Be That 1% Podcast

Title: 3 conversations your Mind is having during hard conversations

Episode: 249

Title: 3 conversations your Mind is having during hard conversations

Description: Want to be better at handling hard conversations? James shares a framework he learned from the book 'Difficult Conversations that highlights the 3 conversations we are all having during any conversation, especially the hard ones.

Use this framework to establish and keep your balance when under the pressure of giving/receiving feedback.

Show Links:

Connect with James:

IG: James_Silvas

jamessilvas.com

Bethatonepercent.com

Show Notes

Episode: 248

Title: How to start, scale and sell an 8 figure business with Solomon Airhart

Description:

Solomon Airhart is a leader, serial entrepreneur, investor, and former CEO of Aruza Marketing, an 8-figure Pest Control company built from nothing by Solomon and his team. Currently, Solomon is CEO of Growable Ventures where he helps home service entrepreneurs grow and scale their businesses and become financially free.

In this episode, Solomon shares his philosophies on creating value and maintaining a good business growth mindset. He also talks about how he exited a company he birthed, and did it gracefully. You'll learn a lot about creating value from scratch, and how to turn your purpose into a business.

Show Topics:

• The foundation of Solomon's entrepreneurial spirit
• The journey to becoming a successful serial entrepreneur
• How to recruit the right team members
• The exit process
• Healthy business practices
• Strategies for making effective business decisions

Show Links:

Connect with Solomon

IG: https://www.instagram.com/solomonairhart/?hl=en

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/solomonairhart/

Aruza Marketing: https://www.aruzamarketing.com/

Connect with James:

jamessilvas.com

Bethatonepercent.com

IG: https://www.instagram.com/james_silvas/?hl=en

Key Takeaways

7:10 The foundation of Solomon's entrepreneurial spirit

Strong foundations are instrumental to building a successful business. Solomon shares his earliest business role models with us.

Solomon: "My grandparents and my mom were both entrepreneurs. And so there's a story from my grandma and my grandpa that always stuck with me and resonated with me, and it's still what leads and guides me a lot today.

And my mom started her own business, raised my sister and me simultaneously, and provided us with everything we needed, and I'd watch her work 24 hours straight.

Sometimes I'd go to bed at night. She'd be working. I'd wake up, and she'd still be working. So I just always was around that hard work ethic and entrepreneurial mind.

And so I always knew that's what I wanted to do. As I became an adult, I got into sales, I think sales was the best thing I could have ever done, and I think everybody should at some point in their life do a sales job because it flows into so much of life".

13:42 The journey to becoming a successful serial entrepreneur.

Startup journeys are always inspiring, with a lot to learn. We get to hear how Solomon built something from nothing and made a graceful exit with his partner.

Solomon: "I had confidence in ourselves because I knew that worst case scenario, me and Jordan can sell, right? So the hard part is over regarding getting the customers.

The most important aspect of any business is to get revenue into the door, and I knew that we could do that, and then I figured, hey, look, we're smart enough to figure the rest of this stuff out.

I knew a decent amount about it. I have been in the industry selling it but needed to learn more about running the business or operations. And so obviously, persistence is great there because we came into so many roadblocks and did so many things wrong.

So at that time, in the beginning stages of Aruza, the whole philosophy of failing fast was what I lived by. I'm going to make a lot of mistakes, but let's just get through them quickly and figure out how to keep pushing forward.

And then it comes down to learning a lot and trying to pick people's brains as much as possible. You open yourself up and drop your ego to where you can say, hey, look, I don't know anything about this. Could you help me or teach me?

And so I learned a lot that way, but as we kept building Aruza, we had this one thought where it's like every time we came into a road bump, it was like, oh, we got to work harder.

So that was really how Aruza started. When things get tough, we'll outwork everyone around us, and that's what we did. But we always had the idea of what it could be.

But it became way more than what I had even imagined. But it started by slowly bringing the right people around."

15:50 On recruiting team members

Getting people to leave previous engagements to come work for you and believing in your ideas and dreams requires a special skill. Solomon takes us through what that process is for him.

