just in business but in life. When you're happy in life, your business can roll.

That final line hit me hard as I'm about to make some life altering changes in the next few months. I kept looking around at the things in my life that weren't working well, namely my business. When in fact I had so much to be happy about. When I acknowledged this, deep down in my core, I finally began to pull myself out from rock bottom. 

We only get one life, one time on this planet. Make it count.