Your Inner Circle Will Make or Break You

Your Inner Circle Will Make or Break You
Lessons from the Keller Williams Family Reunion in Marbella)

🔥 If you're the smartest person in the room, you're in the wrong room—and it's probably slowing you down.

Episode Description

In this episode of Highest Level, Michael Bailey and Anthony Dawson unpack powerful lessons from the Keller Williams Family Reunion in Marbella.

From the energy of the room to the wisdom in the conversations, this episode dives deep into one core truth: you are who you surround yourself with.

They break down why success isn’t a solo journey, how your inner circle can accelerate—or sabotage—your growth, and why learning from people who’ve already walked the path is a shortcut to your highest level.

Whether you're building a business, growing a team, or leveling up personally, this one’s a wake-up call to check your environment—and choose your people wisely.

Transcript

Speaker 00: 0:00

You're listening to Highest Level with Michael Bailey and Anthony Dawson, a podcast dedicated to unlocking peak performance, powerful mindset shifts and the real conversations behind success. Get ready to think bigger, grow faster and aim higher. This is Highest Level.

Anthony: 0:29

Hi everybody and welcome back to episode two of Highest Level Podcast. I'm Anthony Dawson. I'm a real estate agent covering predominantly the hyperlocal area of Pendle in Pendleside and all the lovely villages there and some of the adjoining towns. And with me is co-host.

Michael : 0:48

And it's Michael Bailey. Great to be here again to record this second episode. And I deal with residential property in and around the Preston area and surrounding. So we've been on a very Interesting trip, Anthony, haven't we, fairly recently?

Anthony: 1:02

Yeah, it was fantastic by way of the fact that it was Marbella, so it was a lovely setting. There's some nice little bit of sun there, some great networking and some phenomenal education opportunities there and lots of notes to reflect on.

Michael : 1:16

Yeah, so we went to the Keller Williams event family reunion in Spain, have them all over the world. Went to the Las Vegas one in January for the main one. But I think one of the things we took from it most was the importance of having your five people around you to really want to drive you on. Because I think the adage is if you're not in a group of people that pushes you, then of course you're just going to stand still and possibly even retract from where you're trying to get to. So yeah, I think that was one of our biggest lessons, wasn't it?

Anthony: 1:44

Absolutely. And I think it reinforced the danger of being in the presence of people that maybe aren't in your tribe, aren't pursuing the same path, maybe a bit more negative, not as forward-looking looking, you know, really kind of drilling it down into five core people that you find aspirational, maybe want to be like, or can certainly learn from. And I think as well, it was very interesting to see that you can sometimes have a power five for the here and now, which is fantastic. And then, you know, in a year, two years, as your goals change, as your education develops, you can outgrow them, outlearn them maybe. But an There's nothing wrong with that.

Michael : 2:30

Yeah, it reminds me of the, there's a video that's been on TikTok, Instagram, all that kind of stuff about where we're almost like rocket ships going to the moon or what have you. And some people are there only to be in your life for a season, as the chap on the video put it. The rocket blasters drop off because, yeah, not everyone's there to be with you all of the time. But, yeah, it's certainly something I've considered a lot since we've been back. And I've kind of done some work on my Power Five, really, and thought about other people that I might want to bring into there or I'd love to and I've asked to, more so from a full-rounded perspective. It's not just from business. I think this is really, really important in your personal life as well. And I think you've probably thought the same.

Anthony: 3:13

Yeah, in fact, it's interesting. I was having a chat with my sister, Victoria, a few days ago, and she was saying there's people that come into your life for a reason, a season, and then some of them for life. And I think, you know, that analogy, friends, aspirational role models and educators. So, yeah.

Michael : 3:31

Yeah, so we met some people that we've seen before. One person I would say that we managed to graciously, she's She gave us a lot of her time, someone that we learned a huge amount of information from off the back of what we'd already learned in Las Vegas was Caroline, wasn't it? Definitely. She's in my core five and

Anthony: 3:54

I'm sure it's the same for Michael.

