Doing less is creating more because you’re working on the right things. Listen up and stay focused on your goals.
Episode Transcription
Den Lennie (1s):
Hey, guys! Den here for this week’s shorty. Thanks to my wonderful assistant Milca who just reminded me. I had to record one because I’ve gotten stuck into a really cool I’m going to work quite John, I’ll be sharing with you in the next month or two, actually be walking a big project in the background. So excited to share that with you and bring that to you all in good time. So today I wanted to just share something with you very briefly, that I think you’ll find really interesting and that I think will help you if you’re open to it. So I’ll let get. And just a second.
Den Lennie (45s):
So I want to just talk about the fact that I’ve had. This massive, em, breakthrough recently breaks should be the wrong word realization. And that is the, the slower I go at something with more consideration, the faster I get results, and that is completely opposite to what I’ve previously experienced. I’ve tended to go. I’m a pretty big implementer. I tend to implement stuff straight away and I go hard and I get stuff done. And, but since kind of before Christmases, I guess since I started doing a younger yoga, I started to be more considerate in everything I’m doing in my business in life.
Den Lennie (1m 32s):
So I’m, I’m not working as many hours and yet I’m getting the best results I’ve ever gotten. Our mastermind is growing our courses, growing our clients are getting just phenomenal results in community is incredible. You know, it’s become much bigger than me. You know, the people in the community are so proactive at supporting each other. It’s just blows my mind, but, but I’m very conscious of how I spend my time. So my part of my life goal is to, to not work full time, I want to walk 20 to 30 hours a week and enjoy mountain biking and yoga and reading and hanging out in this beautiful place where we live taking landscape photographs, playing music, all the kind of fun stuff that, you know, we used to do when we were younger until, you know, what got in the way.
Den Lennie (2m 21s):
And before, you know, it was like suddenly, you know, I don’t know what you’re just like it, it was like, Oh God, I’ve got a real job now. And that’s what most of running in business can be like, it can feel like you’ve given yourself a job. And so I’ve been sort of really thinking about how, how can I make myself more effective and more efficient. And one of the ways I’ve done that is by being super organized and super structured in my working week. And so I have very clear times when I work, I’ve actually discovered that my optimal walking time is between 12:00 PM and 4:00 PM.
Den Lennie (3m 1s):
So that’s like four hours in the middle of the day. I get up at six for the first six hours. I’m doing other things. But when I get to sit down at my desk, I’m so productive and so focused that I am getting more done with less effort than ever before in my life. I’m also largely focused on just helping my clients succeed. And if you take that philosophy and help your clients succeed, then literally you can’t go wrong. You know, I did an, an extra call for a couple of my clients last night. Who’ve been struggling a bit with just, you know, homeschooling and in the UK and they’ve missed a couple of calls and I could see them getting behind them and it was really bothering them, but, you know, priorities must be what they are, you know, and, and the UK being in lockdown, it’s tough.
Den Lennie (3m 48s):
It’s did an extra call and because I’m up at six in the morning by 10 minute to call eight o’clock at night, I was pretty knackered. So I spent 45 minutes meditating before the call to energize myself so that I give my clients the very best of me for the time they’re on the call with me. And then I was buzzing after the call and the same this morning, you know, I got up at six, I meditated for half an hour. I had a coffee hang out with my wife, watched a bit of YouTube and then went and did the call. I had an amazing call. We talked about, you know, the whole idea of affiliates and how can you get people to refer you work? And is there a, is there an argument for saying some people that keeps a $500 incentive or where this big deep discussion about, and, and then we discussed that storyboards of all things, you know, so it was a, such a kind of interesting mix of topics, but, but throughout all of this, I’m just like, why is it I’m getting so much done in such a short time?
