The Identity Shift — Who Do You Need to Become

Most people want a new life but are holding onto an old identity. They want new results with old thinking. New income with old habits. New relationships with old patterns. And that's exactly why they stay stuck.

In Episode 10 of The Mindset Academy, we go deeper than motivation. We go deeper than habits. We get to the root — your identity. Who you believe you are is controlling every decision you make, every opportunity you accept, and every limit you tolerate. And until that changes, nothing else will.

In this episode, Terrence breaks down the psychology behind why identity runs your life, why most people never make the shift, and the exact tools you need to shed the old version of yourself and build the one your next level demands.

What you'll walk away with:

• Why your current identity was built by repetition — and how to rebuild it intentionally
• The science behind why growth feels like a threat to your brain
• How your environment and your circle are quietly keeping you the same person
• A four-step framework to audit, interrupt, release, and rebuild your identity
• What the identity shift actually feels like in real time — and why most people quit right before the breakthrough

This episode is for the leader who knows they're capable of more but keeps getting in their own way. It's time to stop performing the old version and start becoming the new one.

Drop "IDENTITY SHIFT" in the comments if you're committed to building the next version of you.

🎙️ The Mindset Academy | Hosted by Terrence Feagin. New episodes every week. Subscribe so you never miss a drop.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to the Mindset Academy. This is a place where your excuses they come to die and your potential finally wakes up. I'm your host, Terrence Fagan, and I'm here to help you break your limits, level up your mindset, and actually live the life you keep on talking about. Look around here, we do not do fluffy motivation, we do real talk, proven tools, and a powerful conversation with people who've been through it and came out winning. So I want you to buckle up because we're diving into the psychology, the grind, and the glory of becoming your best self. This is the mindset academy. Class is officially in session. Yo, welcome back to another episode of the Mindset Academy. And before we really jump into this whole episode, I just want to clap it up. Why am I clapping it? Because man, we hit a milestone. We hit a milestone of 10 episodes in now. Y'all probably thinking, man, that's not a big milestone. Well, goddammit it is for me. And I'm gonna be real because me, some people never even have 10 episodes, some people never get the ideas off the ground, some people never even really try. So I'm gonna clap it up for me. And you know, I'm gonna talk about some statistics as well. So, yes, I've been doing this podcast for a while, stopped, got back on it, and we're 10 episodes in so far. So we'll see how far I can really take this. I want to take this to infinity and beyond. But really, I don't know. You know, I'm I'm taking whatever the Lord gives me and moving it as passionately as possible. But I want to talk about some of the statistics, yo. So 10 episodes in a majority of the podcast is being listed in the United States as of right now. And what I can see here is that we actually in other countries. So I got two actual listeners or two individuals that listen to the podcast in Japan, one in Brazil, one in Singapore, one in Bangladesh, one in Iraq. Iraq. Is it Iraq or whatever, Iraq, and one in Vietnam. So, I mean, 10 episodes in, you never really know where you know this can take you. So we're not all over the world yet, but we getting there, we're pushing it, we're pushing the boundaries every single day. And you know, the course United States, we're all over the map right now. But man, 10 episodes in, dude. I'm I'm happy for it. I don't give it. I don't look, I'm happy. And if you're happy for me, continue to listen, continue to download these, continue to listen and um support the boy. As y'all know, I'm also on IG, TikTok, and also YouTube. So if you want to see more of Terrence Fagan, if you want to see more of the boy, the young man, the kid, I ain't no kid, I'm a grown-ass man, but y'all catch my jerk, right? Alright, so the episode today is titled The Identity Shift. Who do you need to become? You know, I think it's all about becoming the journey, the destination is gonna be there, but becoming the person that you want to be is bigger than anything. So let me ask you, and I need you to really sit with this question, really sit with it. Like take your time and understand what I'm asking you. But who are you right now? I'm not talking about your job title, I'm not talking about what your mama called you, not the version of you that actually shows up at the family cookout. I'm talking about the identity that you are carrying every single day. I'm talking about the story you tell yourself about who you are and what you're actually capable of. Because here's the truth. Here's the truth. Most people are living inside of an identity that was built for them, but not by them. I'm talking about your environment is shaping you, your failures have shaped you, your wins have shaped you, other people's opinion of you have shaped