Michael : 3:56

Yeah, she's a high performing agent within the Keller Williams Network. She's very well respected and does things perhaps that we don't do quite yet. And it's a way of getting help and support to elevate what we doing on a business perspective. specifically. And yeah, having that power team, I think is really, really important. I think it goes for everything. I think it's, you know, down to educational, it's down to having people to speak to as a person, it's down to, you know, all the good stuff that we should all be doing, sport, exercise, fitness, all of that stuff. And you want people that are going to challenge you. I don't think you want yes people.

Anthony: 4:34

No, you're someone who's not afraid to say, actually, you're wrong. And even if they can't necessarily detail why, but you make you go away and have a think about it because you can be challenged. And then if you challenge the thought and you still come back with the same opinion, well, at least you've considered it. And I think going back to these five people in your core team, it's something I'm kind of toying with the idea of is do you need one person in each separate category? So have you got the aspirational one? Have you got someone who's an education one, maybe a business coach, a personal coach, and then maybe something spiritual, health related, Don't know. I'm still working on my five. I've only got, yeah, I've only got, I think, two of them identified. So there's tickets still, the seats still available if you want to get into the five.

Michael : 5:24

But there's also, I think as well, like you've said, there's people for me for particular purposes, like you referenced before. So I have a couple of mentors. I have someone more on a, on like on a personal holistic type level. And I think especially perhaps for chaps, sometimes it isn't, that easy to talk about, how we're feeling and all that kind of stuff is very easy to bottle that up. So I think having an outlet for that and having good friends for any purpose like that is super, super important. So I know you and I have become great friends over the past six months to a year. But again, I think one of the main reasons for that is, as we would term it, we're in each other's tribe. We're from a similar mindset, we're driven, we want passionately to succeed, but equally we're not, we want to better ourselves and it can only better you yourself by going out and finding the best in class people who are willing to challenge you. And I think that goes for in every sphere that you're looking at.

Anthony: 6:21

And I think the key core attribute there is to be a learning based individual. You know, we are all still learning. I was chatting to my dad this morning and he was saying, you know, so you're in Keller Williams, been there a couple of years now, so you've figured it all out and you've learned it all. And the answer is, well, I wish. Everything's evolving all the time. We're evolving, the industry's evolving, the government interactions and and policies they're always keeping us on our toes so there's always something and I think it's important again you know if you're in what I would say the right tribe you're looking forward you're trying to develop what you're going to do and not necessarily be overly concerned with what others might be doing you know focus on your own patch your own pitch and then plough the field accordingly nice bit of alliteration there big fan of that I think it's

Michael : 7:10

important as well to make sure that you And this is very difficult for a lot of people to not be, especially when it comes to friends, I think, hanging on to negative people too much, because I think that can really, really impact you if you're not careful. And again, it doesn't mean that you can't see these people, but it might mean that perhaps you don't spend as much time with them as you used to. But I think that's absolutely fine. It's not a comfortable thing to do. But of course, if you want to be the best version of yourself, then you can't rely on comfort. You have to get uncomfortable for that.

Anthony: 7:40

And I think that's kind of... ties in with something else that we've talked about Michael in regards to if you've got your power five you can have a 20 you know who's the guys behind the five the five being the guys you want to spend most of your time with there's an analogy if you hang out with you know four of a type of person you become the fifth so if you're hanging around with power players that you aspire to getting on the same level as well if you hang around with them learn off them you'll become the fifth and that's why you've got to be really careful about you know the people you're associating with, also the environments that you're choosing to situate in, because ultimately you have the choice. That's the fantastic thing about this. You've got the choice. And if you're not comfortable or you're looking at the people that you're surrounding yourself with and you're thinking, this isn't how I want my story to end, I actually want more, then fine, you can work on that and you can try and identify who the five that you want to be with and around to to help drive you forward.

