Next Level University

Why It Doesn’t Feel Like You’re Growing (2048)

• Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros

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Ever feel like you're putting in the work but not seeing results? In this honest and uplifting episode, Kevin and Alan unpack why personal growth often feels invisible in real time. From emotional checkpoints to measuring habits, they share real-life reflections that show just how far consistency can take you, even when it doesn’t feel like it.

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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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Alan: https://www.facebook.com/alan.lazaros
Kevin: https://www.facebook.com/kevin.palmieri.90/

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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:
(2:57) Realizations from episode 1000
(4:01) The power of perspective
(5:21) What stopping really means
(6:29) Aim too high, get humble pie
(8:01) Why progress feels uncomfortable
(9:06) Next Level Dreamliner: The planner, agenda, journal, and habit tracker to rule them all. Get a copy: https://a.co/d/9fPpxEt
(11:33) Tracking habits for clarity
(16:09) How to measure your growth
(17:37) Outro

Send a text to Kevin and Alan!

Kevin Palmieri:

I have lost 15 pounds since the beginning of my diet. If I was not looking at the scale every day, I would have almost no idea how much weight I've lost. I probably would say like 5 pounds, Because when you get in the flow of it, yesterday and today just meld together and I don't look, I don't feel I don't perform any differently today than I did yesterday. I think that's the same type of feeling we get when it comes to growth in general.

Alan Lazaros:

There's an objective measurement of objective truth, of progress, and then there's the way you feel about that progress. I think progress and making progress feels really good, but a lot of times if you aren't measuring something along the way, it's very hard to tell whether or not you're actually making real progress.

Kevin Palmieri:

Welcome to Next Level University. I'm your host, kevin Palmieri, and I'm your co-host, alan Lazarus. At NLU, we believe in a heart-driven but no BS approach to holistic self-improvement for dream chasers.

Alan Lazaros:

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

Kevin Palmieri:

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.

Alan Lazaros:

Self-improvement in your pocket, every day, from anywhere, completely free.

Kevin Palmieri:

Welcome to Next Level University, next Level Nation today for episode number 2048. Happy Friday. If you are listening to this on the day it goes, live why it doesn't feel like you're growing. So last night had a long ass day, long. Just I told taran I said I had 15 times throughout the day where I said there's no way I can get all this done and all of this is time sensitive and all of it needs to be done. I got it all done. Awesome, nice work. It was terrible.

Kevin Palmieri:

I was eating dinner and I had one of those nights where Taryn was out, just me and the kitties, and I was like, ah, what do I want to do? Do I want to watch something? So I start by listening to music and the music gets progressively sadder and sadder and sadder and then at one point I'm just like sitting on the couch crying like not like a bad cry, and I said, ah, shit, I got to go look at some old episodes. That's the flow, that's how it goes. So I started with episode 1000. Alan and I bawling our eyes out and I just jumped around and I went back and I had this very humbling moment where I'm watching episode 1000 and I was like have. You are pretty fucking bad. I mean, you did this a thousand, more than a thousand times up up until that point I was like this isn't great compared to where you are today. It's not great.

Kevin Palmieri:

I started that episode out with like a 12 minute monologue just went. I just fucking went, alan. It was like you weren't even there. It's like I was doing a solo episode. You're just, and I was like he's, he must have so much. He's so self-secure because you're just like staring into the camera the whole time and I'm just going and I'm doing that right now. I'm on, I'm on the. I'm on that track. Right now were we in the. This was virtual, right, this was virtual. Yeah, we were both looking directly into the camera. The lighting was worse. The sound was probably better, because we're figuring shit out over here. The sound was better. I don't know.

Alan Lazaros:

I was watching on my TV, so it's hard to tell me that's not true.

Kevin Palmieri:

No, no, I wouldn't say the sound is better. Well, we've had a really good a thousand episodes in. When I look back from this new perspective, this new perch, I realized how much higher I am now than I was at the time. But you never know that unless you got to a thousand. And then you'd never know that. If you stopped You'd say, oh yeah, I was a really good podcaster Compared to what?

