Next Level University

3 Questions That Can Change Your Life… (1858)

• Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros

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Are you getting level 2 results from level 10 investments? Join Kevin and Alan in this thought-provoking episode as they share three simple questions that could change your life. Whether you’re struggling with time management, feeling burnt out, or wasting resources, this episode provides real-life examples and valuable advice on investing in what truly matters. Great for anyone looking to improve their focus and create meaningful results in life and work!

Link mentioned:
Free-30 Minute Business Breakthrough Session Call with Alan:
https://bit.ly/4f3MSUz

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NLU is not just a podcast; it’s a gateway to a wealth of resources designed to help you achieve your goals and dreams. From our Next Level Dreamliner to our Group Coaching, we offer a variety of tools and communities to support your personal development journey.

For more information, please check out our website at the link below. 👇

Website 💻  http://www.nextleveluniverse.com

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We love connecting with you guys! Reach out on Instagram, Facebook, or via email. We’re here to support you in your personal and professional development journey.

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Kevin: https://www.instagram.com/neverquitkid/
Alan: https://www.instagram.com/alazaros88/

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Email 💬
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Alan@nextleveluniverse.com

LinkedIn ✍
Kevin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-palmieri-5b7736160/
Alan: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alanlazarosllc/

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Show notes:
(2:04) Overview of coaching strategy: Metrics, habits, and identity
(4:50) Question 1: Where are you wasting time?
(9:24) Question 2: Where are you wasting effort?
(12:46) Next Level Dreamliner: the planner, agenda, journal, and habit tracker to rule them all. Get a copy: https://a.co/d/9fPpxEt
(13:53) Question 3: Where are you wasting money?
(16:18) Being honest with yourself and making better choices
(19:15) Communication in relationships and aligning values
(24:40) Outro

Send a text to Kevin and Alan!

🎙️ Hosted by Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros

Next Level University is a top-ranked daily podcast for dream chasers and self-improvement lovers. With over 2,100 episodes, we help you level up in life, love, health, and wealth one day at a time. Subscribe for real, honest, no-fluff growth every single day.

Speaker 1

you could easily say, all right, cool, just door, dash it, and then you save time and you save effort. Well, no, because it costs more money. You really have to go through and figure out where are you maxed out on the amount of time you're investing? All right, cool. Maybe then you want to use money to buy back time. That's a deeper conversation.

Speaker 2

If you're really, really, really honest with yourself, just make sure you're not investing level 10 time, effort and money into level two value. Not everything is of equal value and it shouldn't be, and if you do that, you're going to spread yourself too thin and then you're going to burn down.

Speaker 1

Welcome to Next Level University. I'm your host, Kevin Palmieri.

Speaker 2

And I'm your co-host, Alan Lazarus.

Speaker 1

At NLU, we believe in a heart-driven but no BS approach to holistic self-improvement for dream chasers.

Speaker 2

Our goal with every episode is to help you level up your life, love, health and wealth.

Speaker 1

We bring you a new episode every single day on topics like confidence, self-belief, self-worth, self-awareness, relationships, boundaries, consistency, habits and defining your own unique version of success Self-improvement in your pocket every day, from anywhere, completely free.

Speaker 1

Welcome to Next Level University, level University, next Level Nation. Welcome back to another episode of Next Level University, where we help you level up your life, your love, your health and your wealth. Today, for episode number 1,858, three questions that can change your life. We've done a lot of these episodes because I believe a lot of questions can change your life.

Speaker 2

Oh yeah, is asking yourself the question going to change your life? We've done a lot of these episodes because I believe a lot of questions can change your life?

Overview of coaching strategy: Metrics, habits, and identity

Speaker 1

Is asking yourself the question going to change your life? No, it's going to be what you answer and then what you do with the answer. I've always liked questions that raise awareness and I always like episodes that have questions that raise awareness. So, alan, these were your three questions, so I will kick it to you.

Speaker 2

My brethren, the coaching that I do with individuals. These are three questions are some of my go-tos. The first one is some of your gophers.

