Young and Profiting with Hala Taha - Donald Miller: Be Your Own Hero | E153

Episode Date: January 26, 2022

What prevents people from taking that first step to becoming their own hero? This week on YAP we are chatting with Donald Miller. Donald is an author, public speaker, and business owner, widely considered one of the most entertaining and informative speakers in the world. He is the CEO of StoryBrand, a marketing company that helps more than 3,000 business leaders clarify their brand message so their companies grow every year. Donald’s thoughts on stories have deeply influenced leaders and teams for Pantene, Ford/Lincoln, Zaxby's, Chick-fil-A, Steelcase, Intel, Prime Lending, and thousands more. He is also the CEO of Business Made Simple, the host of the Business Made Simple podcast, and the author of personal essays and books about faith, God, and self-discovery, including the bestsellers Building a StoryBrand and Marketing Made Simple, and his most recent, Hero on a Mission. He lives and works in Nashville, Tennessee with his wife Elizabeth on their estate: Goose Hill.  In this episode, Donald will share all of his philosophies from his new book Hero On a Mission. We will talk about Donald’s 4 characteristics: Victim, Hero, Villain, and Guide, and how we can choose which role we want to play. We will also dive into how writing a eulogy can help us get closer to our goals not by focusing on our death, but our life! If you want to learn more about personal transformation and how to go from a victim to a hero, this is an episode for you! Sponsored by -  Jordan Harbinger - Check out jordanharbinger.com/start for some episode recommendations. Mint Mobile -  Real Vision - Visit realvision.com/yap and join Real Vision for just $1! Issuu - Sign up for a premium account and get 50% off! Go to ISSUU.com/podcast and use promo code YAP.  Prose - Take your FREE in-depth hair consultation and get 15% off your first order today! Go to Prose.com/yap. Social Media:  Follow YAP on IG: www.instagram.com/youngandprofiting Reach out to Hala directly at [e-mail] Follow Hala on Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/htaha/ Follow Hala on Instagram: www.instagram.com/yapwithhala Follow Hala on Clubhouse: @halataha Check out our website to meet the team, view show notes and transcripts: www.youngandprofiting.com Timestamps: (00:41) - Donald shares about his mid 20s and his previous victim mentality (05:16) - The genesis of Donald’s book Hero On A Mission (08:37) - Breaking down the 4 characteristics found in the book (09:27) - The Victim (13:16) - The Villain (15:00) - The Hero (15:55) - The Guide (18:45) - The inspirational story of a Victim transforming to a Hero (20:55) - Donald explains the difference between an external locus of control and an internal locus of control (24:42) - What prevents someone from taking that step to become a hero? (32:37) - Why writing a eulogy help you get closer to your goals (36:11) - The elements of a well written eulogy (39:28) - How to take action on what you’ve written in your eulogy (42:18) - The story of Victor Frankl and Logotherapy (47:26) - Donald gives his definition of personal agency (49:55) - What is the one actionable thing that our listeners can do today to be more profiting tomorrow? (51:30) - Why is the question “Who am I becoming?” an important question to ask yourself? (52:24) - What is Donald’s secret to profiting in life? Mentioned In The Episode:  Donald’s Book - https://amazon.com/dp/1400226945  Donald’s Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/donaldmiller  My Daily Planner - https://heroonamission.com/  Free Download - https://heroonamission.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode of YAP is sponsored in part by Shopify. Shopify simplifies selling online and in-person so you can focus on successfully growing your business. Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at Shopify.com-profiting. This episode is brought to you by Action Alkaline Water. Proper hydration can help unlock your potential, whether you're slaying meetings, crushing workouts, or learning balloon art.

Action is purified alkaline water, ion charged to 9.5 pH at the time of bottling. Maybe you'll get so inspired that you'll fill a recording studio with balloon animals. Not that I've done that. Get seriously hydrated, take action, visit the Action Alkaline Water Store on Amazon, that's AC plus IOLN. You're listening to YAP, Young and Profiting Podcast, a place where you can listen, learn, and profit. Welcome to the show.

I'm your host, Halla Taha, and on Young and Profiting Podcast, we investigate a new topic each week and interview some of the brightest minds in the world. My goal is to turn their wisdom into actionable advice that you can use in your everyday life, no matter your age, profession or industry. There's no fluff on this podcast, and that's on purpose. I'm here to uncover value from my guests by doing the proper research and asking the right questions. If you're new to the show, we've chatted with the likes of XFBI agents, real estate moguls, self-made billionaires, CEOs, and bestselling authors.