Kevin Palmieri:

Compared to somebody who just started, yeah, compared to you at 100, 200, 500, sure, but only today do I know that I wasn't that good then because I kept going, and I think that is. Maybe we can make something up. I don't know. But that's why progress and growth is so hard, because unless something meaningful happens, unless you have checkpoints, it's really hard to even know that you're growing. You might feel different, it's really hard to quantify that, it's really hard to define that. So I know this is something we've talked about before, but when I have those moments, it's it just blows my mind that I thought I was good Statistically. I think we were really good, because most people don't go to a thousand episodes. Now, at two thousand episodes, I think I was shit.

Alan Lazaros:

Yeah, what's the lesson?

Kevin Palmieri:

for the future. I suck now too, and I'm way better than I was at a thousand, but I'm not nearly as good as I will be at three thousand. That's it, and it's that way forever. I'm better than I was at a thousand, but I'm not nearly as good, as I will be at 3000.

Alan Lazaros:

That's it and it's that way forever. But that's why, when you stop, you are signing an agreement that says I'm okay with being where I am. I do not want to get any better and I'm not committed to get any better. You're not going a client. You know who you are two days ago. Every goal you set in the future is going to require a negative feeling in the present. Progress feels, progress feels. I want to make sure I articulate this correctly. Okay, in the beginning I thought I was a strong speaker and then I realized I sucked. When we went and saw Brendan Burchard. Compared to him, I had the moment of I'm nowhere near this guy. And this is back then, 2018 timeframe. Kev goes and he thinks he's not going to fit in at all in this environment and he ends up being ahead of the audience statistically speaking. More clarity, more dialed in, more habits. Whatever I go comparing brendan, he goes comparing to the audience. I leave with humble pie.

Kevin Palmieri:

I always say I've started saying aim too high and you get humble pie aim too low and you don't grow oh shit, that's bumper sticker material right there in a positive way.

Alan Lazaros:

I want to give you a little backstory of why I remember that so well. I gave a speech at toastmasters which was also a big milestone of oh, I am a strong speaker Because most of the time I feel like I'm not Filler words blah, blah, blah, whole thing. I get a lot of emails, tons of praise, grateful If anyone's listening. By the way, that was at Toastmasters and you're listening to. You checked out the episode. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. Got lots of love. Wow, blown the episode. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. Got lots of love. Wow, blown away All this stuff. Appreciate it. I get an email from Dia. Shout out to Dia if you're listening. She's the one who invited me. I was on her podcast, you were on her podcast and she said hey, things like this bug me and I don't want to impose, but would you be open to some feedback?

Alan Lazaros:

I did find one spelling error on one of your slides and I had a moment of, of course, absolutely, yes. Please tell me Seriously where I reviewed them. I'm surprised, but let's figure it out. The slide you know the self-belief slide that we have with the pyramid. At the, it said aim too high and you'll eat humble pie, and at the bottom. It said aim too low and you won't grow to instead of to oh yeah, it's a tough one, yeah, on both of them.

Alan Lazaros:

So now I fixed it. So now I memorize that because of that whole experience. Just take you behind the scenes. What was I talking about? Oh, progress, progress. I think short term it usually feels Okay objective, truth and logic, emotion. Getting better feels like shit emotionally. The reason why is because, in order to get better, you have to look at where you suck, so it doesn't feel good. Why is because, in order to get better, you have to look at where you suck, so it doesn't feel good. However, when you realize you've made a ton of progress, sometimes that can feel good, but I think progress is very hard to notice because it never feels like it's happening. It's almost like you feel worse. In the beginning I thought I was a great speaker. I don't feel like a great speaker now, until I go to Toastmasters and realize that the reps have paid off.

Kevin Palmieri:

Yeah, well, you need, there needs to be some sort of finish line. It's not a real finish line. There needs to be a checkpoint, and the checkpoint allows you to look back on the previous version of you.

