Nobody Grows Alone

Back To School And Sick Kids

SPEAKER_00 0:00

What is going on, my people? I always say good morning, but is it good morning anymore?

SPEAKER_01 0:05

Uh no, not for us.

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Well, I mean it's 1101. Oh, yeah, it is. I guess still good morning. We know a lot of you guys' kids are back in school. So has anybody else gotten sick? Because everybody in our family seems to be getting sick. We actually had to pick up our son from school a few minutes ago, which is why we're doing this a little bit later. But it seems like everybody's getting sick. I hope that is not you. But that is not the topic for today.

Nobody Grows Alone Principle

SPEAKER_00 0:28

Today we're going to be talking about the fact that nobody grows alone. Nobody grows alone. Uh, one of the questions that people ask me all the time is like, how do I grow faster? I know last week we got a lot of feedback from that one, by the way. The how do you grow on the inside so that you can grow on the outside, right? It's a lot of like personal development language. And I love when we tactically show people what that actually looks like, which is what we did last week. But this week we're gonna do something very, very similar, right? It's the whole idea of you're the average of the five people you spend the most time with. I remember hearing that and it was amazing. I was like, that is incredible. And then as I started to understand it deeply, I started to see how that is the speed boost. It's like the literal cheat code if you set it up right. It is not as simple as the five people you spend the most time with. Just like it's not as simple as growing the inside and it'll help you grow on the outside. There's actually some tactics that will help you grow faster, produce more without having to do as much work, but also not burn yourself out. Let's talk about that today. Let's talk about the cheat code. And it doesn't matter where you're trying to do this in. If you're trying to get healthier, if you're trying to become a better parent, you're trying to become a better spouse, this is the way to do it.

SPEAKER_01 1:40

Let's go.

SPEAKER_00 1:41

All right. Welcome to Modern Leadership Coaching. This is Mark.

SPEAKER_01 1:44

And I'm Teresa.

SPEAKER_00 1:45

And this is where we talk about what it actually takes to lead well, even when I don't speak good. Or read good too. Or do other good things too.

The Three Levels Of Reach

SPEAKER_00 1:53

All right, guys. So this topic is nobody grows alone. And I really want to dive into a philosophy that I learned from one of my mentors. It has a lot to do with the environment that you're in, is critical. I co-run a uh program inside of the Dad Edge. And inside of that program, we have um we have different pillars that we teach on. And one of the key pillars is vitality. And we think about vitality, our energy and our focus. And a lot of the things that we do or the environment that we're in either gives us energy or it takes energy away. And I think a lot about that related to environments, not just energy, but even like growth, perspectives, even thoughts, those kind of things. How do you decide who your five people are? I think about this process that we guide people through, which is called the three levels of reach. I want to dive into a little bit of a mini training here. I know the first question is like, what got us thinking about this whole idea of the three levels of reach? And what got me thinking about this is I hear a lot of people who want to be able to grow faster, right? They're like, I want to grow faster. And they know that the slowest way to grow is alone. And they're trying to listen to podcasts and trying to work through books and trying to do it on their own. And they get to this point where they're like, I'm stuck. I need some help. And so whenever I have somebody that I'm talking to, I explain this idea of three levels of reach where I thought it would be a good idea to do it in the podcast. So we talk about this being the three levels of reach because there's three levels that you want to make sure that you reach to make sure that you keep growing, keep growing at a fast enough pace and you keep your motivation and energy really high. Now, the first level is reaching down. Now, when I say reaching down, I don't mean like somebody who's less than a human than you. I mean like somebody who's a lower level of growth than you, who's maybe a few steps behind you, right? Thinking about somebody like related to health and fitness. Maybe you're helping somebody along that path who's maybe a few steps behind you, right? If you're a coach and you're trying to really help learn and facilitate and learn the process of coaching, you're helping coach people who are at a lower level of growth, right? And and this is a lot of time is what we um term as leaders is like serving people, right? Being able to lift them up to our level. And if you have something that you've worked through, something that you've gotten through on the other end, you have reached a new level. You may not be where you want to be, but there's people out there who would love to be where you're at. And so when we reach down, we're reaching down to people to help lift them up to where we are. Now, the thing is, is that when I find people who are, let's say, in business or leading, if you only reach down and you're the average of the five people you spend the most time with, they're gonna have this force that's gonna start pulling you down to them. And you're gonna probably meet somewhere in the middle, but you wanna make sure that you don't do that. You don't want to just reach down. That's why there is two other directions for you to reach out. The next level of reach is reaching out. People who are around your level who you can have conversations with, um, which by the way, if you're like lifting people up, you don't want to have certain conversations with them about what you're struggling with or what you're going through necessarily. You want to have a group of people who are like considered your peers to be able to hold you accountable, have conversations related to this, and maybe give you like some different ideas and strategies and whatnot, right? But that's where we reach out. So being in a room of people where you can feel seen and heard and they are at a similar space than you. So it feels like, okay, I'm not the only person going through this. Now the third level of reach is reaching up. Reaching up to somebody who's a few steps ahead of you, somebody who knows where the potholes are, somebody who can point out some of these different directions, somebody who can like guide you through the things that you need to do to get to that next level. And so when I think about like health and fitness or wellness or uh coaching, right? I think about are we in an environment or creating an environment of the three levels of reach? Why is it creating an environment? Because that's what we do for all of our programs. So I know a lot of people who've been through our programs, they give us that feedback of like, I don't know. It just I felt like I sped up the process of my growth. And the reason why is because even like in our certification, we walk people through the three levels of reach. Reaching down because we ask them to do practice sessions and bring that information to the call, reaching out because they actually do practice live on the calls with us, and reaching up so that we can be there to mentor them, to give them advice and direction and teach them the growth model and all those kind of things. And when you're in that environment, you feel fully supported, but you realize like how much like you can grow in that short period of time, which, you know, we just got finished with another round. And when we ask them, we we make sure we ask them like, hey, where were you before and where are you after? It's exponential, like what they were able to do, right? And then we just remind them that they need to keep moving through environments that have those three levels of reach. But it also is important for you, like as a person, if you want to get better in business, are you focusing on the three levels of reach? Are you helping somebody else below you? Are you surrounding yourself with other people who are at your level? And do you have a mentor, somebody you can reach out to to get that help? And all three of these ways of reaching out actually work in tandem with each other. Each one makes the other one stronger. And so when you have these three levels of reach, it's gonna help you reach your goals much faster because we all know like the environment is contagious. I don't know about you guys, but like when I was a police officer and I was, you know, um hanging around with whoever I had I had to work with in the car, there'd be days where I had I was in a good mood. And there were days would be that I wouldn't because it's very contagious the environment you're in. So taking control of this, especially in the area you most want to grow, is really, really important.

