The Abundance Mindset

Your mindset is often everything. If your mindset is scarcity, you react one way. If it’s abundance, you react differently.

Shifting to an abundance mindset has positively impacted Sarah's real estate career. In this episode she shares an exercise called "What would that give me?" to help realtors transition from a state of constantly worrying about their next deal to having a more relaxed and structured approach towards their business.

She also discusses her experience in the Sahara Trek, suggesting it may have spurred a shift in her perspective, encouraging a more holistic and honest approach towards personal and business growth.

Listen For
1:56 Transitioning to an abundance mindset
6:13 Implementing systems for success
14:37 Focusing on quality client relationships

Guest: Sarah Garner, Royal LePage Toronto
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Transcript

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Sarah Garner (00:00):

How do you start acting like the CEO of your business instead of some employee of some unidentified corporation? Because it's you and it's the decisions you make and ultimately the direction you want to take your business in.

Manny Andrade (00:00):

Hello everyone. Welcome to another podcast of Coffee Beans and Real Estate. Today I'm actually excited, we have a special guest, a member of our brokerage, Royal Page Supreme here in Toronto. We're talking about coffee beans today, and I had a pre pre-recording conversation with Sarah, and yeah, unbeknownst to her, I think she mentioned the word business a dozen times. I was counting, and it's exactly what we're talking about. So coffee beans and real estate. Sarah, it is a discussion or it's a concept that I think I apply here when somebody new to the business comes on or even veterans. We have this discussion where we try to implement a business mindset or introduce or impose a business mindset to realtors. Realtors are independent contractors self-employed, and I think that is an inherent trait in that it will lead to failure. Because there are no rules, no time of operation, no business hours.

(01:09):

And so the first conversation I have with Coffee Bean is I have imagined if there were coffee shop owner, it could be any business owner, any business owner, but coffee beans, coffee and real estate agents go well, go hand in hand. So having or listening to you, and we got onto this, we're talking about scarcity and abundance mindset, and then just listening to your discussion was exactly what this topic is or the title of the program, Coffee Beans and Real Estate. I'm going to ask you, we first started to talk about scarcity mindset and abundance mindset. I'm going to turn it over to you and just take us from the beginning how it's sort of affected your career, how it is affecting still your career ongoing.

(01:56):

Sure. Well, thanks first for having me on this cool show. But yeah, abundance and scarcity. I think so many people, so many business owners struggle with and I think that I spent probably the first 10 years of my career scrambling, where's my next deal going to come from? How am I going to grow my database? All the questions that rookies and like you said before veterans have. And so I just found quite recently that I've made a real shift in my mindset, in the way I approach my business from always worrying about where my next deal is coming from to actually relaxing and exhaling into much more of an abundance attitude about business, really about life. So...

Manny Andrade (02:52):

Right, business life and balance. I think you talked about, and you're going to talk about balancing the two. I want to add to this, you said 10 years you are a sort of veteran in the business, and I am very tough on numbers. I'll consider a rookie anywhere from zero days in a business to five years, sophomore, five to 10. And you are in the senior sort of 17 year in the business, is that correct?

Sarah Garner (03:22):

Yeah!

Manny Andrade (03:22):

You're approaching 17?

Sarah Garner (03:24):

I'm in the twilight of my career.

Manny Andrade (03:26):

You are not. You are shifting. I've had the privilege of working with you for the entire length of your career. Yes.

(03:37):

And previous as a selling member of the brokerage we worked at and now as broker of record. And you continue to evolve and you have some really wonderful insights. And then you're going to share that with us today. And this is something that I wish we could bottle and duplicate, sell, and I wish we could share this program with the entire industry and just have your mindset sort of transcend onto everyone else. Because we struggle. We struggle and because we are self-employed and because we often don't have guidance as much as we try as a brokerage to, but you're self-tought, you're a student of the profession. Is that fair to say?

