EFR 393: Becoming the Expert You Already Are and Best Productivity Hacks for Entrepreneurs with Dustin Lien

Do you struggle with imposter syndrome? Do you feel like becoming an expert in something is next to impossible? What if you already were the expert and you just didn't know it, or rather were too afraid to even think such a thing? E-commerce expert and entrepreneur Dustin Lien is here to tell you exactly why you most likely already are an expert in a field and key productivity hacks to help you get even better at what you do. In this episode, expect to learn tactics to help your passion in life rise to the top, time management skills, how to ask the right questions of yourself and your schedule and so much more!

Follow Dustin @dustinrlien

Follow Chase @chase_chewning

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Episode resources:

• AudibleTrial.com/everforward for your free 30-day trial

• High-Performance Habits by Brendan Burchard

• The One Thing by Gary Keller and Jay Pappasan

• Get Dustin's 4 Pillars of a Successful Client Business 

• Listen to Chase's interview in episode 35 on Dustin's podcast   

• Learn how to launch, grow, and monetize your podcast through Chase's courses at www.OperationPodcast.com

Complete episode transcipt (timestamps do not reflect episode intro, allot 9:13 for intro time):

Chase: [00:00] Dustin what’s up, man? 

Dustin: [00:01] what’s up, Chase? 

Chase: [00:03] I scared you with that intro. Just jumping right in, man. Good to see you again, man. Welcome back to LA. 

Dustin: [00:10] thank you. It's fun to be here. Um, last time. I think we did like anything official. You were actually a speaker at EF summit last year. Honestly, it was it was like this, like this time last year almost exactly I think it was like, mid-September. Damn and now you're like ATX living.

Dustin: [00:30] Yeah, that went fast. Things got weird.

Chase: [00:33] very weird, very weird. You moved and then the world went to, you know, hell in a handbasket kind of thing, man.

Dustin: [00:37] don't put this on me.

Chase: [00:39] what has Austin been like, kind of just life compared to living in Los Angeles?

Dustin: [00:43] Austin is great. It's, it's got so much culture to it. Similarly to how LA does in a lot of the creative aspects and entrepreneurial spirit is in Austin as well. So the transition has been fairly simple for me. And I mean, I used to live I grew up in Texas. I didn't live in Austin specifically but I went to college in St. Marcus, which is like 20 minutes. So I worked in Austin. So I've been around Austin, but I've never lived there and then I was in LA for seven years. And so back in LA, in Austin, but then the thing that's annoying is just well, annoying is not the right word. But the thing that is frustrating is that, you know, we can't go see like music and there's festivals and all these things like there's all these things we want to do when we're there, you know, but you know, we're, we're living and getting through it and finding new ways to thrive. So it's been good.

Chase: [01:40] environment is such a huge contributing factor for me for just honestly, daily overall happiness, but damn sure when it comes to my productivity and creativity, and I know with everything that you do in your business, that's creativity and productivity are essentials. Right? Have you found that environment really does play a big role or are you not as sensitive as I am? 

Dustin: [02:04] that's a great question. I recently discovered how much environment affects me because I don't think it did that much before.

Chase: [02:12] How so? 

Dustin: [02:13] So one major change was obviously, you know, I'm, I'm used to working out of an office or a co-working space or something other than where I live, because, you know, in LA, or at least, you know, when we were living in LA, most of our, all of our apartments were either studio apartments or one bedrooms, and you know, live with my wife. So, and she is typically and she's an actor, and she's a screenwriter. So she spends a lot of time at home as well and so usually it was like, Okay, I'll leave, I'm going to go work out of an office or co working space, you have the house, and then we're good but then when the virus hit, it was like, we're both there. And we moved to Austin, like right after that happened. So we do we have a two bedroom now, which has been great but the, we are, you know, still working from both of us working from home. And I thought I could pull it off really well and I had every I have a game plan I my office all set up nice. All the, all the little like, things to not distract me but I mean, probably not dramatic to say my productivity was about 60% to what it usually was just the just the little things you don't think about like, like, when you're like, I have two dogs and so I'm not used to them running in and running up to me every 10 minutes, because they want to say hi. Which is lovely, and I love but when I'm trying to focus every 10 minutes of that is tough. Or, or me

Chase: [03:39] the micro distractions. 

Dustin: [03:40] Yes, yeah, those are the ones that get you because they're not the ones you even are conscious of and all of a sudden, your two minute distraction turned into a 20 minute break and you didn't even know what happened. 

Chase: [03:47] Somehow you find yourself laying on the bed, scrolling or like texting. Yeah, I know that. 

Dustin: [03:53] so that was it was it was an adjustment. I recently just signed a lease on an office downtown Austin. 

Chase: [03:58] awesome, man congrats. 

Dustin: [03:59] thank you. Yeah, it's been it's been great. Productivity right back up. So it's, it's, it was a really good learning experience for me to see that I actually don't work that well at home and now I know that now the rest of my life, I can be self-aware about that. Which is, which is nice. 

Chase: [04:15] you threw a number out 60% you felt like your productivity was about 60%. So that tells me you're pretty aware of where you are, you kind of have like a way to measure quantitative qualitative of your productivity. What are some things that you do to make sure that you're staying productive throughout the day for just daily living, but you know, being a business owner, you got to kind of have some kind of checks and balance system, right? What is that? 

Dustin: [04:39] so two things I'll say one is I care a lot about my productivity while I'm trying to be productive but if it's if I need to take, if I need to take a day off I am not hard on myself about that. I'm just, that's just my ebb and flow. But when I'm working, I want it to be productive work because that allows me to be able to rest later when I need to. So that being said, while I'm working, one thing that I do is I don't do this all the time, but probably every three to four months, I will track my time through the day. And I'll track it for an entire week. And I'll track it down to like what, you know, what's the activity that I'm doing? Start/Stop with a timer. 