SPEAKER_01 7:07

Yeah.

What Goes Wrong Without Them

SPEAKER_01 7:08

And what can happen when you aren't leaning into those three levels of reach?

SPEAKER_00 7:13

Yeah. So let's go through each one because each one has a drawback that can happen, right? So if you're not reaching down, you're not reminding yourself of how far you've come. So if you are just focused on, I'm just growing, I'm just gonna have a mentor, and you're not reaching down to help somebody else, you don't realize that you've climbed mountains. You don't realize that you have so much self-confidence, you don't realize how much you can actually help people with where you're at. And it doesn't solidify a lot of the lessons that you've learned. And so what'll happen is you'll forget those lessons, you'll run into that problem again, and you'll get frustrated because you haven't uh continued to practice it. So if you're not reaching down, you're gonna quickly notice that you're gonna start to experience some of those problems, but you're also gonna not remind yourself of how far you come.

SPEAKER_01 7:56

Yeah, I I I love that because it's a reminder of how far you've come when you're maybe mentoring somebody else that is a few steps behind you. And that constant reminder will give you the confidence to continue to move forward and to actually tap into the other levels of reach as well.

SPEAKER_00 8:14

100%, 100%. So now let's talk about reaching out. Okay. So reaching out, it's really important because sharing where you're at, maybe some of the challenges that you're going through, is not necessarily what you want to do when you're trying to lift people up to your space, right? It's just, it's, it's not the right environment to go in there, right? Which is why you creating an environment is usually not the best place for you to get your three levels of reach. You want to find something else outside of that because you're a part of that environment. And it just makes things a little bit weird and awkward, right? But when you're reaching out to other people who are at or around the same level as you, you can relate to them. They can relate to you. It feels like, okay, it's not just me versus the world, like they're going through their own things too. And you're gonna be able to see some of the things that they do that actually works that you're gonna be able to actually lean into, right? The thing that can happen though is if you are reaching out, like let's say in this specific area, you're reaching out and you find that you're all struggling with the same thing, that is actually a problem as well, right? So I hear a lot of people are like, hey, I'm trying to lose weight. So I decided to get together with a bunch of people who are struggling with losing weight and we're gonna hold each other accountable. And I'm like, that's the worst idea ever. Like if you're just in an environment, there's nobody else that you can reach up to, like you're going to very quickly find out that you're going to keep spiraling and keep buying into each other's perspectives and stories.

SPEAKER_01 9:29

Yeah, you're just gonna validate each other and that's not gonna help you grow.