Our subject matter ranges from enhancing productivity, had to gain influence, the art of entrepreneurship, and more. If you're smart and like to continually improve yourself, hit the subscribe button, because you'll love it here at Young and Profiting Podcast. This week on YAP, we're chatting with Donald Miller. Donald Miller is a New York Times best-selling author, public speaker, podcast host, and business owner, who is widely considered as one of the most entertaining and informative speakers in the world.

We had Donald on our show fairly recently in episode number 120, where we talked about storytelling for business and how to leverage storytelling in your marketing to drive sales. If you're interested in that topic, be sure to go back to episode number 120 to check it out. Donald is also the CEO of Storybrand, a top marketing company that has helped more than 3,000 businesses clarify their brand message. Donald's company Storybrand has deeply influenced the marketing strategy for brands like Pantene, Ford, Chick-fil-A, Intel, and thousands more. He's also the host of the extremely popular Business Made Simple podcast, which I've

appeared on twice, and he's the author of the best-selling books, Building a Storybrand and Marketing Made Simple. And his latest book, Hero on a Mission just came out and is the focus of today's episode. In this episode, we get a refresher on Donald's four characters in every story, the victim, the hero, the villain, and the guide, and we'll hear how Donald acted like a victim

throughout his 20s and how that mentality totally worked against him. And we'll gain an understanding on the steps he took to turn things around and to transform into the hero of his own life. We'll get a peek into some of Donald's tools for his long-term success like the elements of his morning ritual, which includes reading his eulogy to remind himself every day of his top priorities. And lastly, we'll learn how we can each reframe our own story and structure our lives in such a way that we experience a deep and fulfilling sense of meaning.

If you want to learn more about personal transformation and how to go from a victim to a hero, this episode is for you. Hey, Donald, welcome back to Young and Profiting Podcast. It's good to see you, Halla. I'm so happy that you're here. You're one of my favorite people in this space. So for those of you who don't know Donald, Donald is an amazing entrepreneur. He's also the CEO of a company called Story Brand, which has helped thousands of companies, household names,

like Pantene and Chick-fil-A, create their brand narrative. And Donald is a master at that. Donald's actually here today because he's launching a new book. It already launched. It's called Hero on a Mission. And so that's out now. And today we're going to talk to him about his book and his transformation personally. So Donald, you're super successful now.

You're very well put together. You're a great businessman. You come highly recommended, but it turns out when I was reading your book that you weren't always like this. And in your mid 20s, you got a victim mindset. And you couldn't make any money. And you didn't have great relationships. And you were basically like a failure at life. So talk to us about what you were like in your mid 20s and how you are a victim and then we'll go from there.

Well, I will say when I look back at the kid in their mid 20s on 50 now, I still really like that kid. He was fun. He liked to ride. He believed in himself as a rider. He had great friends. He went on some great adventures. But yeah, I think underlying all of that

was this sort of idea of I'm doomed. It's never gonna happen for me. I'm never gonna get my break. The world is against me. And my life showed, it showed that. It was probably 150 pounds heavier than I am now. Oh wow. Yeah, no, I was 387 at my highest.

I'm 210 or 208 the other day. I was kind of proud. I'm down two pounds. So I was fat then. I'm just chubby now. So things are getting way better, right? You know, but I kind of have this default mode of seeing myself as a victim and I didn't realize

that I was choosing that identity. And I discovered it in the very strange way, in order to write, in order to be a writer, I'd studied story because you know, you study story to try to get people to turn the page and you use these techniques. And I noticed there are four characters in almost every story, the victim, the villain, the hero, and the guide.

And as I looked at my life like a story, I realized, oh my word, if your life is a story, you're the victim. Somebody else is the hero and you're this bit part that lays around feeling sorry for itself. And somebody else gets the girl and gets the money and gets the job and gets the accolades. And you just suck energy into yourself. And quite frankly, it's not very attractive. And when I realized that, I stopped doing it.

I didn't have to fight it. I just stopped doing it because I realized, wait a second, you're thinking of yourself as the victim because you wanna make excuses for not trying. You wanna make excuses for not succeeding. You want a rescuer. You want somebody to come and do the work for you because you don't know how to do it.

