SPECIAL REPLAY: Tommy Breedlove - How to Figure Out Your "Zone of Brilliance"

Speaker A: Welcome to the Good Money podcast, where we believe money is not bad and good people like you should have more of it. That's why we help you get into the top 1% of your field, make more money, and do more good. Each week we give you access to the best business minds with actionable advice, impactful stories and and the inspiration you need to build the career and life you want. I'm your host, Derek Kim. You have a strong vision and big goals for your business, but how do you make sure your daily actions are leading you toward the success you want? My guest today, Tommy Breedlove, specializes in coaching high achieving entrepreneurs and executives. He's also the author of the Wall Street Journal and USA Today best selling book, Legendary. Today, Tommy shares his strategies for identifying your personal zone of brilliance, plus how to set clear goals that are actually achievable and manage your time to maximize productivity. Then Tommy reveals how vulnerability and authenticity are key factors in building connections and attracting clients. Tommy also talks about the value of investing time and money into you and your business and how to know when it's time to work with a coach, attend an industry event, or join a mastermind group. This conversation is a great guide on using your time wisely and advancing confidently toward your business goals. Tommy, welcome to the Good Money podcast.

Speaker B: Derek. Kenny, my dear brother, we've had such a great conversation. Humbled and honored to be here. Been waiting for this for a long time. Um, love everything you stand for and do, man. Let's get to it. I love you, brother. Let's go.

Speaker C: Well, you're coming in red hot. You were just telling me offline you just had a successful red hot second event in Tampa and you helped a lot of people's lives. And now our listeners get the benefit of you helping their lives as well. So I'm super jacked about today. Well, let's get right to it. What are the steps in your legendary playbook that our listeners should incorporate into their daily routine if they want to stand out in their industry?

Speaker B: Yep, absolutely. And it's going to be a little different than they actually think. I would bet. Uh, that it doesn't matter if they're a solopreneur, an entrepreneur, they're a financial planner, cpa, lawyer, whatever it is you do, I almost guarantee you you're world class and badass at your craft. And the only way to be lead at your craft is practice it over and over and over. And eventually you become a world class pro. You master it, and then leadership is teaching it to others. So I'M not going to go there. That's easy. We can talk about scaling their business and marketing and all that, but all that's all meaningless as well, in my opinion. What people don't realize is their number one asset in their ent life is them and usually high achieving entrepreneurs, executives or aspiring entrepreneurs and executives who are high achievers and ambitious. Guess what? We put last ourselves And.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker B: And I gotta be honest, Eric, man, I was, you would have looked at me about 13 years ago. I was a senior partner, international practice leader on the board of directors and owner of one of the largest public accounting, financial consulting and M and A firms in the Southeast. I was an owner and on the board of directors. And you would have looked at me brother, and you would have said, he's got it all figured out. Fancy suit, office the size of a football field, girl on my arm. You said, this dude's going somewhere. This is, this is who I want to be. And on the inside, I was just insecure, angry, and never felt good enough. And it almost cost me everything at 39 years old. Because when the money, success, title and money and I'm a money is important guy. Let me be clear. Someone says money's not important, run from them, they're broken. However, wherever you go, there you are. And money and success is a catapult and it literally will amplify your goodness or your darkness. And so it almost costs me, losing everything, my friend, to like really say, okay, why do I feel lost? Why do I feel alone? Why am I worried, insecure and why am I angry? And so for me, the number one thing I would tell every single person living on this if you want success and happiness, if you want to make impact and be fulfilled, if you want to scale and then have a life of significance, is the number one asset you need to prioritize is you. You've got to lead, respect and love yourself before anyone else will lead, love and respect you fully. And so the moment that I made me m my full time job and I can this morning, I'm not kidding, I spent two hours on being elite by me. I'm talking about working on my physical muscles, my emotional muscles, my mental muscles and my spiritual muscles. And I do it every single day so that I stand with humble confidence, so that I stand with humble courage and that I am as head back and should shoulders up and I can walk to the fire. Never from the fire. And when that Ike, I call him Ike. When Tommy's negative mind comes in, I call it the Tommy go round when he kicks in, and it kicks in on a regular basis. And I feel like a fraud or I'm insecure or I'm worried or I'm feeling for. And, you know, we're a small company, we have 15 lives, but every single day I get up and I work on me and I work hard on me to be the best leader, the best human, the best man, and the best business leader that I can, so that I can go out and lead, love and respect others better by working on me. From my money to my success to my impact, my peace of mind, my courage, my confidence. It has gone from in the last 14 years, and that's what I've been doing for 14 years. I'm getting ready to be 50 and my big transition at 36. The number one thing they have to do, and it's the easiest thing to do and the hardest thing to do, because the first thing they're going to get up, they're going to say their families are most important. They're lying. It's their business and career. Let's be clear. If you're listening to this podcast, the Good Money Podcast, chances are your business and your careers first. But in order to make to be the best and the thing that people follow the most. And I'm going to stop talking so Derek can get back to his goodness. The people that. If you want people and clients and customers to follow you, you must be confident in what you do. But even more, you must be confident in who you are. And that is what I would tell every single person listening to this podcast.

