Next Level University

Sometimes The Best Answer Is “I Need To Get Better” (2081)

• Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros

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What if the reason you’re stuck… is you? In this episode, Kevin and Alan explore the hard but liberating truth: real growth begins with radical responsibility. Through stories of broken relationships and business lessons learned the hard way, they reveal how facing the mirror, not pointing fingers, was the key to their next level. If you're ready to trade blame for breakthrough, this conversation is for you.

Learn more about:
Big goals don’t happen by accident. Next Level Dreamliner helps you plan, track, and follow through. Grab your copy 👉  https://a.co/d/9fPpxEt

Business Growth University: Real strategies to grow your business, sharpen your skills, and unlock your potential - https://www.buzzsprout.com/2501638 

Free 30-minute Business Breakthrough Session with Alan -
https://calendly.com/alanlazaros/30-minute-free-breakthrough-session?month=2025-04
Free 30-Minute Podcast Breakthrough Session with Kevin -
https://calendly.com/kevinpalmieri/free-30-minute-podcast-breakthrough-session-with-kevin

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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
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Kevin@nextleveluniverse.com
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:
(2:53) From blame to personal ownership
(4:55) Truth, growth, and self-belief
(6:57) Finding gold in tough moments
(8:36) Do you deserve more success?
(10:26) Personality traits that matter most
(12:54) Next Level Dreamliner: The planner, agenda, journal, and habit tracker to rule them all. Get a copy: https://a.co/d/9fPpxEt
(14:33) What we had to level up
(18:29) Scaling, pressure, and mindset shifts
(22:51) Outro

Send a text to Kevin and Alan!

Kevin Palmieri:

If I had a dollar for every time something went wrong and I sat back and I looked for every excuse in the book I want to blame this, I want to blame that, I don't want to take ownership. And then I just looked at myself and said, well, I think the problem is I just need to get better. I would have a lot more money than I do now, for sure.

Alan Lazaros:

This is a recurring theme in Kevin and I's life. This is what it means to be next level, and it's not fun, it's not easy, but pretty much every time you face a roadblock or an obstacle or a challenge, most of the time, the large majority of the time, it's yeah, I just have to get better.

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. Our goal with every episode is to help you level relationships, boundaries, consistency, habits and defining your own unique version of success 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 2,000 in 81,. Sometimes the best answer is I need to get better. So you heard in the preamble my intention. My goal in this episode is how do we make that empowering? Because that for most of my life was not the answer, and all we mean by that is, when something goes wrong, it's really easy to look externally, it's really easy to blame other things, it's really easy to make excuses and I'm not saying I don't do that, but usually eventually I get to the place. This is my fucking fault, this is my fault. And if I was more capable, if I was more consistent, if I was more emotionally sound, this wouldn't have happened in the first place. So that's really what we're talking about. But I also understand that that isn't necessarily the most empowering. How do we make that level of ownership?

Alan Lazaros:

not, I won't say not suck, suck less. I guess I just had a funny scenario play out in my head. Yeah, imagine, kev eight years ago pre-podcast. Something happens, something goes wrong and it's like, ah, that really sucks. I think I'm gonna smoke this weed, hell yeah all the time instead of I'll get better it's, I think I'm just gonna go. I'll get a hot. It was awesome.

Kevin Palmieri:

I a lot of people when I go on podcasts I talk about how my ex left me and and eventually it got to the point where I was like yeah, she was right. And they're like that's really, that's really like big of you, that's like very responsible. I was going. This took like years and this wasn't like the week after this took. This took me a minute. So I appreciate, I appreciate the credit, but it's what was the week after me?

Alan Lazaros:

just pain oh, my god, what was your story to yourself as to why it wasn't oh?

Kevin Palmieri:

I'll just go get better. What was it? She was crazy. That's what I said. Yeah, she's crazy, it wasn't. Oh, I'll just go get better. What was it? She was crazy, that's what I said. Yeah, she's crazy, that's what I said. Yeah, yeah, that's what I said. That's it got me through it. It got me through it and then eventually it was like kev, I don't know. I feel like a lot of what she said was right in retrospect, you know, but you're not always ready for that. Well, that's that's why I want to create a constructive way, because in the moment it's really hard to to do that.