Chase: [05:22] so task and then time? Okay, cool. 

Dustin: [05:23] and there's a there's an app I use, it's called toggle. It's like a web app.

Chase: [05:29] I've heard of that. Yeah. 

Dustin: [05:30] It's really, it's nice to have a good free version too, which I'm a sucker for a good free version. So it's cool and it helps you categorize. So you just type in what you're working on or for me, I'll put I'll put the stuff, I'm doing it for longer than a week. Usually, I'll do it for a week. But if I do it for a month, for example, I'll put a project name and then the month, and then you just hit start, and you select that project, and then I'll work on it when I'm done, uncheck it, it logs it for me. And then I look at the end of the week, and I can see very clearly where my time went. And I get really because I don't do that often. I get really granular. So if I go pee, I stop it so it is not a running clock so it's active work that way I know. Was I at the office for 10 hours or did I work for 10 hours? Because they're very different things.

Chase: [06:17] busy versus productivity.

Dustin: [06:18] Yes, and we I mean, we know from I don't remember the where I read this, but I read one time that the average American worker works about two hours and 51 minutes a day. 

Chase: [06:28] Wow. Out of like a normal eight hour workday kind of thing?

Dustin: [06:32] yeah, that's like active work and being someone who used to work an average corporate job, I know that that was probably mine, too because when you, you know, if you don't care that much about what you're doing sometimes you fall into a pattern of like, if I don't have to work or if no one's checking me I'm gonna, 

Chase: [06:48] if there's no accountability, then yeah, I can kind of like play fast and loose a little bit. 

Dustin: [06:51] Yeah. And so for me, what I tried to do when I when I timed myself is self-accountability, like, and now I'm accountable also to this timer and it's so simple, even though it's not a person that can even check me, it's me knowing the statistic so I can look at it and judge it accurately. So I can look back. So the 60% honest that was flippantly thrown out there, but it's probably pretty close to accurate because I can look at from, I put a blog on my, on my website, probably a year ago, maybe even more, where I did this, and I showed the experiment and my average work hours was a little over seven hours a day of active work, which is great. I'm happy with that. And then so now when I did it, I did it after like through this process, and it was dropping more into the fours. And it was I mean, it's me trying to work and just getting distracted with all these things. So it's very different. 

Chase: [07:46] would you agree or disagree that going from seven hours to four could be a good thing? If you can get seven hours of work out of four? Is that kind of a goal of yours? Or is it just instituting or introducing something to hold you accountable to kind of like, make sure that you are working the same? I guess what I'm trying to ask, is do you know, you need a devoted timeframe of work to get things done or are you looking to like kind of compress time and optimize your time? 

Dustin: [08:15] that’s a good question. I think for me, I gauged my, I used to gauge my success based on how many people required my attention per day. Now I feel like I gauge it by how few people need my attention.

Chase: [08:33] I like that. Yeah. 

Dustin: [08:34] So for me, if I'm working, if I'm working seven hours a day actively, and it's serving clients or serving employees, I mean, one, I'm happy about that, because I that's I'm in the business of serving people. But also I, I know for my energy levels and my creativity and how I think I need downtime, like I need, I need downtime, as in this two hour block has nothing that is required of me. So if I want to work during it, I can work on a new project or coming up with a new service or thinking of new ways to creatively help clients or things like that.

Chase: [09:06] choice versus obligation. Option versus obligation. 

Dustin: [09:08] that’s something that's very important to me.

Chase: [09:12] how like relieving is that sometimes to know that I mean, being self-employed as well, or even just everyday life, just knowing that you've got a window of time that you're not obligated to anyone else do anything else and that just frees up so many opportunities to do nothing, which is so important to kind of have that rest and digest that parasympathetic that calm down that chill time. Or you get the ability to start a new project. Or to lay on the floor and scroll on Instagram, or call your mom or whatever it is. Do you find that that you kind of go more in one of the two buckets? Do you go more into it now this is when I get the opportunity to create something new to dive into something new, or do you opt more for kind of the recovery, the downtime? 

Dustin: [09:56] I think it varies based on how I'm feeling I don't I always like to cage, I don't like to always gauge what things I'm going to do based on how I feel, because that's a trap sometimes and that's just sometimes just lacking discipline, if all you do is go off your emotion but I'm pretty aware now at this stage in my career of when I just need a break. And so if it's one of those weeks where I need a break, and I have a couple hours, and I just need to chill, I'll do it. But if not, if I'm feeling like my energy level is high, if I've been eating well, sleeping well, I'll take it as I'll take any chance I can to work on something new because that's, to me, that's what brings life into me and my career is new things like trying something new, is so energizing to me.

Chase: [10:41] have you always been this kind of in tune with I'd even say biofeedback, you know, this in tune with your workflow and productivity has always been kind of like a strong skill set of yours, or has it developed over time? How did you get it to where it is now? Or is it just innate? 

Dustin: [10:57] I've developed it, and I'm nowhere near a perfect specimen of this but there's definitely, as I've gotten more solid in what my what my passion path is, and I can see a longer term, you know, where, where am I now? Where am I headed? That helps me a lot to decide like, based on how I'm feeling right now, if I rest is that, is that a good thing or a bad thing? Because sometimes if you're, if you're not clear on your goal, or goal might not even be the right word, if you're not clear on where you the direction you're headed. So if you're trying to serve more people, or you're trying to grow your business to a certain level, or you're trying to work a certain amount of hours less per day, whatever your goal is, if you're aware of that, then you can make decisions based on how quickly would I like to get there, or can I take a break today. So I think it's just developed over time, as I've discovered where I'm headed. 