you. And somewhere along that, you accepted that version of yourself that was never actually yours to keep. But what if I told you that that identity is not permanent? It can change, dog. It can change, you can change it right now. What if I told you that the story that you've been living is just a draft? It's just a draft. You can change it. You have the power to rewrite it. So today, we're going deep. We're going into the deep blue sea. Y'all know I love the sea, man, being in the navy, but man, I remember being out to sea and it was just so dark. I'm talking about pitch. This is the darkest blue, navy blue that you will ever see in your life. And sometimes when you talk about your identity shift, you gotta bring that dark blue out of you. But what happens is that most people they never really want to bring it out, and that's exactly how you can actually stay in that world. But I want you to shed who you were to become who you need to be. And this is the mindset academy, and that's what we're doing. So let's get right into it, alright? What is the identity that you are holding, and why does it run in your life? Here's the science behind it, right? So it really matters why you're holding that. It really matters because you know, really, before we even talk about your identity, do you you need to understand this identity is actually what actually what identity actually is because most people think identity is just who they are, it's fixed, it's permanent, it's set in stone, but that's not how the brain works, brother. That is not how the brain works. So I did a little research on this. So, a psychologist named Dr. Carroll at Stanford, very smart individual, they found that people who believe in their traits are fixed. That's what they call a fixed mindset. They avoid challenges, they give up easy, they see efforts, they think life is really pointless. But the people who believe they can grow, of course, opposite a fix is a growth mindset, and they embrace the changes and they see them as an opportunity to evolve. Are you looking at yourself as an opportunity to evolve? Understand that the identity is a collection of your beliefs, it's what you believe about yourself, it's what you deserve, it's what is possible for you, and all of those beliefs are built on one thing what you repeatedly say to yourself. Every time you act in a certain way, dog, your brain says, Ah, that's just who I am. Every time you avoid something, your brain says, We don't do that. Every time you tolerate something, your brain says, We can just accept it, dog. You are choosing your current reality, you repeat your ways into it. What it is, is an identity loop. You're staying stuck, you're on the rat way, the rat wheel, you're constantly running around the track, the same exact loop. So here's what nobody's really talking about. Your identity doesn't just live in your head, it controls your behavior. Your behavior reinforces your identity. Your identity is creating your results. As I said, it is a loop. It's a loop. So I read a book, right? Um, James Clare, the author, The Atomic Habits. What they were talking about, what James talked about is explaining the identity based on habits are really the most powerful because they change what you believe about yourself. He also wrote that every action you take is a vote for the type of person you want to become. The goal isn't just to read the book, it's about becoming a reader. It's not about running a mile, it's becoming a runner. And I could really talk more about that because, man, I remember one point in time is you know, I used to hate running, then I started doing it. And I'm like, okay, this is getting easier. I started going a lot further. I started going a lot further. I started to push myself, and that's just how life works. Now I had to re-kind of restart because after I had my daughter, man, I really fell off, but now I'm getting back to it and I'm running two miles every day, and I'm seeing like I'm gaining that competitive edge back. I'm gaining that that that deep person is coming out of me and it's pulling out of me every mile I run, and what am I doing? I'm becoming that runner again. So when somebody says, I've always been this way, I don't want to hear that. What because what they're really saying is you have been voting for that version of yourself for so long and you forgot that you were casting those votes. So you love that person, you want that person to consistently come out. You are the voter, you are the architect, you are building your life, you are constructing it, and it's just a structure. But get what? Like all great structures, they can be torn down. Structures can be rebuilt. So, man, it's been so many times where I've had to rebuild myself. It's been so many times, like I just had to have a rebuilding structure, man. It was a version of myself that I believe hard work alone was enough, and I was grinding, putting in hours, checking boxes, but it didn't fit the mode of who I want to be to be. So I had to rechange, I had to change where I was. And I'm telling you that when you change who you are, you can rebuild it to become somebody else. But the most dangerous thing about an old identity is that most dangerous prison for anybody is that they can't see it. The old identities, they don't announce themselves, man. They don't show up and