Alan Lazaros:

Hello, hello, hello. Nlu listener. Thank you, as always, for listening to Next Level University. Real quick. I just want to jump in and let you 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.

Kevin Palmieri:

If we think of it this way, what is the creature that's in the pot of boiling water? The frog, the frog. I like frogs, so I don't really want to Apparently, that's not true.

Kevin Palmieri:

It wouldn't surprise me. Yeah, apparently that's not Of course it's not. When the water gets hot, anything's going to jump out. It's not going gonna stay there till it boils to death. What are we doing here? But the thought process was if you put a frog in a pot of water and you just turn the temperature up a little bit, and you turn it up a little bit, you turn a little bit, the frog doesn't know that it's gonna boil to death, even though it would. Because I feel like that's just basic instinct, survival 101. But for the sake of this episode, are you really going to know the difference between 70 degree water and 75 degree? If you get in a pool and it goes from 70 degrees to 75 degrees over the course of an hour, do you think you're going to know the difference? No way Over the course of an hour?

Alan Lazaros:

no, no way Do you ever go from hot tub to pool? Of course it's terrible.

Kevin Palmieri:

Oh, it's the worst. It's terrible. You ever go from pool to hot tub. It's also terrible in the opposite way.

Kevin Palmieri:

But if not if it's spread out over time, you might not notice. Yeah, because by the time you get used to 70 degrees, it then becomes 71 degrees. By the time it goes to 72 degrees, you're already used to 71, so you're not comparing to 70, you're comparing to 71 by the. So you're not comparing to 70, you're comparing to 71. By the time you're at 74, you're comparing to 74, not 70. So it's, the thing you're comparing to is not where you started. It's the last checkpoint you went through.

Alan Lazaros:

Yeah, this is why I'm so big on objective measurement. That's why we always track metrics and habits. It's really important to see how far we've come. But here's the thing we track, track metrics and habits. It's really important to see how far we've come. But here's the thing we track quarterly metrics and habits. If you look back one quarter, there's progress for sure. If you look back three years, it's insane. It's insane. Your new walking pace is your old all-out sprint. But all along the way you have to trust that that's the case.

Alan Lazaros:

I was on with a client earlier today and I said dude, dude, I need to show you where we start everybody on group coaching, because you have lost it. You do not understand. This dude has 15 metrics, three self-esteem builders and 18 habits. I said you have lost perspective on what it's like to not track habits. Let me show you where we start people in group coaching, and this is no shade thrown at group coaching. Kevin started with five. I started with these little black notepads. 10 years ago I pulled them both up and I said this is where you started to six habits. Now look at your sheet. You don't under even you don't even remember what it's like. You don't even remember? Do you remember what it was like to have five habits?

Kevin Palmieri:

I feel like I have a decent memory of it. I don't ever want to lose sight of it.

Alan Lazaros:

Well, you're consciously trying not to lose sight of it.

Kevin Palmieri:

I try stuff all the time.

Alan Lazaros:

Emilia and I were talking the other day and I said I feel like we suck sometimes because we aren't good at communicating Things that we don't deal with anymore. I don't, okay. Let me give you an example. A lot of people are asking how do you guys stay motivated? I have no fucking idea. I Can't remember the last time I wasn't motivated. Seriously, I can, okay. Well then, that's something you should teach because I?

Kevin Palmieri:

No, because I don't know. It's not that I get motivated. I just go sit in the office for a while and then I get overwhelmed with work and I start working. It's not I don't know.

Alan Lazaros:

There are base-level problems that we forgot. We even had, at least Emilia and I, one of the challenges in Relationship Talks coaching and one of the benefits of it too. We have the Conscious Couples podcast and we're trying to the brainstorming sessions that I have with Emilia to try to figure out what's relevant. We had a comment on YouTube of a guy who is going through it with his wife and I had to sit down with Emilia and say can we try to go back? Like what was it like back when we were with a partner? That wasn't Because Emilia and I we've never fought. We don't really argue, it's just it works really well. We're both pretty motivated, we work together, we live together, we share a car Like our life is magnificent and I'm grateful.

