Chris: Welcome to Total Freedom Podcast, my name is Christopher Duncan and I have Alex Charfen back here again, and it’s such a pleasure to have Alex on the show. This is the third time. He’s the only one that we’ve had back on the show three times. And the reason is this: I really wanted Alex back. I’ve been working really closely with him and, Alex, it’s so great to have you here.
If you haven’t caught the other two shows, you need to. Just because you’re listening to this, let me give you a quick intro on who Alex is. He’s everything about momentum. And Alex stands for creating massive momentum entrepreneurs. He’s been featured on nearly every single news medium you can look at. His book “Entrepreneur Personality Type” has been one of the things I actually travel with. There’s only a few books I travel with, and it’s one of them.
And I’m so excited to share some things on this show now with Alex. We’re not going to go into his story and things like that today because we’ve already done it, but Alex, welcome to the show brother!
00:01:31 – Alex: It’s funny, like from the first show, I don’t remember how long ago that was, but I was just thinking that was like the introduction on how we worked really closely together. It’s interesting to see that evolution.
00:05:00 – Chris: And I listened to one free piece of content from you about contribution, and my whole body just went “thank you.” And I remember it so clearly ‘cuz you talked about what entrepreneurs really wanna do, and what really fricking matters. I’m sitting there and I get this piece of advice from you, and you fricking changed my life by putting that content out there. Alex just said one thing: It was about waking up in the morning, getting yourself focused on what you’re gonna be, and you said that there were four things; who do you wanna impact, how do you want them to change, how will you change them, and what’s your scoreboard. And I remember it so clearly because I thought, I may as well do something that makes a big difference. And so I wanted to say, thank you so much, first, for being you and bringing that out to the world, because here’s what I know. Normally, people like Alex just deal with their companies. And they don’t share the inner workings of it. And when you shared that to me, and when you actually did that tiny little thing, we snapped back within three months. We’re doing six figures a month. So, I wanna talk about that today. I wanna talk about momentum based on experience, and I want to just extend some massive gratitude to you and listeners.
00:06:32 – Alex: I love you brother. Thank you, Chris. You have no idea how much that means to me because I remember when we were in California and we were in person when we talked about that. And, as an author, and somebody who puts stuff out there, you often don’t know what the effect is on people. And every time I hear something, especially from someone of your level, it just reminds me how important it is to continue putting yourself out there. Because, you know and I know, sometimes, it’s hard to fire up the video camera one more time, light it up and do it again. But it means something when you know that someone’s going through the incredible pressure and life-changing conditions that you’re in. For a video to bring you back like that, it makes me wanna go post more videos. I appreciate it, man.
00:07:36 – Chris: Thanks. It was huge. And this is what I got from it, and I want to find this out from you. I found out what really mattered. For so long, I felt lost, Alex. I played basketball internationally, and I always focused on that. Then I was in business, but I wasn’t really in it. It was like I was in it to make a business just to get out of it. Now, I’m in it because I’m in it and I wanna fricking be in it.
00:08:20 – Chris: How is it so different from all the other personality types?
00:08:29 – Alex: You know, Chris, I think it’s what you said. You said it so many times already. We are physiologically sensitive momentum based beings. You said, “I watched this video you did, and my whole body said ‘thank you.'” You understand. You are physiologically sensitive. We are hard-wired to be looking for momentum; to wanna drive forward, to wanna create progress in the world. And, here’s what’s interesting. I remember the first podcast we did. And you were still in that place where “I got some stuff I wanna do. I’m gonna make a big splash.” There’s a lot of entrepreneurs that I encounter that are in that place, and I always think to myself, “It’s okay.” Because, here’s what happens. When an entrepreneur understands their greater contribution, they’re no longer struggling to work. They just can’t stop. They’re no longer setting an alarm clock. They’re just up 3:30 in the morning. And what happens is, you uncork that contribution in someone, and you can take someone who thought they were in it to retire, make money, whatever, and next thing you know, they’re in love with their tribe. They’re crying about the effect they’re having on people, and that’s not work. The fact is, I think is entrepreneurs, we want to actualize. We want to create success in our lives. While success for people like us is being exactly in that place where you’re making your greatest contribution. And, Chris I don’t think that’s what it’s like for the rest of the world. We’re hard-wired to be like that.