Speaker 1

I gotta adjust my lights in here. Pardon the, pardon, the the just jeffing of lights. I my lighting's all jeffed in the studio. I gotta figure it out all right, we're out here doing it always always, always.

Speaker 2

We're still here, baby. We're out here doing it, okay. So I'm trying to think of a way to provide context for this. I've said this before, I will say it again, that the only three human resources we have are time, effort and money. That's what it comes down to. So I'm going to break down how I coach people in a very the shortest possible form. This is what I've got, okay, someone comes to me, they tell me a goal and we dial in their metrics, habits and their identity.

Speaker 2

Now, what you measure determines what you focus on. What you focus on determines where you invest your time, effort and money, and where you invest your time, effort and money is what determines the results that you achieve in your life. If I could really, that could be a flow chart of how to. So someone comes to me, they have a goal and I sort of break all that stuff down. And when you do this for so long mentoring for 10 years, coaching for seven and, honestly, even before that let's be real. But ultimately it's my favorite thing in the world and what it comes down to is you, you have persons, places, things and ideas, and you have time, effort and money, and so, for example, the amount of time and effort that I've put into my relationship with Kev is extremely, extremely, extremely, extremely, extremely high, and that is a relationship that has benefited me tremendously Okay, more so than almost any other relationship in my life other than Emilia Smith.

Speaker 1

I'm in second place. Emilia always takes first place. There's nothing I can do to take that top spot. Darn there, really isn't.

Speaker 2

I'm good with second place, a simple second place would suffice.

Speaker 1

Just give me the medal and let me step on the podium. You don't have to tell me why I didn't win. Thank you very much.

Speaker 2

But seriously, out of all the relationships in my entire life, 35 years on this planet, emilia, by far the most Best investment I've ever made. Second would be my man. Kev grew up in the same small town.

Speaker 1

Oh yeah, a couple kids without fathers trying to figure it out dreams, holy crap big dreams and naivete two things those are dangerous big dreams, naivete, those are tons of self-belief, zero humility.

Question 1: Where are you wasting time?

Speaker 2

Baby, I'm kidding on me, all right, so uh, the first question where are you wasting time?

Speaker 2

questions yes number one where are you wasting time? I did this with my man, andrew, on a coaching session on tuesday. Where are you wasting time? And all of us can, and again, a waste of time. What's a waste of time for me might not be a waste of time for you. It depends on your core values. It depends on your goals, it of time. What's a waste of time for me might not be a waste of time for you. It depends on your core values. It depends on your goals. It depends on what's meaningful work for you. It depends on what you care about. Uh, it depends on what you, your circumstances, and so it depends on your age. It depends on a lot of things. So, for everyone out there, ask yourself this simple question when am I wasting time?

Speaker 2

Kevin and I in in group coaching, we have a slide where it shows a little baby on the far left and an older woman on the far right and it shows days, weeks, months, quarters, years, decades, and I think we actually go seconds, minutes, hours, days. Yeah, we go all the way from seconds to lifetime and it's a really powerful slide, and I often have said this before. If you live to 100, it's 365 days times 100. That's 36,500. If you only had 36,500 days left, or $36,500, how carefully would you spend your money? You could never make another dollar. That's the metaphor.

Speaker 1

So where are you wasting time, ke, my man? Let's lead by example. I said social media, so I it's awesome, I have so many wonderful conversations going on with many of you listening through social media specifically. Well, I was going to say specifically instagram, dms, but facebook, quite a lot, and linkedin somehow is coming into the fray. I don't.

Speaker 1

I'm not excited about it, if I'm being honest, because LinkedIn is not my jam, it's definitely coming up, but it's very easy for me to be talking to someone and the next thing I know I find myself on pizza huts Instagram. It's not it's not out of the realm of possibility for that to happen or a BMW page where I'm looking at cars I love I. Or a BMW page where I'm looking at cars I love cars that I need to stop getting derailed and something happened. So on my phone remember how I was talking about you can measure screen time. Mm-hmm. You can't see it on. Yeah, you can't see it on this view, unfortunately, but I have a lot of lights in the studio and a couple of the lights I have are app based, so I can change the colors with an app. I can turn them on, turn them off.

