Another Excuse Newsletter

Welcome back to the Another Excuse Newsletter. It isn’t just another excuse, but a reason to start that thing you’ve been putting off.

What to expect this week:
👓Perspective - What’s the silly story you’re telling yourself?
🔨 Tool - Product Hunt
🍿Consume - Failure
📖Concept - BAG Networking Ice Breaker

Perspective

What’s the silly story you’re telling yourself?

I heard Shaan Puri, say this the other day, and it’s true.

No matter what stage of life you’re in, we’re all coming up with some sort of excuse.

Some may be bigger or smaller than others, but there’s always something we’d like to be doing that we just haven’t gotten around to yet.

And a lot of the time it’s because of an excuse we’ve told ourselves.

Sometimes we don’t even see it as an excuse. We see it as a valid reason as to why we aren’t doing that thing or why we haven’t started yet.

But when you reframe it as a silly story we tell ourselves, it takes the pressure off and helps us realize that a lot of the time we are telling ourselves silly stories.

It’s not the right time.

We’re waiting for something external to happen.

We don't have enough knowledge on the topic.

It’s dependent on someone else.

Those are just a few off the top of my head, but they come in many shapes and sizes.

You’re no different.

Everyone does it. Even the most successful people.

The only difference is, they realise it’s a silly story and they do something about it. They change their behaviour.

So, hopefully, this makes you aware of your silly story, and you do something about it.

Tool

Product Hunt

Another one of those tools that’s just so obvious. I can’t believe I haven’t spoken about it yet.

If you haven’t heard of Product Hunt, it’s a site that surfaces the best new products daily.

So people who create the latest apps, websites and creations will post them on the site and enthusiasts will test them out, give reviews and upvote them.

Why is this a great tool?

Well, it’s a great tool for two reasons.

1. It’s a great way to get noticed by those early adopters looking for that new product that solves a particular pain point for them.
   

2. It’s a great way to stay at the forefront of what products are being developed.

So it’s a win/win for both types of users.

The amount of founders I’ve spoken to who’ve said they posted their product on Product Hunt and got their first 1000 users or acquired investment is crazy.

It’s extremely powerful and the place to hang out if you’re developing something yourself.

Check it out.

Test out some new products. Get involved.

Maybe it will give you some ideas to create your own thing.

Consume (Read / Watch / Listen)

@ahormozi

Everyone is telling you "I told you so" and the hard part is, they're right today. But not forever.

Failure

This video speaks for itself.

We forget that most successful people fail so many times before they find that thing that works.

This video is a great reminder of that.

And something I need to remind myself about constantly.

I need to fail more.

The more you fail the better your chances are in finding the thing that works.

Fail fast and fail forward.

Concept

BAG Networking Ice Breaker

Tim Ferris hosted an event ages ago and a ticket to attend cost $10k.

While thinking about how he could pack as much value as possible into this event so it felt worth it to everyone who attended, he decided to use this opener.

I’m not sure if he came up with it, but he made all attendees (over 100) do it and this alone recouped the value of the ticket cost.

So what is the BAG icebreaker?

It’s pretty straightforward and we’ve been asked to do a version of this in a few situations, but the real challenge is to answer correctly, so you get the most from it.

The B stands for Brag.

The A stands for Ask.

And the G stands for Give.

Now, you may be able to come up with an answer for each of these pretty quickly, but in an environment like a Tim Ferris event, would your answers get you the most value?

And for those who don’t know what a Tim Ferris event would look like, it’s basically a networking/speaking event full of high-net-worth successful individuals.

A strong network has the biggest impact on career trajectory and opportunity.

So being able to brag in a way that will impress, ask where you’d get the most value and give where you can provide the most value and build a relationship is so important.

I don’t have the answer for you, but I believe that this is something we should all consider.

This approach can be used in a cold DM to someone asking for a coffee or a way to introduce yourself at a networking event.

If you can deliver your BAG in a succinct, to-the-point and high-value way, your network will deliver in ways you wouldn’t expect.

It’s not all about taking, it’s also about giving. Think about that the next time you’re looking for some help on something.

Let me know your BAG by replying to this email.

Thanks for Reading

Now start something!

P.S. Feedback is welcome and needed! If you’d prefer to send me an email and not respond, you can do so here: [email protected]

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