00:10:08 – Chris: That took me so long to understand. In fact, since we first met till now, I honestly got off the first call, and I was like, “Everyone’s like that. Isn’t everyone like that?” And then, I went in, and I went to this leadership conference, and somehow I ended up at it. Because of everything, I went through this year, so much generosity, and I wanna thank Jenner and Brad Ballard who invited me to this thing. They didn’t ask me to pay. They sent me to this thing, but I went to it, and it was 2 out of 4 days with everybody that could be there. And the one thing I took out of it, Alex, was I was like, “Holy crap. Like these people are focused on buying stuff and what they’re doing.” I was like; I couldn’t even understand so much so that I made a lot of friends, but I don’t even know how to actually go and hang out with them. No motivation and no momentum to do it. That’s gonna decrease my productivity. I don’t want that.
00:11:19 – Chris: So, it was big, man. So, for the people out there who are actually momentum based beings, how do they know?
00:11:25 – Alex: We have three awarenesses of the entrepreneurial personality type, but I go about this a different way. We’ve been studying this, and I’ve seen success over a long time. And so, the questions I ask, the way I ask you to self-qualify is different than most. So, it’s three things. The first one is entrepreneurial personality types throughout history, those that are momentum based beings that are meant to do more, put on this planet to change things. The first qualifier is you always knew you were different. So, if you knew you were different from a young age, you knew you were different from the people around you, that is the first qualifier. So, that’s the first awareness of the entrepreneurial personality type.
00:12:08 – Alex: The second one, is, do you have innate motivations? Here’s what I mean by innate motivations. Psychology tells us that we have motivation outside ourselves. Like, external or internal, extrinsic or intrinsic, innate motivation is, you’re one of those people that just has got to move forward, wants to continue doing things, wants to make things happen, change the status quo, improve the world around you, get back to the drive. That’s innate motivation.
00:12:35 – Alex: And then the third thing, and this is the big one, we call it the “Call of Contribution.” It comes on subtlety. It this voice in your head that says, “Hey Chris, there’s more here. You can do more. You can be more. You can create more. You can contribute more. You can make a bigger change. You can have a bigger effect.” At first, it might just be a little whisper, for entrepreneurial personality types, that whisper becomes a yell, and over time it’s like the only thing you can hear. So if you have those three qualifiers, you knew you were different, you know you have innate motivation, and you’re one of those people that wants to make a greater contribution, then you’re probably an entrepreneurial personality type.
00:13:24 – Chris: It’s been the biggest revelation for me. And I said to my mom last night, I was chatting to her about this, ‘cuz she said to me, Alex, she goes, “There’s more outside just your business.” I looked to her for the first time ever, and I said, “Well, for me, there isn’t.” When I said it, I knew she wouldn’t get it. My business is the life and blood, breathing in the contribution, the thing I wanna leave behind, the thing that in a hundred years, will still be here.
00:14:04 – Alex: Yeah. Here’s the fact of being an entrepreneurial personality type. The way we’re hard wired, if you don’t admit that your business is one of the most important things in your life, one of the most spiritual undertakings of your entire lifetime, then you’re just denying something to yourself. Because the fact is, that for people like us, when we step forward and we create this thing called a business, when we step into the place of vulnerability of declaring that we’re an entrepreneur and that we’ve now become a commodity, that is one of the biggest and most significant contributions a human being can make back to the tribe.
00:14:44 Alex: The challenge for the people who don’t get it, is that they want us to slow down, or back down, or they don’t understand because they’ve never been in that place where contribution becomes the thing that you do every day. They’ve never been in that place where you could connect to you greatest contribution and see yourself moving towards it. Because, when you do, you can’t stop.