Sarah Garner (04:25):

Yeah, for sure. And I'm going to heart back to one of my mentors and somebody who really helped me springboard into a different approach to business, and that's the Brian Buffini group and his catchphrase of the bumblebee. I think most realtors can probably relate to that. And you just literally trying one thing from the next, and like you said, you're scrambling and that's just not an efficient way to run your business. And so part of, I think what we're talking about today is how do you start acting like you own this business? How do you start acting like the CEO of your business instead of some employee of some unidentified corporation? Because it's you and it's the decisions you make and ultimately the direction you want to take your business in. And we talked really briefly this morning, Manny, about you've got to have this sort of 30,000 foot view first. Overall, what do I want my business to look like? And then you can start to sort of narrow it down and to get to a point where you're looking at how many transactions I need to do, what kind of gross commissions do I want to be earning, those sorts of things. But if you don't have a 30,000 foot plan of what you want your business to look like, it is going to be a tough slog and you're going to be a bumblebee.

Manny Andrade (06:00):

Share those, some of the questions or some of the, I guess, ideas or that take you to that 30,000 or from 30,000 down, you have a system, if that's fair to say.

Sarah Garner (06:13):

Yeah. Well, I mean there's kind of two things. I think one is if you look at any organization chart of a corporation, you have vice presidents of a bunch of different groups. You have a VP of finance, you have a VP of organization, you have an HR division. And so if you look at your real estate business with an org chart, and then unfortunately, as Brian Buffini says, you're kind of wearing all those hats. But I think that if you are intentional about all those different areas of your business, I think that sort of puts you on track for more success.

Manny Andrade (06:54):

Yeah. Brian talks about...

Sarah Garner (06:56):

 Yeah

Manny Andrade (06:56):

Sorry to cut you off. Brian talks about being a CEO, CFO and COO and the CEO is the rainmaker, the one that's going out there, lead gen, and then there's the financial component or aspect to our business. And then chief operating, which is what you're doing is analyzing, looking at systems or ways to grow the business and budgets and whatever. So we are sales reps or brokers, but not necessarily business owners, business mindset. And Brian, yeah, you're right. You're a big fan of Brian, and we may have struggled a little bit convincing you to do, maybe not.

Sarah Garner (07:36):

There's probably a struggle there, but...

Manny Andrade (07:39):

A little bit of a struggle. And it is, and it's difficult. It's something that it's difficult to probably convey to somebody new to the business because A, there's immediate pressure to make money. You come into this business and you're told in school or you're going to be told by me that the first 60 to 90 days you're probably going to go without, or maybe you make your first transaction and it'll take another 30 to 60 days to collect on it. It's tough. So there's immediate pressure to make money. So we forego everything else and we don't plan. We don't build from the foundation up. And then, which leads to failure more often than not.

Sarah Garner (08:21):

Yeah. And I think then this kind of doubles back on our original idea of talking about scarcity and abundance. And that is that now you're four or five months into your career and the anxiety level is rising because you're not producing. And I don't know if you want to talk about this, what would that give me exercise, but...

Manny Andrade (08:46):

Hell yeah!

Sarah Garner (08:48):

Okay. So again, I mentioned Tara Brach. She's an American Buddhist educator. She runs online courses. She has a daily meditation that people can subscribe to. And this is kind of my interpretation of one of her exercises, which is centering around living a life of abundance. And it's really was pretty instrumental in my shift from always wondering where my next deal is coming from, how I'm going to build my database. And so I just wanted to share that with you. And it might resonate with some people, and I just call it what would that give me? This is an exercise. And so I think it's fair to say that everybody has a personal scarcity script. It's different for everybody. Somebody's triggered by something that's making them feel that they don't have enough of whatever it happens to be. But for this conversation, why don't we keep it close to the real estate profession? And so maybe the script is something for people like I don't know where my next deal is going to come from.

