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Privilege - Growth Mindset Ep. 7
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Nov 9, 2023
Join Mahesh Chand on Growth Mindset with a special guest - Aaron Johnson where they will discuss success, motivation, drive, and more importantly, privilege. Is being poor or rich good or bad? You'll be surprised. C# Corner - Community of Software and Data Developers https://www.c-sharpcorner.com #csharpcorner #growth #midset #motivation #liveshow
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Plus I thought we were supposed to play other video as well. Are we live
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Yes we are. Alright. Good morning, good evening, good afternoon. Everybody welcome to the Growth Mindset Show
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My name is Mahesh Chan. It's a little cloudy outside here in Philadelphia and today we are going to talk about
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We have a special guest which I'm going to introduce you a little bit
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But before that, if you are, it looks like you're joining us for the first time, welcome
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to the show. If you are our regular user who's watching us again, welcome back to the show
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Looks like we have a lot of people joining us from different places. I see people joining from Europe
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I see people joining from Philadelphia and from India. welcome to the show welcome Anurad, welcome Megha. Again as you may know if
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you're already joined you have already joined in the past you know that this Growth Mindset Show we focus on growth, we focus on growth, we focus on success
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motivation, anything around getting better at where you are today. It's very
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open-minded you know we are you can ask any questions here this is not a we are
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not restricting from you know this or that whatever questions you have on your mind about
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career your growth your anything motivation covid related hopefully everybody's safe this covid
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19 cases are still growing everywhere in the world hopefully you are staying safe hopefully
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you know your job is still going on and you're working from home and one of the reason you know
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we launched this growth mindset show was to bring something to people who are, you know
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working from home. They need motivation. They need some kind of inspiration. And that's where
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really we want to focus on, keep going until at least this, you know, we are all working from home
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Chaman, good morning. Good evening. Again, guys, feel free to start posting your questions during
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the show and we will take questions in the second half of the show
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If you are joining us first time, welcome, again welcome to the show from Afghanistan
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Nice to see people joining us from different countries. So before I go into too much into the specific topics, let me invite our special guest today
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and this person you know is a good friend I know him for several years
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and when I met first time you know we started working on different things
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but I have seen a big growth in over you know I would say
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in last five years or so and I want to bring that to
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the discussion today that what does it take for any of us
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to go to the next level next level means if you are a software developer
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How do you become a tech lead? If you are a tech lead, how do you become a project manager
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If you are a student, how do you get to the job? How do you find an internship
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Or if you are starting your own business, what does it take you to get to the next level
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What are the things successful people do? These people do? What are their attributes? What are their characteristics
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So you can learn from them, so we all can learn from them. So, let me know. Our today's guest is Aaron Johnson
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Let's invite Aaron Johnson to the show. hey man great to be on thanks for having me appreciate it no no problem no problem how's
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how's everything going just like everybody else trying to uh do great business try to impact
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people and then most of all stay safe and uh in these crazy times and you're joining us from i
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believe king of prussia you want to tell a little bit about how's weather there and how things are
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Yeah, so, yeah, we'll just let you in from my morning. I had acupuncture today, trying to open up my body and heal it from, you know, all the
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strenuous activities of the week. I try to wake up early every morning just to kind of beat people to the punch
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It's cloudy, a little rainy, but, you know, we can make do with what we put in our mind
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And I think that's why we're here today to talk about is growth mindset. And I started off strong with getting acupuncture and getting my mind clear to get on the show
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That's awesome. So, you know, everybody who's watching the show, I mean, starting early, starting, you know, before anybody else, really, you know, get motivated and start the day is a pretty good idea
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So, Aaron, I know I remember I met you probably about six, seven years ago now
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Yeah. And then, you know, I've seen your growth when I met you
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You know, I introduced my son, Neil, and, you know, you were, you know, you started, you were starting your company pretty much at that time
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Yeah. And what I have seen in these last few years, your company has grown probably from like zero to thousand times
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Literally. Yeah. You know, you had a few people there. Now you have, you know, hundreds of athletes
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And not only they're athletes, some are in NBA, they're playing in NBA
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Some are playing in colleges. And I've seen you very closely working with young kids
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Yeah. And one thing, if you don't mind, would you like to share your story with, you know, our audience
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And also a little bit more on your background, where you come from
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And, you know, as a as a kid growing up, what were the challenges you faced
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Yeah. So, yeah, I'd love to. Again, thanks for having me on the show and for all the people that are viewing globally in the country
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I appreciate you taking time to listen to me. You know, I started I was born in Philadelphia in the city and my dad, my mother was, you know, it was just her and my father
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my dad was actually a disciplinarian at Glen Mills, which was a school where kids who got
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in trouble would go. And my dad's job was to make sure they stayed in school. And if
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they left he would go find them and bring them back So we got to a point financially where we were just struggling and we were living in not the greatest area And this kind of started with my growth mindset was from my father my father had no previous um uh experience selling
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computers or even knew what anything was in terms of software but he was desperate he was like i need
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to figure out how to get my family to another level so he had my mother call um ibm's president
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at the time in the Northeast and say that he had a, he wanted to introduce him to Howard
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Johnson, who, by the way, he does not own the hotel chain. And he was, he, he made the phone call and said, you know, I'm, I'm another, you know
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entrepreneur that's been in the computer sales business. And I would like to talk to knowing that my father has never been in computer sales or
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didn't even know anything about computers, but somehow got the meeting with, with the
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the regional sales manager, IBM, uh, and got, you know, got the job and started selling, uh
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uh, computer software with no experience, uh, from a disciplinarian at Glen Mills. So from a young
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age, I just saw like my, my mother and, you know, and my mother's a real estate agent. She's very
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successful. And, um, you know, we just come from the ground up. I mean, from everything with my
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family's done from my grandfather on my mother's side, who's from Sicily, who came here and worked
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in a restaurant, slept on a desk to my father's family, you know, who, you know, came from Jamaica
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and Africa to come here and create their own. So it was, you know, I think a lot of things in terms