00:15:08 – Chris: I love it. People my whole life have said, “Chris, you’re too intense. Why don’t you stop?” They just had never understood what it’s like every day to wake up and know that you are helping your clients, to make money, to help your staff, and I love it so much.
15:39 – Chris: You’ve helped lots of people. What are the biggest problems that they face?
00:15:45 – Alex: I think the biggest issue that entrepreneurs face is that we’re not good at asking for help. And our biggest challenge is that there’s this mythology around being an entrepreneur that we have to be somehow perfect. And I think that far too many entrepreneurs get to this place where they’re not transparent, they’re not real. They get caught up with one of these people who convince them to fake it till they make it. They get pushed into this place of endless hustle and hard work, and what happens is, you get into a place where you get all that noise. For entrepreneurs, it could be hard to move forward. And I think that the biggest challenge, for me, I get a little emotional about this, but I think the biggest issue for me, for entrepreneurs today, is that there’s this new form of entrepreneurial cannibalism out there where you’ve got these trainers who are now training people nothing more besides just sell stuff to people. And there are literally trainers who will show you how to understand the market, get the market to obsess over you, show the market how to buy, what they want, make them completely dependent on getting your product, by writing sales letters and putting them into a system. But, Chris, I have a hard time finding the person who’s training on how to deliver. I think that’s one of the biggest challenges for entrepreneurs today is knowing who to trust, how to move forward, and how to create momentum because it is a wild, wild west of advice out there. It’s such a hit or miss proposition these days.
00:17:23 – Chris: It’s so much easier to teach people how to mine the gold than actually to be the one that’s mining for the gold. Your post, recently, I really loved. So I wanna ask, you to dive into this. Just yesterday, and you talked about different levels of advice, and why your company gives advice differently. It was awesome. It was so awesome that I sent you a message about it, and then I had to go and do it. I was just so pissed off, about how epic it was, so I’ll let you just roll with it.
00:17:55 – Alex: I have this hierarchy of advice because I’ve been around the self-improvement, consulting, coaching world for so long, and understand, I never sold a product online until 2007. Prior to that, I had a long career as a consultant, as a real estate investor, as an advisor to a lot of very important people, and then I got into doing this. And when I started really looking at this, there’s this hierarchy of products. So, here’s the issue. The issue is that most of the products are in this first category. It’s hard work. So, how many products out there, tell people, “Hey, you need to work hard.” Today it’s, “Hustle, hard work grit, determination,” all of this crap.
The misconception about grit is that there’s this new research study out, that everyone who’s ever been successful in history had grit. So, in order to be successful, you have to demonstrate grit. Wait a second. If we had a book on how to find stuff, we would interview people who had found stuff? And then they tell us you just keep on looking.
The fact is, that everyone who was successful of course, they worked hard! You don’t get there without working hard. The challenge is, this is where most people play. Hustle and hard work. That is the most entry level, rudimentary, training, and communication that there is. Problem is, most of the world plays there. And that’s also where most of the world lives. Most of the world is working hard, but they’re not getting anywhere.
So, the second level is motivation. It’s not just hard work. Now let’s motivate you. Let me tell you a metaphor that gets you pumped up and motivated. You know, Chris, this is where I think far too many people have become experts; in bullshit, mindless, endless motivation. How often do you see someone who’s just motivated, but doesn’t know why? You see it all the time these days. It’s like they’re zombies of over excitement.