Michael : 8:43

Yeah, you did very well there, not saying the naughty word in that analogy. Well done. I think something else that we both learned as well, certainly it was very, very clear to me, is that all work, no play makes Jack a dull boy or whatever the version of that phrase is. And afterwards, we had some fun in Spain. I think it's really important as well to make sure that's in focus and you have someone to hold you to account. And otherwise, with people that are, people that come from backgrounds that make them very hard work working with very, very strong work ethics like ours and plenty of people we know, I think sometimes we probably wear that as a bit of a badge of honour and that can be to our detriment and we forget about having fun, being people outside of the business world and making sure we're looking after ourselves. But yeah, certainly for me, just almost like childlike in a way,

Anthony: 9:31

having some fun. I think our friend and peer, Steve Litt, says it really well. He says, work hard, play harder. And I think something, you know, if I reflect on on my career over the years. I think sometimes I've been In the moment when, say, treating yourself or having a break or whatever, feeling guilty about the fact that, you know, I have taken myself out of the business, but we've ultimately got to not lose sight of the whole point of the exercise. The point of the working hard is to be able to enjoy the boons and the fruits of our labours with friends, with family, and, you know, the five or the 20 or whatever you choose, or even, you know, community. Again, giving back. Part of the Keller Williams mantra is you know we do this to help others and again I think as a blanket tribe term we're all we're all on the same team on that

Michael : 10:27

yeah yeah I was at I took my son to cricket this week or two weeks ago and then last night and yeah I was blown away I've done some sponsorship for the cricket club I've done it because I think it's the right thing to do and I'm very community minded and all that kind of stuff but I was really really taken aback at how much of an impact that's made

Anthony: 10:43

just had a thought you're sponsoring a cricket team I'm sponsoring a cricket team I There should be some kind of... Or the Anthony Dawson, Michael Bailey challenge. I like it. The cup, yeah. The Bailey Dawson cup.

Michael : 10:53

But yeah, that's important as well, I think, giving back. But I don't think you can do any of these great things and be the best person you can and the best business person you can or best anything without looking after yourself. I think that's another thing that we've had a bit more in focus as well most recently. Yeah, so I think that we've learned some... Or sometimes it's not even learning. It's being reminded of these really, really important lessons. Yeah. And the fun element, that was definitely something that came from the Spanish Family Union because whilst the conferences were brilliant, they were great speakers, lots of data, there was a fun element to that as well. And I think that's important because that really helped to develop community and you could see community in that group of agents from Spain.

Anthony: 11:35

Yeah, really strong bond between the guys over there. And I think, is it fair to say no one parties like the Spanish? I don't know, there was a couple of late nights there and yeah, and everything that comes with that, which was great.

Michael : 11:47

Yeah, and again, it's an important reminder. I know sometimes I take myself way too seriously and forget about the fun, so it was good to be around those people who Didn't really think, just having fun, enjoying each other's company in a social setting rather than just talking about business. So we got to know people on a bit of a deeper level as well, which was fantastic.

Anthony: 12:07

And I think as well, there's the blueprint there. That works. So looking ahead, what's on the horizon? And I think, Michael, you're going to, is it going to Austin soon, is it?

Michael : 12:17

Yeah, I'm very lucky to have been invited to a mastermind with Gary Keller in Austin alongside Dominic Marcel from the UK with 20 of the Keller Williams worldwide agents only which is unbelievable but I think if we're talking about power five in terms of our network and where we are hey there's no one better than Gary Keller no way and obviously there's the other people around him too that will be there and all those guys have been there done there done it got the t-shirt years and years and years and decades and decades in the business. If you don't think you can learn from people like that, then I think your mindset's completely wrong.