Chase: [11:55] that is such a powerful statement. I know that's kind of what we want to really drive home today is recognizing and how to recognize your skill sets, how to recognize what's working for me what's not, and where I can go deeper, where I can get more optimized. To not only make my life and my work more fulfilling, but to then offer that to somebody else, because you've got great skill sets that I may also have, I may be better at them, you may be better at them or flat out like you're clearly an expert in one area that I have no ability or even no interest. And I'm not saying this right or wrong. It is what it is. And I was telling you earlier that one of the one of the questions that I get a lot, you know, I think through this path of personal development, self-optimization is like, what am I good at? What's my passion? What's my purpose? How can I contribute anything to the world that hasn't already been done? And, I mean, I got a whole slew of ideas and concepts and stuff but you know, how does that sit with you, man? When you hear or even when you went through it yourself of what's my passion? What am I good at? What's my skill set? How can I even maybe live off my skill set? What was that journey like for you? 

Dustin: [13:14] Yeah, that's a great question, too. You're full of good questions. 

Chase: [13:18] *laughs* Good thing I am a podcaster. Thank you. 

Dustin: [13:23] for me, my I think my journey was probably really similar to most people's. And I say that to encourage anyone listening who is trying to figure this out. 

Chase: [13:41] you started at a base level somewhere and like grew; you didn't just start off as an expert somewhere? That's weird. 

Dustin: [13:48] other than all the head starts I had, yeah. So for me, it was very organic but I also had a big drive to use my personal interests to make an income. And I want to preface this with, I don't think it's better or truly I used to, I used to think it was better or worse to like, work for yourself, or use your passions for your income. I don't think that anymore. I think each person needs to decide what stage they're at now, if that's the right place for them to be, because in some cases, it's horribly irresponsible to try to like quit your job and go follow your passion today. I know this because I tried to do that twice and ran out of money and burned through all of my savings. Right before my wedding. Bad idea. Luckily, I recovered. But I mean, a lot of people that it's the story goes differently. So that's just my that's my preface. Anyway, moving on.

Chase: [14:49] I think that's a very important part of your journey. Thanks for kind of including that that piece

Dustin: [14:53] yeah. So for me, I decided around the entrepreneurial bug hit me pretty quickly and it was a natural first question for me is what like, what do I already know how to do that I can get started. I think a lot of people try to jump to like they'll look at, they'll look at someone who's at, you know, a point F and they'll compare their point A, it's, it's really dangerous to do that because then you start trying to mimic and model what someone who is four years ahead of you is doing and it doesn't work the same. You can't build a business the same way that someone who already has existing assets is building the business. It does not work. 

Chase: [15:32] you may get a little bit of traction, something technically may work, but you won't know why and won't know how. And those are two fundamental properties that if you're going to scale, if you're going to actually keep that momentum going. Without it, you're going to crumble. 

Dustin: [15:49] you need repeatable, scalable systems. So a really great place to start is what you said a little bit earlier is just what are you already good at. So if you're looking to start a passion project, whether it's a side project or you want to go all in on, it doesn't really matter. The formula starts out the same, what is something you're already good at? And a good way to gauge that I've found is just asking, if you can't figure it out yourself, which sometimes you can't, and that's fine. Sometimes we're blind to our own greatness. And you know, or we're playing the comparison game, and we're missing out on pieces of us that are so unique. So if you can't figure it out yourself, that's totally cool. Ask a friend, ask a close friend, like, hey, what when you think of me, like, what do you see that I'm really great at? Because usually, and we do this with all of our friends, too. It's a quick, you know, you meet someone for the first time, usually pretty quickly, you figure out like, oh, they're like, they're, they're an asset to me in this way. It's almost, it's almost like an evolutionary thing where we like to survive this person is bigger than me and I want to be their friend because they helped me survive, or this person is smarter at this than I am. 

Chase: [16:57] their contribution to the tribe. 

Dustin: [16:59] yeah and so usually people can spot that in you a lot quicker than you can spot it in yourself. So that's a great place to start when you're looking for a skill or something is what do people already ask you for help with? And what things that people see in you. And then from there, it's usually getting past the, you brought this up earlier to which I love is imposter syndrome. I don't love imposter syndrome but I love the concept of breaking. But I mean that, that whole for anyone who doesn't know what imposter syndrome, that's a tongue twister imposter syndrome is, it's the essence of it is that you aren't sure that you have the capabilities to do the thing you're trying to do or the thing you're already in the position to do, you're feeling like you don't have the self-confidence or you're unaware of your ability to actually do it. There is an equally scary counter side, which is delusion, or arrogance or overconfidence, where you're actually not qualified to do what you're trying to do and you need to work on your skill set. But there is everyone can start somewhere where they're in an expert position. We were talking about this a little bit earlier to a line that I really like to remind people of if they're feeling like they're not an expert enough at something or they're not, they can't think of anything they're better at than anyone. Just remember that everyone is an expert at something compared to someone and if you remember that, and you can start from your square one, which is exactly where you need to start, instead of trying to start at someone else's square one or someone else's square four where you can't get any traction. 

Chase: [18:38] yeah, absolutely. Um, do you think really, this concept of imposter syndrome has it always been here? Or is it just because we have access via internet social media? We have so much more access to, to see things and to see what people are doing what they're not doing. Do you think this has always been a part of kind of the human evolution when it comes to personal development or even professional? Or is it just like, society has kind of cultivated this new environment that we're just bombarded and it's like, we can't help but feel like an imposter?

Dustin: [19:20] that is such a good insight. I don't know if I've ever thought about that. My knee jerk reaction is that it has always been around but it's different.

Chase: [19:32] how so?