00:20:48 – Alex: It’s because when you get people so over-motivated like we get into this place where we can’t be present. So now, you move up from there. Now there’s this new place: Goals and objectives. There are trainers who will train people on goals, outcomes, but this is dangerous. A lot of trainers won’t do this because they don’t know how to help you get through it. Here’s the real problem; most trainers, they will tell you how to set goals, but I’ve been to very few goal accomplishment seminars. There’s a ton of time spent on setting the goal then how do you get there is kinda brushed under the rug. That level of trainer drives me nuts. And so you take one step up from there, and now you get into some serious consulting and coaching. This is the trainers who are willing to train and who are about perspective and measurement, but this is not sexy stuff. When I start telling people, “Let’s talk about your metrics. I wanna understand your cash flow. I wanna understand your top-line, your bottom-line,” most entrepreneurs are like, “I’m out.” “I want that 90-day, $100,000 thing.” The fact is, that is a tiny percentage of entrepreneurs who even will play in perspective and measurement. And are willing to set up metrics, set up measurement, understand where they are. And then you get one step up from there.
00:22:17 – Alex: You get to where we play. And above that sits communication systems. The systems through which you build a business. The systems through which you actually scale and grow. And here’s the fact, less than one percent of trainers will even play here and there’s about twenty percent of trainers that will market to this result and then there’s about another sixty percent, who talk about it enough but they don’t know how to actually get anywhere near a communication system and that’s where people really fall down. Because here’s the fact, there’s three types of systems.
[00:22:59]
Alex: There’s three types of systems: the Internal Communications Systems we use…I mean, you look at someone like Tony Robbins, and he has some intense Internal Communications Systems. But they’re proven! They’re spelled out. They’ve been there. Then there’s the Communications Systems we use to communicate with others, and then how do we grow our business? Our team?
Chris: Yeah.
Alex: So here’s what’s interesting about us, Chris; I think working with you is very much the same way. We sell the system that makes it so that the entrepreneur can do what they’re best at.
Chris: Yeah!
Alex: That’s what you’ve recently done with us! You gave us a system so that we could do what were best at, and I think that in the world of growth and scale—like I said, about 1% of entrepreneurs want the Communication System, and then there’s a fraction of that 1% that could even understand how to apply it. So we’re looking for a very high level client, and I’m not saying a high-level cashflow client. I don’t need somebody who’s making a million dollars right now. I’m looking for a client who understands very clearly that, if they have Communication Systems to replace where they are band-aiding with communication skill, their lives would change.
Chris: Yeah. And what a great level to play at. What a great level to play at. One of the biggest shifts that I’m seeing out there is this shift through, from the person who’s doing it all, and has got so much on their plate, on their shoulders, right through to the person who’s actually the leader.
Alex: Yeah.
Chris: And that shift is what I see you providing. We are born into this employee society. We are told to trade time for money, and no one’s sharing what you’re sharing. It’s massive.
Alex: Thanks, Chris.
[00:24:43]
Alex: I like what you just said, that we’re trained to trade time for money. Even worse, we’re trained not to ask for help.
Chris: Right.
Alex: When I say Communications Systems, here’s what we do: we help entrepreneurs understand how to, on a daily basis, mine your life for where you need help. And then very clearly, and succinctly, and with an eye on your longer-term goal, understand where to ask for help so that you get there. And I think that, you know—is it okay to talk about the competition you did with us? Because I think that was just such an incredible example.
Chris: Oh, I’d love to.
Alex: Okay. We just ran this competition. And we had—I think we were expecting about a hundred people. We had almost 300. We read every word of submission, and it was amazing what people told us. And I just talked to our winner. We took it seriously. We read every submission. We talked to a bunch of people, we found out kind of where they were, and we made sure we had the right winner.
Alex: I talked to her, and here’s how astute she is as an entrepreneur. She’s got a business that’s doing well. She’s an Amazon reseller. She’s building her own brand. I said, “What’s the biggest thing that you need?” And she said, “You know, Alex, right now, it feels like in the business, I’m doing everything and I have people who are kind of helping, and it feels like our lives revolve around Amazon. And I know that what the business should have is that the world should revolve around the business. Amazon should be a tool, and I want this system so that everyone knows what they’re supposed to be doing, and the business grows—instead of just what we do on Amazon.”