Solomon: "I've always been a big dreamer, and I think anybody who's known me for a long time knows that I've been that way, and I talk about it all the time, the dreams or my vision or what I want to do is always pouring out of my mouth, and I think sometimes maybe people even get sick of it a little bit.

As we look back now, we made many friends in Charlotte that first met Jordan and me when we were starting this business and were like, oh, man, you would come around all the time. I am like, we're going to build this pest control thing. It's going to be huge. And they would kind of chuckle to themselves, these guys are crazy, and now they look back, and they're like, oh, well, you did everything you said you were going to do.

And it's like talking about that vision a lot. And then when you talk about things, you create this picture, interested people that want to be a part of that are going to rise to the surface, I would capture them.

The biggest thing is figuring out, okay, what is their motivating factor, and how can I solve their problem with what I have, the vehicle I have to offer them?

And that was the big thing, like identifying the right type of people and then figuring out what they want and then how Aruza or what I have to offer here sort of solve that and then make that connection to them".

24:29 The exit process

We talk about startups all the time but rarely exiting. There are some important things to consider when planning to sell or expand your business with investors.

Solomon: "When we wanted to sell the business, we always wanted to sell it as a platform. A platform would be a company that someone's buying that they're going to go buy smaller companies and roll them up into this platform, and your company will then be the brand that all these other companies roll up into and become.

And so you want to sell as something other than a company that's just going to get rolled up and changed into a name and is somebody else. You want to be that one name that stands through the test of time.

So if you can find a specialized industry business broker. Ideally, a good business broker is someone specialized within your area or your industry".

31:00 Healthy business practices.

If you want to start a new business, here are things you need to consider.

Solomon: "Maybe we'll start with the bad because I think some of the bad equates to the good, and I'm not saying that this is a wrong way to do it, but it's a way that we did it where I just don't know if me personally, in the place I'm at in my life now would want to do it like this again.

When you're starting the business, you have these ambitions of growing super fast, right and blowing up because those are the types of things that people's eyes will go towards. They're the things that people are going to talk about. But growing at such a fast rate has drawbacks.

The biggest one has to take on debt and capital to grow. If you're growing 100% to 300% plus a year, you're not going to be able to do that from cash flow, and having that debt can wear on you and be stressful.

Budgeting is another big thing. Like most people, when you're starting a business, you don't know about budgeting and forecasting and things like that, but that's the thing that I will always remember moving forward.

It's like, okay, look, we're gonna look at the next year, and we're going to forecast what growth we would want, and we're gonna run all those numbers on a monthly analysis and figure out what it is going to cost us? Can we afford that? And if we have to take on debt, are we comfortable taking on that level of debt to get this? Or if not, would we be fine taking a smaller growth and not having to take on that debt?"

36:26: Strategies for making effective business decisions

Solomon shares some of his best decision-making strategies in business.

Solomon: "One of the decisions is you have to take care of the fuel. What I mean by that is when you're running a business, there's a certain thing going to fuel that business and grow that business. You have to make sure you take care of that.

If you got the gas line going into your house, you don't turn the gas line off. It's not going to stay heated. And so you have to take care of your sales team, the people who are selling or your marketing team, whatever, is driving the money into the business. We always had to make sure that we were nurturing the sales".

48:40 Solomon's last words

The landscape is changing. Solomon predicts employees may not be around forever with advancements in technology and AI. His advice is to find your purpose, niche, and unique values you can provide the world.

Solomon: "Figure out how to turn that into a business and then deliver it to the world. And don't be afraid of failing, and know that you are going to fail and fail fast, but you are capable of this growth, and you are capable of this success.

So be willing to take the chance on yourself. If there's any chance you're willing to take, you have to take the chance on yourself. And so go out there and just do it."

Suggested Listening:

165: How To Stay Consistent, Take Action and Understand Your Purpose

Description: Giovanni Gubbels is an entrepreneur, international businessman, and the CEO and founder of ChainCargo, a tech transportation logistics company with the mission of bridging the gap between technology and logistics.

In this episode, Giovanni and I had a fantastic conversation about adopting the top sports mindset in your business and managing a business effectively. Join us in this insightful conversation.