 Dustin: [19:33] I think if you if we go back to tribal living, or like there's a new book I'm working on right now it's called the village expert and we go back to like tribal or village living and people like there are clear cut people who are the best in their area, or you grew up you know, your dad is a blacksmith and now you are too or, you know, like there's this there's this flow of like being trained as an as a what's the word?

Chase: [20:00] an apprentice or an understudy

Dustin: [20:01] Yeah. And so it's almost like, like, you probably feel like an imposter because you are while you're being trained, but you have someone holding your hand there. And then in your tribe or your village, that's everyone already knows that's what you're in. So there are a lot of advantages to that, actually. Now, we have so much access to seeing so many different people and different ways of doing things, it gets so overwhelming and then on top of it, just the highlight reel living where we're seeing, even though we know now and we that the highlight reel thing has been preached 1000 times, but we know it, we still watch it and we're still feel bad about ourselves when we see someone. I did it today, I was looking at someone like one of one of my friends, that's even worse, people who actually want to succeed. I was looking at it and I was like, I was feeling like those little feelings of like inadequacy or jealousy. But that's why am I feeling this, like, really, this should just be inspiring me and it does. But my point is, we can be aware of it, and we can still have those issues. So I think it's gotten worse, or it's different but I think it's always been there to some extent. But one thing I always like to keep in mind is that God doesn't call the prepared, he prepares the called. So if you are feeling like there's something on your heart that you want to do, and you feel like it's a mission for you in life, there's a reason you're feeling that and a good compass is like, is it calling you to serve people? If it's calling you to serve people in some way it's on your heart for a reason. So latch on to that, and move forward. 

Chase: [21:34] I'll play devil's advocate there. I think that moment, right, there is where most people were a lot of people that don't move forward and that's I think the beginning stages are that's when the doorway to imposter syndrome to fear to comparison, a lot of things that's when that doors opened, and we peek in and we see all the potential, it's like all the good everything that we want that we think is possible that that feeling that's pulling us, but at the same time, we also see everyone that's already doing it. We see all the other coaches, podcasters, ecommerce people, apparel people, and doctors, whatever. It's like we see it all together. So when you see that, like, how do you decipher like that example, you're just talking about earlier what's that kind of self-talk that you have that you think someone could also apply to, like, catch themselves and then like, really talk themselves through it?

Dustin: [22:30] so what I like to do is, well, one, I want to call back the concept of a village expert, a village expert isn't concerned with what's happening in the other villages, they have a duty where they're at. And that's the same for all of us, we have circles that we're involved in, and we have duties within those. So if we can keep that as a perspective, it helps to know that it doesn't matter if someone else is doing it. Of course, someone else and honestly, in the business sense, that's great that someone else is doing it that proves there's a need and humanity for that. 

Chase: [22:59] there is a model.

Dustin: [23:00] Yeah. You don't have to start so confused. 

Chase: [23:03] there is a market. 

Dustin: [23:04] I mean, if you're feeling imposter syndrome, but you because you can see someone else doing it, that's actually a good sign. And then the way that I like to get through it personally, if I'm not sure about maybe it's a new service I'm launching at my company, and I'm not sure like it's going to work out is do it for free for someone. It's a great way to remember that you can help someone and provide value and, and taking away the monetary part of it, it helps to take away some of that fear, because you're no longer an imposter when you're just helping someone and that's all you're thinking about is helping. So that's a great place to start is find someone you can serve for free with that thing and see how it goes. 

Chase: [23:46] Is that how I know it's kind of like, um, I've been familiar with, you know, your business and how you will help tremendously with you know, marketing, email marketing, and kind of just brand awareness. Like, I've seen how the sausage is made, and it's damn good sausage, like, you guys are good at what you do and now I understand you're kind of taking that skill set, and going a little bit deeper. And we were talking earlier about how I think that's another great way to think to work through not only imposter syndrome, but just to really honor your skill set even more and to see how you can optimize it, you know? Ever Forward we are all about, you know, self-optimization, human optimization in that damn shirt comes into play when you're talking about your business and your livelihood. So how are you doing that now for people? How are you helping others establish this is your skill set, this is what you're good at working through things for free, helping them realize these like niche below the niche below the niche, like subcategories so that we can tap in and truly serve?

Dustin: [24:45] Yeah. So what I want to tell a story to answer the question.

Chase: [24:47] story time. I will get comfortable. Not that I'm not comfortable already. We're chilling on a couch. Can’t beat this. Do you need a blankie? I'm pretty sure any second now my dog might run up and you know, sit on your lap 

Dustin: [25:05] your dog is so, so cute. What's your dog's name? 

Chase: [25:06] Nella, she's asleep somewhere. She's either asleep or running a million miles an hour. 