And none of it is working. And so when I began, you know, it's a percentage game. When I began, you know, if I've seen myself 80% of the time as a victim, I began to see myself 32% of the time as a victim. And 60% of the time as a hero, everything began to change. I mean, everything. And, you know, lost weight, got a book published, started a little company, started to learn

more, and sort of acquire knowledge about how to get better. And, you know, it didn't change overnight, but now 25 years later, my life is not perfect. There's hard things that happen to us all. But I enjoy my life. And more than I enjoy my life. And more than I enjoy my life, what I'm really saying is I enjoy the story that I'm living inside of. And it's transforming me and continuing to make me stronger. And so, I wonder now that I've written this book and there's been so much feedback about it, I'm realizing,

oh my word, this isn't just me. There's a lot of people who don't realize, wait a second, I've been identifying as the wrong character in the story. And it's not working. And if I just identify as this character, things start to change. And of course, the four characters that exist in story, the victim, the villain, the hero, and the guide exist in story because they exist in us. All four of them exist in you. And I personally play all four every day, but to degree that I give the

victim stage time, my life goes nowhere. To degree that I give the villain stage time, people don't like me and they want to throw me in jail and they want justice against me. And to degree I give the hero stage time, I transform into a better version of myself. And so the idea is just try to give the hero more time in your life. And your life will shape up accordingly without you having to do much of anything. Oh my gosh, this is so powerful. And I can't wait to really dive deep on each one of those different characters and just go into all of that. But before we do that, I want to know the genesis of this book. Why did you decide that you wanted to write this book at this point in your

life? Because you've been writing for years. How come, why did you wanted to write this book at this point in your life? Because you've been writing for years. How come, why did you decide to put this out now? What was the big change or a-ha moment where you were like, I really need to write this book about transforming from victim to hero? Well, I didn't. I decided I wanted to write this book 10 years ago and I couldn't. I mean, I tried and tried and tried and I just couldn't get it to where it was simple and easy to follow and easy to understand.

I could live it, but I couldn't explain to anybody else what it was. It was a combination of a little bit of Joseph Campbell's work, a little bit of Victor Frankl's work, and then sort of a memoir story of how I was applying these things. So I tried in various forms and it just wasn't readable, wasn't enjoyable to read. Finish the book and sat down and said, I think I can do this and started. And I think, Holly, you know this, when you actually sit down, you write those first few paragraphs, you get the first few pages out. You pretty much know this one's going to go all the way. This one's going to go all the way to the end zone. And I felt that and over the year,

you know, would get up early from about 7am to 9am and work on this and try to explain it. Few fits and false starts, a lot of stuff in the trash can. But ultimately, you know, was able to finish the book. And I think most of it, I was able to finish because I just kept telling myself, look, keep it simple, keep it simple, keep it simple, keep it simple, don't get into the weeds.

And it became a book. And I'm really, really grateful. It also, something also happened while I was writing the book that I think pushed me through. And my wife got pregnant. And I finished the book, and we had our daughter Imaline,

and then I started rewriting it. And so the whole time I'm writing it, I'm thinking I'm gonna be a dad. What do I wanna leave for my kids? Like what if I die and she never meets me? And that sort of became a motivation to get it all down. And then after she was born, of course, I fell completely in love with this little child

and started thinking about my legacy and that made the book just feels so much more important. So I think, you know, what I'm hearing, and I wasn't expecting this and didn't know it was happening, but my friends are saying, wow, this got really personal, and I didn't know that was happening, but I think that was the other motivation that in the end, you know, yes, I can leave behind a college education for her. Maybe I can leave behind some sort of a house or some financial help, but really what I want to leave behind is, hey, I can leave behind a college education for her. Maybe I can leave behind some sort of house or some financial help. But really what I want to leave behind is, hey, I'm a lot in book.

There's four characters living inside you, and you need to pay really close attention to which one's bubbling to the surface. Because that's going to dictate everything else that comes forward in life, including the quality of your relationships, the depth of the love that you have, your ability to keep a job, your ability to sustain friendships, all of it stems from the person that you identify with inside yourself. So, I have to say, I love looking at your Instagram. It's so cute.

All the pictures you post of your daughter and your wife. I'm sorry, yeah. If you want to know more about business, there's other accounts, but if you want to see my dogs and my wife and my daughter, then that's the Instagram account of it. So what you said was just really powerful. We all have four personalities that live inside of us, and it's our choice to decide which one we want to give the most energy to.