Anthony: 12:53

Yeah, there's time for a course correction, I think, there. And again, it goes back to, you know, if you want to grow, expand, develop, you've got to be learning-based and you've got to be open to sometimes people saying, actually, you're wrong. But then, and it's, again, you can look on Facebook or the internet and you can always find competing arguments, you know, who's right, who's wrong. And I think the key thing for For me, he's always, okay, can you explain to me the quality of the data set that you're looking at? Neil deGrasse Tyson says it wonderfully. He says, I'm not saying you're wrong. I just need to see better data to confirm what you're telling me, which I think is really important to do. And then on the back of that, I think later this year, there's an opportunity and an invite for us to both go to Florida, perhaps, where there's the International Keller Williams Luxury Symposium, where where there's gonna be key people from every international luxury market. So the top of the pops really, internationally, sharing contact information, sharing lessons learned, and also being open about, and I would say there's no one better than the Americans for this, saying, this is how I got it wrong, don't do this, learn from it, and really springboard forward. And I think in America, there's zero stigma I would even say it is a badge of honour when people say I got this wrong and the company folded and then I did something and that folded and it's kind of once you've there's nearly I've had this discussion a few times and once you've failed three times now you've got the wisdom now you're ready to absolutely fast lane to the top whereas I think in England we're a little bit more how can I put it elusive on the talking about what things we've got wrong. And I think, again, if you've got them, if you're surrounded by the right tribe, then share the learnings, what's working, what's not working. And I think that's something that we're very keen on. We share that a lot. And I think, again, within the massive army, if you will, of Keller Williams, that we have smaller tribes, don't we? And so Steve Litt, we've got Steph, we've got Adia, and we're constantly on a daily basis chatting around, trying to work problems off. Dan as well. And a few others as well, which names are escaping me now that the camera's pointing in my face. But yeah, you know, it's good community.

Michael : 15:27

Yeah. And again, I think the interesting part about the community section is you've got various people in that group with some with, Dan's probably the most experienced agent I've ever met in my career. And then you've got other people who are fairly new to it, but you always learn something from everybody, which I think is really, in fact, I think that's one of the best things about Keller Williams is And in terms of failure, I think if you're not failing regularly, you're not going quick enough. And you should make failure, rejection, all that stuff, your best friend. Because I think it was Gary Keller in the Mastermind in Family Union said, there is no success without pain and failure. And I mean, I can't put it better myself. That's absolutely true. And again,

Anthony: 16:05

Patrice, she talks about that and really, you know, reminded us again when we were in Vegas about fail forward, which again is another mantra that a lot of people... swear by but yeah I can't believe I forgot Dan Lewis my spirit animal there but just circling back to something you were saying about in our little daily interaction community and WhatsApp groups I think it really is crucial to have people from the different walks of life and also at different stages in their business because I know I get blown away with certainly the obvious one which is learnings from say Dan who's just you know he's forgotten more on estate agency than some people will will level earned, that is the level of wisdom that he's at. But then also, sometimes it's the unblinkered blue sky thinking. Yeah, fresh people. Absolutely, because they've not been, I don't know. They've not got the constraints of experience. Anesthetised by the dogma and the methodology. And again, I think that's part of the problem with the English system. It's that old and archaic. It's definitely time for a reshuffle. Things like in America, you can, from offer to close, can be 28 days or something, a variation on that. Again, the Scottish system, you know, I like that where it's nearly going back to the medieval times of, you know, a man's word is his bond. You say a thing, right, that thing's now happening. I really like that. And I think that's probably, well, it's probably the topic for a different podcast, but yeah, the English system, yeah, pros and cons. But yeah, we'll leave that one there.

Michael : 17:38

But again, it's spending time with those people. We've got a great guy in Keller Williams, Paul Leslie, who's really, really pushing the the boundaries massively when it comes to making buyers informed before they make an offer. He's created a load of amazing documentation and ways of doing it to really, really reduce his fall through rate down dramatically. So he's someone that we need to spend some more time with. But again, I'd say whichever network you're in or anything at all, he's a guy who's going places in terms of really, really trying to change what we're

Anthony: 18:13

doing. Absolutely. when you speak to him and we've scratched the surface on what his service offering is to both the buyers, the onboarding, the process and also the sellers. It's not a case of he's a little bit more evolved and he's the next rung up the ladder. I feel like the guy's been to the future and come back because it's many rungs. It's so well put together and evolved and I'm keen to explore that