Show Topics:

• A journey to Gio's childhood.
• Lessons learned from the cradle.
• The importance of mentors.
• The thin line between sport and business.
• The Vision behind Chain Cargo.
• Giovanni's view on business.
• The challenges in recruiting team members for a start-up business.
• Tools to arm yourself with when thinking about starting a business.
• Keeping the top sports mindset in business.
• Handling uncertainty as a business owner.
• Gio's intentionality with leadership.

Show Links:

Connect with Giovanni:

IG: @giovannigubbels

LinkedIn: Giovanni Gubbels

Connect with James:

jamessilvas.com

Bethatonepercent.com

IG: @james_silvas

Key Takeaways

06:00 Gio's childhood, the basis for his becoming. For everyone succeeding in their fields, there is a story. Good or bad, it shapes us into becoming who and what we are.

Gio takes us on a journey to his childhood.

Gio: "I grew up in a safe environment. My family is close to me. My dad was a Marine, or still is, for a few more months, and then he would be a coach with early retirement.

So yeah, it was like manly surroundings when he was home, but he was also often away because of his job. So I bonded well with my mom. But later on, because of also having my father figure away and back and away and back, I started changing because of that. My dad had different expectations. He was over-protecting and setting high targets, which he still loves to do. But also, looking back, it changed my behavior".

07:45 Lessons from the cradle. Childhood lessons are meant to keep us grounded as we go through life. We often need to remember many of them, but Gio shares some of them.

Gio, "The big thing my dad always said was assumptions, do not make assumptions. That's also with the listening part. If you listen carefully to someone else, you'll start making assumptions, and there's where many things go wrong.

Also, to give, to get what you want, you need to give. So you need to work for it, you need to do it, you need to try it".

11:00 The thin line between sport and business. Over time, we have rightfully seen the bromance going on between sports and business. They are so alike that it's a huge plus for one when you have the other. Gio explains how having sporting experience influences his business life.

Gio: "I started pretty young, and I could play quite some ball on an amateur level, and the biggest learning curve was there.

In sports, you need to practice. You need to keep doing it, getting better every day. You get to work with disappointments. You cannot do it alone because in soccer, you have eleven people on the pitch, people on the bench, et cetera, and you need to do it together.

Sports have helped me become who I am. Teamwork, discipline, practice, receiving feedback from a coach, and just working towards something like that are all that help.

And that resonates well with business owners. For me, it's like running a business is a top sports mentality. Yeah, it will be hard if you don't have that".

13:35 The Vision behind Chain Cargo. Gio talks a bit about what his company is about and the idea behind its start-up.

Gio: "Chain Cargo is a tech company. We are creating software for the logistics space, and the service that we offer is like organizing transportation from A to B, for shippers, for trucking transportation, for vans, et cetera. And the thing we do differently than others is that we are focused on our carrier.

If you look worldwide, but I take the US for an example, there are a lot of trucking companies, but 98% only exist out of 20 trucks or less. So imagine that many trucking companies do their planning and their organizations on Excel, other than doing it in an old system or using a SaaS model or anything. But imagine that all those different companies are like having their planning, their customers, their agents, et cetera. It means that the market needs to be more cohesive. And we all know, at least the people in logistics, that there are a lot of empty kilometers and mileage, a lot of debt mileage, how we call it, which are paid but not filled, but also like a lot of empty mileage, which is just not filled because they don't have a load.

Over the last few years, we have like a lot of capacity issues. And here's where you already go wrong. Like there is capacity, but we need to find out where. And I think here's where we come into the space where we are building software that we want to give out to the market for free in return for the data so we can make the invisible visible and start optimizing and utilizing the existing capacity on the road to flatten the climate curve and lower down the footprint in the supply chain".

15:30 Giovanni's view on business. Like success, the idea of what business is different for different individuals. Here is what Gio thinks business is about.

Gio: "I only sometimes feel that I'm running a business. A lot of stuff makes me feel it's a business, but that is the less fun side.

You must be aware of what you are trying to solve. And then what I try to solve is bigger than what my targeted avatar audience is, which is paying for the services. So I'm happy that I could pivot the problem I saw and the thing I want to solve, like the emissions and logistics, to a way that we can impact that and make money without having that part as a money maker".

19:48 The challenges in recruiting team members for a start-up business.