So it's the victim, the villain, the hero, and the guide. Could you really take us deep on these? Break it down. What are each of the characteristics of each of these personality types? Well, you know, again, there are four. And my thesis in the book is the reason that these screenwriters and these storytellers keep choosing these four characters to write about

is not because there are victims in the world and there are villains in the world and there are heroes in the world and there are guides in the world. It's literally because they're all inside of us all. In stories, they're villains in the world, and they're heroes in the world, and they're guides in the world, it's literally because they're all inside of us all. In stories, they're not. In stories, they're separated into different characters, but that's not the way it works in life. They're in us.

And so when we hear that voice that says, look, I'm doomed, I'm not gonna be able to make it out. Woe is me, my life always, this terrible stuff like this always happens, that's the victim. And the victim in a story plays a bit part. The victim in a story exists to make the hero look good because the hero rescues them and the villain look bad

because the villain tortures them. That's the only purpose of the victim. They do not transform. They do not get a reward at the end of the story, they do nothing happens to them except that they play off the hero and the villain. And if we do identify too strongly with the victim inside of us, that is exactly what happens to you. I mean, the story of your life literally plays out that way. You don't transform, you don't get what you want, you don't become a better version of yourself, you don't get rewarded, you don't get respected, people basically feel sorry for you.

And that gives you some resources, some change that's thrown at you, but that's it. And some people get hooked on that change and just think that's the only way that they can survive. It also helps us make, it serves us in some way. Victim mentality is a coping mechanism. And sometimes, let me just say, it's actually an effective coping mechanism. And it's helpful for a couple of days. It's not purely evil, it's not purely bad. I finished the book, the Amaline was born,

it's in a really good space. And before the book came out, about two weeks before the book came out, I had to make an extremely difficult family decision. And the family decision was to let go of my chocolate lab, Lucy. The average lifespan of a chocolate lab is 10 to 12 years. She's 14 and a half. And she had a big tumor, a lot of arthritis, but she was cognizant, you know. And the doctor was saying, look, you know, anything passed today,

and you're just making her suffer so that you don't have to feel guilty. And you know, I thought about it, thought, okay, we gotta do this. You know, I let her go. We let her, you know, it was a beautiful time, a family time together, and let her go, put her in the car.

Hala, the next day, I'm in a fetal position in my bed, weeping. I mean, this is, you know, she's my best friend. And my wife calls her my first wife. And I'm saying to myself, I'm releasing a book in two weeks, defending the identity that life has meaning. And it's all a lie. It's just a complete lie.

There is no meaning because we can't keep our dogs. And a couple days later, of course, I'm saying, well, you know, it is how beautiful is it that she was with me that long and she got to meet my daughter and she got to move into this house a year and a half ago that's called Goose Hill. It's literally named after her, Lucy Goose. And she taught me about friendship. She taught me about devotion. She taught me about she got me to Betsy, she taught me to be responsible in relationships. You know, it took a couple days for me to convert and to transform from a victim mentality,

which is okay, it's okay, but we can't stay there. We become victims temporarily in life so that we can turn around and metabolize the pain and turn it into strength and optimism and hope. And skill, by the way, and empathy, beautiful things come from pain. And, you know, that's the benefit of having understood what I wrote about in the book is you can sort of be self-aware and gently and with great grace guide yourself toward a more optimistic identity. So, but that's the victim and the danger being a victim.

The villain is very similar. The victim experiences pain, so does the villain. The villain though rises up in strength rather than stays the victim, but they rise up in strength not to help others, but to seek vengeance on a world that's hurt them. So the, and the hero also experiences pain. The hero experiences pain and rises up and says, I'm going to become strong so that nobody else has to experience the pain I did. I'm

going to defend them and defend the world against these injustices where the villain says, I'm going to get people, I'm going to get back at people. And the general rule about a villain in a story is that they make others small. And so there's that spirit in us. I've got it in me, I don't know about you, but the spirit to gossip, the spirit to demean others, the spirit to think that others are lesser than you is a villainistic, characteristic. And if we let that take too much ownership of our life, if we over-identify with that, what happens to a villain in a story?

Well, they are killed. They are killed or they are thrown in jail. They're taken care of. And I have friends now who are mistreating their employees, who are doing, they're just stressed and overworked as the truth, but the way they're responding to that, their teams are mounting against them. And I'm just, look, it's very predictable. This all, all of this is extremely predictable. What you need to do is say, I've been very stressed, I've been extremely rude,

and I've diminished you, and I want to apologize. And if you'll give me a chance to start over, let's keep working. And that immediately transforms you out of the villain and back into the hero. So the idea is if we can get ourselves to just function more as a hero than anything else, the story's going to go well. Now, what does a hero do? A hero rises up against what they are challenged with and transforms into a better version of themselves so that they can overcome the challenge.