Michael : 18:40

a lot. And to be one of the, we went to another training event with Advantage HR 2020, a little while back now. And one thing that both Paul and Don McMarcel said in the kind of interview panel there was they said their kind of leading edge is always just trying to do everything to the highest level they can. And I thought that was really interesting because that's a very simplistic way of looking at it, but simplistically perfect because it, you know, when I've been talking to my team about that and taking it back to that all of the time. So always what we're doing here will well, is that the very best we could do it? And it's just a very, very focusing statement on improving and getting better. And this is why all these people are around us because we don't all do things the same. Some of us will do things better in one area and vice versa. But yeah, learning as much as we can is, I think, absolutely essential in any walk of life.

Anthony: 19:32

I think standards is a really key topic, actually, because you can only go as fast as the weakest team member, you could say. So you kind of look at your service offering and you think, okay, so where am I weakest? And it's that one thing that maybe lets down the whole thing. So you've got to be mindful of where is that? Let's look at that and let's develop that. But then conversely, when you're all of these different aspects, the different, I suppose, chapters, topic areas in your business, if you can look at them and go, okay, so that's good. How can I make it better? And I think it's a double-edged sword, this bit. And I know we both struggle with this because we can be content with what we've done and go, yes, that is good. That is a good level, but how can I make it better? And you can fall foul of kind of chasing the dragon. Is that the right phraseology where it's like, okay, I've done that. And it's easy to beat yourself up and lose sight of the fact, actually, you know what, this is really good. But I think it's only through that constant, I'm going to say criticism, that you are, or self-observation, that you're driving it forward. And again, I think that's integral to being a comfort that's at the tip of the spear which the competition look at and either get frustrated by or admire depending on what their outlook on life is but very much puts you above the competition, makes you the go-to, makes you the people that other people want to come to for the service, for their information.

Michael : 21:06

I think that's a really interesting point because that's a characteristic I've seen in lots and lots of successful people and that doesn't just mean successful in business, successful in changing their life in terms of fitness, in various things like that, by always looking to get better. So I think you're right. It's both a benefit and a bit of a curse at the same time as well. But I think it's just an awareness of knowing that it can never be perfect. And what can we do every day to try and push the level forward? Someone that I know, Ian, a PT guy, said to me on many occasions, listen, if you do, using the 80-20 law, if you're doing things right 80% of the time, yes it's not perfect but you're going to go quicker than doing it 50 50 so not to obviously reflect on the 20 that you've not done correctly potentially but we'll look at every day individually like tomorrow's another day yes i didn't do that as well as i wanted to right what can i do today to change that um and we're just looking for again we've said it lots already and i'll continue to say probably for the rest of my life we're just looking for little marginal gains most of the things i think all of us would like to improve in our lives personal professional or otherwise isn't as far away as we think it's just small little marginal

Anthony: 22:14

gains I think that's something that ties in with a conversation I had with Claire Reddings recently with regard to, you know, if you can just commit to a 1% improvement every day, you know, at the end of the year, three, six, five degrees of movement. I mean, in one year, that is a significant move of the dial. And again, if you then start to do that year on year, but that's 1% a day or one degree a day, that compounds. Yeah. You're moving mountains. You're not looking at molehills and feeling defeated.

Michael : 22:49

Yeah, and I saw a video with Kobe Bryant, one of the greatest ever basketball players, unfortunately not with us anymore, but he was saying the same. I'll just outwork my competition. I'll just do 2% a day more. And by the time it gets to, as you say, the end of the year, 365 days later, I'm miles ahead of you. You're never going to reach me because I'm willing to just put that extra effort in. I also heard it on a podcast about... They were talking about David Beckham, one of my favourite players, probably one of my sporting heroes potentially. They were talking about how he took free kicks after training every single day. Just 10, not 100, not 50, but 10. And he did it day in, day out. And he used to hit 8 out of 10 into the top corner or in the goal, whatever, you know what I mean? But my point being, it was that compounding effort over time, which was quite small, which made him possibly, well not possibly, in my view, one of the best free kick specialists we've ever seen. but it's all the same thing it's the little one percenters that compound over time