SPEAKER_00 9:32

100%. I mean, I mean, a lot of times, like, um, even if we have friends in our life, we're having conversations with them, that's kind of what you're doing, is you're validating their stories and they're validating your stories, which if you want to change, that is actually not helpful. If you want to just stay in the same space you're at, that's okay. You can you could do that, you can feel connected that way. Um, but there's just a different level when you're actually talking to a coach or getting some help from somebody who's like, but let me show you this. Let me show you this, this specific thing that might be getting in your way, right? Now, when we think about like reaching up, and we think about somebody that's a few steps ahead of us. Obviously, if we don't have that, it's very easy to get stuck in repeating the same patterns over and over and over again. But it slows down the entire process. Because when you think about when you have that level of reach, when you're reaching up and that person's like giving you some advice and direction and things that you would have never been able to figure out on your own, maybe they've gone through some struggles that you've gone through. Maybe they can show you some things adaptive and technical that like for you to not ever have to struggle with, right? It actually helps you when it comes to reaching out to the people that you're having that other conversations with because you're processing it, but it also helps you continue to develop so you can continue reaching down. And the number of people that you reach down to is now much more because you're continuing to grow. And so when you look at this, it's a complete cycle. The complete cycle is being able to reach down, reach out, and reach up. And when you have these three levels of reach, this is what really speeds the process up for you. So there's something that happens when you reach back and you help somebody a few steps behind you. What do you think that does for the person that is actually the one who's helping?

SPEAKER_01 11:01

Yeah, it improves their confidence because you know, how amazing does it feel to actually help someone or provide that support for somebody else where you know you've already gone through something and you're like, hey, I got you. Like this is how you can guide someone so that they don't maybe make the same mistakes that you did. And it just gives you this sense of that you're making an impact uh for someone who may really need that support.

SPEAKER_00 11:29

Yeah. I

Build Your Growth Environment

SPEAKER_00 11:30

love it. I love it. Okay, so let's wind down this episode and really give them some tangible things in terms of like what they can do. So if somebody right now is kind of feeling alone in terms of like their growth, I have like a couple ideas that I can throw out there. Okay. First off, is think about the three levels of reach. Actually, write out like who is somebody that I can help, who's somebody at or around my level, and who is somebody that I can reach up to. Like literally just write them out. Sometimes you'll find that you actually have people like that in your life. Sometimes you'll have to do something different to make sure that you intentionally have that, right? So if that's the case, just sit down, think about okay, these three levels of reach, who do I have in place for each? And how can I find somebody in order to get there? Of course, if you need some help with that, reach out because obviously this is what we do is we put together groups and stuff like this. But if you're somebody who's leading, right? And you're leading a team or you're putting some things together for other people, I want you to also think about this. How can you create an environment for them, for the people that you most want to mentor, to support, to develop, right? Like how can you create these three levels of reach for them? Obviously, you might be the person to reach up to, but is there an environment where they can reach out to people at around their level? And how could you get them to be able to reach down to help support people who are maybe a few steps behind? Because every time that we not only put ourselves in this environment, if we see that it speeds up our growth, we want to ask ourselves, how do we create an environment like this for our kids, for other people that we want to be able to mentor, for other people that we want to be able to lead effectively? And when you start asking yourself that question, you can get very clear on the kind of impact that you can make in somebody's life, but also how quickly you can speed up this process of growth by making sure that they are in the right environment. Because the environment changes everything. It can either move you down one direction or the other, being intentional about it, just like how we say about your thoughts, knowing that you have a choice around the people you spend the most time with. You have a choice to actually sit down and ask yourself, Am I going to go through and see if I have the three levels of reach, right? And even maybe even revisiting when I was growing the fastest. How did I have those three levels of reach? You may find some like, you know what? I had this, this, and this. No wonder why I was growing so much. And hopefully that will get you to spark some ideas in terms of what you can do to lead and move

Free Leadership Series And Close

SPEAKER_00 13:41

forward.

SPEAKER_01 13:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:41

All right, guys. One more resource that we want to give for you. I know we've been talking about the High Impact Master Academy. We have a round starting very, very soon, but we also have a five-part leadership series, which is like mini podcasts that we put together to really help you with being able to effectively lead yourself. So if you find that in a situation like this, like you talk yourself out of these environments, who am I to be in those environments? Those kind of things, definitely grab a copy of that. If you go to modernleadership.us forward slash lead. We walk you through like how to really start leading yourself effectively through these things and really start to see that this is the perfect thing for you is to be able to step into this environment. It's one of the big things that I remind myself of like the right environment feels uncomfortable when I first get in there. If it feels comfortable, it's actually not the right environment for me anymore. Maybe I don't, I don't have a place to reach up, right? Or maybe I need to make a shift or an adjustment to make sure that I continue to level up in these areas. And so anytime that I have this feeling of like, oh, who am I to do this or or whatnot, I remember to examine that because in reality, like it makes it be the perfect thing for me to do. Perfect next step for me. So if you think that would be helpful, check that out. We'll leave it in the show notes. Super pumped about our next round of HIMAA to be able to help people explore these three levels of reach, but also develop their coaching and leadership in there. We really appreciate you guys for listening to this one. Anything else we can do for you, please don't hesitate to reach out. And yeah, we just appreciate you for listening. All right, everybody. Have a great weekend, and I'll see you soon.