Speaker C: So be confident in what you do and be confident in who you are. And as you talked about, you can't fake that. People can smell it a mile away. The inauthenticity, the doubt, the worry. But when a confident person enters the room and leaves the room, they feel it and they know it. I love that.

Speaker B: And arrogance is insecurity on steroids. And people that are insecure talk about money or transactions. You know, let me tell you, let me get a little secret. Wealthy people don't talk about money. They talk about impact scale. They're excited about what you're doing. They want to know about what you're doing. So when I hear people saying, oh, we're doing a billion in transactions. Transactions, or I know, X, Y and Z. Name dropping, name dropping, name dropping. That's just insecurity, man. And they're trying to get you to like them. Whereas if they would just step back and love who they are and what they are and where they're going. People, you said it. People are drawn to authenticity, they're drawn to realness, they're drawn to vulnerability. Vulnerability does not mean emotionally vomiting on people. That is difference. If you want to know what emotionally vomit looks like, look on Facebook. But people are drawn to who you are, what you're doing and where you're going, not who you know and not what you've done. Now that's important for credibility, standpoint, but I promise you, people buy you more than what you've done. Actually, they buy a combination of both. That's why I want you to be confident in what you do and confident in who you are. Off my softbox. Thank you, Derek.

Speaker C: Yeah, Tommy. No, it's great. Great. Hey, how can business owners create success that also benefits their community?

Speaker B: Yeah. And so this is Simon, this goes back to Simon Sinek is you've got to find what you want to fight against and what you want to fight for. You got to fight. You got to find what you want to fight against and fight for. And whether you're a cpa, an entrepreneur, a corporate executive, a lawyer, it doesn't matter. There's so many professional services people out in this world right now is you got to find your cause and you got to fight against it. And so for us, what I love about what I get to do in our legendary life movement and we're a home for high achieving entrepreneurs and executives to do business in life with, at live events and through our masterminds and communities. What I love is we know our enemy. We're fighting against laziness, apathy, entitlement and victimhood. That is our enemies. And by the way, guess what? Our mass media, our social media, Most of our 24 hour news and all that, they are wanting you to be a victim. Entitled, lazy and apathy. And they want you to know that they've got you. And the truth is they don't have you. You've got you. And so we've created an enemy that we are, uh, we know we're the. We're the problem and the solution. No one's coming to save us. There is no magic pill. And if we had the answers, we'd already done it. So what I would do is figure out what you're fighting for and what you're fighting against. And everything you do as a business, everything, your mission, vision and purpose, your mission, vision and purpose is to not only to give people great value and to make them better than when they arrive for you, but also know who you're fighting for and who you're fighting against. And one of the things we're fighting against in our high achieving, ambitious communities is we will do everything we can to have more and win because we crave title, success, respect and status. That's what we crave. And we will compromise everything to go get it. And so, and what we do in legendary is we want you to be elite in business success, money and leadership, but we don't want you to do it at the price of everything that's important to you. So not only be elite in business success and money, but also be elite in life and your relationships. And we believe in this organization that you can have it all, but you're going to have to work your butt off for it and connect with others just like you. Because again, if you had all the answers, you would have already done it. And so find out what you're fighting for, find out what you're fighting against, and make sure every decision you make and every strategic plan that you have goes through that mission, vision and purpose, and you'll be just fine. I like that.