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of growth mindset, there's outliers in our life that happen that kind of trigger us to do things
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out of the norm. And then there's people that have influenced us to kind of take the next step that
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we were kind of going to. So, you know, along that path, you know, I played, I pushed my way into
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you know, playing collegiate ball at Penn State, and I had to go to prep school and dealt with
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tremendous adversity. I mean, you know, if anyone knows the show Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, which
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you know, is a show about a, you know, an African-American kid, Will Smith, who went into
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the white community, but was with a black family. That was kind of me. I was in the white community
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after being in the black community and I was the only one, even though I'm light skin
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I was looked different as. And a lot of things happened to me that were unjust because of
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you know, my background and personality. And then through that, it's helped me so much
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been able to kind of, you know, mold myself to different people because I've dealt with so many
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So through that, I went to college, then I played professionally 10 years in Europe and
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briefed it three months with the Celtics. And the hardest moment of my life was retiring and
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not knowing what I was going to do. You get to a point, I think we've all been there
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whether you're a young aspiring developer or you're a tech leader, you know, you get to this
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point where you kind of lose your identity before you find it again. And I think that's what
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happened with me is I lost my identity in terms of as a basketball player and had to kind of
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rebrand myself to the world. And it was hard. And I was able to do it through business. And I started
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my company, Ball Beyond. I didn't know what I was going to call it. I was sitting at four o'clock
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in the morning one night, you know, watching TV and I kept seeing Star Trek and beyond. And I was
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like, well, okay, basketball beyond is like, it's ever growing. It's never ending. So I was like
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okay, Ball Beyond. So, you know, three and a half to four years later, we have like six
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700 kids in our program. We have international kids flying in to train with me. And now recently
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I'm doing like consulting deals with other tech people and business leaders
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It's just how to get, you know, how to understand, how to get past your kind of vulnerability
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So that's kind of my story. And I'm just, I'm continuing to try to write it and meet good people like Mahesh
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And people aren't here. Maybe they can help me in a certain way. Maybe I can help you. So that's kind of my story
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No, that's great. That's a very inspiring story. And I think one thing we all can learn from this, your story is
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and even everybody who's watching the show, right? We have people joining us from different parts
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It looks like, you know, this is your ball beyond is your company
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It's more like a really, even though you played as a player
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as a basketball player athlete, but you end up running your own business
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So one thing I can say is from here is that we don't have to kind of restrict ourselves
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in saying that, which I see a lot. That's where growth mindset is, is when a mind says, you know what, I'm only a developer and I only can do these things
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Sure. I talk to a lot of these guys and they're like, and it's, you know, just a real, real story
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Like I call this guy like, hey, why don't you come and attend
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There's a conference happening here in, you know, in Kingoprasia area. Like, well, this is a .NET conference and I'm just a Java developer
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So this is a kind of already mindset where you're already telling your mindset, oh, that's not for me
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So one thing, you know, I really want to have the next discussion topic is that what did it take you like, you know, from being a player, being an athlete to start your own business
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What are the challenges you found? And during those challenges, what are the things you, you know, did you make friendship
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Did you become more, you know, you know, partner with somebody? How what are those things you basically from a player to a business owner
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Right. Yeah. What are the challenges you faced during that time? Yeah. So number one challenge as an athlete to become a business person is one
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First and foremost is you're not a business person. And the leverage that you had as a player gives you nothing in terms of the business world, because to be 33, 30, you know, and start my own company, you're basically restarting yourself
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And there's people that started in college at 18 that are competing against you and you're a rookie and you're older
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So I think the number one thing that I dealt with that I was able to get over and now my life is when I'm mentoring kids and I'm doing deals and things is the fear of failure
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It's such a powerful thing, just fear in general, because half the time you won't take the risk
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It's because you're listening to people that really have never taken any risk
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Everyone doesn't really want you to do something different than them. So when I decided to do this and kind of like do my own thing in the basketball space and actually run my own programs and run my own business, there were so many people said, hey, you need to partner with this guy
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And my whole thing was like, no, I'm going to take my own money into it. I'm going to own everything and I'm going to see where it goes because I bet on myself
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And I can't make it when you have your own business, you have to look in the mirror and say whether I fail or I'm successful
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It's on what you bring to it. You can't blame anyone because it's you
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You know, you can't say, oh, my boss was this. No, you are the boss. So you have to make things happen
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I think the biggest challenge is understanding the business part of whatever space you're getting into, like truly understanding it and not being afraid to fail because you're going to fail
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I mean, as you know, I mean, for the developers and people that are in the tech world, I mean, how many different startups fail before one hits
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There's just so many opportunities that you have to kind of fail to learn
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And I think without failure you don educate yourself because you won know what success is until you fail Right So yeah I 100 agree that if you look at the history any successful person right you look at Abraham Lincoln
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you look at Bill Gates, you look at Steve Jobs, you look at even, you know, Michael Jordan
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they all failed so many times, right? And we can go back to those stories where, you know
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Michael Jordan wasn't even playing varsity basketball. You know, Abraham Lincoln, he wasn't, he like
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I think he tried 28 or so many times, before he got really elected
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Yeah. And we see all these stories all the time. So one lesson we can learn from right now
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is that fear of failure should not, you know, kind of pigeonhole you in the things like
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oh, I cannot do that. That's the first thing we need to do is, even as a software developer
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sometimes we don't, you know, we don't go to the next level because we are afraid
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Okay. Oh, I cannot leave my current job. What will happen? Yeah
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So let's talk more about that fear of failure, right? So if somebody who is really, you know, who has never taken the steps outside of their inner normal, what they're used to, and they're obviously afraid, what is the first thing you would say or guide them to take a first, like a baby step
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I think changing your habits. There's a great book that inspired me, two books that I read before I started my company that really pushed me
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And one was called outliers and one was called the power of habits. I think when you change your habits, you kind of your mindset changes. So what I mean by that, it's I know a lot of people say, hey, wake up in the morning, every morning early. But it's it's it's I think it's production over activity