Alex: That was so clear to me. I thought, “gosh, this is the perfect winner,” because that’s what we help people do. We help people create that Communications System, minimum effective dose, on the fly, building it as you go so that you can create momentum. We’ve done it with hundreds of businesses and we know we’re going to help her.
Chris: That’s so exciting, and what a great gesture as well. I mean, obviously, it’s a win-win for everybody involved, of course, but also for her the most. So that’s good. And I see that, Alex. I see so many people—they get themselves a start, and then the amount of times people come to me and…say, “Alright, Chris, this is my fifth, sixth, or seventh business, and I hope this one’s going to work.” And I look at them, and I go, “Do you know what? You need to fundamentally shift and change your identity for this to actually work.”
[00:27:16]
Chris: For me, in my journey—and I want you to help me kind of see how I’ve shifted—but the first part, for me—I was in that first part, man! I was all, like, hard work and hustle! I had to get there, and then I had to get motivated. One of the biggest transformations I had to get pulled rather than pushing myself.
Alex: Yeah.
Chris: And then I went after the goals, the objectives…but something shifted. And I think there have been two big shifts for me, and I want to hear if this is similar with other people.
Chris: The first thing is, I went; “I actually am self-aware enough to know I can’t do this all.” And then I sucked so bad at employing other people, so then I went back and went, “I’m just going to do it all!” Then that didn’t work, and I felt like I was oscillating, until I [went], “You know what I need? I need systems and processes.” But every single part of me hated systems and processes! Now, it’s all I talk about! So I made that shift, and then that’s going to explode into the millions.
[00:28:14]
Chris: How do you see that? Like, when people on their trajectory. Is it true, for everyone else, that they have to let go of their old self and move?
Alex: Absolutely. But, you know, not as many people have such a high level of awareness about it as you do, Chris. I think I can describe the transition that you’re describing from a perspective of having watched it with hundreds of entrepreneurs. I think you’re describing, from having to be pushed and motivated and moved forward—because you know what? There’s a reason why these guys who teach hustle and motivation and all that stuff do so well. It’s because there are people who want that.
Chris: Right!
Alex: And it’s because there are people who are getting up every day and they’re kind of—what happens in an entrepreneurs’ life is that for a long period in our lives, we get up and we try and motivate ourselves to do something. And really, what normally is happening is, we’re running away from the opposite of whatever result it is. You kind of said it before; you knew what you were doing. You were making a lot of money, but you were running away from the result of not having money.
Chris: [laughs]
Alex: It’s not like we’re really creating anything, we’re—and you even said it! It was the difference between being pushed and being pulled. In our lives as entrepreneurs, we are always, in the early life, trying to get away from something. Trying to get away from the impression we used to be, trying to get away from how we used to feel about ourselves, trying to get away from how people used to judge us. Trying to get away from the poverty or the lack of success or whatever we had—we’re working towards something, right? It’s different.
Alex: And I think what happens is, there’s this magical time in our entrepreneur life where we connect with our vision, our movement, that contribution we want to make in the world. We see that it can be real, and rather than running away from something? We start running towards. And when you can connect that and start running towards something, that’s when life takes on a whole different level of momentum. And what’s magical about it is, if you read the lives of enough entrepreneurs, you can see this shift in people’s lives. You can see the shift in people’s artwork. You can see the shift in the way that entrepreneurs wrote. You can see the shift in the contributions they made.
Alex: I mean, you can even see the shift in the early days of someone like Henry Ford, who used to publish anti-Semitic documentation about Jews! Anti-Jewish documentation. Who went from the beginning of his life to being a bigot to at the end of his life—after having grown his business—his entire goal was to democratize the automobile so that everyone could have one. He was running towards.
[00:30:57]
Alex: And what’s interesting, Chris, is—and, you know, see if you’re feeling some of this stuff—when you start running towards something, a lot less is important.
Chris: Yes.
Alex: Right? When you start running towards something, your days become a lot more focused. And when you start running towards something, you almost run on this different level of energy, and this different level of propulsion. And gone is that motivation and stuff. It’s almost like a connection directly to what your destiny is.