Speaker 1

If that app is open, it counts as screen time yeah I left it open the other day for eight hours said I was on my phone for eight hours. I was like there's not, not a chance, I was on my phone, there's no possibility sunday no, no, no, no, no, no. This was during the week, because I left the app open and I was in the studio all day, so the lights were on all day and I was thinking to myself there's no way, there's no possibility that I was on my phone for eight hours. I just worked 12.

Speaker 1

but that's not related at all social media for me what's yours.

Speaker 2

My kevin and I talked beforehand about this. I really so. Every single day, I listen to a morning mindset workout. It's a video called ode to excellence uh, on a youtube page called your world within with eddie panero, and I've been listening to that every single day for almost 10 years and it's super motivational. It's a letter to yourself about how to get after it and reach your potential Adore. It Absolutely adore it, and in order to get to that playlist, I have to open YouTube and if you're on YouTube, you can see this and it shows okay, there's me, there's a little Kobe Bryant, there's Tom Brady and then this is Michael Burt. Michael Burt, my man, michael Burt. So I get sucked down these reels sometimes, including my own, so sometimes I'll review the reels that we have as well, but that's really it is. I'll fall down the rabbit hole of YouTube reels more often than I should. I just got a recruiter hitting me up for a job.

Speaker 1

What do they need? Send it on my way, I could probably I'll take care of it. What are they looking for? Some sort of mechanical? Hey, I'm.

Speaker 2

Naomi from Tiger Recruitment Uh-huh, there's a remote job that seems like a great fit for you.

Speaker 1

Would you like to learn more, including the pay? I would like to learn more, especially the pay, and I think the job title would also be beneficial to know yeah, what are we doing here?

Speaker 2

maybe industry?

Question 2: Where are you wasting effort?

Speaker 1

so that's the first one. What's the second one? So the number one question is where are you wasting time?

Speaker 2

yeah, number two is where are you is? Where are you wasting time? Yeah, number two is where are you wasting effort? Where are you wasting effort, kev? You struggle with the effort one, because what's the difference between time and effort? Time is seconds, minutes, hours. That's pretty self-explanatory. Effort is what you're putting into the seconds, minutes and hours. Battery power.

Speaker 1

Yeah, exactly Battery power. Yeah, exactly Battery power.

Speaker 2

Willpower, battery power. A good metaphor is the iPhone. When you have 50 apps open, the battery drains quicker and if you have too much going on and you're too overwhelmed and you're focused on too many priorities in a given day, it it's overloaded and you can crash your computer, metaphorically, or your iphone, uh. So where are you putting too much effort? I have an example emily and I we painted our deck when we first moved into this condo and she got two-thirds of it done. And I'm over here, mr painter, jeff, just trying to do it perfectly, and I said, yeah, but look at, look at mine, mine is pristine. She said, alan, you're not a deck painter. What do we like? Get this done right. And I agree with her 100. I just I used to paint up in maine. It was multi-million dollar mansions on the ocean, so I have a certain standard when I paint because, I was going to get fired if I didn't paint to a certain standard.

Speaker 2

You can't paint a multi-million dollar ocean mansion quickly, and so I treated our deck the same. But, honestly, too much effort, waste of effort. You don't want to put level 10 effort into level 2 things.

Speaker 1

Well, this is where the how you do one thing is how you do everything quote holds true. I still don't believe in it. I think it's BS. I really do it doesn't. Unless it was. Yeah, I still I can't get it. I can't get on the train. I can't get on the train. But how you do one thing is essentially how you do everything. You're very thorough thank you.

Speaker 2

You're welcome also sometimes it sucks, yeah, sometimes too much right, and that's. Every strength comes with a weakness. Boom, there it is. Yeah, what about you, man? Where are you wasting effort, this?