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You know, I think so many people are very trying to be so active, but they're not really getting anything done
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So my thing is, is create habits that have that lead to progression
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So what I mean by that is, you know, every morning I try to work out and it's it's it's more therapy
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Obviously, it's for my health, but I do stuff in the morning to prepare me for my day
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So I think if you can get up and get your mind clear and start changing your habits
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I think you can actually change your mindset to get rid of those fear of failure. I mean
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it's, it's hard to change, you know, all of a sudden when you're so used to doing something. So
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usually habits are hard to break, but you can break them by creating new ones. And then sometimes
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then the old ones kind of disappear. So I'm a big believer in just trying to create new habits. So
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if you're struggling, you know, with taking chances, you know, start waking up early and
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doing something that you would never do like you know wake up and you know join a fit class or wake
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up and box wake up and do something that's completely outside of your normal and that'll
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start getting your mind to get out of that whole mentality of oh I can't do that I don't have enough
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money or I don't have the technology or I don't have the right you know I'm not in the right space
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I think by just doing that mentally you kind of prepare yourself to take more chances
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well we are talking about um growth mindset here we are talking about habits passion we're talking
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about you know how to change your habits welcome i see a lot of people have joined us ashish welcome
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sean sean from philadelphia welcome yeah definitely power of habit you just talked about
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it's a good book you want to read you want to change your habits uh ajmat khan welcome
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Welcome to the show. Guys, if you are just joining us, this is a growth mindset show
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On this show, our goal is bring different successful people, share their stories and how they became successful and how do you really get to the next level
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You know, it could be your any career. It could be your development. It could be starting your own business
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So, so Aaron, you today we are talking about Aaron Johnson. Aaron Johnson is a good friend and founder of a company called Ball Beyond
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So you just talked about, right, habit. And habits are something which are, as you said, you have to start slow
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You have to start changing your mind. And one of the fundamentals of growth mindset is telling your mind that you can do what you don't want to do, right
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Or you can change your habits, right? Yeah. so um and you just had a good point here said like production over activities right so sometimes
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and i've been through that too sometimes we just looks like we're doing so many things in dirt
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like yeah i talked to this guy like oh i'm so busy i cannot do that like okay busy doing what
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exactly so you just mentioned that production over activity so you don't have to do million
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thing to become a productive or become successful as long as you focus on that. So out of our lives
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you know, you, we have so many things going on, social media, TV, this, that we have politics
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How do you kind of find the focus, uh, on the things that matters to you, uh, rather than just
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you know, looking at talking to everybody? What is that? How do you focus on the things, uh
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to become more productive? So my dad, he didn't tell me, I'm sure he didn't create this quote
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but there's a great quote that I live by and that my dad taught me when I was like 15
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Actions express priorities. So what your actions show is what put priority in your day
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So like for me, you know, my business is my baby. It's what creates my wealth
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It creates opportunities for people. So, you know, putting that first in terms of just being strategic about things like, you know, I know a lot of people out there and I know you can attest to this
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There's so many people that want to meet, you know, and you sometimes you have to really decipher, you know, whether those meetings are going to be productive or not
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Because I know a lot of people spend a lot of time on the phone and meeting and doing different things
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I think your time is your most valuable asset. so you know take that time and put it towards what is most important in your day you know what
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what are you striving for what is your number one goal you know if it's to if it's if it's to be um
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you know a big time developer if it's to get a new job if it's to you know get your mind in a
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different space then then then you take that time and make that sacred and not let anyone interrupt
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that because I think interruption creates a lot of um you know it creates a lot of chaos in your
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mind when you do when you're trying to focus on one solitary goal so um that's what i would say
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i would say really focus on time and foot and and think about execution over just being you know
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frantically busy for no reason yeah okay well that's great that's great so we we have you know
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two things here is one you just talk about the time right another one is goal and you know we
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had a past show where we talked about the goals and so one thing I want to emphasize here is that
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if you want to achieve something in life it could be anything right it could be getting a certification
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it could be getting a new job or it could be like a starting your own company or a startup or whatever
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learning new thing first thing I think everybody you know who is watching us is you should focus
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on setting a goal. And you know, goal can be your short goals long goals and differently eventually a purpose right In life So goal can be daily goals like today I want to finish this thing and then in you know five years
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down the road I want to be at this level. So once you have goals set as you said then you need to
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kind of look at your time where you're spending that time and we just had a show and pass focus
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on just time because every day in our lives we look at our bank account, we look at our finances
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we like measure, okay where am I spending my money? Yeah. But how many people really go and say
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oh where am I spending my time? Exactly. Like they will be watching like a TV, Netflix for three hours
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and because it's entertainment because brain is getting this food for you know junk food for
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entertainment like they're just and they don't realize that by the time they're done with the
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netflix three hours go as you said something you said something earlier that's that's perfect it's
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everyone says they're so busy but people say they're so busy because they don't want to meet
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with you if it's really important they'll make time to meet with you everybody has a time in
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the day with between being you know being on instagram and twitter and watching useless
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television or just spending time. Everybody has 30 minutes to an hour a day for something that's
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super important. When people usually say they're too busy, it's because they don't want to deal
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with you. I mean, that's just usually what happens. Yeah. Somebody, I read it or somebody
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said that half of the success in life is just to be there and be available. Okay. And so I agree
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with that. So let's change a little bit of the topic, right? So what
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I'm seeing is, you know, we did some research and I had a show here today on
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social media. And what we learned is that today in the U.S.