Alan Lazaros:

Well. So here's the conundrum. It's easier to say, ah, she's crazy, of course, way easier. You tell yourself a story. It's not accurate, so it's not helpful, but it helps you ease the pain and then you lick your wounds, you go into the next relationship. You know, maybe, maybe there was something to what she was saying. And then you face a little bit of truth and the amount of growth that you'll experience is predicated on the amount of truth you can handle. The amount of growth that you'll experience is predicated on the amount of truth you can handle, and I think that this is the growth journey. The growth journey. Sorry if I can't talk tonight. We just got off group coaching and we did a pre-session during session, post-experience review. It's been a long, freaking day. Thank you, listeners, for hanging with us. Okay, growth journey in a nutshell you want to get to the next level, so you have to face a little more truth on this level. So maybe she's not crazy and maybe some of the stuff she said has some truth. Okay, what truth?

Kevin Palmieri:

Good, what was true. I was depressed, I was anxious and I was not as good a partner as she deserved. Those are facts. But at the time it's like, when you're already down, the last thing you want to do is look at more proof that you should be down further. And I just wasn't. I wasn't prepared. So I think the goal is to be able to do that quicker and quicker and quicker, and I think that just comes from time. But I also think that comes from self-belief. If you don't think you can change it, you're not gonna own it. Yeah, you can't. It would be detrimental to say like, yeah, you know what? Oh that that episode was a right piece of shit. That's my fault, even though I don't think I'm capable of doing a good episode. That's not going to be constructive.

Alan Lazaros:

Well, if you don't own all of it. So let's say we do a terrible episode, let's say hypothetically, and if we don't own that, that wasn't great because of us. Now we have no power to change it. We have no power to get better. I said this to you on a team huddle. I said this to the whole team on the team huddle. I said you guys are all awesome, we're crushing it. I'm so grateful, but none of that really matters because none of that has to change. So thank you so much.

Alan Lazaros:

80% of what you guys are doing is un-fucking-believable Way to go. I'm not going to focus on that today because that's already good. This 20% over here is not great. In order to get to the next level, we have to improve this 20%. And so let's say, you lose a chess match, or you lose a basketball game, or you lose a tennis match. I don't know why I picked tennis. You have to watch it back and see what went wrong so that you can learn. But, just like speeches that don't go well, you got to watch them, especially the ones that suck the most. It especially the ones that suck the most. It's the experiences that suck the most that we least want to look at, but that's where most of the gold is buried. The gold is buried where you least want to dig.

Kevin Palmieri:

I had a thought. I was on a podcast the other day. It was a really good one and it was the. The person was like you're very, you're very humble for your level of success. It's like, first of all, I'm not that successful, so but thank you, I appreciate it. I think you think I'm way more successful than I actually am. I'll take that, I appreciate that and I said honestly I I don't know if I've all I haven't always been this way I definitely are actually really successful.

Kevin Palmieri:

Statistically speaking. Yeah, actually really successful statistically speaking, yeah, but I'm now I'm on your end where it's like, yeah, I'm kind of a loser, though I want to be. I want to be more successful, ready top one percent loser, but either way, let's be more successful. Yeah, exactly, I said honestly, I don't feel like I deserve to be any more successful than I am. I'm exactly as successful as I should be, based on the amount of effort I've put in, and I think that's essentially what we're talking about here. I'm just, I just need to get better. I'm not as good as I need to be yet, not maybe not necessarily in the things that you see. Maybe you think I'm good at podcasting Awesome, I appreciate that but there's some stuff behind the scenes that I have to get way better at. My organization has come way up way up.

Kevin Palmieri:

I way up, I have some shit on my desk. For sure my desk is not as clean as yours, but trust me, it is 90% better than it used to be. Nice, that 10%, though, that's a that's a big 10% and there's a lot that's going to change over that. 10% Levels, man. There are levels, but I everything has levels. If, if you're out there right now, if you have this I live near an airport these planes, man, I swear. Sometimes they fly. I've had times where I thought the plane was going to fly into the side of the house Because the airport is literally like two streets over. It's wild.