Chris: It’s so huge. It’s so huge. Everything changed for me, when I was sitting there. And I got right back to that morning moment and started going, “Okay, so how am I bringing my end game?” Got my plan back out…
Chris: And I just started going, like, “Okay, so that’s how I need to start off with.” Everything was good.
[00:31:51]
Chris: We’re going to have a quick break. We have an amazing webinar coming up, listeners, so go ahead and go and listen to that, and we look forward to continuing this conversation just after the break. Alex, I am looking forward to talking to you about what it is that you’re doing in 2017, and how our listeners can get involved. So we’ll catch everyone straight after this.
Alex: You got it, Chris.
—
[00:33:13]
Chris: Welcome back! I hope you’ve been enjoying. I’m here with Alex Charfen, and, Alex, it’s been a fun chat so far. We’ve talked about the different levels of consultants, from hard work to motivation to goals, to the coaching, and then right through to what you do; Communications Systems. And I’ve been loving it. I love all of our conversations, actually, I always feel momentum. I’ve got a ton of notes.
Chris: I want us to transition into momentum. And the one thing I’ve been talking about, and we’ve been talking about throughout the show is, a morning momentum moment that I had, and how that really got me back on track. So I would love to talk about a few things; first off, why is the morning so important? I would love you to share about your planner. I’ve got my copy right here—and listeners, I go through Alex’s planner every single day. So I’d love to hear about it.
Alex: You got it, Chris. You know, I was just in Zurich, Switzerland. I was at one of the most expensive events that there is. It’s one of the most exclusive; Robin Sharma’s Titan Summit. Steve Wozniack, the co-founder of apple, was one the speakers—just to give you a read on who was there.
Alex: Here’s what’s so intense: every time that I go out, and every time I’m at any type of even these days, what we’re hearing about is planning. We’re hearing about creating clarity and understanding how to be present and even meditation. It’s crazy! So for us, the more we go out and we’re talking about how to do those things, it’s drawing people towards us!
[00:34:51]
Alex: I’m sorry, what was the question?
Chris: I really want everyone to understand why the morning, and what they’ve done—
Alex: Oh! You got it.
Alex: I think Robin said it best at his conference. He actually said; your focus, your ability to pay attention, and your decision-making ability all peak first thing in the morning. And I think that, for a lot of people, they don’t believe it. Here’s the problem; if you’re not getting a good night’s sleep, if you’re drinking the night before, if you’re dehydrated the night before, if you’re not getting proper nutrition—then, in the morning, you feel sluggish and you feel tired! But the fact is that for the human body, all of our willpower peaks in the morning.
Alex: What we found out through neurological study is that the amount of decisions you make over time during the day, the amount of interactions you have over time during the day, the amount of pressure and noise—quiet literally!—that your body is affected to takes your decision making capability down. What we do with 100% of our clients is a process called Planning in Solitude, which is focus time in the morning to create intention for the day and, what’s even more important is, we create a structure to help our clients offload where they are uncomfortable. And people always say, “What does that mean?” Here’s why that’s so important: people like us will not admit where we’re uncomfortable.
Chris: [laughs]
Alex: Right? We have this Success Mechanism where we will continue to put up with more, do more, try to do it all ourselves—like you said, Chris—and we can slip into a trap at any given time if we’re not being careful. What we do is, we help entrepreneurs offload where they’re uncomfortable everyday by sitting down and going through this process. And you answer two questions. One is, what’s my intention for the day? What am I going to get done today? How am I going to connect with people? What am I going to get out of every meeting?
Alex: Then they move on to; where was I uncomfortable yesterday? And that’s the magic question, because if you can start to identify that, you change everything in your life.