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average adult in the U.S. spend about three to four hours just on
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social media. Yeah. And kids even spend more, right? Now social media, games
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video games, they spend hours and hours on these gadgets and devices
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isn't you know yeah um so obviously it could be bad social media could be bad social media could
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be good or both right combination of both so let's talk about something how do you use social media
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for your benefit to achieve your goal and also not waste your time right we are talking about goal
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and time yeah yeah i think um i think i think what i've done with my businesses is that i've kind of
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put my life out there. I kind of let, I kind of let people see how I live it. Um, and just put it
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out there and try to be as genuine as possible because I mean, we have one life. I mean, I'm not
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I'm not trying to hide. I'm, I tell people what I am, who I am. And I think when you do that
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it resonates with your audience. And I think, um, the way to, the way to continue to use it is use
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it as a tool, use it as something that you can brand yourself, brand your business, but take time
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away from it, you know, read, read, I think reading is, is, is, it's been so helpful with me
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throughout the years. It's just kind of getting away, you know, getting away from the, the
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the social media world, getting away from what everyone's doing and just kind of, you know
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you, your mind is just continuing to process information and kind of decipher what makes
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sense to you. But it's challenging because, you know, everywhere we go these phones are almost
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like running our life. I remember me and you were talking about, maybe it was a year ago
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people are more worried about the health of their phone in terms of their battery life
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than they actually are their own health. You know, they'll put all this crazy stuff in their body and
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not work out. But then, you know, they're the first to run and make sure there's a charge
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for the phone, which is kind of really interesting, you know. So I think we need to put more emphasis
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on us and be more selfish with us and sometimes leave your phone behind you know like if you're
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going to run an errand just put your phone at home it's it's it's a freeing um it makes you
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feel free in a certain way when you don't have your phone i'm sure a lot of people are worried like oh my god they're on my phone but we managed pretty well without cell phones before they were
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out i mean people were able to do things so i think sometimes it's good to just leave your phone
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away from you um as as an outlet to escape social media um like anything too much of anything is not
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good yeah so this is good you know point and um i i agree with that in in our last show we talked
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about you know devices how these devices are running our lives right yep and one other thing
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i mentioned that it's okay to a few hours a day put your phone somewhere and don't even find it
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it's okay. Yeah. You know, so I don't even have a charger in my office because it's
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so I don't want to look around it. If I have to go charge, I have to walk to the kitchen
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So at least I got some work from here. Yeah. And then I leave my phone there sometimes. So
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so what we'll do now is we will welcome. Everybody looks like we have a few more people join
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Welcome to the growth mindset show. In this show, we talked about growth mindset
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We talked about success, motivation, career jobs, any questions you have feel free to post all your questions in second half of the show we are going
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to take those questions we're going to talk about the questions again questions can be anything we
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don't really restrict people for you know you can ask any question you can ask about the community
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you can ask about Aaron's shirt you can ask about anything so feel free to post your questions
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we will take a one minute break now and then we will be back
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Thank you
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Thank you
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welcome back to the growth mindset so we are if you are joining us first time
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Welcome to the show, it's a growth mindset show. We talk about mindset, we talk about growth, we talk about success, career and we have some guests on the show
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Every show we have different guests and today we have Aaron Johnson talking about success, growth mindset, motivation, body, sports, anything you guys have any questions
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So this is a second part of the show. Before I go to my next topic, Aaron, let's take one question
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I think we have a question, and this is actually leading to our discussion here
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Simon, you want to put the question in here? We have a question from Chaman
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And the question is, it's really hard for me to ask for help. How can we be more open and ask for help from others
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And this, I can relate. You know, I was in the same boat, you know, being like a shy