(09:57):

So instead, what if I knew where my next deal was coming from, what would that give me? So this is a repetitive exercise, and you really have to be honest with yourself, and you have to really think about what your responses are. So if I asked myself that, what if I did know where my next deal was coming from? What would that give me? Well, it might give me a chance to relax a bit about my mortgage payments and my bills. And then you ask yourself, well, what if I could relax a bit about my mortgage payments and my bills? What would that give me? Well, it might allow me to think more critically about my business. And if I could think more critically about my business, what would that give me? So you said, I'm accelerating the thought process just for this podcast, but you may sit and meditate on this for a while because the answers may not come really quickly, but this is just sort of an example.

(10:53):

And so if I could think more critically about my business, what would that give me? Well, it might be able to allow me to put systems in place that would increase my sales, that would grow my database. And then you say, well, if I put systems in place and I could increase my sales and build my database, what would that give me? Well, it might give me peace of mind that I have the tools to succeed. And if I had the tools to succeed, what would that give me? Well, it might give me time to spend a more important things in my life. So you see, for me, what happened is it transitioned away from being just about business, and it started to become a pretty personal examination of my life and how scarcity, abundance plays into my life, not just into my business. So I kept with this and I said, well, if I spend more time on more important things in my life, what would that give me?

(11:50):

Well, that might give me work-life balance. And if I had life work balance, what would that give me? And for me, that gave me appreciation and gratitude for my life, for my business, for the important people in my life. And so if I had appreciation and gratitude, what would that give me? And for me that gives me an open heart. And if I have an open heart, then I can start genuinely servicing my clients. I can have more personal relationships in my life. And so it becomes a pretty intense exercise if you're honest and if you allow the process to play itself out, it's just a simple question, what would that give me?

Manny Andrade (12:34):

Yeah, it's a simple enough question and concept as well. It's a simple enough concept, but it's a tough, you have to be honest with yourself. And I'm listening to the audiobook now by David Goggins, and he's former, I'm not sure if he's still former Navy Seal. And he talks, that's all he talks about is the accountability mirror and being honest with yourself. And I think oftentimes we have discussions around real estate and setting goals and whatnot, and we have all of these wonderful goals, dreams, and aspirations, but we don't have a systems like yours. And then if we do, we are not honest about it and we sort of waver or sort of drift off early on like any other goal. Most goals are broken. What is it? Within the first three weeks. But I've seen you grow, this year, last year.

Sarah Garner (13:30):

Are you going to make fun of me cutting my database down?

Manny Andrade (13:33):

Well, we're going to talk about it because right now you were saying grow your database. So in the last minute or so, you mentioned growing the database, but ironically something that you and I discussed and was sort of you focused on the attention to the few over the many. So a lot of realtors coming into the business, and look, it's a tough business. We have 70 over 70,000 realtors, and a lot of them are struggling not because of the balanced market that we're in right now, a market that I think is actually healthy. We've been fighting for this market for five years and here it is now. But it's tough. It's always tough. It's always tough. But three years ago, was it, maybe you had the conversation where you said, Manny, I'm just going to focus hyperfocus on my super clients. I'm just going to dive in deeper and connect with them on a higher level, if you will. And your business evolved, let's just say. Fair to say?

Sarah Garner (14:37):

Yeah. I think I actually, I reached a breaking point in a lot of ways in that I felt that I was kind of spinning my wheels and I thought I was doing everything right, calls, notes, pop bys, but A, I wasn't really getting the results I wanted, and I don't think I was really enjoying my business. And so out of desperation in some ways I said, screw it. I'm just going to cut all the fat from my database. I mean, I've always had a small database to begin with, so now it's like microscopic. And what I basically did was I just said, I looked really hard at all those names. And have they given me a referral? Have I done any repeat business? Have I transacted with them? And if I could say no to all those things, they were gone. And that, again, getting back to this scarcity, abundance mindset, you don't want to let go. But maybe I'm going to get a transaction from these guys. No, you're not. You're not going to get a transaction from them. You haven't gotten a transaction from them in eight years. What's going to change now? But it's that letting go. That's what really changed things for me. When I let go.