Alan Lazaros:

But I remember back in the day it was always, I mean, it was constant. It was so fucking frustrating, it was so bad, like in comparison. And here's the thing I remember my friends back then are like you have the best relationship ever. And I remember thinking, yeah, compared to yours, but trust me, this sucks. It's all relative, everything is relative. You might think Kevin and I are great speakers, but you should have heard the way I was talking about after reviewing Next Level Live. Next Level Live, I reviewed it. Every other word I said like or um, or you know, most people wouldn't even notice that I don't think I've said many filler words on this episode. Kevin would notice, but that's it all. Depends, right, if you're into football and you watch a football game you, but that's it all depends, right?

Kevin Palmieri:

If you're into football and you watch a football game, you're noticing details no one else notices. When you watch fights, you're noticing things I wouldn't notice because you've done martial arts. I think that there's just infinite distinctions and infinite growth. But along the way you have to trust that it's happening, even though you kind of don't know that it's happening.

Alan Lazaros:

What is the next level lesson? What is the takeaway based on this? Because obviously, obviously, this is more of a. This is like a deeper thoughts awareness type episode. This will be very, very brief.

Alan Lazaros:

I used to suck at timing. I was so bad with time and I'm still tough, like I'm still late sometimes. I'm not perfect, don't get me wrong, but when it comes to speaking in a certain amount of time, I used to be so bad at that. The first live event we co-hosted, I was over by, I think. I think I only got through two thirds of my whole presentation.

Alan Lazaros:

At Toastmasters they had green for 10 minutes, yellow for five minutes, red for one minute, and I remember thinking to myself I'm good, I'll just set a timer, and I was down to the 22nd mark, so it was 29 minutes. 40 seconds was a 30 minute speech, but that's just. I didn't. I'm suddenly good with time Now. I never was good with time. I think it's just the reps I mean speaking of that. I'm fucking it up in real time right now, but at the end of the day, it's because we are always up against a deadline. So that progress. My next level lesson is progress is happening, whether you're aware of it or not, if you're putting in the reps and if you're consistent.

Kevin Palmieri:

I can't speak to this enough because I've said it so many times. You we do a lot of episodes. You probably don't remember it. You need to create checkpoints. We have a checkpoint. Every day, this podcast, every single day we record an episode.

Kevin Palmieri:

I can go back and see Kevin two years ago live. I can see it. This was good. This wasn't good. He was super passionate that day. He looked tired, whatever. Create some level of checkpoint.

Kevin Palmieri:

Take out your phone. Record a video. Take out your phone record an audio journal. Take a picture of yourself. Date it. I have a, an album in my phone right now for this bulk and this cut. When I'm down at 170 pounds, I'm going to look at the whole thing. I can't tell how different I look right now, but I guarantee when I go through there, if I was to do day one, day two, day three, boom, boom, boom you'd be able to see the change over the course of it, but you wouldn't be able to see it day to day. All right, cool.

Kevin Palmieri:

If you are looking for a group of like-minded humans who are into personal development, who want to become successful through personal development, we have a private Facebook group called Next Level Nation. We'll have the link in the show notes and we have a free capital F, capital R, capital E, capital E free book club every single Saturday, 1230 Eastern time. I'm still not invited. I'm trying to work out who to speak to directly to be allowed into the book club. But Alan runs that they are reading Reset by Dan Heath. So join us. You do not have to have read the book, you don't have to participate If you want to be around Next Level Books with Next Level people. That is the place for you. As always, we love you, we appreciate 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.

Alan Lazaros:

Keep it Next Level Next.

Kevin Palmieri:

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

Alan Lazaros:

Level family. 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.

Kevin Palmieri:

Thank you again and we will talk to you tomorrow.

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Alan Lazaros

Host
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Kevin Palmieri

Host