243. Create Your Own Luck: Work Ethic + Attitude

Luck isn’t random—it’s engineered by how you work and who you are while you work. In this Mindset Café episode, we break down 10 practical moves to expand your opportunity surface area: reframing luck, defining the work-ethic/attitude equation, compounding daily reps, turning attitude into a credibility multiplier, making yourself findable, stacking interlocking skills, moving fast when windows open, choosing hard rooms, staying resilient without drama, and closing the loop with follow-ups and proof. If you want more serendipity in business and life, build the habits that invite it in and keep the door open.

Chapters

• 0:18 Luck As Math, Not Magic
• 1:27 Work Ethic As The Key
• 3:22 Action Beats Vision Boards
• 4:36 Focus On Possibilities, Not Fears
• 5:37 Obstacles As Filters, Not Stops
• 7:52 Luck Is Man-Made
• 9:21 The Barber Story On Attitude
• 13:53 Make Yourself Findable For Opportunity
• 16:34 Friction Creates Growth
• 21:06 Show Up At 100 Percent
• 22:44 Presence With Family And Work
• 23:10 Create Your Own Luck Today

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:18

What's up, guys? People call it luck, I call it math. Do the reps, bring the attitude, and watch what the odds tilt. Today we're engineering good luck on purpose. Right? Welcome back to another episode of the Mindset Cafe podcast. It's your boy Devin. And if you've ever looked at someone and thought, man, they get all the breaks. Like they're just lucky. Right. This episode is going to deconstruct, but also just reshift your mindset about luck, right? And what's really happening. So we're going to cover a few different points, and hopefully it will allow you to expand your mind and expand your attitude, right? And allow you to actually see the opportunities that are in front of you, right? Because most of the time, opportunities are every day. It's just your mindset and your view of the world and your view of your day that allows you to miss those opportunities. So this isn't, we're not going to go off of theory, we're not going to go off of you know make-believe, you know, hypothetical things. Like this is practical, this is repeatable, and you can honestly start it today. So you guys already know I'm a I'm a big analogy person, and I want you to think as luck is the door, right? The door to your next level, the door to the opportunity that you've been seeking. And your work ethic is essentially the key. That is the key to unlock the door of luck. But to keep that door open, you're gonna need those hinges to work, and that's your attitude. Your attitude towards your day, your attitude towards others, and your attitude just in your attitude just to everything. So I want you to think about luck in the sense that it's not a lottery ticket, right? Just like success is not a lottery ticket. You don't just get handed success, get handed, you know, your your dream opportunity. It's a visit, and the way you get that visit to luck, and the way you get to be able to go to you know, uh get that opportunity essentially is your work ethic. That's how you get the invite, right? And your attitude's gonna keep that invite open because if you have a positive attitude and you have you know an attitude people want to be around and and you know, so forth, that's how you get referred, that's how you you know meet new people and so forth. So I want you to shift your mind from thinking about luck as some random magic that just happens, you know, and if you just keep hoping and praying and wishing that you know it's gonna increase your odds because that's not how it works. I'm gonna go a little off topic. You know, we've talked about vision boards and we've talked about those things, like those are all awesome tools, right? You should have you know a vision or a game plan of where you're going, but at the same time, just because the vision is there, just because you've mapped it out in your head or you mapped it out on a board, doesn't mean that the world is gonna hand it to you. That's not how it works. You have to take action and you have to do it whether you feel like it or not. We've said this, I've said this multiple times. You have to think of your work ethic every single day because how you do one thing is how you do everything. Your work ethic every single day, showing up when you don't feel like it, showing up when you do feel like it, but either way, you're showing up with a positive attitude, you're showing up with an attitude that other people want to be around because that's what creates a gravitational pull towards you. Opportunities start coming towards you, people you know want to be around you. Um, you know, success just starts to you know happen, right? Because it's your outlook. If you have a positive outlook, then you're going to naturally start to see things from a positive view, and you're gonna see the opportunity in each and everything versus what could happen negatively. So many different things can happen negatively, but whatever happens is because you think about it. How many times have you been, you know, actually, hopefully you haven't been doing this a lot, but have you ever been driving or have you ever let's say if you you know have ever tried snowboarding and your first time snowboarding, you're like, don't fall, don't fall, don't fall, don't fall, and all of a sudden you fall, right? Because you're thinking about falling. So your brain is gonna make you do what you're thinking about. But if you're not thinking about falling, then typically you'll go a little bit further. You might still fall, but it's