[00:37:02]
Chris: And you’ve got five ways to measure the discomfort, isn’t it? It’s cash, effort—
Alex: Yes! Yeah. So it’s five currencies. It’s cash, time, effort, energy and focus. These are the five currencies we invest for success. So, cash—we all know what that means. Time—there’s no such thing as managing it. It’s an expiring commodity. Your effort, energy, and focus—you know, effort is, how much effort are you putting out? How hard is what you’re doing? How uphill of a climb is it? Energy is literally, how much energy is it taking? Because people tell me, “Oh, Alex, it’s no big deal, you know. It’s not hard to train for a marathon, it’s brainless.” Yeah, but you’re training for a marathon! And the last one is focus. That’s the one that gets people.
Alex: I usually go through a little bit of a cascade. If somebody’s really overwhelmed, I’ll say, “Alright, well, let’s take read; where’s cash, where’s time, where’s effort, where’s energy?” Focus is the one that gets us, because if you’re going along in life, and all of a sudden you’re hit upside the head with, like, an event that you had, Chris, your focus is gone. In a heartbeat.
Chris: Yup!
Alex: You just can’t—you know what that feels like! And so, for me, I do everything I can to preserve cash, time, effort, energy, focus. How do I make sure I’m not overcommitting those? Because if you’re overcommitting those consistently, you’re not going to do what you want to do with your life.
Chris: So true. And for me to be able to get back? That was so big. And I had my own way, and I think your way is great. What you gave me was that push to get back into the morning routine. In the book, Power of Habit, Charles Duhigg talks about a ‘keystone habit.’ And I have to say that I think the morning routine and that, you know, as you call planning and solitude, is the keystone habit of success.
Alex: Yeah, absolutely. Yes. It’s just like hydration is a keystone habit for physiological success, planning and solitude is a keystone habit for success. I love that.
[00:39:03]
Chris: Man, I just want to sit here and talk to you, but I know you’ve got a meeting coming up. Let’s talk about these weird glasses that both of us are wearing, because I’m sure everyone is asking about why are two entrepreneurs sitting here talking with these glasses on, inside, and no one’s mentioned them yet.
Alex: Yeah, no kidding! [laughs] So, I think we should just let everybody know. You and I are what I think most people would refer to as biohackers. But I think what a biohacker is, in my regard is, a person who does everything they can to get the most out of their body.
Chris: Yes.
Alex: What I just said, how can I get the maximum amount of effort, energy, and focus every day? And, so, you know—I started wearing these tinted glasses a while ago because they lower the blue light spectrum indoors, they make it so that I’m not exposed to harmful blue light—just like the ones you’re wearing, Chris. Here’s what that does; when I take these off and I look at a computer screen, it feels harsh. It actually feels, like, irritating now, and I’ve realized how much irritation I was putting up with. So by wearing these, I’m lowering the noise on my eyes, my nervous system, I’m not taking on that blue light. And here’s the big thing: the blue light from a computer or from a phone, these kill us. Because when you look at it, your eyes are seeing blue light spectrum that’s as bright as the sun at noon.
Chris: Whoa.
Alex: And we now know scientifically that our body regulates to light. So here’s the issue; if it’s four o’clock and you’re looking at the sun at noon, and it’s seven o’clock and you’re looking at the sun at noon, and it’s ten o’clock and you’re looking at the sun at noon, what happens is your circadian rhythm in your body can get completely reversed and all screwed up. Your experiencing something called time shifting. Here’s what happens to a lot of people; they’re watching TV so late, they’re looking at screens so early, their body has no clue what time it is! And what we see is auto-immune issues. We see people feeling rundown and having all kinds of symptoms like thyroid and hormonal and cortisol issues, and when you really look at all of those, they can be caused by this over-acceleration from blue light. And so, for me, I’m protecting myself from blue lights. I’m protecting my corneas and my entire focus, energy, and effort.