say, hey, I'm your limiting belief. It's a prison door that people can walk out of, but they show up as self-sabotage, procrastination, fear, imposter syndrome, and staying comfortable. Identity is a threat, man. But the good thing about threats is that you can avoid those threats. You can you can eliminate those threats. But if you're not eliminating those threats, it won't go anywhere. And really, it's you're not eliminating those threats because you're comfortable. You have to become comfortable with becoming uncomfortable, discomfort. You have to feel it in order to level up, you have to feel the discomfort, and it's not about being weak, that's your old identity fighting back, man. I'm fighting my old identity, something I've been working on my whole entire life. And I'm not just trying to survive, I'm not trying to protect myself from it. I understand it. But you have once you understand it, you fight every day. And if you don't understand that yet, you'll quit every single time it gets hard, and you'll start to blame it on motivation. But it's not motivation, it's not so let's talk about why most people never really shift. And as I said before, it's about comfort, it's a comfort trap. These people are comfortable. You have to be okay with getting out of the comfort trap. And the brutal honest truth is that most people want a new life. Hold on, hold on, hold on. I'm gonna stop this episode right here for one second. This is not a commercial, it's not for sponsors. I don't have any sponsors. I'm stopping it because I need to say something directly to you. I mean you, the person listening to this right now. If you've been listening to the Mindset Academy for any amount of time, whether this is your first episode or your 15th, there's a reason you keep coming back. It's not because you need more information, you have more than enough information. You keep coming back because something in you know that there is a version of you, your business, your leadership, your confidence, your life that you have not yet stepped into. And you're trying to close that gap. See, I understand. Here's what I've learned from coaching entrepreneurs and leaders, and what nobody in the personal development space will say out loud. Podcast books, courses, YouTube videos, they can give you the framework, but they cannot give you that shift that you're looking for. The shift, the actual change in how you see yourself, how you carry yourself, how you make decisions, how you lead. That doesn't happen from consumption, it happens from confrontation. Confrontation with the story you've been telling yourself, confrontation with the belief that's been quietly running your business behind the scenes, confrontation with the version of you that's been playing it safe and calling it strategy. I want to ask you something. I've never asked a regular episode before. How long have you been running and living under the same ceiling? The same revenues, the same level of confidence, the same patterns showing up in your team, same decisions you keep not making, the same version of yourself running the same playbook, how long? How long has it really truly been? Six months, a year, three years? How long has it been? And how much of that ceiling is costing you? Not just in money, but in time and opportunity in the life that you have on pause while you're trying to figure it out. That's not judgment, that's a question. I've had to sit with this myself, and I tell you it's a lot. It is the question that had led me and led me to building Elevate 6. See, Elevate 6 is my private one-on-one coaching program, and I want to tell you that what it actually is because it's probably not what you think coaching is. It's not me giving you a strategy, it's not me holding you accountable to a checklist, it's a direct, private, weekly partnership where we go after a specific belief, the specific patterns, and the specific internal blocks that have been setting a ceiling on every area of your life. And then we break right through it. And it's not over years, it's not over months, sometimes it's over weeks. I've watched people who have been stuck in the same income level for three years, close their biggest deals ever in just 90 days. I've watched leaders who couldn't hold a team together build a culture that their people actually fight to be a part of. I've watched entrepreneurs who second guess every price they set to start to change what their actual worth is without apology and without having to close more clients that they ever had to do without actually overcharging. Not because I give you something new to do. Nah. It's because we change who they actually were. And when their identity changes, everything changes. The strategy, the confidence, the results, it's all of it. So now I want to ask you here is who elevate six is actually for. It's for the person listening to this podcast, which tells me you already know the inner work is real and it's necessary. And you're ready to stop consuming and start to transform. It's for the entrepreneur who is generating revenue but knows that they're operating at 60% of what they actually can be capable of. It's for the leader who is performing with confidence externally and carrying something completely different internally, it's for the person who is done waiting for the right moment. Because here is