Manny Andrade (15:57):

It's the yobe bear mentality. In for a nickel in for a dime, but then it's like it's an addiction and you're, you get stuck in that sort of mindset and you're foregoing quality for quantity, but the quantity really isn't producing or providing any sort of income or return on your efforts. And then it gets a little, then you start, you stop having fun doing this. It's an amazing business. It's a wonderful career. 17 years for you. I am twice that plus two, Sarah.

Sarah Garner (16:33):

Hats off.

Manny Andrade (16:35):

And I'm still having fun. I'm actually having. I had this conversation with a group of people recently. I told 'em, you have me at my best. I am having fun still after 36 years. I got to tell you, there were moments there and years and different times in my life as a salesperson or broker that I sort of struggled. But then like yourself, you find ways to reinvent yourself and all find a new high, which is what you're doing.

Sarah Garner (17:00):

And just to sort of build on that idea is people ask me what's it like being a realtor or whatever? And I find myself telling anybody who will listen, I have the best clients, I have the best clients, and you'd be the first one to tell me that's not a coincidence. And you're right. You nurture that clientele you choose ultimately. And that's, again, I've probably been singing the Brian Buffini song for most of this podcast, but he does say that you get to a point in your career when you can actually start picking and choosing who you want to work with. And for him, I remember a big takeaway was that that's sort of the definition of success. It doesn't matter how much money you make, it doesn't matter how many transactions you do. Are you in control of your business and are you in control of the people who you're transacting with?

Manny Andrade (18:03):

Right? Yeah. But it's the whole mindset. And to be fair, that wasn't your mindset 17 years ago or 16 years ago when you started, maybe the first five years. But you grew, you evolved, and you are a student of the business of this wonderful career, and you're constantly learning and applying new ways to self-improve.

Sarah Garner (18:31):

Well, I hope so. Thanks. I mean, again, it's just like, what is that thing? If you're, you're not a tree, so like move. Something like that, you know what I mean? You're not attached to the ground, so you have to make a change when, and for a lot of people, I think for me, you get to almost a breaking point where things aren't working or some people, and you hear this a lot, oh my God, I'm working 65, 70 hours a week. What are you doing that for?

Manny Andrade (19:12):

Well, they're not working. They're inefficient. It's like a poorly tuned engine. You're working extra hard to get to the same destination that a fine tuned engine would, right? It's like an old diesel tractor engine from the early 20th century versus a finely tuned electrical three cylinder engine. You'll get there quicker when making a lot less noise, less effort. But it's having systems in place. And I tip my hat to you and others. I had a conversation with somebody, I'm not going to mention her name, but she was our top producer last year. So RDH, we call her in here, and I told her she doesn't know how many gears she had. I asked her how many gears she had in a transmission, and she said, 500. That's a lot of gears. She was sort of, am I peaking? Have I peaked? I said, no, probably if you have 500 gears in your transmission, you're probably on less than 10 now. You're on fifth gear. It's commendable for people like yourself to keep reinventing yourself, finding new highs, new ceilings, challenging yourself and learning and being a student, adapting new ways, adopting to systems. And I don't want to end this without saying it. You did these Sahara Trek, was it four years ago?

Sarah Garner (20:37):

2019

Manny Andrade (20:39):

Tell us a little bit about than and we'll come back into the business mindset. So you and a hundred other realtors from RealPage went to the Sahara Desert to do what?

Sarah Garner (20:49):

To just walk around in the sand for a hundred kilometers for five days, but more importantly, to raise money for one of the most important charities in my life.

Manny Andrade (21:01):

Yeah,

Sarah Garner (21:01):

Yeah. I wonder if... I've never actually made that connection, but I wonder if that experience somehow springboarded me into a different attitude about mindset In my business, that was a pretty intense five days. You're going to do something like that soon.

Manny Andrade (21:20):

Well, I'm doing the Ecuador Trek in Ecuador in mount... The world's highest active volcano. So we're doing that. But so ask yourself, let me ask you that question. Did it, so the trek, which was part of your whole shift and then mindset, having time, leisure, time to do, in addition to all that, you're a mother of four and you have a beautiful dog that is a sister to my kids dog. So anyways, I digress. So did that experience in doing the Sahara Trek, did it humble you a little bit or did it give you further insights to grow or an appreciation or an appetite to sort of evolve your business?