Kevin Palmieri:

Gently, ask yourself this question, because I don't know what's going to come up. Do you think you deserve to be more successful than you are? If so, why? If not, why not? I think that's a really good place to start self-awareness because, again, there's some people out there that might have super low self-worth and you could be like super deserving. You've done the work, you've worked on yourself, you're putting it out there, you're growing and you just don't feel good. That's an internal thing, and there's people out there that you don't really. You're most likely not listening to this podcast, but if you are, sit with me. You're not really working that hard and you're wondering why you're not more successful than everybody around you. It's like they're working harder than you are, so you don't deserve to be more successful than them. That's a bad place to be, so I don't. This is always a hard topic because it depends on where you are, but what is your relationship with what you've accomplished?

Alan Lazaros:

well, let's give some of the stuff, let's give some of the goods of what? So 2000 and what episode is this? 2070?

Alan Lazaros:

2081 yeah so eight year journey, eight year journey. Most of the time when Kevin and I go back to the drawing board it's okay, we're not good enough yet and we don't mean good enough intrinsically. We mean good enough for that level of success. So it's so obvious in hindsight. It's not as obvious in foresight. So in hindsight, you weren't remember when I used to tell you you're not that organized. I think I knew that. But I used to tell you you need to be more organized this is how I broke it down.

Alan Lazaros:

I said my man kev.

Kevin Palmieri:

There's this personality test called hexico this is how to sell kev, something this is personality test called hexico.

Alan Lazaros:

It tests you on 26 facets of your personality and the most correlated with business success. You and I, we have a business together. We do. I didn't actually talk like this. Uh, the most statistically correlated with business success is is conscientiousness, and we all have a certain level of conscientiousness. It's like a scale from zero to 10. So think of someone who's a mess and never organized, and their car isn't clean, their house isn't clean, they're just kind of all over the place. That's someone who has a low score on conscientiousness. Maybe they're very creative, but they have a low conscientiousness score and therefore they should not start a business unless they have someone in their corner who is very conscientious.

Alan Lazaros:

Conscientiousness in Hexaco, which stands for humility, extroversion, introversion. All this different stuff tests you on your personality. So it breaks down into four sub-facets. Now you can see why it's so hard to convince anyone of anything. The four sub-facets are diligence, which is hard work you got that, kev. Good to go. Hard worker. Check Green, baby, green, yellow, red, green. Prudence, that's uh, what's that? It's the ability to make a great, long-term, rational choice.

Alan Lazaros:

Strong, it's the strong to semi-strong depending on whether or not you chat GPT All right. So there's prudence, diligence, hard work and intelligent decision-making, long-term strategic thinking. And then there's organization, oof Kev. We want to build a successful company together, kev going to need you to button up, man.

Kevin Palmieri:

Yeah.

Alan Lazaros:

Love you, right? So here's how you influence Kev. You want a successful business, right, yeah, okay, the science shows, right, okay. And then the fourth one is what perfectionism? It means? You're being very thorough and thoughtful. So six sigma three defects per million transactions. So, kev, if you send three million emails, you can only have three spelling errors. Are you game?

Kevin Palmieri:

I feel like I'm pretty good at spelling, so that's good yeah better than me, probably.

Alan Lazaros:

I would say I'm not that strong of a speller. You did win a spelling bee.

Kevin Palmieri:

Second place, second way back look there, there and there got me he's. He's over there by the tree. It was like me he's.

Alan Lazaros:

He's over there by the tree. It was like t-h-e-i-r, no, t-h-e-r-e. Dumb rookie mistake, dumb amateur hour, amateur hour. I had it all right. 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. In hindsight, what is it obvious that you needed to improve to get to even this level is it obvious that you needed to improve to get to even this level organization?

Kevin Palmieri:

for sure, one of the things I really really needed to improve is when I'm really good at getting a result, I'm not always good at following up. I'm not always doing good at doing the next action after the result. So, like I don't know what a good example is, like I would say, hey, email me if you need help with this. Somebody would email me and it would take me a week to get back. That not good. That's not good. You can't do that. I always love your face whenever you can't do that.