Speaker C: Our listeners will need to schedule some time, uh, some vacation days to re. Listen to what you just said multiple times because that was really good.

Speaker B: Thank you, brother. Well, well said and I hope the passion comes through. Derek.

Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, I was going to tell you, Tommy, we need to really ramp it up a little bit. I think people see some, some lethargic guests on the line here today. No, you're bringing in, man, this is great. Hey, what are your best tips to boost productivity and make more money through time management?

Speaker B: So this is worth every amount of money you're paying me to be here, Derek, which I'm, I should be paying you to be here. So let's be honest, we're doing this for free because we just want to give back. We want to give back and make great value. And by the way, for 36 years, I was the exact opposite. I was a net taker, Scared, insecure, arrogant man. And now I spent the last 14 years rebuilding that. But here's, here's the most important lesson of all. There's something I call zone of brilliance. And if you spend, I'm going to be, I'm going to tell you how here and just, I'm going to give you tactical ways on how to do this in a minute. There's something called your zone of brilliance. And for all of you in your craft, your profession, or your business, there's things that you enjoy and there's things that you're world class at period. If you can spend one to four hours a day on the things that you enjoy and the things that you're world class at, from efficiency to productivity to profitability and even more important, happiness. Because you love it and you're good at it. The problem is, is we chase shiny objects and email is someone else's to do list. Text is someone else's to do list. We try to multitask. And by the way, only one out of a hundred people can multitask. And I promise you, it's not you or me or the people listening. And when you multitask, you're 40% less efficient. So every night before I go to bed, I think about three ways that I can win tomorrow in my business. I have to be good at it and I have to be world class and I have to like it. And those three things I spend at least four hours a day doing. I would tell people to start at one hour. Create your holy time every single day and protect and defend it. Like there is no tomorrow, no email, no cell phone, definitely no social media. If you're listening, if you're watching social media per day, call me and we have a whole, I'll give you my phone number. We have a whole discussion to have. But every single day I want you to spend one to four hours on your world class make the main thing. The main thing. Pick the three things that would move the ball the most in your business. Only concentrate those. And if you can do one hour a day, you're winning two hours a day, you're winning four hours a day. You're a master in world class. I want you to set your hourly rate as well. And unless you truly enjoy doing those things and uh, you know, accountants are going to say, well m. My worth is $200 an hour or $400 an hour. Actually your worth is probably a lot more than that, especially if you own or operate the business. Set your hourly rate. Outsource the rest to someone else who is better at you than doing it. Stay at your rally rate. Make the three main things. How are you going to win this day? What are the three things that move? Create your holy time. Time. Block it, make it non negotiable. And once you're done doing those three things, the rest of the day is for administration, operations, sales, finance, answering emails. Ask my people. Uh, I mean I wish I had my entire team on the phone. They would tell you that I do this. It looks like that I'm on social media. It looks like That I check email. Hell, it even looks like I answer my text. And I'm not doing any of that. There's a person who's better at it than I am, who's more organized than I am, who I know my hourly rate. And it's not what's going to move the ball forward. And so for me, it's setting your hourly rate, creating holy time, make it non negotiable, don't be distracted. And I promise you start at 30 minutes. But it's got to be, turn off your email, turn off your social media, shut your phone down, and make the main thing the main thing for 30 minutes. What reduces the ball. And I'm going to make it. I'm going to take it a step further, Derek. This is tactical. Here's how we do it at legendary. This is how we do it. I own a boutique hotel in the north Georgia mountains too. So I own two businesses. One is a boutique hotel and one is the legendary. Okay? And legendary is what we're talking about right now. We have our five year, three year and one year vision and goals. So what we do at the one year goals, we reverse engineer it back to each month. And this month, in order to get our one year goal, we have to accomplish this. And then what we do is reverse engineer back to the week and reverse engineer back to the day. Because if you look at the one year goal, it looks overwhelming. But if you reverse engineer it back to what can I do today? What can my administrator do today? What can my chief of staff do today? My marketing person, my director of member experiences, what can we all do today? These three main things today, that gets us our goal in a week, that'll get us our goal in a month, and that'll get us our goal in a year. We make it our holy time, we can make it non negotiable. We don't distract each other between one and four hours a day. If you do those things, you will be elite, more productive, more profitable, more happy, more efficient. Soapbox down. I hope that helped, Derek.