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coming from village. I didn't know. Sometimes I was afraid to ask questions
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Yeah. I say again, my father, you know, he has Parkinson's now. Um, he had a big influence in
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my life and I've seen all these different things happen. And he told me from a young age, he said
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you know, closed mouths don't get fed. So for me, that quote, again, it resonates with me as well
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because, you know, you never know until you ask. And I think getting behind it, I understand where
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you're coming from. Like a lot of my, some of my friends have the same issues. It's not just as
31:02
easy as saying, you just got to do it. You like, you just, you just need to ask them. You'll never
31:06
know. I think, I think a part of a part of that is confidence. A part of that is working on yourself
31:12
to, to not worry about what someone's going to say to you. Not that I think that's fear of rejection
31:19
When you're afraid to ask people things, it's, it's your thinking of what are they going to
31:23
think of you. Do they think you're not smart or do they think that you're going to get rejected by
31:30
you know, somebody that wants to give you an answer? The best way I think you can do it is
31:35
kind of start healing yourself in terms of, you know, believing in yourself and creating
31:40
things that create confidence. And by doing and simple things like this, like when you're when
31:46
you meet somebody or or even when you're getting coffee or you're out with somebody, you know
31:51
sometimes just go out of your way to say hello to someone and it sounds stupid but that in itself
31:57
is going to build that level of communication so that you're able to next time to maybe ask a
32:03
question to someone that you don't know or that is a superior to you that that will gain that
32:08
confidence so that you can do that I think I think it's so many people just say hey you just need to
32:13
do it it's it's not that simple we all have different ways we look at things and we have
32:18
different things that have, you know, the barriers that have gotten our life to make us who we are
32:25
And I think the easiest question, the easiest way to answer that is it's you can't just say, oh, yeah, you need to just ask them
32:31
I think it's more of every day try to find somebody that you can connect with that you don't know
32:37
And by building that confidence and having good experiences is going to make you ask questions to someone else
32:43
Again, without experiences and you having good experiences, it's going to be hard for you to go out of that, go out of your way and face fear a little bit of what that person is going to say to you, whether they give you a great answer, whether they reject you or whether they don't act like you exist
32:58
So my thing is small wins. Try to find small wins in your day every day so that will build a confidence so that you can ask those questions
33:07
Yes, definitely a great question. And, you know, as you said, I like the answer is first time you meet somebody, just say hi or just smile
33:16
And that's a good start point, starting point. And then just ignore them or like, you know, look away from them
33:23
That's the first thing to start with. And as you said, fear of fear of rejection
33:29
And that's it. That's a fear. It's a different kind of fear that you just worry like, oh, what people will think about me
33:36
or they will think like I don't know anything about but if you look at any successful
33:40
people in life you have to take that first step first step is just don't worry
33:46
about what people think of you like you know things, you don't know things
33:51
and just ask the question, just start with that once you start that, it's the first step
33:56
once you take the first step then I think things get better from there and then you just
34:00
and I kind of want to you know there'll be a time when you just button and they just button it clicks and then you'll be
34:09
fine from there yep exactly so looks like we have you know new people joined us wish we not
34:15
welcome to the show we have a smile uh we have rakesh uh we have uh dobras i think that's the
34:23
code name um and welcome to the show guys if you are joining us back welcome back if you're first
34:32
time welcome to the show this is a growth mind show let those questions keep coming
34:37
um and today we are talking about you know different topics topics are around jobs around
34:43
career startups starting your own business and build a mental capacity and so on so forth um
34:50
so Aaron you work with the young minds you work with the young minds you work with the kids
34:56
from age to I don't know six to even you know six eight to ten you know
35:00
Yeah, from the grown-ups, the NBA players. Yeah, NBA players. So, when you especially work with young mindset, obviously they are shy and all that
35:11
And mentorship is a big part of your program. Sure. If one of these guys, whoever joining us today, and they want to become a mentor, they want to help others, what is your advice to them
35:26
I think add value. it doesn't necessarily mean money or having a big company
35:33
I think add value. I think being a mentor is adding value to someone's life
35:37
So if, you know, if there's something that you're more knowledgeable about than others
35:43
you know, give your time. You know, I think it's why a big part of why I want to come on the show
35:48
and do more stuff like this is because I want to give my time to things
35:52
that progress. You know, I'm all about progression. Thus, the name of my company, Ball Beyond
35:56
It's always thinking beyond your limits or reaching bigger than some goal that other people set
36:03
So I think make yourself vulnerable a little bit to people. And I think when people see you're vulnerable and that you're not unattainable, you can be a mentor to somebody
36:15
People look up to people that are willing to be vulnerable. I think vulnerable is a great thing
36:21
I think people are so afraid to face their fears and the things that they try to hold dear to themselves that they're embarrassed by
36:28
But when you embrace those things, I think people see it and you become more comfortable to talk to and more comfortable to be around
36:35
So I think those qualities will help you become a mentor. So, yeah, anybody who is trying to be a mentor, help others again, you know, start slow, start with somebody you already know, probably they need help
36:49
and then one more thing you know I want to ask and I know you have
36:56
a few more minutes left sure before I let you go maybe
37:00
you want to share something like during this COVID times I know a lot of guys
37:04
working from home especially you know in the US and India where cases are growing a lot and
37:10
what are the things how do you keep yourself motivated and still keep doing things and
37:17
what would you tell our guys who feel like, you know, they're kind of stuck in the home
37:22
I think perspective right I think perspective is is is everything I think putting life in perspective will make you feel a lot better about your current status You know there so I answer that question