Alan Lazaros:

Whenever you own stuff like that, it's the funniest face.

Kevin Palmieri:

You make a very specific face whenever you're because I laugh, I laugh through the pain. That for sure, being on time, I was always good at being organized. I was never. I was never really good at, but I'm telling you, if you saw my desk, I got some stuff on here. I have like one pile of stuff. It's very small, and then the rest of my desk is clean as a whistle. I still have the bag of the box of pasta on my desk. That'll be bag of weed. No, no, no, real quick yeah.

Alan Lazaros:

Give me the top three.

Kevin Palmieri:

Alan is really riding me on time lately. For the first eight years I tried to get off here on time and lately he's like dude, just so you know. I got a hard stop at eight. I hate to be that guy.

Alan Lazaros:

It's called a hard out A hard out, a hard out at eight. In the military they call it a hard out. We got to crank in five minutes nine seconds. No. So let me actually unpack that for a second. I've been working too fucking late. Yeah, yeah, it's fair. And if I work late, I go to bed late. If I go to bed late, I wake up late. If I wake up late, I can't first world problems. I'm very, very grateful for where we've ended up, but if I want to get to the next level as the CEO and as a coach and a trainer and a podcaster trust me, I got to keep this streak. So far I'm nine days in a row cutting. I call it closing the store Closing the store by 8 o'clock.

Kevin Palmieri:

Now, mind you, hey, hold on, I have a 10-minute buffer.

Alan Lazaros:

Okay, now tonight, mind you. Hey, hold on, I have a 10 minute buffer. Okay, I do have a 10 minute buffer, so I'm closing the store in four minutes and 28 seconds here. I gotta get my butt downstairs. 10 minute buffer. You're gonna z out the register, you know it. So let's each give our top three things that we sucked at that needed. Quite frankly, I always say this. I said this earlier to a client. If you're out there listening, you know who. I said the science of achievement doesn't give a shit about your feelings. I do. I want to see you win. I understand if you're insecure, that's, you know. It is what it is. The science of achievement doesn't care. Your goals do not care. So you either, do it. This is the system of success. This is what I know will work, statistically speaking. We got to do it. So now we got to work on the inner stuff to figure out what we're doing. So for you, kev, what are the three things that you had to level up in order to get to this level?

Alan Lazaros:

mouth, your mouth, your throat, mouth's making noises over there, please, I burped one should I do health, wealth and love all business I think you do the success ones, the success ones, whatever's truthful for you, whatever the three top ones are organization for sure, I was wildly disorganized.

Kevin Palmieri:

It's about it. Everything else was fucking dialed in. I'll give one. In relationships For a long time I would say if I was in this person's position, this is how I would feel. That's stupid. I'm not in that person's position. Like I'm not in my wife's position. Is what she is thinking more emotional than the way I would think it? Yes, but I also know that about her. So that's on me. It's not like oh, you should think more like me. That's not the case. That's not the reason this happened. So that, like, really understanding somebody else's perspective and instead of excusing my behavior because of the way they think, owning like, oh yeah, you know, you're right, I know that about you. That would be another one for sure.

Alan Lazaros:

And then because then otherwise she has to change right. There's a big difference between she could improve for sure versus changing who she is. Yeah, and if she feels like she has to change who she is, that's not like if this is something I fell in love with and now I'm like, well, that's not the way.

Kevin Palmieri:

I think, politely, kev, politely, kev, you get, you get fucked politely. And then one more, uh, let's see, I I think I subconsciously was afraid to overwhelm myself, so I would. I would always have my foot like if I do way more of that, I'm gonna be super overwhelmed and I don't think it's gonna be good. I've kind of gotten rid of that completely.

Kevin Palmieri:

That's, that's gone, that's nice yeah, and not, and not too, though no, but it's good for success too, because usually innovation comes after pressure I I told Alan I was like, hey, potentially big opportunity, but it's a lot, it's going to be a lot Kev's going to be doing it himself.