Speaker 1

one I'm. I'm struggling with this one, not because I'm not wasting effort I'm sure I am, I just don't know where it is. I feel like I'm pretty dialed in. I essentially eat the same thing every night, so I'm not wasting effort on cooking ground. Turkey and rice and veggies is pretty much what I eat every night, if Taryn makes something leftovers hit me with it.

Speaker 2

Here would be an example, imagine you really like. So here's one for me. There's a place near us Jumbo Donuts, you know, has the best egg sandwiches ever. Huge fan and I could easily just stay home. That's a waste of time and money and effort. Now can I fully call it a waste.

Speaker 1

Let's be honest how often are you getting these things?

Next Level Dreamliner: the planner, agenda, journal, and habit tracker to rule them all. Get a copy:

Speaker 2

uh, once a month probably, but it's right near the track that we go to, so, uh, hammer a couple bacon, egg and cheese, of course, bagels, bagels, lately bulk season, uh, but ultimately it is a waste of effort, it's it's out of the way kind of. Yeah, it's a waste of effort and again I want to be clear here, it doesn't mean it's a hundred percent waste, right. Right, obviously these are delicious and they are delicious, so in some ways they're worth it. But if I was really honest with myself, yeah, I could probably do better with that and maybe make something at home. Know about the Next Level Dreamliner. This is a journal that I use every single day. Achieve your dreams 90 days at a time. It breaks down your dreams into goals, milestones and daily habits. We hope you enjoy it. The link will be in the show notes.

Speaker 1

I would say then, probably for me, it's my once a week takeout meal, whether it's Taco Bell. Taco Bell is like 12 minutes away.

Speaker 2

Oh yeah, there you go. Waste of time, effort and money.

Speaker 1

Yeah yeah, here's where things get wonky. You could easily say, all right, cool, just door, dash it, and then you save time and you save effort. Well, no, because it costs more money. So you really have to go through and figure out where are you. Are you maxed out on the amount of time you're investing? All right, cool. Maybe then you want to use money to buy back time. That's a. That's a deeper conversation, but yeah. I would probably say that I would say effort in achieving and acquiring Taco Bell.

Speaker 2

Third and last question where are you wasting money? This remember, with all of these you're never really wasting it, and I want this to really land in a new way. Think like an investor. I remember I asked Amelia once. I said would you rather buy Walmart stock or Amazon stock? And she said well, I don't, I'm not really sure. And I said Amazon. And she said why? I said because e-commerce is much bigger than people going to stores. Now I actually think Walmart's doing a lot of interesting re-innovating and stuff, and I'm not for Walmart, necessarily, or Amazon, so don't put me on those trains. What I am saying is that it's a more solid investment to go for the thing that's most likely trending up.

Speaker 2

You and I joked one time about selling newspapers or selling kale outside of a candy store. That's your joke, yeah, okay, well, personal development challenging to grow a company in that space. We're doing a great job. I'm proud of us. Now, ultimately, this is an investment of time, effort and money. So when we say, where are you wasting time, where are you wasting time, where are you wasting money, where are you wasting effort, you're not actually wasting it fully. It's just not as optimal or as dialed in.

Speaker 2

And here's the last piece of this. I have a couple clients I call them my Navy SEAL clients. They're two times a week. I can't imagine why you'd want me to coach you twice a week, but I'm awesome. They're crushing. They're absolutely crushing it. I just feel like that's it. Hey, let's go, let's go. It's constant, okay, and one of my clients said thanks for ripping me a new a-hole and I said that's not exactly what I'm doing. However, the point that I'm making with this is I'm really hard on her, and she has asked me to be really hard on her and I've constantly checked in. Is this what you want? So the point that I'm making for everyone watching or listening to this the more you admit where you're wasting time, effort and money, the better choices you'll have with your resources, and then, ironically, you'll actually have more resources. So it's the people who are the most honest with themselves where it comes to where they're wasting time, effort and money that I've found tend to be the most externally successful not necessarily internally fulfilled, but externally successful mine is ufc.