37:36
That's great. That's not a problem. There's so many people in the world and someone always has it worse than you, no matter how bad it is
37:46
And I think when you know how small you are in the world in terms of your problems are in your head
37:52
and then you look around and see some of the travesties that are happening to people in Africa and India
37:57
and different parts of the Middle East and even here in the United States
38:01
We have to put things in perspective. You know, the fact that we have a job, the fact that we can work from home
38:06
the fact that we can get on conferences like this is all big wins
38:11
You know, perspective is a lot. I think when we put things in perspective, it helps us understand about the norm
38:18
And if you do that, I think it will give you more clarity in your day, especially when you feel closed in working from home and feel like there's no outlet to get away from your job or get away from your family
38:29
I think perspective is everything. All right. And then we have a specific question just for you
38:36
Yeah, sure. I work with Cam Reddish, who plays for the Atlanta Hawks
38:41
Mohamed Bambo plays with Orlando Magic. I've worked with Nazi Reid, who's on the Minnesota Timberwolves
38:48
I work with the Morris twins, Markeith, who just won an NBA championship, with Chuck Ellis, who's kind of my mentor in the training business
38:58
I've worked with Keem Warwick, who went to Syracuse with the Grizzlies for a while
39:04
I work with Malcolm Miller, who's the Toronto Raptors, who won an NBA championship
39:10
I've worked with, well, who are some other bigs I've worked with
39:14
Um, J.R. Giddens, um, who's a guard, played for the Boston Celtics
39:19
I probably work with like 10 or 15 pros. Um, so the, you know, teaching them, it's just about like under, you know, that's a
39:26
relationship deal. You know, when you're dealing with someone on that high end of, uh, a player and that
39:32
makes that much money, uh, you just have to be yourself and, and, and show trust
39:37
Um, and I think that's how I've been able to work with them. People trust me because I don't try to change
39:42
I am who I am. And when people see that, they're comfortable and they're like, OK, you know, I can trust him to work with me and share intimate stuff about me and my game
39:51
So, yeah, we probably I probably have 10, 14 guys in the NBA that I work with
39:56
And, you know, now I think the level is going to I got a ton of kids in college that are going to come into the NBA draft in the next two years
40:03
So it's exciting. It's amazing to see these kids come from a, you know, a small step and then grow to be at the top of the profession
40:10
all right that's great and um looks like we have a lot of questions coming again guys the asking
40:17
question is the first thing you can start moving to the right direction right if you have any
40:22
questions you ask those questions um is what question here i had and it's about our today's
40:27
topic is privilege right so let's uh i want to spend a couple of minutes on privilege and you
40:32
can just let me know when you need to go sure i got another 10 minutes okay so let's talk about
40:37
privilege and privilege I want to explain to some people like you know some of us grow up in poor
40:42
conditions you know I remember I grew up in a village where we didn't have anything like I
40:47
didn't have mentor I didn't have guidance nobody told me what to do so it's just like running
40:52
around doing whatever really some people are born in a families and you know good environment they
40:58
get everything given to them you know I see my son he has everything you know he wants you know
41:04
he's 18 he's driving a car which i got when i was like 30 years old so it's all those combined
41:11
where do you let's spend you know talk about a little privilege and how it affects our lives
41:17
when it comes to like a growth and success everything every possible thing privilege
41:24
affects good and bad and uh privilege in terms of not having anything growing up is actually a
41:31
great thing in certain ways. And that depends who that happens to, because there's people that have
41:38
come from nothing. And without that, they wouldn't have been able to build these massive companies
41:42
and be the people they are. But then on the other side of it, there's privilege to where
41:46
you know, you're born into a silver spoon. You're born into the country clubs. You're born into the
41:52
never wanting and never asking for anything. Anything you want is at your fingertips
41:57
never experienced any hardships. I'm reading this book right now and it was, I mean
42:04
I don't know if you know the background of Buddha, but it wasn't, I don't know if it was Buddha
42:09
but it was one of the famous leaders. I don't want to misquote it, but it was talking about this person
42:15
who was born into a kingdom, right? And he had everything. That was Buddha, exactly
42:21
He was a prince. He was a prince. So he was born into incredible wealth
42:25
and he got everything he ever wanted and he just he never really felt right and he was kind of like
42:31
from what i read very depressed and kind of not knowing what to want and pretty much an asshole
42:35
just not good to people just thinking he's above everything so he decided to you know leave the
42:41
whole kingdom and go out on the streets and sleep and live like the homeless and and he did that and
42:46
he completely like basically turned his back on on the kingdom and he realized wow it's really bad
42:52
out here like i have it pretty good and slowly but surely he decided to do it i don't know for
42:56
how many years but he did it for such a long time to where he basically got used to that life he
43:01
almost died and then i guess he sat under a tree i guess it was for 49 days until he came up with
43:07
a good idea and that person became one of the most influential people the world has ever seen
43:12
and that just shows you like he he he actually suffered and and dealt with privilege on both
43:17
sides, having privilege and then being taken away. So I think like there's a fine line between
43:23
not having anything and having everything. And I think it depends on the person, right? Because
43:29
some people are born in nothing and they can make themselves out of it. I think the best way to put
43:33
it is look at our communities, look at certain countries like in India and Africa and even
43:37
here in the United States with some of the people that just have not been born, has not been given
43:42
any breaks, having coming up with no mother, no father, and having to kind of figure a life out
43:49
And then certain people say they should just figure it out, which is ridiculous, because
43:54
I mean, how can a young kid who's eight, nine years old just figure it out when they have no
43:59
parental guidance? You know, your life is, and then there's outliers who do. So I think privilege
44:05
to answer your question, I think privilege creates growth mindset or takes it away
44:11
I don't I don't necessarily think it's more important. I think it's a building block to growth mindset or it's it's a it takes away from growth mindset, depending on which which way you look at it
44:22
Yeah, I mean, yeah, I was watching this documentary on Arnold Schwarzenegger on TV last night