Trying to get people to not only believe your visions and ideas but also join and help grow your business can take time and effort. Here is how Gio jumped this huddle.

Gio: "You need to imagine that I quit my corporate job. I was 24 or 25, and I quit my corporate job to start for myself, started doing some consultancy, and eventually, a year later, started Chain Cargo. So I was also convincing myself that I knew that they could do it.

But I think through the full journey, if you have people who start working with you, you are hiring and stuff, that's already like a game changer that people are leaving their job to work with you in your company in exchange for a salary of course, but still, they make that leap when you don't have anything, you don't have any customers yet you still need to build the software, you just have a story, and they believe in it. So that's something that touched me at a certain point.

The most difficult thing was being a venture capitalist. So we tried, my partners and myself, to merge all the money we earned on consultancy on the side because we were running two businesses, to pay all the salaries to keep growing.

The further you get, your focus will shift, revenue is getting more important, and growth figures are getting more important. You get more opinions because you get more people who also have their ideas, who also have their problems at home. So, you get to deal with a lot of stuff. And for me, we grew hard. We did a good job".

24:00 Tools to arm yourself with when thinking about starting a business.

Experience is always the best teacher. It is a great deal to learn the rudiments of a new skill or business you are interested in from the ones far ahead.

Gio tells us some things start-up business owners should know to prepare themselves better.

Gio "There are several factors in play, and it's purely personal because I don't know how it is for others, but I'm not a writer; I'm more a doer. So I'm from something other than big fancy business plans, not doing and crafting it on the way and just trying to keep on pivoting on your experiences. That, for me, is a big thing. But as I also said, like, top sports mentality, you will get setbacks, so be prepared for that.

It was Brian Donovan who said a few years ago when he was on a retreat in Long Island that running a business is going from crisis to crisis. You only need to manage to have the prices as small as possible and see it coming on time.

And I know it's really hard because it's your baby, but you also need the resources to work at the business instead of the business. Hiring experience is really important, do it as early as possible. It may seem expensive, maybe in your budget, but it delivers so much back and allows you to focus on the bigger picture"

28:50 Keeping the top sports mindset in business.

Gio lets us in on how he has maintained maximum energy and a top sports mindset in his business.

Gio "What personally helped me is that since I started the company, I got coaching for mindset, my traumas, and business coaching, like I experienced with you, which helped.

Sometimes, It's hard because you don't always see it yourself. And that's why I also came back to coaching. I have always been doing it myself in logistics for eight years, so I knew from the bottom up what I was doing, like every detail. And it helped till today that everyone around me also sees me like he is doing the job. He's leading by doing and not by telling or instructing.

For me, you're not doing it alone, but the rest is also not doing it for you. You need to do it together, and you need to play as a team. And everyone has his role, and if somebody is having a bad day, you need to step in".

40:10 Handling uncertainty as a business owner. The fear of the unknown can be a crippling force if it's not managed properly. Here is how Gio handles uncertainty in the face of Crisis.

Gio: "For me, flexibility and adjustment are key. And it's also a mindset thing. I struggle with the fact this is not possible, or it's not going to work, or it doesn't work like this. It's fine that it doesn't work or what else? But I want to hear what's possible.

So if I ask you, for example, can you drink that full bottle of water at once and you say that's not possible, but you can also suggest, maybe that's a little bit too much, but let's take it in several sips. My mind only works constantly, and that's why I struggle with it. If something happens, I'm only thinking about the possibilities, and it makes it easier to deal with uncertainties; you are wired like this.

Are there new opportunities? Where can I shift my energy? Do I need to shift the things around me to get further and create, constantly create 'rest' for everyone? Because if you panic, the rest will panic".

50:10 Gio's intentionality with leadership.

Effective leadership is such a core part of every community, especially in business.

Gio tells us how important channeling his inner child into his leadership role is.

Gio: "So, for me, the inner child, you could say it's a gut feeling, it's the real you, the one who's not thinking, the playful one, the child in you. When you're young, you don't know the rules. You don't know anything. You just do you. And because of the changing behavior of doing things for others to look good, be better and not listen to the things I wanted, I was pushing it away.