Speaker 1

That would be mine. Now again, am I going to stop that? Oh man, it would hurt me deeply to my core in my bones. So maybe not, but I am splitting it with someone which. May that not be legal, I don't care really. There's bigger fish to fry than that and I'm going to live my my life. So don't come at me, bro. But I would say that's probably the biggest space. We've done a lot of viewing of the bank account to figure out where we're not investing money wisely. And can this youtube tv? Can that? How much are you really using it? Is it actually valuable?

Speaker 2

so I would say probably ufc I had one client, anonymously, always, and she sent me screenshots of her iphone, of the subscriptions that she had and her grandkids had actually gotten into her phone and there was a bunch of stuff on there that she never even purchased, she wasn't even using, and I'm talking hundreds, hundreds and hundreds of dollars. And I remember saying you're whoa You're gonna be. Can you imagine how much you're gonna succeed when you button this up?

Speaker 2

Right kevin, and I can say this authentically. I realized this yesterday, kevin. I was thinking between next level podcast solutions, next level social media let's really do this real quick. So between next level podcast solutions, next level social media group's really do this real quick. So between next level podcast solutions, next level social media, group coaching, and then my clients, that's 26 plus 12 plus 51 plus 11, so we are working with directly with 100. That's not even including the 19 person team, so you're looking at 119 people that we work directly with, that we actively, we're playing an active role to help them achieve their goals and dreams, and we work with 61 podcasters if you include group coaching. That's wild. So what my point of all that is, rather than just bragging about us, is there's certain common patterns that kevin and I can tell you this very candidly the people who are the most dialed in are the people who succeed.

Speaker 2

And if you're dialed in with your time, your effort and your money and you're willing to ask these hard questions and own it because, to answer the question about where I'm wasting money, I have Disney Plus, I have Apple TV, I have Netflix and I have Amazon Prime. I would have anyway. So I have Prime Video, but it comes with it, but ultimately I have too many subscriptions. I got rid of Max and obviously, film is one of my favorite things in the world. Ufc is one of Kevin's favorite things in the world, right, so you got to do a cost value analysis with this stuff. But if you're really really really honest with yourself, just make sure you're not investing level 10 time, effort and money into level 2 value. Not everything is of equal value and it shouldn't be, and if you do that, you're going to spread yourself too thin and then you're going to burn down.

Speaker 1

Last thing I would add is when this gets hard is when you, let's say it's a business partner Alan and I are business partners, but let's say it's an intimate relationship a valuable use of time or a preferred use of time for your partner seems like a waste of time quote unquote for you. That's where some conflict can arise and that's where you have to figure out okay, let's have this conversation, and is it a level 10 for you? That's a question that Alan and Emilia would ask themselves. I don't know if you still do, but that's something that Taryn and I have used. Is this a 10 out of 10 for you? I use it all the time. This is something that you would regret highly.

Speaker 1

So my father-in-law's birthday, I think, is November 1st, and his favorite skier is going to be. There's some ski competition somewhere in Vermont I don't know where it is and Taryn said hey, do you want to come? And I said, honestly, there's too much going on. I said where is this for you? Is this like a 10 out of 10? And she said no, no, no, I completely understand. If you can't make it, I appreciate it. I can't make it, there's just too much going on right now. But if that was a 10 out of 10, that might be a different conversation. I'd have to approach it differently and then I could say for me, babe, it's a 10 out of 10 for me not to go. Then we would have to figure out what is aligned.

Speaker 2

That is a world-class conversation right there. That's so important. Emilia had her grandmother coming over and it was right in the middle of sessions and calls and podcasts and training and coaching and I said 0 to 10, how important is it to you that I come down and say hi? And she said it's okay, no worries that I come down and say hi? And she said it's okay, no worries. But that's the thing is, if it's 10 out of 10 important for me not to do it and it's 10 out of 10 important, or it's two out of 10 important for her, then I'm obviously not going to do it, but that's let's say Taryn said it was 10 out of 10, the ski thing.