Heroes are not people who are capable of overcoming challenge. They're not. They're people who are capable of changing into the person who can overcome the challenge. So to stay in a heroic mindset doesn't mean I'm awesome, I'm great. It means I can become the kind of person who can deal with this.

And you know from starting a company, if you did not have the skill sets to start a company and run a successful company when you started, you had to beat yourself, beat your head against the wall many times until you became the person and it's by accepting these challenges that we transform. And then once we do transform and we become very competent, what we find is that winning only for ourselves is really empty. It leaves us kind of feeling lonely.

And so we want to turn around and help others. And indeed, Holly, your entire company, that's what you do. And so that characteristic is called the guide. And the guide is Gandalf and Mary Poppins and on and on and on in these stories Mr. Miyagi in the karate kid, you know these characters that show up to help the hero in the day and So as we get older and more experienced certainly as we become parents the guide Characteristics come alive in us and and I argue in the book that that is actually the most fulfilling role to play. You can't play the guide until you've been the hero for some time.

But slowly the guide begins to manifest itself. And that's indeed where we find a deep sense of meaning in our lives. Let's hold that thought and take a quick break with our sponsors. Young and profitors, do you have a brilliant business idea but you don't know how to move forward with it? Going into debt for a four-year degree isn't the only path to success. Instead, learn everything you need to know about running a business for free by listening to the Millionaire University podcast.

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Wow. So like a couple of things are really standing out based on what you just said. The first is that the way that we acknowledge pain and interact with pain determines whether we're the villain or the hero. Yeah, how we react to it and how we respond to it determines our path. Yeah, which is just super interesting. And then the other thing that really stood out is the fact that in order to be a guide, you need to be a hero first. And once you're kind of confident and successful, the next step is to then give back to others and be a guide and help others. You know, become here as a transport.

That's going to make us more fulfilled. Now, to be sure, you can be a guide at two years old. I mean, you know, if you have a younger sibling and you help them figure out how to use a SIPI cup, you are acting as the guide. So we all act like guides from the beginning. But as we get older, we become much more effective as a guide. I went and interviewed Pete Carroll, who is the coach of the Seattle Seahawks many years ago. And I asked him, when did you first realize

that you wanted to be a coach? And he said, you know, I had the luxury of winning as an athlete really early in life. And I called it a luxury, he said, because it helped me discover that it actually wasn't very fulfilling. But when I turned around and helped other people when it was very meaningful to me,

it was an enjoyable, pleasurable life experience. And so that led me into a career of coaching. Well, what he said there was, I enjoyed playing the hero. It was really nice. But when I started helping other people win, and help other heroes win, I felt a deep calling in my life. And it's true that the objectives that we determine for our lives, if they are mutually beneficial,

that is if they benefit others and they benefit ourselves, they align much more closely with the deep experience of meaning. So, I want to talk about the hero a little bit more because it turns out that every inspirational story basically has the same plot. And a lot of people think of heroes as he's like big, strong people that always do great, but really you say that it's a victim who's transforming and that's really all a hero is. So talk to us more about that. What is the typical inspirational story that we all know? Well, yeah. So when I say, when I say play the hero, most people go, I'm not a hero.

You know, I'm not strong. I'm not this. Well, pause your favorite movie and ask yourself if the hero likes being in this particular situation. I don't care where you pause it in the movie. Pause the movie and ask yourself, is the hero enjoying this? And the answer is no. They're not.

They're clinging to the side of a building. Their girlfriend just left them. They are having to give a speech and they're not. They're clinging to the side of a building. Their girlfriend just left them. They are having to give a speech and they're not ready. It doesn't matter. The whole movie, they are in a place they don't want to be having to do a thing they don't want to have to do, engaging a challenge that they don't feel like they're they measure up to. That's the whole movie. And they're ill equipped. They're afraid. They don't want to do it, they're in desperate need of help. That's a hero. And so if that feels like you,

then well, congratulations, you're in the right place. And that story is transforming. So what we see is in the last nine minutes or so of the film, we're talking about film. In the last nine minutes, the hero has in fact transformed and is a much better version of themselves. We tend to think of heroes and define them by the last nine minutes instead of the previous 90.