Anthony: 23:48

and I think that ties into preparedness and really putting the hard yards in because I don't tend to follow sporting stars like you do Michael but you did mention to me recently about there was one particular footballer I forget his name he was putting an extra hour in of warm up and cool downs every day and that was putting him significantly ahead of the pack and I think was that then

Michael : 24:11

yeah so that was it was high performance with Owen Hargreeves, probably one of the best Up there, I've heard and listened to two fantastic podcasts, which are way, way above everything else I've ever heard. So that's in there. Apart from this one, but we're working on that. But the other one was the Jimmy Carr first one that he did with Stephen Bartlett, the CEO. Unbelievable. Took notes on that. But back to the one you referenced here, that was Owen Hargreaves. And that talks a lot about when he went into Bayern Munich as a 16-year-old kid from Canada and how he... And a lot of that podcast, although football-ish related, is applicable to lots and lots of different things. But the point he was making and the phrase he used was, I just used to chip away every single day. And he copied another older pro called Lazar Rizou, who used to play for France, was a World Cup winner in 98. And that chap used to stretch every day for an hour after training. So what did Owen Hargreaves used to do? He then upped that. He did an hour before training and an hour before bed. And again, he said those one percenters, unfortunately, his career was... marred by injury in the end but in his playing days that's how he got to such a high level he won a number of competitions as quite a young person but yeah that's apart from what we're putting out that's one to listen to definitely because I took so many lessons from that but I guess that could tie back to what we're saying about your five and seeking out data and information it can be people but it can also be podcasts and things like that because I've learned a lot from a number of podcasts that I've listened to I

Anthony: 25:43

think you mentioned something I'm kind of going off on a tangent but it is something that I do does resonate with me and it was getting that Jimmy Carr podcast and he's saying, you know, if you are an E grade, say for example, E grade physics student, don't put the hard yards in to get up to C. We don't need, you know, and I'm trying to be careful with my phraseology here because I don't want to be negative, but you know, we don't need average physicists. You know, if you're a B in it, then yeah, put the hard yards in to become the A star. What we need more of is more best in class in each individual component. And I think that ties in nicely with the whole idea of highest level and getting ahead. Because if you look at your skill repertoire and go, you know what, objectively, well, and if you can't be objective, get somebody to... Speed to your five. Or do a 360 analysis, which maybe Michael can touch on. Look at your skill repertoire, your skill set and go, you know what, I'm excellent at this stuff and I really enjoy doing this stuff. Lean into that. Do more of that. I think sometimes where people get, it can be frustrating for them is if they love doing something that they're not fantastic at, but it might well be that they've not uncovered their superpower. So that's something that I certainly have focused on in building my team and getting core people around me to assist me in things that I'm not very good at because I don't like doing. Sure, I could train and I could become great at, say, for example, accountancy or things like that, but flipping out, I'd rather go and paint walls and I don't even want to do that. But the point is, you know, I'm focusing on the bit that I like and by extension becoming good at because I'm working, you know, invariably an element seven days a week, bank holidays, evenings, whatever, sometimes to the detriment of other relationships and whatnot. And again, that's where you need to have that maybe the presence in the five to say, actually, you know what? You just need to keep that seesaw level and just, again, a course correction. But yeah, so I mean, the 360 analysis, I've not done it yet. I've only recently found out about it, but it sounds fantastic. Michael?