So by understanding who I am and who I got to be doing the work, I realized that it was suppressing my spontaneous thoughts and my spontaneous decisions. So, yeah, there is a big thing for me that nowadays I'm working and listening way more to my inner child.

Still enough, but it makes life easier because it can be that easy. If your body is saying full yes to something, why shouldn't you do it? Why are you going to play the card yourself? Like, oh, yeah, but maybe this, or maybe they will think this".

59:46 In his last words, Gio says;

"We are living in a society where everyone has an opinion, where everyone tries to be looking good towards the outside world. But I want everyone to know that what seems to be successful from the outside can also be lonely.

And you always do it really for yourself. So forget the rest. Just do your thing and make sure you live your life to your fullest opinion. Doesn't matter only if you listen to it. Stay in your lane, shoot your shot, play your game".

Suggested Listening:

1. Szn 6: 5 Hard things leaders must face and become skilled at to succeed

Description: I have Christopher Mackin on this episode. He is a partner at Bleakley Financial Group, 3 time-recognized Forbes Top Next-Gen Wealth Advisor, serial entrepreneur, and philanthropist.

Christopher has a magnetic warm aura around him that makes you want to have conversations with him. We talked about wealth and finance and of course, he shared a bit of his story. I think you'll gain a lot of insight and value from this one.

Show Topics:

• Christopher's view on wealth.
• Getting a mindset shift on wealth.
• The money scarcity mindset.
• Save, invest, and spend.
• Christopher's favorite thing to do.

Show Links:

Connect with Christopher

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/consciouswealthadvisor/

IG: https://www.instagram.com/consciouswealthadvisor/

Website: https://www.bleakley.com/themackins

Connect with James:

jamessilvas.com

Bethatonepercent.com

IG: https://www.instagram.com/james_silvas/

Key Takeaways

05:20 Christopher's view on wealth.

When you think of wealth, do you just think of liquid cash and assets? Here is Christopher's multifaceted definition of what wealth truly is about.

Christopher: "So before I go into the definition, I would say that the majority of the mindset that people have around finances is negative, regardless of how much or how little they have. And over the years, what has just amazed me is that as I have been growing my financial wealth and connecting more with people that have a significant amount of financial abundance, I expected that I would see happier people but I started to see a pattern, that there are just as many unhappy people that are loaded with financial abundance as compared to those that don't have that. So when I consider wealth, I focus on wealth as having a good mindset around not only your financial abundance, but also just your mental, physical, and spiritual connection to yourself, to your family, to your community, to the earth, to the universe".

16:14 Getting a mindset shift on wealth. Christopher shares some proven to work steps by his clients that can cause a shift in the misconceptions about wealth.

Christopher: "There's a lot of different modeling that can be done. People do financial projections in their companies, but they often don't do financial projections for their personal life. So I think that taking the opportunity to speak to someone holistically about what it is that is important to you in your life, the things that you want to accomplish, how much money you require to live based on the lifestyle that you want for yourself and your family, what's needed, what do you want to do with whatever is left over? Do you want to hoard it and hold on to it? Are you willing to let go of some of it and share it with other people, share that energy with the rest of the community, the world, however you want to look at it, giving people, taking the opportunity to just see where you're at and see how you're doing along the path to where you want to be? Because I think most people that hoard their money have a scarcity mindset in thinking that they're not going to have enough, that they're going to run out, that they're going to lose their money, and that they need more. But if you don't know what you need, then it's hard to conclude that you won't have enough. Taking a look at what you need and doing it in a very conservative way, using conservative expectations of future returns on investments and other things and income growth and so on, I think is a great exercise for people to go through regardless of where you're at in your life".

22:50 The money scarcity mindset. Christopher shares his thoughts on the origin of this mindset and possible steps to embracing abundance.

Christopher: "I think a lot of our scarcity mindset is inherited from our parents and grandparents. Think about the Great Depression and what happened during that time. I mean, you and I weren't alive at that period, but I don't know how much you've read about what happened during that time. People had a lot, and then everything was taken away from them.

The clients I have that started working with us last year came in just when the market went all the way up. You know, it's on the heels of $13 trillion of stimulus that was injected into the economy, and now the market's down.