Den Lennie (4m 48s):
And part of the reason is that I’m very disciplined in how I run my day in terms of time slot. So I, I have time slots where I do focused work and that focus work is uninterrupted. So there’s, I don’t have any alerts. My email box is empty before that, before I start a day, I don’t check my email every 10 minutes. I don’t respond to anything right away. I make sure that I’m in control of my time because I want to be as productive as I can with the time I have. And I want to serve my clients at the highest level and give you guys great value on these calls, casts. And so the slaughter, I have been attacking life faster.
Den Lennie (5m 30s):
I’ve been getting results and it’s counter intuitive. So I want you to think about how you run your day. And I know from my own experience, and I wouldn’t begin to presume how you run your day, but when I used to live in the UK, I was earlier in my business career. I was just constantly kind of felt on edge. I felt like I was constantly panicking to keep the wheels moving. I used to look at my mentors and go, why are you so chilled out? Why are you so relaxed? Why are you like not jumping at every opportunity? It seemed to be kind of very focused on one thing and I couldn’t work it out. And now I get it that the single point of focus, the one thing focus is, is what makes the biggest difference. Seeing no to things that don’t support your purpose and mission is the absolute key to success.
Den Lennie (6m 15s):
I remember an interview with Richard Branson, where he said, we get people making us offers all day long for businesses. They said, it’s so important that we say no to most of it, because it might in fact be a great idea. And, and Steve jobs is another one who said this, you know, it’s like what you see, nor two is more important than what you see yes to. And you, you should be seeing no to incredible ideas, because if they are not aligned with your purpose and your overall mission, they will just distract you. And I think that the reason I’m feeling this way now, and that I wanted to share this with you is because I have removed virtually all distractions from my life. My core focus is my video business accelerator to clients.
Den Lennie (6m 57s):
We have two courses. We have the mastermind and we have a course. My focus is those two products, those two sets of people and making this podcast and, and creating marketing to encourage more people towards our, our offer. That is all I do that is it full stop? And that is creating all of the wealth. I desire. It’s the, it’s creating the lifestyle. I desire. I love my job. I love seeing my members succeed. I love my clients. I genuinely we’d have every one of them run my house for a barbecue. That’s because I get to choose who I work with. So, you know, I reject a lot of people and for some people it’s not a good fit and they don’t want to stick around.
Den Lennie (7m 38s):
Cause it doesn’t feel right. And that’s okay too. But the, the kids that I have, I just had to share this with you like that, to doing less is actually creating more because I’m walking on the right things. So I want you to think about doing an audit in your own life, you know, track yourself the next two weeks. There’s a great app called rescue time, downloaded on your phone, put it on your computer, see how you’re spending your time. I just do not waste any time though, when I’m in the office, I’m there to work when I’m not in the office, I’m doing something else. Be that reading, playing, having fun, doing yoga. And that’s all part of my, my, my, my life goal of, of, you know, living a certain way, being in a state.
Den Lennie (8m 26s):
So I hope that’s useful. I just want to share this with you. Cause it, it really, it was like this aha moment today. I was having breakfast with my wife going, it’s just struck me, you know, like it’s, it’s like, I am, I’m suddenly like achieving more than I ever have in my life. Yeah. I’m putting in less effort or the effort is more focused and I’m not wasting energy sitting at a desk eight to 10 hours a day, trying to figure stuff out, chasing too many rabbits. I’ve got one core focus and, and I, I do that at the expense of everything else. And so I want you to think about that in your own business and life, you know, what can you get rid of and how can you streamline what you’re doing and get more focus.
Den Lennie (9m 8s):
All right, guys, I will talk to you again on Thursday. You’ve been listening to the how to scale a video business podcast with me, your host, Den Lennie. If you’re a video business owner, it’s hits a ceiling, we’ve benefited from mentorship, support and coaching and check out how you can work with me over at denlennie.com. Don’t forget to subscribe and rate the shore over on iTunes. And we’d really appreciate you taking a few minutes to leave a review and don’t forget to share if you feel you’ve gotten value from this episode and you think it would be useful for other filmmakers, you know, and please do me a massive favor and share it on social media and in groups that you might be in. So thanks for listening. See you in the next episode.