44:30
I mean, two, three nights before. I kind of knew a little bit, but then I watched more details
44:36
He'll say the main reason for his success is the way he grew up on a farm
44:44
the way his father treated him. His father never told him like he's good at anything
44:49
He always told him, no, you're not good at anything. and he's like that's what made him
44:54
mindset there and made him this stubborn like I going to become this I going to do something in my life I going to leave Austria I going to go to America and become a Mr Universe Yeah exactly
45:05
That's exactly what you're saying here is, yeah, so sometimes, you know, we feel, again
45:10
it goes back to growth, you know, growth mindset and the strong mindset versus weak mindset
45:17
where some of us who are born in a bad situation, weak mindset will say
45:22
oh, there's nothing I can do about it because I'm so poor, I don't have resources
45:26
While strong mindset will try to always fight to go and find their purpose and goal and try to solve it
45:35
And guys, I know some of you guys are young and it's not easy to, you know
45:40
it's easier saying than doing it and happening it. Sometimes it takes longer, sometimes take years and years to get to the, you know
45:48
I know a lot of people say, oh, look at this guy. He's successful. But sometimes you don't
45:53
realize it took him 20, 30 years to reach there where he is, right? Yeah. And success doesn't
45:59
yeah, success doesn't mean happiness. I mean, how many, how many wealthy people around the world
46:04
that we see are just miserable and then having crazy depression, anxiety, and some of them take
46:11
their own life because it's the money. Money is great. It's necessary. It will provide you an
46:18
outlet to do things that you want to do, but it does not create pure happiness. There's just
46:23
you know, that's the, that's a big thing, you know, um, in the world today. It's like
46:27
what makes us happy? How do we get happy? You know, and it's, it's, it's in yourself
46:32
you know, like, I think the biggest thing I think we can take from a lot of the things that are
46:36
going on is that life is really short and why waste it, you know, you know, continuing to
46:43
overthink things and overyze everything. Like when you're coming up and you're young and you're
46:48
trying to build, take chances, take calculated risks because it's so short. Like, do you really
46:54
want to look back and say, Hey, what if I would have just done that? You know, that's what I think
46:59
we should all learn from, from these types of conferences is take risks, be vulnerable. You
47:04
know, it's okay to fail. That's, that's things that have all made great entrepreneurs and great
47:09
business people yeah and you said really good like most people who start their businesses they fail
47:15
uh any story you look at it like frankly speaking i probably have started 12 20 different companies
47:21
and they all fail but i still continue doing more and more but you learn that as you yeah you can't
47:28
learn from success you can learn you can the people people look at the success of things in
47:34
terms of, you know, a company being sold for, you know, how many millions or billions of dollars
47:39
as success, but they learned through the process of failure, like that whole process to get that
47:46
company where it was, was, was failing. They've had to innovate and do different things to make
47:51
it become that. So like everyone talks about, Oh, he was so successful. He's failed so many times
47:57
that you, you have no idea how many times he failed, but it's the process that you remember
48:02
not the money. It's the, it's all the hours you put into, you know, taking calls and running
48:09
around meeting people and, and, and doing, you know, doing tech work or whatever your field is
48:15
It's the process. The process is so much more important than the actual end result, because
48:20
without the process, you don't learn anything. You know what I mean? No one just comes a part
48:25
of a company and just like, all of a sudden it becomes that, that, that's not realistic. So
48:30
So focus on the process and not the end result. Right, right
48:34
Okay, and then we have more questions from Nancy here. One more question is maybe this, you know
48:39
whenever you feel like, let's take one more question. Yeah, this is the last one
48:43
I got to go on two minutes. So there are times when you feel totally stuck
48:48
in knowing where to start and, you know, where to go, where the opportunities are
48:52
What is your definition of true success and impactful life story? Which looks like we were just kind of covering
48:57
this a little bit already. Yeah, yeah. I think, I mean, I'm just a big believer in that we are constantly writing a book, right
49:06
Me and Mahesh is writing a book right now. I'm writing a book right now. The people that are watching are writing a book
49:12
And we're just trying to create a new, better chapter. And I think don't focus on what has happened before
49:20
Focus on what's happening in the future. Learn from the past, but don't dwell on it
49:24
Um, I think too many of us are always looking at what our neighbor is doing. Oh, look at this
49:31
person is doing this. Look at that. It's not, that's not your life. That, that person has
49:35
nothing to do with you. And, and you shouldn't look at that and be like, oh, it's not fair. No
49:40
but we know, we all know life is unfair, but we have to start looking in the mirror and saying
49:44
it's more detrimental than we think. You know, like we, we always put all these celebrities and
49:49
people on a pedestal as like unattainable. And it's like, that's not your life. You know
49:55
like you shouldn't focus on people that have no influence on your life. And I think when we start
50:00
focusing on people that do have influence on your life, and we focus on what's in the mirror
50:04
we'll be able to have more success and find that that happiness that that you mentioned in that
50:10
question. Well, that's great, Aaron. I think I know time is up now you need to leave
50:16
again thank you so much for coming on the show I'm sure a lot of guys who are joining us
50:22
they learned from your experience and your advice and hopefully we'll get you back on the show
50:28
again sometime love to thanks so much for having me have a great day and thanks for everybody who's watching
50:33
have a great day see you guys bye bye alright so welcome guys
50:39
again while we Aaron just going to leave us so let's continue
50:45
our show. We have a few more minutes here. If you are just joining us, welcome to The Growth
50:51
Mindset. Looks like a lot of people are just sticking around asking questions. Let's take
50:56
a few more questions. May, you want to jump in quick? Hey, May, how are you? I'm doing well
51:05
Mahesh. Thank you. How are you? Good. How are things going? So I know you are watching The
51:13
growth mindset did you learn something yeah that was that was incredible I really liked um
51:19
everything Aaron had to say about forming habits and um what really stuck with me was
51:26
him talking about getting up early and doing something outside of your comfort zone you know
51:30
starting your day off kind of uncomfortable to shake you out of your um regular mindset I think