Dustin: [25:12] because she's so comfortable. *both laugh* So when was five years old, I started doing martial arts and my dad did it. Like, my dad did it and both my older brothers. And then so I was next in line, and I was like, I was ready. And so I started when I was five. And I ended up doing it till I was 25. And it was a huge part of my life. But one lesson that I learned so quickly, and so well, and I'm really grateful for is the beauty of learning from someone who's just one or two steps ahead of you. So someone who has been where you're at right now really recently and that's something I think people forget when they're thinking about, like, how can I go deeper into a niche or deeper into you know, how can I kind of put myself in a box to start off with to make this simpler, because they think they have to be so far ahead of everybody else to be able to teach something or help someone with something. But so in martial arts, it was like, you know, you start off as a white belt, or at least in you know, the karate school I was at. And then you learn all those techniques, and you're taught by someone else, right. And so oftentimes, it would be a yellow belt, or an orange belt. So a step or two up that would teach us our movements. And, you know, what, it wasn't always a black belt coming to help teach a white belt, it was it was this natural, like progression. And so then it was so fresh to them, they just, they just got their next belt, so they knew it all so well. And then when I became a yellow belt, then I had the chance to do that for white belts as well, and so on and it was a process throughout this 20 year journey of teaching people who were right, right on your heels. And, and so I think about that a lot in business is how, how can I apply what I know, to a, to a target audience or a target market that is, like, if I'm if I'm teaching, it's who is just a couple steps behind me that it's really fresh in my mind, and I can really help them and that helps take away some of that imposter syndrome to of not feeling like you have to be the best expert, but you can be an expert to them. And then you know, for niching down so if for my company jump x marketing, we as you know, we work a lot with health and fitness brands in the e commerce space and so it's not it's not this direct comparison of like, oh, I know, marketing better than you. It's like, it's it doesn't translate the same way. They're not trying to learn the marketing I know; they need help with it. But one thing that really helps when you're trying to choose a niche, like how can you? So for me, it started off as email marketing, I was really good at email marketing. I did that for my job in the corporate world and I was thinking about how can I use this skill? 

Chase: [28:06] sorry to interrupt you but teachable moment, like, yeah, how did you know you were so good? Like, was it just super natural for you? Did you have a way to quantify it? Everyone was like, yo, Dustin like I keep coming to you like you're the email marketing guy. Like how did you know?

Dustin: [28:17] I think I remember, it's been a handful of years now but I do remember feeling like I did it as a function of my job. So that helped. So in my head, I was like, well, someone already pays me to do this, like, I have a full time job. Like I basically have one giant client, and they provide all my income, but they trust me enough to do this thing. So I must be okay at it. And then as I started doing it for free, was a big way that I did it was like who else do I what other friends or companies do I like maybe know of, or someone who's even, like, you know, if you want to go lower stakes, I helped a lot of friends that didn't even have businesses and they were trying to start their business and I was like, well, let me set up your email marketing for you. So it was a very like good testing ground when the stakes aren't super high. And that's another thing that taking the money out of it helps with is you don't feel the responsibility as much to like, get them a huge ROI return on investment. So that helped. So for me, it was it was a combination of understanding someone already paid me to do it. So that's a great compass and then looking around who else I could try to help for free and doing that a couple of times until I was confirmed in my head of looking at you know, there is their email list growing, are they getting more revenue this month than they did last month? And so those were the quantifiable things that I was doing okay to look.

Chase: [29:38] so you're doing that and then you know, what was the next step in the journey there? 

Dustin: [29:39] so next step there was trying to figure out the kind of awkward halfway point of how do I how do I stop working at my job so I can do this but I don't have the money to do that right now. So I like playing in that middle space of like a, like an incognito nighttime superhero entrepreneur. So that's a lot of it and just, and I think the fear most people have when they're doing any kind of service it can be, it can be fitness coaching, it can be business, it doesn't matter what it is any kind of service that you're offering the first like fear that comes in places is how do I find the right people for me to do this to with without alienating another market that might pay me money because when you're first starting your interest, you're trying to figure out how do I make revenue? And it becomes easier, the more you do it, but in the beginning, I mean, you might, maybe, I mean, still, I don't really I don't, it's not like I'm super Mr. Famous with all these business contacts. A lot of the clients we get now are me reaching out to people who don't know who I am. And that's a lot of what you're doing in the very beginning. So giving yourself advantages, like a market you're already interested in, because it's a long game. You don't you don't want to you don't want to start a business in an area that is that could be profitable, but you hate it every day. 

Chase: [31:08] it will work for a short period of time, you know, six months, a year, maybe even five years, but I promise you absolutely. It's resentment. A lot of times is a very, it's a slow burn. And you think you can tolerate it but next thing you know just engulfs your life. And you're like, yeah, and you wake up like, not good.

Dustin: [31:26] the worst thing for an entrepreneur is to wake up and realize you have a job you hate. It's like, I don't want that happening to people and it happened to me in the beginning, because my goal was to get out of my job. So and that's a mindset thing, too, that I try to work on with people who are starting businesses is, are you starting a business to try to escape something? Or are you trying to go after something you're passionate about? It's very different and it impacts how you work. 

Chase: [31:58] say that again, please. That was powerful. 

Dustin: [31:59] so are you are you trying to start a business because you want to escape something that you're currently doing? Or are you trying to start a business because you want to go after something you're passionate about?

Chase: [32:11] and I'll say to that, like, I'm just getting this physical imagery of think about when we're afraid of something, the more we run away from something, you know, I'm gonna try to get away from this job. I'm trying to get away from this relationship. I'm trying to get away from this town. When we're running away from someone, something, somewhere we will run to anyone, anything, any place. When we're running towards we had like, yo, like, I'm not I'm just trying to get out of this town but I love Denver, I love LA, I love Richmond Virginia, whatever it is, like you will run towards something towards someone something in a much more direct way in a way that you know why and like everything on everything on the way to that place, to that person, to that thing is a part of the journey. They are also price that is also teaching you. Adds purpose to the journey. That was pretty good. Thanks for the muse. 