what I know after coaching hundreds of people, the right moment never comes on its own. You have to make it. Again, this is an investment for the Libase 6. I want to work with you, I want to show you, but before you do anything, before you even pay a single dollar, I need you to start with a 30-minute discovery call with me directly. No sales pressure, no salespeople, no pitch. It's just an honest conversation on what is any way of what you are doing, and is this even a right fit for you? If not, I'll tell you. It's a promise. The link to apply is in the show notes. It takes two minutes to fill out, and personally, I review every single application within 48 hours. If this is something that you truly, absolutely want, I want you to take that step. Alright. Now I appreciate you letting me step into this episode for a second. This program means everything to me, and the people inside it are some of the most confident, committed, high-caliber people I've ever been with in a room. If you belong in that room, I'll see you there. Now let's get back to the episode. But they want to keep the same identity when it's not going to happen. They want new results with old thinking, new income, with old habits, new relationships, with old patterns. You can't live a new story while you're still attached to an old character, it's not going to work, it's not capable of working. Comfort is not just preference, it's a prison that doesn't have bars. Become the most interesting person by coming outside of your comfort zone. Because the most dangerous comfort zone is an identity that feels safe, bruh. Identities that feel safe. Come out of that. Come out of that. Man, there was a study done back in 2019 at a university. I think the university was Bath University. So basically, what they said is that they found that most people often choose a familiar negative outcome over a familiar positive one. Why is that? That's because the brain is wired to prefer a known over an unknown. Be comfortable with stepping into the unknown. Even when the unknown is objectively better, you'll always step out into the known. That's called the status quo bias. Growth requires overriding it. If you want to become better, step into the unknown. You have to be okay with stepping into the unknown. So here's the mirror problem. You know what stops most people from actually shifting their identity is because they're looking in the mirror and they see the wrong self. They look at the past when they say, Oh, this is who I am. They look at their environment and they say, This is what I deserve. They look at other people and they say, That's the problem. I'm the problem. But the mirror. You need to use it to define yourself in the life that you want. The life of who you are. Man, y'all remember Cassius Clay Muhammad Ali. He was a young fighter. But before he became Muhammad Ali, he would actually walk up to people and announce, I'm the greatest. People laughed at him. He wouldn't, he wouldn't even acknowledge the fact of people laughing at him. He wouldn't do anything. Even if he didn't win yet, he always announced and declared that identity of who he is, even before the world could even confirm it. And he built it in the mirror first. And I'll be open and honest with y'all, man. I look in the mirror and I tell myself I'm a multimillionaire. My bank account is not there yet. I tell my family and I tell my kids, I'm a multimillionaire. I look at every I look at my phone screen. I look at my god dang um computer screens. I look at a goal that I I have on my actual, I'm looking at my like my vision board and I write down in my book every single day. I'm reacknowledging the fact that I am a millionaire. And guess what's gonna happen? Lord willing. If we got a lot of time, like because they about to they about to blow this shit up in a minute, but Lord willing, man. It's going to happen. See, the environment is going to keep you the same person. But here's something that people Never talk about the environment is the one one of the most powerful identity anchors that exist. And your environment will keep you there. The people around you, the spaces you're in, the conversations you're exposed to, they're consistently sending your brain a message about who you are, about who you are. Man, the behaviors, the modes, even your identity, everything is contagious. The likelihood of success is going to continue to increase by based off of where you are, your social networks, and who you belong to. You don't just pick up people's habits, bro. You picking up their ceilings, their limits. So I need you to understand. And everyone says this, but I need you to understand this. If you show me your five closest relationships, the people that are near you, then I'm gonna show you what your current identity is. I don't care what I tell my kids this all the time. The people that you are most closest to are gonna define who you are. So I want you to start with a vision. Look yourself in the mirror. Who do you want to be? What does your dream require? Before you can actually build that new identity about who you are, I've done this plenty of times. You have to know what you're building towards. I need you to think about the goals, your income goals, your business goals, your fitness goals. But the real question is, what do you want? The real question is, who