51:37
that's something that could really be of use going forward and changing my mindset really
51:46
all right all right great so let's take a few more questions looks like we have some more questions
51:52
here uh simon you want to put some questions here on the show so we can start talking and then
51:58
what role does vulnerability play in growth mindset whereas i think aaron already covered
52:05
this topic it's okay to be feel like that way because again you got there's no
52:12
role played but yeah it's okay to feel like you don't know things it's okay to
52:17
feel like you are behind everybody it's okay as long as you learn from that and
52:21
try to get to the next level right you know a couple of things we really learned from this show today is that focus on things that matters to you right Focus on looking at yourself and say hey where is my time going
52:39
How am I spending my time to achieve my goal, right? And then, you know, find, I will add a few more things
52:49
find right people who you talk to find people who are kind of they're kind of your real friends not
52:57
the friend who pick on you know things and look for negativity and all that find people who have
53:02
positive mindset uh they kind of motivate you you kind of motivate them uh that's a big thing if you
53:08
want to you know keep looking and keep growing and keep you know there'll be time when you're down
53:14
There'll be time where like, yo, I don't feel like, you know, doing something good today, whatever reason
53:21
Then you go and talk to these guys who motivates you, who says, you know, lift you up
53:31
Take more. You want to go ahead and start picking up some more questions
53:37
May? Yeah, yeah. So this question here asks about 5 a.m. I think, and your personal experience with it, I think 5 a.m. is a tough time to wake up and start
53:51
your day. But like Aaron was talking about, it's all about starting your day kind of outside of
53:56
your comfort zone. And if that's something that you're not used to, that's a great place to start
54:01
getting up and finding productivity so early in the day to really change your mindset for the rest
54:07
of the day and think positively and productively and not like you said not just um being active but
54:15
with reason with purpose and um finding accomplishments through those actions yeah and i think there are two kind of people frankly speaking some people they are early
54:27
risers some people work late you have to look at their situation uh there's no rule at 5 a.m you
54:33
really have to wake up. I know in India I used to wake up you know when I was
54:37
young I used to wake up at 3 3 30 4 a.m. because there were reasons behind it
54:43
You know we lived in village and if you wake up in 3 4 a.m. then my grand
54:48
mom and grandfather they say woke us up and slowly became a habit and we will
54:54
automatically wake up at 4 a.m. and we will go to the well because there's no
54:58
hot water there's no water and so you have to go to a pond or well to go
55:03
take a shower and run around to exercise. So you have to look at your situation
55:08
And other thing is if you, the advantage of people wake up early morning is that
55:14
when you sleep all night for six, seven, whatever, eight hours and you wake up
55:20
your mind is so fresh, means it's like a blank. So anything you write on that mind
55:26
is you can retain for longer time. You can focus more because your brain is not
55:32
processing all day's garbage. Okay, so the reason you do good things in the
55:38
morning is, you know, I remember anything I need to learn for my examination, I'll
55:45
read that early in the morning. That's how we do and we learn in India that you
55:49
got to study in the morning. Why? Well guess what? If you're reading something
55:54
in the evening or afternoon and you have some fight in daytime or you have
55:57
somebody picked on you, your brain is thinking about that. So you have too much
56:02
clutter going in your mind in the evening or afternoon while in the morning you're fresh
56:08
Your brain is really empty, okay? It's like a computer, your processor has only one application
56:13
running in the morning while in the evening your computer has 20 different applications running and
56:19
they're all sharing the memory. So think of that way. So you have to look at yourself, your strengths
56:26
what kind of person you are. If you can wake up early and you can be more productive early
56:31
that's great if you cannot that's also great you need to find that time for me
56:35
for example from last and I work at 10 and night from 10 30 to 12 something
56:41
that's when I'm really focused so you have to find your your zone that come
56:45
for your zone where you can really focus on all right let's take more questions
56:54
Simon you want to put more questions here? Okay, yeah this was your question
57:02
Hello, thank you for... I have a question. Me and my friend we are creating a game more often than I like
57:11
I find myself not having mental capacity to work or I need one to do
57:17
Any tips in order to be able to do more? I think this question has you know some need some more details like are you do
57:27
you have a skill set to build the game right that's number one and if you have
57:31
skill sets you are just you can just find to be motivated focus that's
57:35
different thing but if you don't have a skill set what I would do is probably
57:39
find somebody as a team member of the team who has the skill set number one
57:46
Number two, when you say mental capacity is like are you not focused or motivated
57:53
then you need to find somebody who can help you in that, that you know, basically
58:00
sometimes you can get in a mentor or somebody who can guide you in the right
58:05
direction and tell you this is doing wrong, this is doing right. So having that
58:10
right partner right team helps in these situations. So you know sometimes if you
58:17
look at the history of any successful company there are chances you will be
58:22
more successful any companies are more successful when they have two or three partners compared to one just one owner one founder. Why? Because there'll be
58:31
time where you don't know things you're stuck then you like demotivated because
58:35
you're spending so much time trying to solve one problem. So you need to look at
58:40
your situation what the problem actually is and what the solution can be either do you need to
58:46
bring more more partner or more you know team members to the team or you need help from the
58:52
mentorship side that's where i would recommend you going in that direction
58:56
all right simon we have any more questions yeah i think that's a
59:04
Alright guys Simon you have any more questions
59:14
I can look at the error. No we are good. We are good. Alright
59:19
Okay guys I think what we will do is we will close the show with this end
59:26
Looks like we had a good show everybody. Thank you for joining us from different parts of the world
59:32
We love this show. it's every Friday focus is growth mindset focus we talked about career jobs grow growth success
59:42
startups anything community so I hope you learned something today from today's show and hope to see
59:51
you next Friday 10 a.m. Eastern thank you thank you everyone Thank you
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