So the idea is, if you want to be a hero in a mission, set an objective in your life that is difficult. That's going to require some commitment and some transformation on your part and step into it and try to make it happen. And that is what will transform you. So heroes and victims are very similar, except heroes are not looking for a rescuer. They're getting up and trying to get, no, they may, they may look for help. They may look for a guide, but they're not looking for somebody to take the responsibility

away from them. That's what a victim is doing. So something else that I thought was really interesting. You had an author's note in your book where you talked about the fact that you shouldn't leave your fate up to destiny. And you talk about a concept in your book, the external locus of control and the internal locus of control. Can you talk to us about the difference between the two and why that matters in terms of

how we plan out and go about our lives. Yeah, well, the author's note is very, very short. It says, I don't think we should trust fate to write the story of our lives. Fate is a terrible writer. And it's actually very true. I don't think fate is either working for you or against you. I think it's entirely, it's like the weather. It's neutral and it's completely based on chance.

Sometimes fate works for us and we think, oh, you know, the stars are aligned. I personally don't believe that. And as somebody who believes in God, I don't believe God is either trying to make things happen for you or against you either. I think sometimes you might step in and do that. I don't know, I can't prove that.

But I think what he's doing is saying, here are the basic principles to make something really happen with your life and you get up and do it. That way you will have a sense of fulfillment about what you've done in life. And I, by the way, I'm gonna cheer you on. And to me, that's the interaction I have with God. And I know we're all over the place

theologically as people listen to this thing. But at the same time, I think the point is, if you are trusting an external source to guide the story of your life and make it work out, I personally do not think it's going to work out very well. I think what the external source wants you to do is be empowered and stand up and take responsibility for your life, and I think narrative structure in the universe itself probably rewards that. And it's so much more fulfilling, right? It's just so much more fulfilling to do so.

So psychologists have this term called internal locus of control versus external locus of control. And if you believe that my life is terrible because my parents and because the year I was born and because the way I look and because then what you're saying is my life, the quality of my life is determined by outside sources, things out of my control. Psychologists have a term for that. It's called an external locus of control. That my locus of control is actually external. Now those who identify with an external

locus of control have higher rates of depression, worse relationships, less earning power, higher rates of anxiety, and frustration in life. Now if you say, well, no, my life is miserable right now because of the decisions that I've made. And I willingly did some stuff I shouldn't do. And I So my life is miserable right now because of the decisions that I've made. And I willingly did some stuff I shouldn't do. And I mismanaged some money and I wasted my time. Even though it sounds like you're saying, you know, my life is terrible, that person who

says, well, it's terrible, but it's also pretty much my fault has much less rates of depression, better relationships, higher earning power, less anxiety, they do better in life. Because they actually believe they are in control of their lives, and they can learn from their mistakes and they can move on. So the good thing about external internal looks of control is you're not one or the other person. You actually fluid. In other words, if you have an external locust control, it can change to an internal locust of control. So heroes in stories have high internal locust of controls. Victims in stories have high external locust of control. So once again, whether we have an external or internal locust control, whether we think of ourselves as a victim or a hero,

determines the quality of the story that we will end up living. Oh my gosh, I love that. So let's say that somebody listening is, you know, there's a lot of people in their mid-tonies that are listening in right now that might feel like, man, I feel like I was like Donald when he was in his mid-tonies. And I feel like I approach life with an external locus of control. And I'm a victim. And I approach life as a victim.

What prevents them from transforming? Like what are the big things that prevent people from taking that step to become the hero of their own lives? Well, before I even say that, I want to say that judging yourself, shaming yourself, being upset because you just realized you've had a victim mentality is entirely and completely unhelpful. When we say to ourselves, you're such a little victim and you've wasted the last 10 years and if you weren't such a victim, people would like you.

Freeze that voice for a second, listen to it. Who is that talking? You know who that is talking? It's the villain. So now you're in a worthless conversation between the villain inside you and the victim inside you, two roles that will completely ruin your life.

So we've got to ignore those voices and we can't give them the microphone. What we have to do is say, have some grace. You have seen yourself as the victim because, and I'll tell you why, even if you had a wonderful, healthy childhood and there's no trauma, you see yourself as the victim because your parents did so much for you because they are loving and good. And now you are out on your own, you've been out on your own for a minute, and life is in fact very hard.