Speaker 2

You'd have to invest time, effort and money differently. You'd have to go to Vermont, pay whatever and invest the time and effort and reallocate your. And that's really when I had regrets after my car accident at 26,. That's what it was. I regretted the time and effort that I wasted and the money that I wasted on things that were not as meaningful. And if you want a meaningful life, you have to invest your time, effort and money into meaningful endeavors, and that is based on self-awareness and it's based on your awareness of your partner and your awareness of your friends and your awareness of your surroundings.

Speaker 1

So right on, all right. The three questions are where are you wasting time, where are you wasting effort, where are you wasting money? Next level nation. If you are focused on staying consistent when it comes to your fitness whether that's weightlifting, whether that's Pilates, whether that's yoga, running, whatever it is we have the Next Level Fitness Accountability Group. I think we should probably stop putting the link in the chat or link in the show notes, because we've been getting some spam people selling stocks and shit and I have to research people when they request.

Speaker 1

So if you're interested, please reach out to Alan or myself, alan, when they request. So if you're interested, please reach out to Alan or myself. Alan at nextleveluniversecom. Kevin, at nextleveluniversecom, you can do it on social media. Alan's handle is alazarus at alazarus88, a-l-a-z-a-r-o-s-88. Mine is at neverquitkid on Instagram. Message us and we'll get you set up. You can do it on Facebook, whatever. Whatever's easiest for you. I just want to make sure that the group stays safe and I don't want to have people that somehow come across trying to sling stocks in there. I ain't about that life.

Speaker 2

I was concerned when we started putting the WhatsApp link in the show notes.

Speaker 1

We tested it. It was my idea, we tested it and we are. The test results are in and it's not going to be next level stock accountability group. It's next level fitness accountability group, so I want to make sure we keep it that way also for anyone out there who really wants to achieve their goals in q4 or into 2025.

Speaker 2

We're going to create your top three goals. We're going to measure your top three metrics, we're going to track habits underneath those metrics and then we're going to work on the identity blocks that you have, and that's ultimately what my coaching is. Free breakthrough session. The link will be in the show notes 30 minutes free breakthrough session. I'm not going to sell you anything. I just want to meet you. I just want to help you get you off to the races and ultimately, it's my favorite work in the world, and Kevin and I have had sort of a weird identity crisis recently of we have been doing this for so freaking long now that we're forgetting how valuable these simple fundamentals actually are, because this is kind of all we do.

Speaker 2

It's like if a mechanic's been doing fixing cars for 20 years and again 10 years in this case. You see the car. Oh, I know what's wrong with it. That's how we feel with these certain things. Kevin, podcasting me business, but also just grow yourself, grow your podcast, grow your business. I'm telling you please, please, please, book. There's gonna be insights in there that you might not have thought of and I have dozens of mentors and coaches. I have a therapist. They have helped me tremendously get to where we are and I know that that people need more of that in their life. In hindsight you realize what made the difference, and there's a couple coaches in my life that were very, very, very accurate about some of the hard truths I didn't want to hear, and I really hope that you book.

Outro

Speaker 1

Well, and imagine getting asked questions, like we talked about today, every other week or once a month, or whenever it is every week, depending on what it you're gonna. You're gonna raise your awareness and you'll be able to take different actions after that. All right, we have a team call. Right now we're gonna jump on the the zoom with the wonderful nlu team. As always, we love you, we appreciate you, grateful for each and every one of you, and at nlu we don't have fans, we have family. We will talk to you all tomorrow.

Speaker 2

Please reach out.

Speaker 1

Thanks for joining us for another episode of Next Level University. We love connecting with the Next Level family.

Speaker 2

We mean it when we say family. If you ever need anything, please reach out to us directly. Everything you need to get a hold of us is in the show notes.

Speaker 1

Thank you again and we will talk to you tomorrow.

Head Shot

Alan Lazaros

Host
Head Shot

Kevin Palmieri

Host