not, you're not all of a sudden anticipating the fall and then eventually throwing yourself off balance to fall. And you're like, see, I knew I was gonna fall, right? And like that's that's the outlook we have a lot of times on certain situations. We look for the negative, and then when it does happen, we're like, see, I knew that was gonna happen. When in reality, if we weren't thinking about that and we were thinking about the potentials, what if that native you know event happened or that roadblock came out? Instead of being like, oh see, I knew it wasn't gonna work out, being like, okay, well, this happened, how do we get around this? How do we keep going? Because that's what we talked about in the last episode, right? Your obstacle can be the end point, which it is for a lot of people, or it creates an opportunity for you to find the path that most people don't, and that's why at each level on whatever journey you're going towards, each level you get to, there's less and less people, right? That's that's one of the biggest things, let's say for myself, being an entrepreneur, how many personal trainers say they're gonna open a gym? I'm sure you've worked with a personal trainer, you know, a personal trainer, and when they first become a personal trainer, the first thing they say, you know, in the back of their mind, I'm gonna own my own gym one day, and and so forth. Not very many actually do it. From there, it's like, okay, well, how many people now take that gym and actually expand it? Very few. Each level gets less and less people because the roadblock appears and then they stop there. You have to be willing to look around and see the positive opportunities, whether it works or not, that's just the next obstacle for you to now look for the next path, the next destination or next, you know, I guess path uh round so that you keep moving forward. No, no path to success is a straight line, right? It's gonna be jagged, it's gonna twist all up and all over the place. But at the end of the day, as long as you started here and you're ending up here, it's a win. Whether someone else's is here and yours is way spread out, that doesn't matter. At the end of the day, you both got there, and that's where I think a lot of people start to struggle is they see someone else, let's say, losing weight, and one person's losing weight a little bit faster, and all of a sudden they start to you know critique themselves and like it this isn't working for me, or you know, I'm doing something wrong. It's like, no, maybe your body is just starting off a little bit slower. Maybe you've been working out for a certain amount of time, maybe you need to switch up your workouts, maybe you need to switch up your nutrition more times than not. It's the nutrition, right? If it's not working for you, then find the new path that allows you to continue on what you're doing, but sometimes you have to make a little minor tweak. So I want you to think of luck is man-made. There is, I mean, obviously, you win the lottery and stuff like that. That's you know, you're more likely to get hit by lightning. But true luck is man-made, right? It is made by your work ethic, how hard you work, if you're truly putting 100% into everything that you're doing, and then it's your attitude every time you show up. I can't tell you how many times when I was a personal trainer, you know, when I had my own personal training company, and I would show up, and man, I would be tired, uh, physically, mentally, you know, just drained. But whether my my face looked like it or not, I still showed up with energy. And I remember countless clients being like, You look tired. Like, no, I'm good. Like, let's let's get it, you know. And my response to them was was true. Even though I felt tired, looked tired, whatever, I knew that I was still good to go, and I kept pushing forward. And then they didn't ask me throughout the session if I was still tired because they see I was showing up. Didn't matter how I looked, didn't matter how you know, my if I had back was under my eyes or not, they knew I was there and I was present. I've told this story before. Um but for those of you guys that haven't heard it, I was talking with my, I was getting a haircut from my previous barber and who was a friend and he was a natural plant mine and everything like that. And I was his last client of the day, right? I would train him and he, you know, he would cut me up. And I showed up and he started off the haircut just going on and on about how tired he was and how it was such a long day and how busy he is and all this stuff. I'm sitting there for like 10 minutes just listening, just listening. And then finally I was like, yo, I was like, I'm not gonna sit here and compare who is more tired, right? We both know like if we're going hour for hour who worked more, like I would out outdo you, right? But that's not what it's about. Have you ever showed up to one of our training sessions? And I and you you tell me, you know, you look tired, and I responded, yeah, I am, I'm you know, so busy right now. And then he sat there for a minute, you know, turned the clippers off and thought about it. And I was like, think about it. Any have have I ever told you I was tired? And he thought about research, honestly, no. And I was like, there's a reason for that. The more you tell yourself you're tired, the more tired you get. But also think about this. Every time we trained, you looked forward to coming to see me to train. So why would I make you feel like I didn't want to be there? Because I would I was tired, I would rather be resting, I would rather