Speaker C: Wow. If you heard the keyboard clacking in the background, it's because I am the one taking notes right now. Well said. I wrote down zone of brilliance. Create the key three tasks, block out up to four hours. No socials. The holy time. Set your hourly rate.

Speaker B: Just start with one hour.

Speaker C: This is such a good episode. Yeah.

Speaker A: Start with one hour.

Speaker B: Start with one hour.

Speaker C: Of course, of course.

Speaker B: Non filtered, non negotiable. Holy time. Start with one hour.

Speaker C: I love it. I love it.

Speaker A: I'll be back with more of my conversation with Tommy in just a moment. I want to take a quick break from our conversation to tell you about a free gift I have for you. But first let me ask you a question. Do you want to get paid more money? Maybe you feel frustrated that you're not getting paid enough at your current job. You deserve to be paid what you are worth. But there is a problem. If you don't know how to ask for a raise, you will never get it. Now, I know communicating your value and asking for a raise can feel scary. That's exactly why I designed a three step plan so you can get the raise you deserve and you can download it right now for free@gettheriseyou want.com. i'm on a mission to help every American create the lasting wealth and meaningful life they deserve. And that starts with being paid the money that you are worth. So here's what to do. Go to gettheriseyouant.com, download your free PDF and start earning what you're worth right now. Just go to gettheriseyouant.com to get a simple three step plan to get the raise you want. That's gettheriseyou want dot com. And now here's the rest of my conversation with Tommy.

Speaker C: Hey Tommy, I'm curious now, you know I'm a big believer, as you know, in having a cause that motivates you. And we teach all of our business owners to have a cause you care about because you can then use that to go make more money to do more good with it. And I'm curious from your standpoint, what are some practical ways that you can motivate yourself to go make more money to do more good with it.