Michael : 27:52

Yeah, you speak to various people in your world and you ask them to give you a true and honest assessment on you in a particular skill or you as a person. So you can get some honest feedback. You don't really want to say, send that to yes people so depending on who and what your family relationships like family are probably normally quite good like that as kind of friends but also mentors so you get a real understanding from other people well what do what do you think about it but to your point of what yeah Jimmy was saying is focus on you find your the Gary Keller book the one thing find your one thing and double down on that you're not going to be great at everything and as Craig Delahoy from 8020 one of my coaches would put it as you've said it's far easier to go from an eight to a 10 than it is from a one to a five. So why would you try and go for a one to a five? Find a seven or eight and get them in the right seat on the bus. And there's no, I probably found that quite hard I was going to use the word humility, that's probably not quite the right word, but to have the humility to say, you know what, hands up, this isn't my bag, I'm not best in this area, why should I, or who could I give this to that's better than me? And I think that's one of the big lessons I've taken from Keller Williams in whole, is that it's about leveraging the things that you're not good enough to better people that can do it better than you, and then you'll go further. I think... I don't know if you said this to me the other day or heard it someone else. It was about Richard Branson. They were asking him about, oh, it's from Simon Gates' podcast. They were saying, what is, Richard, what's your, do you know the difference between gross and net profit? One of the richest guys in Britain, like a fantastic business person, had no idea or seemed to have no idea why. He's not interested in that stuff. It's not his skill. So he's got a load of guys and girls that can do it better than him. And I think that goes for all facets of life, not just business. If it's, you know, if you're struggling at the, at the, at the, at the gym or something, we'll perhaps get an accountability partner. Or if you're, if you can get a PT, online PTs are pretty good. They're not too expensive. Um, and I know I'm talking about fitness a lot, but for me, that's something that's quite, uh, focused in my mind at the minute that that's one of the building blocks where I really fail on probably on a day to day basis. Um, but it's just try and be better and and find the support you need in those particular areas where you're not so strong. But it does take some humility to say, hey, you know what? That's not my bag. I'm not great at that.

Anthony: 30:16

And I think, again, that probably circles back to the British problem and maybe we like to give off the, yeah, I'm awesome in every single facet of my life and I don't want to even accept internally that there might be a weakness in an area. But I think in so doing, if we put our American friend's persona on and go hey i'm weak over there so i need to get somebody into uh to coach me or leverage it out and there's nothing wrong with either of those and i think with leveraging i think uh something michael reminded me of recently was that you can go fast alone but you can go further as a team what was that was that the phrase i think you said it better than that but yeah i can't remember the

Michael : 30:58

exact phraseology

Anthony: 30:59

at the minute

Michael : 31:01

but yeah uh yeah basically you can go fast on your own or further together essentially and it and it's true And it goes for anything. Like, you know, I've... Few people in Keller Williams will know this story because Claire Reddings at the family union said about this, which isn't a big deal, but the way it was phrased was quite funny, is that I get people to trim my bush. What she meant was at home, I've nearly probably taken myself out two or three times when I've been cutting the hedges by trimming through the cable. So, hey, that's not a skill of mine. So I found a guy now that can come and do that. And that allows me to spend that time in a far more valuable way elsewhere. But of course, it takes time to get to these kind of things. But I think the sooner you can leverage various things, the quicker that you can move, you can move forward. I think one of the other things we saw in the Spanish family reunion, as this is obviously our musings from Marbella, was how they really, really did double down and celebrated success. I think back to the British point, we're not all that great at that. I know, to be honest, for me, I'll have an achievement and it will be there for, you know, five minutes and I'm right onto the next but they they made a very big point of celebrating everybody and everybody celebrated everybody and it was a real kind of interwoven culture of hey you know well done you've done fantastic well there so have you and celebrating everyone which I which I thought was great and it really encourages people to to push on it's something I've been trying to do more and more within my team praising praising what I should because that means something to people

Anthony: 32:34

I think it's a wonderful opportunity to do something that's a powerful tool to really really making your mindset cast iron, really strong and powerful. And it's free and easy to do, and it's really easy to lose sight of. And again, it's that gratitude. And I think sometimes it's fun to, and productive, to have small wins. Have some things that, get some small wins in the day. Start the day off with small success, and then build on that. Get that momentum going. And again, that's the great thing about having teams, because you get people to riff off, and, hey, I got a little bit of success over here. It's like, fantastic. And then you end up with this massively positive energy, and it's kind of like, it's avalanching your way through the day, and it nearly becomes magnetic or something. You're getting more wins. They happen more frequently. The wins start growing in size. And not only do you become successful and get the financial benefits of that, but you end up having fun as you go and I think it's very key to get those two things on balance, or it's certainly on the page anyway.