Chris: It was huge for me, and—I mean, I only got them because you kept talking about them so long, but I got them. And here’s what happened to me; dude, I stop now at, like, 8PM. I used to be hustle ‘til 1AM, wake up at 8AM. Now, I like—I’m done! It’s weird! I feel like wearing these all day doesn’t keep me in this updrive. I feel more centered and grounded, and I am sleeping better, waking up earlier, and I’m getting more done.
Alex: Yeah, you know what’s funny, Chris? Is some guys will listen to this and now go, “Oh my gosh, I would never wear those glasses, I love being up until 1!”
Chris: I know!
[00:41:54]
Alex: Here’s what they don’t know; they don’t know that when you start creating a high level of focus, when you start creating a high level of intention, when you start offloading where you’re uncomfortable, here’s what happens: one, you don’t have to be up until 1.
Chris: Mm-hmm.
Alex: And two, you get so much done during the day—such a high level of output, such a high level of focus—that you wouldn’t risk it by staying up ‘til one.
Chris: That’s right. That’s right. And—yeah. That’s exactly it, it’s such a big difference, and focus, clarity, and momentum, things are getting done, and it’s been done in less time, and it’s just better. Potent productivity.
Alex: Yeah!
Chris: It’s potent. It’s like taking just the minimal. It’s so good. I love it, man.
[00:42:51]
Chris: Hey, we’re running out of time, bro!
Alex: [laughs]
Chris: We could sit here and talk forever, and listeners you probably get that. Alex is coming back! I’m just going to keep hounding him and his team to get him on another show, because I just love talking. I want to next time talk more about biohacking and everything like that as well, if it—when it happens, which is great.
Chris: So, I’m sure some of the listeners want this planner. Where do they go to get it?
Alex: Go to charfen.com/planner, and we will give you the primary pages of that planning system, and then there’s a program where you can kind of learn the whole thing. What that planner will do is help you solve that age-old crisis for entrepreneurs of, how do you declare where you want to go long-term, and build all the way back to the day-to-day to get there.
Chris: I bought that program, and it was…the reason why I bought it, and Alex will remember this message I sent him, is I said; stop giving me so much great free stuff, I need to send you money.
Alex: [laughs]
Chris: And his response was exactly what I said. “Okay, well, let’s make that happen!” [laughs] And the program was amazing, so I highly recommend it. Alex, I know you’ve got to go. I appreciate you, man. Bottom of my heart. You and what you guys are doing over at Charfen is just awesome, and you’re making a difference in people’s lives. To me, that means somebody who’s not a fake guru, who’s not going to try to teach me another technique or tactical marketing thing that I already have learnt and know, but actually shows me the ground. Like, how to move forward, build a team, and create a contribution, so. Massive love for you and everything you guys are doing over there, man.
Alex: I want to thank you, man. Your team is one of the few marketing organizations that is outsourced that actually cares about a result more than just delivering the event or the product. The way you guys have hung in there with us through this competition, the amount of work you personally put into it, your team’s put into it, it is an extraordinary level of dedication that you and your team have that we just haven’t experienced with any type of marketing—contracting or outsourcing or consulting—so I want to thank you too, man. This has been an intense couple of weeks for us.
Chris: [laughs] You bet, brother, and I’m sure it’s going to stay that way, because I don’t know anything but intensity!
Alex: [laughs]
Chris: Hey, listeners! If you’re out there and you’ve got some momentum from this, make sure you go check out Alex on Facebook. Everything’s going to be on the shownotes: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, every other way you can chase him. I suggest that you go and do that. I suggest you get the momentum planner. I suggest you leave a comment, subscribe, like, and share this podcast, and I suggest that you live with Total Freedom. Free your mind, free your time, and free your life, so you can do more of what matters most. We love you so much. We will see you on the next episode. Bye for now.
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Episode 13: Melissa Krivacheck | How To Move Forward From Being Fired to Being A Successful Entrepreneur; The Secret Weapon to Massive Transformation
Episode 23: Daniel Dipiazza | How to Build Business Relationships the Right Way; Learning the Exceptional Skills
Episode 37: Alex Charfen, Round 2