be doing something else than being present with you right now. I was like, don't get me wrong, you're telling me all this right now, that's fine. We're boys and all that kind of stuff, but I guarantee if you're telling me telling me this, I guarantee you you tell this to other clients. And you will start to lose clients if you continue to do this. I promise. May not happen the first time, but how you do one thing is how you do everything, and I guarantee you're gonna repeat it again to the same client, it's gonna be a kind of a little trend, and then all of a sudden, that dude's gonna be like, yo, like my barber just doesn't want to cut me up. He he's you know always tired and and whatever. And so I told him that, and ever since then, he never told me that he was tired. I you know, he's mentioned to me multiple times how that that one one little best is, that little one little talk, you know, resonated with them. And his work ethic was good, don't get me wrong. Like, even when he was tired and telling me how tired he was, like he still cut good, still did everything good, but it was his attitude, right? And that's what kills a lot of the time is your attitude. You could be the hardest worker and and and be the best best person in your trade or you know, in as a friend, but if every time you show up, your attitude shit, it's not gonna last very long. I don't care what the situation is, I promise. Um, but you get to realize that like that's why would I refer someone to let's say that barber if I knew he was and I did we didn't have this talk, and I knew he was gonna be, you know, telling each person that I sent him how tired he was and how this and how that. And it's like this is you know, for not for me. Like honestly, I know there's a lot of guys love getting haircuts, and it's like their spa time. Like, my barbers know that yo, I want to be in and out. Like, we can talk as we cut, but don't stop cutting to you know go on with the whole story, but we don't have time for that. Um, but why would I send someone to him that it's their highlight of the day? Like they love getting cut up every week or every other week, and I'm and I'm like, yo, he's really good, and I and I refer you um a client, and all of a sudden that's their experience, just hearing all this negativity and and all that kind of stuff, and feeling like they don't you don't want them there, like I wouldn't refer anyone to that. So you have to think of that as how opportunity is as well. Why would opportunity seek you out if you're always gloomy, if you're always down, if you're always negative. No opportunity is gonna seek that out except for the negative ones. And then you're gonna tell yourself, well, look, I told you it wasn't gonna do this, or look, I told you this was gonna happen. Well, yeah, no shit. You were looking for that. If you're looking for that, it's gonna find you. It's it's that simple. Yeah, we have good days, and yeah, we have bad days, but at the same time, actually, I'll rephrase that. Every day is a good day, and that's not to sound cheesy, but throughout your day, you have good moments, you have so-so moments, and you have moments that aren't so favorable, right? Bad moments. But that one bad moment doesn't make the day a bad day unless you let it. Let's say you get into, this has happened to me before, let's say you get into a fender bender, you get in a car accident, right? How long does that car accident happen? Right? Then there's the paperwork and you know, taking pictures and all that kind of stuff. Five minutes, ten minutes max. Maybe let's say you take your car to, you know, the auto shop or whatever case, let's say an hour total. Well, there's still 23 other hours in the day. So why would I let one out of 23 more, right? 24 total, affect me and say this whole day is bad. Like it doesn't make sense. So you gotta think in every in every bad situation or bad event in the day, there's a lesson to be learned. The heart accident, could have left a little bit earlier, not been a rush. Could have made sure I was checking this and that, right? You know, looking out my side mirrors more. Whatever the case may be, take the lesson, learn so it doesn't happen again. That's how life works. You get knocked down, you get back up, you get knocked down, you get back up. Each time you get back up, you should get back up stronger, you should have learned something, you should have become a better version of you. Um and so, like all that is to say you have to make yourself essentially findable for luck, right? Because your days compound, and that's where opportunity sits. There's not maybe not the opportunity that you're looking for in every single day, but at the same time, it might just be tomorrow, it might be in an hour, you don't know, so you show up like it's going to present itself each and every day, each and every moment, because you don't know. No one knows. But if you should have prepared for opportunity to find you, then it will. Right? And the compound effect essentially is you have to think that 30 minutes focused a day can add up to 180 plus hours in a year. So let's say you're focusing on a task or focusing on a new skill, and you're shit at it today. Right? Let's say you're working out, right? First time you've ever worked out in your life. Do a 30-minute workout, whoops your ass. Well, you do it again tomorrow, whoops your ass. Next day, it whoops your ass, right? But all of a sudden in a year, you're doing 30-minute workouts daily. Well, you've already worked out for over 180 plus hours in the year. Don't you think by you know 170 the workout's not