Sarah Garner (22:07):

Yeah, for sure. I mean, it gives you a whole different perspective on the world. And again, we talked earlier about this 30,000 foot view, and I think that that experience probably really started that idea percolating. And that, one thing for sure, when I was standing on one of the highest dunes in the northern Sahara, I felt really, really small. And I think that that was the word you used is humbling. And I think that, so yeah, you start, and again, these things are all connected, so you can't compartmentalize your business from your personal life and from your other achievements. They're all connected. And so if you succeed in one area of your life, there's a good likelihood that you're going to succeed in other places. And so I think maybe to your point, the success that I experienced doing the Sahara Trek, maybe that made me realize that I could succeed in other areas, my business, my personal life, whatever. Just getting back to this whole, what would it give me exercise. You have to really, really ask yourself what you really want? What do you want from your business, whatever. And that gets back to that idea you said about being honest with whatever the questions are.

Manny Andrade (23:34):

Yeah. When you ask somebody new to the business, why do you want to do real estate? Why do you want to do real estate sales? Why do you want to join this profession or industry? It's like, well, I think I'm well suited for it. I like people, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But it's only... you're laughing. There's a lot more to it than that. And it's a constant growth process, evolution. I told you short while ago that I told this small group of people that I feel I feel am at my best. I am more involved in real estate today than I ever was organized real estate, volunteering, getting into growing as a business owner, as a broker, trying to evolve, growing as a parent because you have recent additions to the family, but you have to do that. You have to do that. And if you tell, when I interview and I tell some of the new to the business, these things, their eyes sort of glaze over and I feel that I'm sort of overwhelming them at times, but it's a reality.

Sarah Garner (24:44):

Yeah, I think also you were just saying you ask people why they get into the business, and I find that I noticed them a pattern in the way that I'm dealing with my referrals lately. I've been really fortunate that I've been generating a lot of referrals, and one of the first questions I ask every referral client is, how can, I want to talk to you about how I can best serve you? So that's the biggest message to send to rookies is that it's not that you like people and you love houses, it's that you have a desire to serve.

Manny Andrade (25:21):

Right. And it goes back to you focusing on quality of service versus quantity. Just having 500 people in a database and spinning wheels, you are actually hyperfocused on serving and growing your business. And you said, I'm fortunate. I think you used the word fortunate. There's an old saying, the harder I work, the luckier I get. And it seems to be something that is happening to you right now, but luck has nothing to do with it, does it? The quality of client that you work with or choose you to work with is not a coincidence. It's through your efforts, your mindset, through everything that you do for them. There are no shortage of business owners or realtors today, but you seem to have found you didn't stumble onto it, you weren't looking for it to found the key to your success, and you're able to share some of those insights with others today. If you had any, I want to ask you two tough questions. So if you had any advice to give yourself when you first started, anytime between day one and year five, what would you tell Sarah Garner 16 years ago? What would you say, Sarah, do this differently?

Sarah Garner (26:43):

Well, I think there's some mechanical things that I would have done differently, and then I think there was some sort of psychological, philosophical things I would've done differently. Mechanically. When I say mechanically, I mean I would've started right from day one, nurturing a database, and I didn't do that.

Manny Andrade (27:01):

Did you resist that? Did you have other visions or ideas of reinventing the wheels said, I have my own.

Sarah Garner (27:06):

No, I didn't have the onboarding that you have now. I think what you've done with this brokerage is phenomenal because you've given rookies and people new to the business an entire onboarding package to get them set up for success. And I think that when I started just as a function of what real estate was at that time, I didn't have that, so I didn't really have anybody telling me what the first steps were, so I kind of just stumbled along for a while. So mechanically, I think that that's the first thing. But then also, what would I say to myself? I think I'd probably say be a little kinder to myself, be a little gentler. Because again, when you are so hard on yourself and you're beating yourself up because you're not producing, that's just the wrong mindset.