do you need to become? It's all about becoming. Remember, I said that in the beginning. Who are you required to become in order to receive those goals? Who do I need to become in order to become a millionaire? And the goal is not just the destination, bro. I said that. It's not the destination, it's the identity in the destination. Who are you becoming as you get to that destination? And if you want to build a seven-figure business, if you want to build a great relationship, who is that person? Do they wake up with discipline? Do you wake up with discipline right now? Yeah, you say you want to be disciplined and look better in the future. They make decisions from a vision and it's not from fear. You have to lead people, you have to lead yourself, you have to handle pressure, you need to stay consistent. If these are all the things that you are to become at the end, you have to start to do it. So the question isn't how do I make money? The question is who do I need to become so that the money is a result of who I am. You all know the story about Kobe Bryant, man. Kobe didn't just practice basketball, he literally built an alter ego called the Black Mama. Maybe you need to build an identity for yourself. You may have to build an alter ego as well, the black mama. It's a separate identity. He could step into the court and become the black mama. Somebody that was fearless, cold-blooded, relentless. And when he put off that jersey, he wasn't just being Kobe, the shy kid from Philadelphia, right? He struggled relationships. He struggled in his personal life, he struggled in his marriage. But when you step on that court, you become somebody cold, freaking blooded. When you step into your passion, you become somebody who is not to be messed with. This is an identity tool that you can use. You have to choose to become a new person. Change your identity, create an alter ego. I want you to write yourself as a character description. I want you to do something right now, right now, or after you listen to this podcast, or if you're driving right now, of course, that's not the thing. But I want you to grab a notebook, grab a pen, and I want you to describe the highest version of yourself. It's not a goal, it's just a character description. I do this all the time. I know what my character looks like, I know the card he draws, I know the one card he has in his wallet, I know what the bank account looks like, I know what a watch, I know what the house looks like, I know what my options look like as far as business. I know who I am, I know the character that I'm molding myself to becoming. So, what does this person believe? How do they carry themselves? How do they handle pressure? How do they treat their time? How do they talk to themselves? What do they refuse to tolerate? What do they refuse to tolerate? Clarity of your vision is not motivational fluff, bro. It's a contingency tool, it's a real life tool that you can use to perfect who you want to be. And the more detail that you get this character description, the more your brain has a target aim at. See, our brains are aiming, cerebral. What do they say? And um, damn, I just forgot the book. But basically, there's a book, and I'm gonna get to it. I'm probably staring at I think it's actually in the house, but basically, your your brain is a a tool that can basically lock on a targets like a missile would lock on to your target, as I said, man. Vague vision produces vague results, precision creates transformation, the gap between old you and new you, man. Now, this is where we're actually getting real. This is where we're going to really take it to the next level now. Once you know who you need to become, you need to have confront. You need to have confronted who you are, and that's the gap, that's the problem. And this is how we work on the gap. So the gap between who you are and who you need to become is not a sign of failure, bro. It's not, it's a map. You're gonna clearly figure out exactly who you need to become. So every successful person that you admire, they all had gaps. LeBron had gaps. Oprah, bro, she was told she was unfit for TV. Guess what? She done blew up and made her own network. Close the gap. Steve Jobs was fired from a company he built. He closed the gap. Every declarated military veteran that you respect, they became someone harder, someone more disciplined, someone more focused. And guess what? Before they walked into boot camp and after, they changed the gap. Or even from boot camp to be and becoming a veteran, they had to close a gap. The gap is not where you fail, the gap is where you grow. So now we're gonna talk about shedding the old identity, and this is how you shed the old identity. Number one, I need you to audit your current identity. Now, also, I have a tool. If you go to my Instagram or YouTube, I have a tool in there where you can audit your actual identity, and this is how it's gonna happen. So you can't change what you have in examine, you have to look at it. The first step in your identity is really being brutally honest with yourself, and you have to audit your identity that you're currently running, because if you don't, it won't change. So ask yourself, what do you consistently say about yourself out loud in your head? What are the limits? What do you limit yourself to? And what are you accepting as those