Speaker B: So I'm a firm believer you're either motivated or you're not. And so if you're not motivated, that means you don't love what you're doing or you haven't found your passion or purpose. So I can't motivate you. I can lead, I can inspire, I can show the way. So I can't motivate you. But the first thing is you've got to bring something to market that people think has great value to it. But the key is you've got to love it and you got to practice it yourself. And let me tell you what motivates me is on the chase of more status, more power, more money, and more respect, which is just insecurity and tangible. I almost lost everything twice. And so the things that I talk to, to our High achieving entrepreneurs and executives. Everything, every day is the stuff that literally saved my life. It's literally the stuff that made me scale and build two multimillion dollar businesses. It's literally the stuff that honestly saved my damn relationship with my wife. And so I have found my passion. And Derek, just to be honest, this is not what it sounds like to have it all figured out. I have wrote a Wall Street Journal and USA Today best selling book that I will never live up to called Legendary. I will never live up to the pages or the man in that book. I get to talk in the mirror all day, every day and say, hey, Tommy, you're not doing this. And when I'm on stage or running my Mastermind or one of our live events, I'm the first to say I am not doing this and reminding myself that I'm not doing it. If you want to make more impact and scale and make more money, find what you need, perfect that, craft the best you can and go sell it to others just like you. Over time, what I have found is I have found my tribe. My tribe is not for everyone. We're ambitious and high achievers, that's what we are. We want to make an impact through business that turns off about nine out of 10 people, so be it. But I have found my niche, um, and the people just like me and I provide them value and I connect them with other people just like them. So figure out what you need. Why do you do what you do, why are you good at what you do and what lights you up about doing that? And what I would tell people too is if you're smaller, go out there and ask for help. But don't be a net taker, be a net giver and let me give you a world class hack that one of my best friends, Chris Tough taught me. Mask your ask in a dream. My dream is to help 1 million high achieving, ambitious entrepreneurs, executives. My dream is to help them not only make great impact through their success and their businesses, but leave a legacy with the people they touched. Their family, their friends, and most importantly, themselves. If you tell people your dream, they want to help you, go get it. But one of the things I want to tell people is don't be desperate, don't be a nut taker and save your asks. Always figure out a way you can serve, a way you can give back. But to make more money, to make more impact, I can't motivate you. If you love what you're doing, you're inspired by it. And by the way if it's a pain that you are meeting within yourself, you're going to be motivated and love doing it anyway. Figure out why you do what you do, how it relates to you personally, how it relates to your soul personally. Tell people, be vulnerable. You've heard me be vulnerable. I'm giving you the gift to go in a second. I screwed it all up for 36 years while making a lot of money, and I left a path of destruction behind me. Now for the last 14 years, I've made even more money, but now we're making great impact and success and I feel humble and peaceful. You've got to love what you do and be passionate about it, and you've got to need it and want it. And when you needed to want it, there's a million more that want it and need it because they're just like you. You are not alone in your wants, needs and desires. Find out what that is, find out your passion, find out your calls to go fight against, and hopefully you're fighting for yourself. Be vulnerable and authentic and people will buy from you all day, every day. That's to me, but a motivation. You're either motivated or you're not.

Speaker C: Yeah, makes sense. Makes sense. Hey, Tommy, if our listeners could do only one thing to get into the top 1% of their field now, what would you tell them to do?

Speaker B: I can't do one. I'm gonna do number one. Show up. I'm gonna put you in the top 10%, then I'm gonna put you in the Top 1%. Top 10% is show up. Show up for yourself. Do what you're gonna say to do and honor your word. Do what you say you're gonna do. And show up when you're making a commitment. Show up something when an employee show up. But more importantly, show up for yourself. Prioritize yourself, particip rescue. Every single day. You got to show up for yourself first, which most of us high achievers put ourselves last. You got to change that paradigm. Put it first. So show up for yourself first. That'll put you in the top 10% to put you in the top 1%. You've heard it time and time again. I am in the mastermind community building, connection, growth business. Guess what? I pay to be in a mastermind. I'm currently working with three coaches to help me scale, build and make my business more efficiently. So I practice what I teach. If you invest your time, your money into others, who will make you better, more successfully, internal and external. I'm telling you, if you Want to be in the top 1%. Number one is show up, honor your word, and do what you're saying to do to put you in the top 1%. Invest a ton of your time and money into your business success, into your life success, and into your knowledge with coaches, with books, with masterminds, and people who have been there and done that. I invested. I'm not going to pull up the curtain. I'm not kidding. I invested over a hundred grand into me and my team last year in my businesses. Guess what? I know it's going to pay me over a million guarantee. It's without question. It's without question. And so we don't just go and do these things. We put them into our goals. We put them into our daily strategies. Whether we're at Russell Brunson's event, Darren Hardy's event, Alex Hermosa's event, the mastermind that I'm in, or we're doing EOS right now with an implementer. All of those things I'm doing right now is we put them into our daily goals, our daily to dos, and our daily KPIs. So we're just not learning. We're practicing what we're learning. We're taking intentional actions. Top 10% show up. Whole world's not showing up right now. Top 1%, double down. Invest in your marketing, invest in yourselves, invest in your talent, invest in yourself, and get out there. Because if you had all the answers, you would have already done it. And get someone who will help you be better at everything you do.