Dustin: [33:17] I think that's a big and you know, it's a big thing when you're so for me, I was trying to escape my nine to five job. And there are various reasons for that, but it caused the cycle in my life, where for a while, I kept going, like job the job thinking the next one would save me. And like, because like you said, me people do that in relationships. People do that in the city, they live in anything. Diet methods, like the next one's going to save me, it's because you're trying to run away from something instead of make a permanent fix towards something that you want. And so in, in, like, the client service business, when you're trying to start a service, what people do is they feel like, well, I just want to get out of this so I'll take any work I can. You end up with clients, you don't like, you end up doing work, you don't even like, and then you don't and then you also have this, like, you know, for me, it was like I was I was good at building websites, I was good at email marketing, like I had kind of this marketing toolkit. And so anyone who came to me with any of those, I was like, Yes, I'll do it. Yes, I'll do it. Yes, I'll do it. And it's not that there's anything wrong with that but you have to have a vision beyond being scrappy, and taking anything that comes to you because if you don't you end up in, in a situation where you're not able to scale and you also just don't like any of the work you're doing. So a good compass for other people and what helped me was thinking, okay, what what's something I am good at, so from use email marketing, and then who has a specific audience and market that I can serve that I like that industry? So for me was a no brainer, health and fitness has been a huge part of my life. I used to be a trainer for six years, very part of my life and so I was like, boom, I'm just gonna go I'm gonna find clients in the health and fitness space, and it made it so much fun. It made it so much more fun to be like, because that's I was helping people. It wasn't just me doing email marketing, and it was like, I'm gonna help you reach more people for this thing that I also love. And it made it just so much better. And then, you know, and then what happens is a natural chain reaction of doing a great job for people because you love the workings of the industry. And then when you ask them for referrals, they can refer you confidently and specifically, no one wants to work with a generalist. It's just true. So then you help someone and then this is how my career got started. I would help someone and I would say, who might you be able to connect me with I really appreciate it and then they would say, yes, you did a great job and then email intro to so and so who was also a health and fitness brand, looking for email marketing. So it was no longer this, like, I can do kind of everything. It's like, if you pass along, this.

Chase: [35:47] it's like you got your, if you do it, right or even just a little bit of strategy, like those referrals that you got your own kind of marketing team because the person that you show up for that you love working for the most odds are they know people just like that. They know other business owners just like that. So you were really you are, were really great at this skill set, and really loved working for this specific type or types of person persons. Then I'm sure they referred and you found other people in the same kind of world. So it was like, you know, that cuts out so much of that struggle in the beginning and that's definitely a lesson that I would go back until day one entrepreneur Chase. My I say that my transition from nine to five, to self-employed, to business owner wasn't as much of a struggle as I know, some people have because I went from doing my profession for somebody else to doing my profession for me. I went from being you know, a health coach and a wellness and, you know, fitness expert, and all this stuff, you know, for another company to just doing it for me. So I didn't really have a whole lot of learning curve time, a transition time, but it was saying yes to everybody, any client, anyone, like no matter what the goal was, because in the beginning, I just got married, I was living in DC, like cost of living super high. Like at the beginning, you're saying yes, because you need the money, you need the revenue, you need to kind of build the confidence you need to prove to yourself and your significant other that you can make money and survive. And yeah, I said yes to a lot of people, a lot of projects, a lot of clients that look like I'm actually like, I can help you, but I shouldn't because there is somebody better out there for you or I'm gonna have the resentment you know. Did you have moments like that? What was kind of like a, like a bottom moment for you maybe?

Dustin: [37:37] I had a couple of good bottom moments. 

Chase: [37:35] A couple good bottom moments. I love that. I love that mentality. Man. Here's my favorite worst moment. 

Dustin: [37:38] I just repeated the same mistake over and over. So one of them for me was, and this is why now I recommend people, if they're trying to start a side hustle or start their own, you know, become self-employed don't quit your job until you can and you're gonna hear so many people say the opposite and say that you have to like burn the boats. Don't burn the boats, you might need the boats.

Chase: [38:01] I struggle I see I see benefits and I see pros and cons of both sides, honestly, but please continue. 

Dustin: [38:06] I mean, and I think you can, you can generally tell so what I'll tell you my two experiences. So the first one I was working, I was working a marketing job. I got a big bonus and quit. Because like we had a great year and like it was the bonus payout. So it wasn't sketchy. Everyone calm down. And so I got my bonus. And then I put in my notice, I was like, okay, I have like a decent savings chunk like this will get me through a while. Like this will get me through like six months, and I mean, and honestly, that wasn't a terrible strategy because it's like, if you want to do that go but just know that you have a doomsday. Like know your date, know, you're gonna run out of money because that's gonna motivate you on because for me, what I did is I didn't even know what I wanted to do yet. I just knew I didn't want to be at that job.

Chase: [38:51] again, you were running from something.

Dustin: [38:55] Exactly. So I ended up working, kind of dabbling in some freelance stuff. It was good. It was fine but I didn't know what I was doing at all yet. And so I didn't know what to replicate or what to do more of. I always thought if I had more time, I would be able to grow a business but when you don't know what to do with the time, the time is useless. The seven versus four so I mean, that basically led to me running out of money, and then went back and got another job which was a hard ego blow, honestly. Just because I thought, you know, I was telling all my friends like how you started a business. And, and then I had to go, you know, back and be like, oh, no, I work for this company now. But I mean, if you allow yourself to not tie your ego into it, it makes it easier because and I did that story. The same story happened twice where I quit my job. And then one of them was I was like, I'm just going to drive for Uber and that's how I'll make the extra like cash I need make up the difference. And then I realized I used to try for Uber for 12 hours a day to make the difference. So I was like, well, that didn't make and there goes my other job that I left for now I have the same income but a lot less time. So, but the way that I did it the third time worked a lot better, still wasn't super smart, but to your point, it for me putting my back against the wall helped me. So I had about half of what I needed in monthly revenue coming from clients and then I quit my job knowing that okay, I have some kind of model here that I can if I have 40 hours a week I can make this work and then there are still up and down moments, of course is there just always is but you learn to you know this as an entrepreneur, you learn to like go with the peaks and valleys and not be so emotionally heated every time something happens.