And you are learning and it takes a while to get your sea legs under you. And rather than face the challenges sometimes, you've given into a bit of a victim mentality as a coping mechanism to just to deal with the pain. And I would say, well, that's completely understandable. And not only is it completely understandable, it's kind of funny. It's kind of charming, right? And that's the sort of attitude that we want to have. And now we want to say, however, Mr. Miller,

if you want to be a writer, we're going to have to get up in the morning and we're going to have to work from seven to nine a.m. on the manuscript every day with some discipline. And we're going to have to accept this heroic journey and transform. And that is the attitude that a hero has. And so what would my advice be, one is don't kick yourself around for being a victim. It's wasted energy. Second is a hero has an objective. So we need to define what it is that you want. Do you want to be a writer?

Do you want to start a company? Do you want to be an influencer? Do you want to get married? And do you want to start a family? Do you want to, you know, what do we want to be a writer, do you want to start a company, do you want to be an influencer, do you want to get married, and do you want to start a family, do you want, you know, what do we want? And we need to write those things down. And I recommend in the book writing them down from a very interesting perspective,

and that is the perspective of the end of your life. So I give the assignment in the book to write your eulogy, to actually write your eulogy as though people were reading it after you died and talk about the things that you have accomplished. And what that does is it opens a story loop in our brains. Will you get these things done every morning, including today, about four to five mornings a week,

I read my eulogies, how I start my morning. And my eulogy talks about the fact that Donald Miller has lived three significant stories. One is, he started a company, well, business made simple, which became basically a college at a major university for entrepreneurs. So I have a meeting with the president of a major university here in a couple of weeks to pitch all these frameworks to be housed inside their university. Well, why do I have that meeting? I have that meeting because every morning I get up and I read that story. So every day I'm putting something on the plot.

If this president says, Dom, we're not going to do this, I'm going to get a meeting with another university. But this college is going to exist. So that gives... Oh, wow. You manifested the actual college thing specifically. 100%. Yeah, I wrote it down. Yeah, I wrote, I didn't manifest it.

I decided I pointed there and I went there, right? And I don't know about manifesting. There's nothing magical about, you know, saying I'm gonna eat an Oreo cookie and then you eat it. You know, that's just what you do. But it did, you know, it gave me that. The second is that is my family story. My wife and I and our daughter,

I'm a line live on 15 acres in Nashville, Tennessee. We have an event space. We're building a guest house. It's a beautiful sort of mini retreat center. And the vision several years ago that I wrote in my eulogy was that we would live in a house that serves the world, that thinkers come here, writers come here, entrepreneurs come here, you can't pay, it's all free.

And a couple of weeks from now, Evan McMullen is coming, he's running for Senate in Utah. He's going to speak to a group of influencers here, a former representative from the Red Campaign is coming to meet with country music singers and the governor's office to talk about criminal justice reform. All of that was just an idea. But what it was was a story that my wife and my six-month-old daughter could live into. And what I was trying to do was say, okay, we're going to start a family.

What would be the coolest place you could possibly grow up in to realize that you can change the world? And we dreamed up this house and an event space in the backyard and a guest house where writers come. Right now a couple of writers are upstairs. One of them wrote a book about the lead up to the Iraq war. We had a great dinner last night. Talk about it with some people.

It's just a place where wonderful conversation happens. Well you say, don't that sound so special and so magic. It was just an idea. And then you start doing things toward it. Another one is something called Build the Middle Class that will exist by the end of the year. And basically it's a petition that people can sign. It says we are asking Republicans and Democrats to come together and pass eight pieces of legislation on tax reform, education reform, immigration reform, and so on and so on. Immigration reform launched yesterday. And then that's it. I don't have any time. I've got 30 years left in my life,

and then I'm dead, and I will never come back to this planet. So I have 30 years left, and if somebody comes and says, Dom, we'd love for you to do a TV show. I look at my eulogy and I say, there's no TV show on here. I'm sorry, I can't do it.

I've got three stories, and I'm gonna live these three, and I don't have time to switch gears right now. So that's the thing that if you're in your 20s, it's not too late. In fact, you're in a perfect time to say, well, look, you know, what three stories do I want to live? And the great thing about being in your 20s is you can actually live one of them, follow it away and start another one.

You've got so much time left, but a hero is always inside of a story. And one of the most dangerous things you can do is live your life and not know what story you're inside of. Because if you don't know what story you're inside of, one of two things is happening. One is somebody else is dictating the elements of your story, probably a corporation, right? Or a government or a spouse or somebody else, you're upon in their story, but you don't have a story. Or you just don't have a story.