Speaker C: Well, Tommy, it's time for the last word. What's one thing you want to leave our listeners with today?

Speaker B: One thing I would want to leave your listeners with today is, number one, is know you're not alone. Whatever your fear is. If you have, uh, I'm not good enough, or if you feel like, you know, we have that imposter syndrome, by the way, once a week, Derek, I look up in the ceiling and I'm like, God, my God, can I do this? Do I have what it takes? I feel like a fraud. Um, once a week, it's better than the five days it used to be. So it's getting better, right? Right. Uh, but I would say you're not alone. You're not alone in your worry, fear, insecurity, whatever it is, is to know you're not alone and to go out and participate in your own rescue. Ask for help. Read every book you can get your hands on. Apply the knowledge, participate in your own rescue, Invest into yourself. And the people who are truly successful participate in their own rescue. When times get hard, they just don't quit. Never, ever, ever give up. And if you ask any successful person in the world, the secret to success is mastering your mindset and never giving up. Mastering your mindset, never giving up. Participate in your own rescue. That's what I would leave your audience with.

Speaker C: Tommy, how can our listeners get in touch with you?

Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. If you want to see all of our cool events, we have entrepreneur executive adventure experiences. We are. The best, biggest, best thing we do is retreats. We have our big business and leadership event every year. Or if you want to join a masterminded community, go livelegendary today. Live Legendary today. The book Legendary if you want to dip your toe is at all your favorite bookstores. And if you're not a reader, I will read it to you on audible. Um, but yeah, come hang out with me. I'm going to give you my personal email address too. If you've got a question about how do I get involved in the community, how do I get involved in your mastermind, or how do I come to one of your events, I promise you, you will love it. They're fun, they're growth. And if you want to do cool things with cool people and cool places, come play with us. Reach out to me directly at tommyivelegendary today and hopefully if you're a high achiever who wants to hang out with other people like you, cool things in cool places and learn and grow. Welcome home, Tommy.

Speaker C: Bree Love, really loved our time together today. It's been instrumental that this has been great. You've shared some new twists on old ideas, but you've also given us just a fresh voice of how to really attack and own 2024, especially for those business owners listening that really want to grow and do more good. So, Tommy, thanks for being with us on the Good Money podcast.

Speaker B: Derek, what an honor. And keep being you and keep doing what you're doing. You're making great impact, my brother. Thank you for being you.

Speaker C: My pleasure, man. Thank you, brother.

Speaker A: At the end of each podcast, I give you a roadmap to help you get to the top 1% of your field. I loved how Tommy talked about the importance of finding what you're fighting for and what you're fighting against. Both are so important. And when you position yourself as sort of the guide to walk alongside people, helping them solve their problem and fight their problem together hand in hand, and it's a powerful marketing metaphor and both are so important. Not just what you're fighting for, but also against. Sometimes what you're fighting against is even more powerful than what you're fighting for. You need to have a clear mission, vision and purpose in your business and to align every decision and strategic plan with that mission. So if you were to say, in our company, we're fighting against insert relatable problem that your ideal prospects face, and here's how we fight against that. People rally to that because they know there's a problem, they know they're fighting against it, and have someone walking alongside them to help them. Fight alongside them against that problem can be, uh, super, super powerful. I really enjoyed this and I actually learned a lot that's challenging my own marketing thinking listening to this podcast. I hope it impacts you the same way. That's all for today's episode of the Good Money podcast. Thank you so much for listening and believing like us, that money is not bad and good people like you should have more of it. And don't forget to download your three step plan. To get the raise you want, just go to gettheriseyou want.com getting paid what you're truly worth starts with knowing how to ask. Ask for the raise. Don't miss out on the raise you deserve. My three step plan will show you how. Download the three step plan now at gettheriseyou want.com that's gettheriseyouwant.com and if you found this episode helpful and valuable, please rate and review the show letting us know how these tips are helping you grow your business. We'll see you next week.