Alan Lazaros:

Proud of you man, I always say Kev can start like a champion. The dude can't scale a fucking thing.

Kevin Palmieri:

No, that's not my jam.

Alan Lazaros:

That's not my jam, it's good, you start it, I'll scale it. It's a good team man we're a good team.

Kevin Palmieri:

All right, what are your three? I am being playful, by the way.

Alan Lazaros:

Yeah, all right. So, number one I needed to be more discerning with people. I had such a hard time. I wanted to save everybody. I wanted to desperately to see everybody succeed, and there was no way. That was arrogant and ignorant. And there's no way. There's no way, especially so now.

Alan Lazaros:

My new rule is if you have high humility, high work ethic and you're into personal development, I will help you. If you do not have those three things, we're not going to get along anyway. It's not going to be good for you or for me. So, number one I was not discerning with people.

Alan Lazaros:

Number two what did I have to get better at? I had to get much better at what I pay attention to. I had to get really, really clear on what I allow into my mind and what I don't, because, as the CEO of this company, there's so many fucking distractions, there's so much coming at you. I have an alarming amount of messages right now and I'm grateful, I'm genuinely grateful.

Alan Lazaros:

That is a great problem to have, it's a great challenge to have, but I had to get really discerning with what I did and didn't pay attention to, and make sure that I do not fall down any rabbit holes, and the last one would be I don't particularly think I was a bad leader, but I definitely wasn't a great one yet, and I didn't understand what was unique to me and what was other people's experiences to your point, and I was unconsciously and unintentionally not understanding the level someone else was at and what would get them to their next level, because I didn't understand what level I was actually at. And so an example of that would be if I've worked out for a decade and you haven't worked out at all and we go to the gym together and I overwhelm you without knowing it and then simultaneously you're insecure about it, so you try not to seem overwhelmed and I don't pick up on that, so then it hurts. It hurts our relationship, and which goes back to number one of not being more discerning.

Kevin Palmieri:

Is that all, that's it. You were staring at me feverishly while getting ready to cough, so I wasn't sure if that was like yo, I'm going to cough and then I want to finish, or you were just done.

Alan Lazaros:

No, it's been a long day. My throat sometimes as a speaker. Sometimes you just have to power through it and that's what I'm doing right now.

Kevin Palmieri:

Have you ever tried the old throat coat? I think that's what it's called Tea.

Alan Lazaros:

I know the client shouted to fill it, Send it on over man.

Kevin Palmieri:

I won't, because I don't know where it is or how to get it, but throat coat tea, evidently, is like I don't know if it has honey in it, but it's good for your throat.

Alan Lazaros:

I appreciate it, man, I need it's sometimes every now and then my throat has trouble, so thank you for uh dealing with that. Listeners and viewers, Thank you for being on this next level journey. Journey with us. It's been real.

Kevin Palmieri:

Now. We'll be back tomorrow. I'm just, I'm just, we will be back tomorrow. If you are looking to level up your journaling, next level, dream ladder on Amazon, it can get shipped right to your house Hard copy, soft copy, Amazon it can get shipped right to your house hard copy, soft copy all that it takes like five minutes a day. So if you want to do something sustainable, we are big fans of it. Everybody on the team is doing it. A lot of people have bought them, so thank you to those who have. Hopefully it's been fruitful for you.

Alan Lazaros:

But the link will be in the show notes and for any business owners out there who want to level up their business as well as themselves, business Growth University has three episodes. Every episode is one brick in the structure to build momentum. And check that out, the link will be in the show notes. The first three the first one's on branding, marketing, sales, client delivery and community, and then the first. The next two are going deeper into the first two. So branding and marketing, in other words, the first six are going to go through the entire sales no, not sales star business growth star that Kevin and I created to build NLU.

Kevin Palmieri:

We'll have the link in the show notes for that as well. 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.

Alan Lazaros:

Keep it next level, next level nation you all tomorrow.

Kevin Palmieri:

Keep it Next Level, next Level Nation. Thanks for joining us for another episode of Next.

Alan Lazaros:

Level University. We love connecting with the Next 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

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Kevin Palmieri

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