Michael : 33:52

One of the other things I think that's coming to sharp focus for both of us, although it's pretty well known, is it's all very well and good to look fantastic on Instagram and Facebook and life's brilliant and this, that and the other. I don't think for the large portion of the country, that's reality. So I try and not pay too much attention to that because as we know, there's people struggling everywhere. And I think that's why these relationships that we've got with people on a personal and a professional level, there's nothing better than being in the room with these people or even being in like groups together. Like we've got another WhatsApp group where there was an idea that came in last night. And before you know it, there was three or four different opinions. And that idea has evolved into

Anthony: 34:28

something unbelievable. Phenomenal. Because you can be stuck in an echo chamber with yourself kind of like you're chatting to yourself in an empty room and I suppose there is a time when that can be productive I think maybe that's for self reflection on something and trying to dissect maybe but I think if you want to evolve and move forward you've got to be in a room in a community with the right people and yeah I think that with lockdown and how that changed the world and made Zoom and Teams very much a usable thing bringing wider community closer together we still not got to lose sight of the fact there is no substitute for being in the room with people and here's the great thing and and maybe more so about um our particular the way we've designed our businesses we can we can get these communities like we recently we went up to the lake district we had a day where you know all right it was a hike we weren't sat behind a desk but hey it's 2025 we can do our learning however way we want and if we can create it in a in a fun environment that's going to get repeated brilliant so we were there on a hike for several hours the main topic being business and we're riffing off each other we're talking we're evolving we're sharing learning points what's not working and then we jumped in a tarn and did some cold water shock therapy

Michael : 35:47

and it was fantastic because all the time what we're trying to do is stretch our mentality and our mental capacity because It's cold, yeah? It was seven degrees or something. I don't know what we did in there. 20, 25 minutes. Minus 20, I'm sure of it. But I think that's something really, really good to push your mindset. Another thing that we've both done recently, started with you, Anthony. And again, I think this was from Steve Litt, an idea from him. You've just come off the back of a five-day fast. I've then done that also. And to be honest, on the second day, I could have given up. So of course, there's lots of health benefits from it and everything else. And we're not recommending this, by the way. It's not for everybody, but... The mental boost I got from not giving up

Anthony: 36:25

was unbelievable. Absolutely. And I caveat that by saying, do get medical, um, not don't get to the point where you need medical intervention, but get medical advice on it. One of my, uh, very close friends, Richard Higgs, he studied it an awful lot. So I was chatting with him regularly about it. And one of the amazing things I'm, this is a total bastardization of his explanation, which was, was, uh, was fantastic. But he was saying how you do get, um, hormones released in your brain, which really massively help your cognitive ability and there's been things going on certainly in my life and in my business and I feel that that it's really just I don't know I don't necessarily believe in the concept of fate but it happened at the right time for me to be able to help process and manage and move things forward and evolve personally as well as a business so fasting definitely something to look into reach your own conclusions on it

Michael : 37:16

yeah and then I guess to sum up we've talked a lot about kind of mental fortitude and faith and all that kind of stuff. So, hey, I know there's lots of agents out there or people generally that might be struggling right now. If someone wants to talk about something in particular, if it's agency or personal, again, we may not know one another, so you might not want to, but I just want to make it clear that my line or our lines are always open because you never know when you might need some support and it's very easy to just stay locked in the echo chamber. Drive yourself potty. But you can find us on our social medias, etc., But yeah, I think that's been a fantastic summary of the biggest lesson we learned from Arbea. Definitely, yeah. See you next time.