gonna be as bad? Yeah. If you can do anything for you know that long, you're gonna get better at it. It's inevitable. You learn what doesn't work, you learn how to do it better, you learn how to improve throughout the process. You're not gonna start off, you know, a professional. Just not how it works. I don't care what people tell you, I don't care, you know, who's done it, you know, and and struck gold on the first go, that's just not how it goes. 99.99% of the time. So you have to realize that if you're invisible to luck, to opportunity, then it can't find you, right? And that you're gonna stay invisible if your attitude is shit you didn't get a good weigh-in, you know, reading, okay. How are you gonna improve? Ask for help. No self- self-reflect, see what you're look back on what you did wrong, right? But don't let that affect the next week, the next two weeks, the next four weeks. You gotta think that, you know, your attitude essentially is a multiplier. It can multiply the good and it can multiply the bad, but at the end of the day, attitude is everything. And I should not wear it today. You know, even one of the shirts that we have at the gym, you know, shout out to RBO because I've copied their shirt, but um the attitude is everything within the shirt, right? That is a hundred percent the truth. Attitude is everything. You have to be early, you have to be ready, and you have to be willing to say yes to the right things. But if you don't have an opposite, if you don't have an opportunistic mindset and the opposite uh man, I'm just getting all tongue-tied right now. If you if you're not looking for opportunity and you're not willing to try, and you're not willing to fail, and you're not willing to learn, then you're always gonna stay where you're at. And you're always gonna look at other people like they got lucky, but that's not the case. You have to find the things that are more difficult that are gonna level you up, right? Friction in your path is a good thing. Anytime you have to do something that is outside your comfort zone, outside your norm, that is you growing. Think about working out, right? Let's say you can't do 10 push-ups. All of a sudden, over you know, a year, now you do 10 push-ups. But just because you can do 10 push-ups when you're doing the 10 now, that's not the work. The work happens once the burn starts happening. Muhammad Ali used to say, you know, they asked how many push-ups can you do? I don't know. I don't start counting until it starts burning. Because that's where the change is. If it's not, if there's no friction, if there's no resistance, that's your your homeostasis, that's your normal. That's something you could already do. You have to push past that to achieve more. So I want you to hopefully look at some of the some of the things that are going throughout your day and realize, are you showing up with 100% effort? Because if not, then you're just wasting your time. If you're just showing up and going through the motions, wasting your time. 100%. If you're going to show up and you're willing to spend your time, the most invaluable thing that you have, if you're willing to spend your time doing something, why not give it 100% of the effort? Or why do it at all? If you show up with that kind of work ethic and a positive attitude, opportunity is going to find you. I can promise you. So I just want you to take that, and you know, today is not going to be a super long one or anything like that. I just want you to realize that you have to make sure that you're self-checking yourself and giving yourself that reality pep talk that I had with my barber. And realize sometimes you have to lie to yourself, and even though you might not feel good, if you're at work or if you're with your family and you're supposed to be present with them, be present with them. My three-year-old daughter doesn't care if I had a long day at work. She just knows I get home, she wants to play with me. It doesn't matter how I feel, it doesn't matter how stressed I am. It doesn't matter that I had a good or a bad, you know, business meeting. It's playtime. Think about that. How many times do you show up, you know, and someone's looking forward to seeing you, or whether it's at work, whether it's family, you're a significant other, and you show up and you're not even there. Because, and then you, you know, sorry, say it was a long day, I just don't feel you know, I feel out of it. How do you think that makes the other person feel? There's gonna be more days like that. And when those days compound, that's where separation starts to sink in. And that's the same separation that's sinking in with your luck or your opportunities because you're showing up and saying, sorry, I just don't feel like it today. So hopefully that that sinks in a little bit for you. Um make sure you guys share share this episode with a friend, right? I want you to share this episode with someone that's told you that they're tired, that you know they're that they've had the mindset we've been talking about where you know they always are that person that the woe is me, or that you know, other people are lucky. I'm just I'm just naturally unlucky. Share this episode with them. I challenge you to do that. But I just want to let you guys know you can create your own luck starting today, starting right now. But are you going to? That's the real question. Hopefully, you guys do. See you guys on the next one. I appreciate you guys. I love you guys. You guys need anything? Send me out.

SPEAKER_01: 24:00

Like my set caught shots. I can't be distracted. I'm a find a time to be back.