That was the last point that they remember. So today, for some people, if their portfolios are down because the market is down and crypto's crash and real estate are kind of starting to soften a little bit, they're looking at their loss because of what they had last year, even though it was just arbitrary. Like, the value of whatever they had at that time, but they used that as, a new baseline of where they were and then where they are today.

And it's that comparison of feeling like you lost something that puts you back into that scarcity mindset. So we've inherited it not only through ancestry but also too, because at the end of the day, with scarcity, I feel that people often think that there's not enough to go around. You see it during Black Friday deals. People claw at each other, trying to get, the last toy that's on sale or whatever before someone else does. That is animal-like activity.

If people just approach every day that what is meant for them, they will receive, and as they continue to show up and deliver value to the world that's in alignment with what they feel good about doing, they will forever have enough.

But it's the comparison that I think also helps with scarcity, that people compare themselves to other people. You see people on yachts and planes and all of a sudden everybody wants to be on a yacht and plane now. So that's their new baseline of where they want to build their wealth to. And at the end of the day, that's like not the top 1% thing and that's like a top .05% thing. It doesn't have to be that way. But it is that way at the moment.

So I think that focusing on what you have instead of what you don't have is the first step to overcoming abundance. They always say, where your energy flows, your mind goes. So wherever you focus your energy, I promise that's how you're going to feel".

34:20 Save, invest, and spend.

For entrepreneurs, between being scared of increasing the cost of service rendered and the current economic situation, there is barely enough left to save or invest. Christopher tells us how to go about this.

Christopher: "Most people discount the value that they add and underprice their services because they're afraid to ask for more. They have the mindset of like, oh if I ask for more money, they're going to say no most of the time. That's just a story we're telling ourselves in our head and what we're accustomed to. Don't be afraid to ask for more.

Understand what your value is. Feel into your value. Do you feel confident in what you're delivering and that what you're delivering is well received? If so, raise your services. I mean, if you as a coach haven't increased your coaching services by 8% this year just like inflation has, you're doing yourself a disservice. Your cost of living went up, but your fees stayed the same.

Consider raising the rate of your services, I think that's a good step for people to earn more, but I think once you start earning enough to sustain the baseline lifestyle that you want for yourself, don't focus on spending all of the new money that comes in on just enhancing your lifestyle.

Spend some on investing back into yourself, coaching, for example. Spend some, save some. People should be saving ideally 15% of their income, to be able to retire at a decent age if they want to stop working. If they don't want to stop working, then the numbers are different as long as they can. But make sure that you have the right benefits in place so that you protect yourself from health events that might occur, and you protect your family."

46:15 Christopher lets us in on his favorite part of his job.

Christopher: "To help people change their mindset around their money and help them make smart decisions because so many people make decisions from scarcity, from worry, and oftentimes if you look at the masculine and feminine, most women are very conservative, most men are very aggressive, and on average, it's not always the case.

But when you have that difference between a man and woman in the household or even just a masculine-feminine in a gay relationship. There are typically two mindsets, opposites sometimes attract. So helping people overcome those differences that oftentimes they don't talk about together and be able to be a bridge for those conversations to happen.

Sometimes I got to be the deliverer of bad news, but that just comes along with the job".

If you have attached your value as a human being to how much wealth you have created, Christopher has this to say to you, "regardless of how much money you've made or saved in the past, you are enough. If you continue to just stay focused on doing things that you're passionate about, doing things that feel good, and creating value for other people in the world, you'll never worry about not having enough".

Suggested Listening:

1. 5 Ways The Ego Destroys Your Success

Episode: 245

Title: Hard things leaders must face and become skilled at to succeed

Description: As a leader, you will face these 5 challenges time and time again. Your level of skill in each of these areas will make the difference between achieving a goal and falling short. Tune in to see which challenge you'll need to improve in so that you can lead more effectively.