Chase: [40:40] true, man, if I could pass back another piece of advice there to the young, hungry entrepreneur, the side hustler is and it takes a while it's not easy if you can get as comfortable, if you can learn to get as comfortable when you have no money coming in, when you have no leads, no clients, when you know, on paper, air quote here are not successful. If you can get as comfortable with that as when you're killing it, the money's coming in, the clients are coming in like life is good because if we can detach, and this is where the ego work is that we're talking about but also if you can detach from the outcome, yeah, then your level of productivity, your level of your mindset for damn sure, but just everything else will begin to stay congruent; will stay the same. So if I have the same mindset, and the same work ethic and the same habits and the same level of productivity and the same, you know, hey, I need to reach out to Dustin or you know, ask for support or you know, whatever, when things are at their worst and their best, then that really does help smooth out the peaks and valleys. Doesn't eliminate them for damn sure but that's honestly, I think the past year, actually, I would love to get input on this as well. Money mindset has been has been a tough one for me to overcome. I had a lot of scarcity mindset, and through a lot of my personal work and let it bled into in a good way, my professional work. I really realized, you know, kind of going back to my childhood and my upbringing and just my lifelong association to money and I had to work through that I had to fully just sit down and understand. What do I believe about money? What is my relationship with money? Why do I always feel like if I have it like it's going to be gone again, you know? I'm good at making money I'm really good at spending money. And so I had to really work through that and understand that. And again, really, especially when you become self-employed me not having client, me not having money, is not I'm an imposter is not I'm worthless, is not I'm horrible at what I'm doing. It's just how I'm going about it needs improvement and that's been a big area for me. I'm curious, as the money mindset kind of played a role into all these peaks and valleys familiar with?

Dustin: [42:57] I am still working through it to be honest and it's like, it's always been a weird thing for me, because I think I'm sometimes I get overly sensitive to my fear of being greedy. And it's like, it's like, in turn, what I do is I self-sabotage. But then, like, the realization of like, well, me, making less money probably just makes me more greedy because then all I think about is how I need more money. So that's something I've been working through is like, just as long as I know, my heart's in the right spot and that like money's not my main driver. If I know that I'm keeping people above money, then I'm in an OK, spot. And I think like, understanding that I'm gonna have different, it's gonna keep changing over life. And I'm just gonna keep working on it. It doesn't need to be this aha moment where like, oh, I figured all of it out now. So that's been, I'm still working through like, don't, don't be afraid to scale because you think you're gonna become greedy? Because then when something like a virus hits the globe, then you have to, you know, a lot of work to do instead of being okay.

Chase: [44:03] that is so powerful. Just got all my wheels spinning in my head of, I mean, it sounds really weird and sounds like BS, sometimes you say this out loud. But I would say that, like a hesitation, where I'm, I have and probably still am a bottleneck to my own success and a lot of things I do is like, oh, like, because I don't define success by how much money I make, or have. I define success by my level of fulfillment in my work that I do every day, the quality of life that I had, have the quality of life of my relationships, and like the work that me and my team are doing and so, again, that all ties into the money mindset, well, I need to generate money. My business needs to be profitable so that me and everyone else around me can contribute to the overall can keep the things going, and can really move towards that definition of success of fulfillment happiness, doing good things and just like showing up and loving what I'm doing every day. That's been it sounds really weird to say that I'm not making as much money as, as I want or could because I just like, I don't want to become greedy. I don't want to have all that money, money problems, but. It's weird. It's weird. 

Dustin: [45:20] it's so weird. Yeah, no, it's true. That's true for me, too. It's like, I, and I think it's, it’s like, because I'm the same with you where I don't I don't judge my success by the amount of dollars in the bank account, I just don't. And I hope that I don't. But personal finances and business finances need to be looked at differently. And that's something I am working on and it's like when you're when you're working for. And it's weird, because when you're working at it, just you know, when you're working for someone else, you get paid what you're given. And it's you don't even have to you don't have to overthink. Like someone else validates that I'm worth this much money and that's great, then like you're not getting judged for how much money you make or whatever, because someone else told you, you can make it so true. But then when you work for yourself, you're determining your paycheck in a lot of ways. But then also you stop or for me, I didn't understand the separation for a long time of my personal finances, and my business finances, it's different. And I liked what you said about, you know, a business obviously needs to generate money to keep the good things going. It's like and you mentioned, you mentioned like the employees, and that's such an important thing that I've been working on for me is just remembering that that the work will one innately, the work we're doing is good work for good people for good reasons. So I don't want to stop another person from being able to be involved in that because I can't get over my weird money issues. Then I had a mentor tell me this one time, and it just stuck with me. I think about it all the time. He said, he said, the point of the point of an employee is not to get a job done. The point of, of a job is to get an employee done, as in working. You hire someone. Yes, there's a thing to be done. But really, the main goal is to develop them. So you're using the job to develop the person instead of the person to do the tasks you don't want to do. Very different and for me, that works into the money mindset of I'm not like I want to I want the business to generate money so I can keep developing these people. And so that's a really a helpful thing in my head. 

Chase: [47:27] developing a business, developing a purpose is very important and is necessary work. But I would make the statement, the argument that if you focus even a little bit more it damn sure at least equal on developing people, then, in a lot of ways the rest will take care of itself. It's been so great having you on here, man, I'm kind of getting towards the end. I'm curious, you know, what's your baby right now? What are you working on? How are you, we talked a lot about productivity and money, mindset, productivity mindset, a lot of ways to like, get through this stuff but like, how, how are you really doing that now? And what's your big project you've been working on now?

Dustin: [48:04] so the main project I'm working on now like obviously, I run a marketing agency called Jump X marketing we work with, we do ecommerce marketing for brands in the health and fitness space. So that's my main, that's what I do but on the side, I'm working on helping more people who

Chase: [48:20] I love By the way, like you own your own business, run your business and you have a side hustle to yourself. 