limits? What behaviors do you keep repeating even though they don't actually serve you? What version of yourself do you default to under pressure? What is it? You understand that the average person has between 6,000 and 6,000, maybe 7, 7,000 thoughts per day. And a lot of research is pointing to that 80% of those thoughts are negative, bro. And up to even maybe 90% of those are repetitive. So what you said yesterday or on loop for today. This is how you're breaking that by auditing. You can't heal what you refuse to look at. So look at what you're saying. Number two, I need you to interrupt the pattern. Once you've done the actual audit, I need you to move on to the next job, which is all about interruption, okay? Because your brain is going to keep running that same pattern until you actually give it a new one. So the old thoughts, I'm not good enough for this opportunity. I need you to interrupt it and basically tell yourself, where did that belief even come from? Where did I even start from? Is it actually true or is it even familiar? You may have another old thoughts like I'm sleeping in, skipping a workout, avoiding that hard call. You need to do the complete opposite. You need to do it over and over again, and again and again and again. So I've been reading this book by um David Goggins basically uh Never Quit or Never Over. And we all know that David Goggins, man, he he is a tough ultra-marathon runner, but he actually grew up with a lot of learned disabilities, abusive parents, living with a drill sergeant um grandfather, and bro, like he gained tons of weight, got up to over almost 300 pounds. But the one thing that he started to do before he even decided to become a Navy SEAL, he would call it accountability mirror, right? He was standing in front of the mirror, the mirror trick, every day telling himself the truth about who he was and who he needed to become. So he didn't just dream about changing, he interrupted his thoughts every single day. And he went from being 297 pounds to going through his whole you know Navy SEAL training, even getting hurt, consistently staying in. But he wouldn't have done that if he did not interrupt his identity. I need you to interrupt who you are, you need to die to the old self, die to the old story, and this is the hardest part because it's comfort, but the part that everybody skips, man, because it is the hardest part, and a lot of people don't do hard stuff. If you just start to do hard stuff every day, bro, you become a better person. So it's not about you know grieving on who you were, it's not a pity party, it's no hate. You just need to walk through it because the old version of you serves no purpose, it's got you to where you are right now, and it's protected you, and you needed that protection, but now it's no more keeping it safe, man. The world is not a safe place. I honor you for being that who you are, who you were, but now it's time to release it, and you can respect who you were by refusing to remain that person because as you as you continue to refuse, if you start to refuse to be that person, brother, you will become better you. Okay, you will become a better you. Now, let's build that new identity. Now, really, right now, what I want to say is thank y'all for even being here. We're about 27 minutes into this podcast. I really do appreciate y'all staying in, sticking through this, and really learning as much as you possibly can. So if you want to watch videos like this, I always encourage you to subscribe to my YouTube channel. It's more information on there where you can consistently learn. But if you just like hearing the boy voice, I appreciate you. There's nothing wrong with listening to this. If you want to like a visual, you know, you know, a visual example of what I'm doing, man, always go over to YouTube. Now, let's talk about how to build that new identity. So, step one, all right. I want you to have it stack, all right? I want you to have it stack on the identity of who you want to be, right? So here's how you build that new identity in real life. And it's not about motivation, it's not about inspiration, it's all about creating the behaviors and repeating it consistently over time. So every action that you're actually voting into your life, those votes add up. And one that, you know, athletes do is that they work on a 90-day rule, right? And they focus on a workout session or they may even focus on becoming a higher performer, but it's about 90-day focus and really sticking in there for 90 days. And if you realize like a lot of things can change in 90 days, but if you don't rise to the level of your goals, man, you're gonna fall to the levels of your systems, and your systems are those old habits, okay? So create habit, identity stacking for at least 90 days. And if you can stick to that, you're going to create a new individual. The second thing is that you've got to rebuild your environment. For some of you, it may be hard for you to move and to change your environment, but if you really want to change your identity, you have to change what is around you. Clean up your apartment, clean up your car, clean up your house, clean up your relationship, clean up your diet, clean up what you're thinking about. And your environment is either going to feed you this new version or you need to starve it. It is it's either