Show Links:

Connect with James:

jamessilvas.com

Bethatonepercent.com

Episode: 244

Title: Breaking the Cycle: How to Overcome People Pleasing and Find Your Own Voice

Description: In this episode James provides a framework that will help you navigate people pleasing, find your voice and own your power

Show topics:

• Identify your motivations:
• Set boundaries:
• Practice assertiveness
• Learning to say no
• Seek support

Show Links

Connect with James:

jamessilvas.com

Bethatonepercent.com

IG: @james_silvas

Title: Balancing Being a Parent & High Performer with Nike Trainer Betina Gozo Shimonek

Description:

Betina is a Nike trainer of 8 years who advocates strength training. Her number one goal is to promote fitness and training to inspire people to make positive lifestyle changes, live their most optimal life and most importantly, feel great. She's known for motivating people to reach outside their comfort zone to transform body and mind in every stage of life.

In addition to leading workouts for thousands of people worldwide, Betina has made an impact in the digital fitness world. She's known for her Lead and Follow workouts for beginners, pregnancy, and postpartum routines with Nike Training Club, Apple Fitness+, and NordicTrack.

With over 10 years in the industry and an array of certifications, she's honored to be on the Women's Health Magazine Advisory Board who she collaborated with for the book The Woman's Guide to Strength Training – Featuring Weight Training Workouts to Help You Get Toned, Burn Body Fat, Increase Longevity, and Pursue a Healthy Lifestyle (Women's Health Publishing).

She is also a Mother to her daughter, Aluna, with another baby on the way.

In this episode, we dive into balancing parenthood with being a high-performer, the habits and practices of putting yourself first so you can better serve others, being present as your #1 value, and much more.

Show Topics:

• Service to Others, Service to Yourself
• Time Blocking
• Getting Good Sleep (Even with a toddler!)
• Having an intentional morning routine
• Surrendering Control
• Do this one thing before having a child
• Becoming a parent has made Betina feel invincible
• James's upcoming book on listening
• Presence as your number one value

Show Links:

Connect with Betina:

IG: @betinagozo

Connect with James:

jamessilvas.com

Bethatonepercent.com

IG: @james_silvas

Key Takeaways

5:45 Service to Others, Service to Yourself

Betina: "Service is so important to me, but you should always service yourself first. And you know, it's always so refreshing. Even if I miss her and I miss my husband. I know that I'm able to do something for myself. I can recharge, but then I'm also doing something that's serving others. So it gives me another sense of purpose and it helps me get into that mindset of… it's okay that I'm going to miss all these things. You just have to shift your mindset."

James: "People will ask me, don't you wish that you spent more time at home? Or do you like that you travel so much? And here's what I've come to understand. By me traveling and impacting other people around this world, that actually makes me a better father and a better husband. And yes, there is a sacrifice to that, but it also allows me to be more present when I am with my family, and I can bring the passion and the love that I have for my work into my family."

13:00 Time Blocking

Betina: "I try to block out time. I listen to a lot of the Huberman lab. I love his episode on focus. I try to go for no more than 90 minutes of really focused work. On a good day, I'll have two of those sessions, but that's on a really good day. But I'm very happy if I have a 90 minute session. So that's the biggest thing for me. It's gonna take me a little bit to warm up. I need that 5 to 10 minutes to do whatever on my phone, check Instagram, you know, make my coffee, and then sit on my computer for 5 to 10 minutes, check my email, get all the clutter away and then say, okay, this is the time for it to go away. And now I need to focus."

James: "My office is right by the living room and so when I'm in brainstorming sessions or content creation or research mode, I have to have noise cancellation headphones to even remotely focus on the task. And could I go somewhere? Yeah. But I also like the flexibility of once I'm done with my work, I just walk out my door and see my son and Amanda… So it's like really having to block out time and communicate to Amanda…. Like just really communicating my needs so that I can still get work done at a high level despite external distraction."

17:15 Getting Good Sleep (Even with a toddler!)

Betina: "I am so good on my sleep. It's like the one thing that I do have right now. I'm so grateful, especially having a toddler. We put her down at 7:30 to 8:00 at night and then Nick and I will hang out and watch TV or relax or do whatever. But when it comes time to my wind down routine, I'm very good. I have my brain dump. I think that's something that everybody should do. Because even last night I didn't do it and I actually woke up in the middle of the night and I had all these things that I was thinking about. But I usually just journal for 15 to 20 minutes and I have to do that because that is where I put all the thoughts in my head away and I just can go into dreamland."