Manny Andrade (28:02):

It's tough though. It's tough. You're right. Be patient, maybe

Sarah Garner (28:06):

Be patient.

Manny Andrade (28:07):

Be more patient,

Sarah Garner (28:07):

Be patient and kind, and just realize that this is all part of the human condition, to be honest.

Manny Andrade (28:16):

It is. It is. There's so much psychology behind everything and anything, but it's random. We treat it as random, but it's not. There's a lot going on. And personal growth and evolution, and you have to work at it. You have to work at it.

Sarah Garner (28:38):

You have to hone your skills too. I think too many people just fly by the seat of their pants, and you really need to hone your skills, whatever they are, negotiation skills, bookkeeping skills, basic organizational skills, you need the skills.

Manny Andrade (28:55):

Allen Iverson, we spoke about him on the show, and I don't know if you're familiar with the name. He was a superstar, natural athlete, basketball player, played for the 76 ERs in out of Philly, and there's a whole episode at Tyre goes on. He goes off on his coach. He said, practice, practice! I don't want to practice. I want to play. That was the end of his career, and I struggle as a broker, coach, manager and bring people and said, let's do this. Well, I've done it. Well, I mean, Wayne Gretzky is fairly good, was fairly good at faceoffs, but he practiced faceoffs and skating drills and this lap shot and the shot. So why is it that we resist on practicing and working on it?

Sarah Garner (29:41):

I still do my listing presentation in front of the mirror, just so you know. I don't walk into a listing presentation unprepared.

Manny Andrade (29:49):

We're going to share this program and thousands of people are going to listen to it and hear you say, I still practice. Of course, if you're not practicing in front of your peers, colleagues, or in front of your mirror, then you're going to practice in front of your clients. And that is not where you want to fail.

Sarah Garner (30:05):

No.

Manny Andrade (30:05):

Brian Buffini, your mentor or mine, he says, you don't practice until you get it right. You practice until you stop getting it wrong. I'm going to ask you a question, and I think we're going to wrap it up, and I'm also going to add, I stopped counting how many times you and I said business or corporation as it applied to your business and to mine. It is beyond 40 I think. If somebody wants you at home listening to this, go back fact check it, then give us some feedback. I think it's in the 40 range. If you had one word. We have a little fun thing that we're doing here. We're in the pursuit of it, it being what trait, character, personality trait, character trait, strength. One word only that you would apply to Sarah to say that sort of shaped you. What is that one noun, verb, adjective, pronoun. I'll tell you mine, I'll give you a little. Mine was fear, and if you go back to episode one, I'll tell you all about fear and my grandmother, and she shaped me. I have a fear of failure. So fear drove me. We have courage already on the mannequin. We have persistence. What is your word? Can you come up with just one word and we can count down 10 seconds?

Sarah Garner (31:25):

Well, you might have to get the dictionary out for this one.

Manny Andrade (31:27):

Okay, go ahead.

Sarah Garner (31:28):

Indefatigable.

Manny Andrade (31:30):

You've called me that before.

Sarah Garner (31:32):

Tireless.

Manny Andrade (31:33):

Okay. Yeah.

Sarah Garner (31:35):

You just got to keep going.

Manny Andrade (31:36):

It never ends. It's a journey. It's a never ending journey of growth, personal growth, perseverance. Absolutely. Great work. It's

Sarah Garner (31:45):

A good thing.

Manny Andrade (31:46):

I'm going to make sure I spell it correctly before I pin it on the mannequin. So this is great. Listen, time just flew. We didn't rehearse it. We didn't. This is great. I want to thank you Sarah Garner for A, being a wonderful human being. Being a friend, somebody I can call a friend, sharing your insights and your wisdom with us today and participating. I think this stuff is invaluable to anyone in the business. I know you're going to change somebody's mindset.

Sarah Garner (32:17):

I hope so.

Manny Andrade (32:18):

And for you listening. Until next time, thanks for tuning in. Thank you again, and I'll see you later.