one or the other, man. And what are you listening to in the morning? What are the conversations that you're in daily? Who are you allowing access to your energy? What's on your phone screen? Like I told you, you can my goals are right here on my phone screen. What is feeding you? What is feeding you? You know, your environment change that you make is going to shift your whole entire mindset. Like I remember I stopped my day. I started my day, you know, with social media. I used to stop letting those opinions of strangers really impact my morning. And I started more now with prayer, intention, movement, writing in my journal, listening to the word. And I did that, and I'm still doing it. And I'm changing my mind, and I'm becoming something that's more tangible and real. You'll start to see your life really change. Now, the third one is that you need to change how you talk to yourself. It's going to change yourself. A lot of us we may talk to other people bad, but the one thing is you got to do is that you have to stop talking to yourself bad. The most consistent voice is the one that you hear every single day. And what you say over and over, your brain is going to accept that. And that's why, that's why Jesus and in the Bible, it says there's power in the tongue. There's life and death in the tongue, and there's power in your words. The shift isn't about pretending that everything is great. The shift is about directing your inner dialogue with intention. You have to change that old identity talk that you say to yourself, I always do this. I can't figure this out. Who am I? Who do I think I am? The new identity is all about. I am learning how to do this. I am the kind of person who figures things out. I do hard things. I was just talking about my wife because we're getting ready to buy this house, and we just trying to figure out, like, yo, it's a lot more money that we got to come up with. You know, at first I was a little bit down, and I'm like, man, that bro, we're gonna figure this out. You know, we're gonna do this. And my whole, my whole mind is like, okay, what is the what do we need to do? The inner voice is telling me, yo, this is going to work. But it's really about not just commentary, it's about construction. Every word is a brick, day by day, day by day, day by day. Another thing, you gotta upgrade your circle, man. That's the one thing that's really gonna cost you, as I said before, look around at your people. Because some of the people that you are around right now, they're not positioning an identity of who you're building towards. And it's not their fault, bro. It's not. If you have a new identity of who you want to become, you need to get in another friend group. And these things I had to learn along my entire journey, and I'm still changing my circle. I'm changing my circle. You don't have to cut everyone off, but those people that can't be in that new circle with you, you have to create the new people around you. That's just what you have to do. And I'm gonna be honest, like the identity shift, it's gonna feel like you're in the middle of the sea. It's dark, as I said, it's it's the darkest blue that you've ever been around before. Because personal development is a space where it's not a highlight reel, it's the truth about who you are. And while you're in the middle of that deep sea by yourself and that identity shift, it's gonna feel like fraud. You're gonna feel like you're pretending, you're gonna have days where that old self just consistently pulls you back, and you may also even go back. You're gonna lose people you prefer, the old version of you. You're gonna feel alone in a room and it's gonna work so hard, and you're gonna feel like it's just not working. But guess what? That discomfort or the growth is not a warning sign, it's not a time to go back. You're in the middle of that dark tunnel where you can see the light, but you don't stop in the middle of that tunnel. It's a mile marker, it means you are somewhere where you've never been. You're in the middle of that ocean where it's nowhere that you've never been. But guess what? You keep building, you keep working, you keep going harder. You're not stuck, you're not broken, you're not too far gone. Eventually, that yacht's gonna come get you and it's gonna take you to your destination, but you have to keep working. You're someone who has been running that old program in a new world, and that program can be rewritten. The identity shift is not a moment, it's a decision and you make it every single day. Every time you choose discipline over comfort, you vote in again that old self, you vote in against your new self. Every time you change that conversation in your head, you're voting for the new you. Every time you walk into a room and decide to show up differently, you're voting for the new you, and eventually, and I promise you this those votes are going to add up, and that new version wins in the end. You don't find new identity, you build it. One decision, one day, one vote at a time. I'm Terrence Fagan, and this is the Mindset Academy. And the only version of you that matters is the one you're brave enough to become. I love y'all, I see y'all in the next episode. What I want you to do is comment, write, send this over to someone else who loves and appreciates this. And I see y'all again. Take care.