19:30 Having an intentional morning routine

James: "What I've learned is there's your ideal schedule of how if your morning went like this, it would be the perfect day, but then you also have to be prepared for none of that to be able to happen. And what are your quick, 5 to 10 minute routines or habits that can snap you into high performance thinking or being to still get the job done? People are going to be somewhat empathetic and compassionate to the fact that you have kids, but at the end of the day, they're hiring you for a reason, right? You have a job to perform. You have an outcome that you need to get, you have a result that you need to create. The older I've gotten, the less I've been dedicated to my morning having to go a certain way. It's more so like I need these small staples, whether that's breathing for a certain way or just some jumping jacks. Something usually centered around breath or movement is enough to get me to where I need to go."

23:10 Surrendering Control

Betina: "I read a ton of books before and it's funny because now, this time around I'm like, I'll figure it out. The common theme with all those books and just health and wellness in general is taking care of yourself. Everyone's always looking for that magic book or magic pill that's going to make life so much better. But it really is all about you taking care of yourself, not just what you put in your body. Or what you do with it exercise-wise, but how you take care of your mind because that's gonna help you with the way you react with your children, with the way you react with your spouse, with the way you treat yourself.

James: And also surrendering that you can't control it. That was the hardest thing and still is the hardest thing for me to wrestle with. I believe it should go this way. And then it's the complete opposite and like me having to calm myself down from not meeting the expectation. And if you could get better at that, then parenting will be easier.

29:19 Do This One Thing Before Having a Child

James: "For someone who wants to be a parent who isn't currently a parent, what would you tell them to think about before having a child? What I think has helped Amanda and I is that we've had a lot of life together. It was me, and then it was Amanda, and then it was James and Amanda, but it was James and Amanda for a while. We traveled, we did things, we experienced life. We got to understand what that was like. We supported each other in different business ventures and, and just found our love first, and then had a baby. So we had our own energy signature of what it felt like and the memories that were associated to us. And then the family came. Now that's a different version of us, an upgraded version of us. But for us, we established that time together initially."

35:33 Becoming a Parent Has Made Betina Feel Invincible

Betina: "I feel like I'm invincible now. Being a mom, or just parents, it's just different, you know?

I feel like even my confidence has changed. I didn't think that I would be a mom in the next two years from the last time, I think the last time we chatted. I just feel like there's so many things that I could do. And then even now, like trying to watch Aluna and write a book and travel and do all of these and be a wife and take care of three huge dogs that each weigh in total over 350 pounds. I really feel like I can do anything. It's been a privilege and an honor to be able to show a lot of women that they can do that. Um, that's one thing that I've always told myself is when I'm sharing anything on social, I wanna share it in a way to show that women that, hey, in reality I'm struggling at times, but guess what? You totally can do this. And I think it's cheesy, but the Filipinos, I just wanna show all the Filipino women in the world, look what I'm doing. It's pretty cool."

39:29 James's Upcoming Book on Listening

James: "I'm actually in the very elementary process of writing a book. On listening. The strategy is to be a better listener. So I think that one of the struggles that we all see in society is that we don't listen. We think we listen. We don't listen to ourselves and partly because we don't listen to ourselves, we can't listen to other people because we're just so concerned with how we're being perceived or what other people are thinking that we're out of the moment.

So it's like if we can learn to listen truly, then we're connecting to the moment, which means we're present. And that means we're giving the best gift that I think we can give other people, which is our time, our attention. And if parents can be better listeners to their children. If bosses can be better listeners towards their employees, if presidents can be better listeners to their countries, if countries could be better listeners to other countries... we would have deeper levels of understanding."

45:00 Presence as Your Number One Value

James: "So we talked about presence a little a moment ago, right? That is my number one value. That's the thing that I try to be the best at in my own way. Well, when you have kids, it's like that gets fractured. Very rarely are you going to have the undivided attention, right? And, and so that's the challenge that I've been tasking myself with is can you still be. And I don't know if it sounds like an oxymoron, but even with the distraction, like can you be one with the distraction to the point where the distraction does not take you out of the moment, but you're still able to be in the moment, like it's you bring it into the bubble."

Suggested Listening

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IG: @james_silvas