Dustin: [48:27] Always, I get bored. You do this too. It's like an entrepreneur’s problem. It's just like boredom. You're just like what else can I do? Like I can do this than I can do this.

Chase: [48:40] the problem is because like we realize there's a whole tangent like we realized what is possible. Anything. It's just like, oh, if I have an idea and once you realize that you're the only person like that is going to start or stop that like it's just like, I can do it. Let's see what happens. Dude, it is mind blowing. 

Dustin: [49:00] so like that's I mean, that's what I'm working on helping people do is figure out what they're what they're good at and start a service business just try like fitness coaching. It can be marketing it can be I've helped people become financial advisors. People help be a health coach for women that were recently pregnant and gave birth and they're trying to get back into it. Just really specific things like if you have a thing you're good at or life experience you can share through a service that's what I'm trying to help people discover and grow so there's a website skillsetsandhandshakes.com and there's resources on there to help people from ground zero or someone who may be has kind of gotten their feet wet but they're just spinning their wheels a little bit need to figure out where to go. So I put together for your audience actually just a specific page, they can go to an extra downloads that aren't typically free. Just because you know, so skillsetsandhandshakes.com/Chase. That's what we're going with. 

Chase: [50:07] Awesome, man. I will have to check that out. Cool. I mean another great lesson is going back to day one entrepreneur Chase is learn how to say no, like, don't say yes to every client every opportunity but also like, get help. If I, I did, actually, before I left my job, I officially hired a mentor, kind of like a life coach, business coach. She had done basically everything that I could ever hope to want to do in this kind of like health, wellness, entrepreneur space and but then when I transitioned, because I was again just focused on revenue and money, like I stopped that relationship because I need to just make money. I can't have anything going out but it's a catch 22 I mean, if I had done if I kept that going, or hired, somebody went through a course or just did anything to like, feed that process. It's all learning curves, right? 

Dustin: [51:04] I'm really glad you brought it up said forgot to mention it when I was just kind of telling some of my story. I one of the catalysts when I started making kind of enough to quit my job was a mentor and like it was literally night and day of someone giving me a concept not even like a full strategist, like concept, a paradigm shift and within 30 days, I was set it was that and like, so now. I mean, I still right now I'm working with the growth marketing coach, I'm always working with some kind of coach, because even when it seems like the money is going out instead of back in, there's always an inflection point. I mean, yeah, you don't like go to college expecting to make your money back right away? But it's the same concept just get a get someone who's been where you are to help you and it's just if like, if you if you can afford to do it, because it's so useful. 

Chase: [51:56] I'll even say, make a way to afford it. Find a way like, go like, alright, if the cost for this course or the cost for this, this coach is 200 bucks a month, 1000 bucks a month, right now your job is to go find a new client find a way to pay for that. I absolutely that I would make damn sure that I did that for sure. I've had two pay like, full on costs, like full investment, everything coaches mentors, over the years, and the first one, she helped me like, I wouldn't have launched anywhere close to how I did when I left my job if it wasn't for her. She's still in my life, and in a way and the second was when I made a big business shift in like, spring ish, Summer 2019 investing in another coach and literally, within the first phone call of that second investment everything became clear. It was just like, why are you doing that? You love this instead? You're right. And so again, I just stopped chasing stuff and it was the best investments, the best decisions I've ever made. I'm overdue for another one. I'm overdue to go back. Thanks for the reminder, man. Well, Dustin, again, thanks for coming on, man. It's been a great conversation. I love these kind of talks and I know that the audience member listening right now who's been on the fence about jumping ship to go to their full blown full blown thing or just I mean, daily productivity hacks alone, and there's so many great things in here. So that in mind, man kind of with the mindset productivity, spinning the wheels, just like all these things all contribute to how I say, you know, live a life Ever Forward. What does that mean to you, man? How did you how do you live a life Ever Forward?

Dustin: [53:43] I think just trying to be I don't want to use this word in a corny way, but like being authentic in my pursuit as well as like person to person but also in the pursuit that I'm going after. Because like we were talking about earlier, when you're when you're when you have some form of alignment, it doesn't always have to feel 100% but when you can tell like you're on the right path, it makes you want to try do things like optimize your health, optimize your productivity, it, it puts you in the state where you want to be getting better. So to me, that's what ever for it is, is being in that state where I want to keep getting better, and then finding new ways to do that. And like particularly with chasing not chasing but pursuing a passionate project. I don't think everyone has just one passion. I think we get to choose on that. But I will say you know show me one person who regrets starting their passion project and I'll show you a million who regret not starting. 

Chase: [54:50] So true man. I love that little nuance there of not getting better not like finding ways to get better but wanting to get better and that is the difference right there. That is that is the difference that will keep you adherent. Like the same thing I'm sure you know you had when you're working with clients you know in like the health coaching fitness spaces. We can help you we can give you the workout give you the nutrition plan all you want, but you have to want it. And the second you stop wanting what you're in the pursuit of is the moment that we're talking about earlier is when imposter syndrome starts it steps in, doubt creeps in and you become less productive when you begin to detach a little bit more. And that's, I believe, that's also kind of a process like it comes with the territory. And I wouldn't even say it's a bad thing, but it's just a thing we need to be mindful of. And that's when we get the opportunity to catch. Do I still feel the same kind of way about this? You know, why do I not want it? And you know, think on that. Why do I want it? Why do I not want it? It's neither good neither bad but just being aware of that concept will make or break your success and just happiness and everything you do for sure. 

Dustin: [55:59] yeah, I agree. 

Chase: [56:01] Dustin, it's been great having you on man. Thank you so much. 

Dustin: [56:03] thanks, this was great.