And so you're a character walking around on a movie set and nobody's given you a script and nobody's given you a part to play. And you literally feel just as uncomfortable in your own skin as you would as that character with no part in the story and yet he's walking around on set. And that's a restless feeling that a lot of people identify with. Totally. I mean, I think this is such an interesting concept.

I had Matt Higgins on the show. He was on Shark Tank. He's a big TV personality, a big VC investor. And he also swears by writing a eulogy and then he reads it every day as well. I had Robert Green on the show, huge successful author. He talks about the law of death denial. And it's very similar that if you avoid the thought of death, you lack urgency, you lack motivation.

And this sounds very similar. So why does writing a eulogy work? Like why do you think that that actually helps you get closer to your goals? Processing your own death does a few really wonderful things for you. And what I mean by processing means realizing that you're not here forever and that your story is, in fact,

very, very short. One, as you mentioned, it creates a sense of urgency. I don't have time to sit around. I don't have time to sit around. I don't have time to take that frivolous meeting. I don't have time to, you know, whatever. I don't have time because I only have a certain number of days left. You know, I got married at 42.

We had a baby when I was 49. I'm now 50. She's six months old. You know, I just told my team yesterday, I'm not doing anymore keynotes and I'm not getting on anymore airplanes. And what I wanna do is I've got 30 years left. I intend to live, I intend to live till I'm 85 years old. That means that my daughter, Hala, will be 35 years old

when I die if I make it to 85. I may not, I may make it 70, soala, will be 35 years old when I die. If I make it to 85, I may not, I may make it to 70, so she's gonna be 20, which is too young. If you had a daughter at 25, she would be 55. She would be 60 when you die. So I'm determined in the 30 to 35 years I've got left to get as many hours with her as my friends who had children when they were 25,

which means I can't get on airplanes. Now, if I didn't fully process the fact that I'm gonna die, I would never make that decision. I'd always be like, well, I got this weekend with Emma line. I can get on this airplane and go do this interview and blah, blah, blah, and I can go do this keynote and we can make some money because I've got forever with my daughter

It's a lie. You don't have forever and one of the things that my daughter will never ever say about me She may say a lot of things like he has terrible dad jokes and his fashion is horrible But what she won't say she won't say is he didn't spend time with me. She will not say that and I get to control that because I get to spend time with her. And so, you know, that's the sort of thing you get when you process your own death. The other thing is, you know, not only a sense of urgency, a sense of focus, right? These are the three stories I've got left. I've got time for nothing else. And everything else is a no. And that's 90% of the stuff that comes my way is a oh no, because when time is being taken away from you,

you get really, really focused right away. So the processing and thinking about our own death is the, I think, is just the basis of wisdom. And if you say, down that's morbid. I don't think we should think about our own death. That's sad. I want to be really clear what you're saying. You have the right to say that, certainly you do.

What you're actually saying is, I don't want to think about the truth. Just let that sit. I don't want to think about the truth. I want to live in denial. And you know, death denial, as you mentioned earlier, is something that does not in fact serve your life. 100%.

So let's give my listeners something actionable to do. If we ask them to write their eulogy, how much time should they take, how long should it be, what are the elements of a really well-written eulogy? Well, in my book, the purpose of the eulogy is actually to give you something that I call narrative traction. And narrative traction is when you get interested in your own story. And you know when you get interested in a story, you get hooked on a story and you're like, oh man, I just lost a weekend. I've got to sit here and keep clicking next, right?

You want that to be your life. So you want to wake up in the morning. And just like on Netflix, when you see that little, the next button slowly lighting up, you want your day to feel like that. I wonder what we can put on the plot today. I'm excited to put my feet into my own shoes and go get something dumb, because we're building something really cool and something really meaningful.

And I'm actually enjoying it. You're looking for narrative traction. So the eulogy assignment that I give in the book is not an actual eulogy assignment. It's not exactly what you want people to read when you die or what people to say. I mean, certainly it is. But what it is is something you can read every morning to remind you what your story is about.

Therefore, in my opinion, it should be short. And why should it be short? It should be short because if you have a seven page eulogy, you will not read it every morning because it takes too long. So mine is about four paragraphs. It takes me about 120 seconds to read it. And I actually have created. And you read it every single morning.

It's part of your morning routine. I spent $200,000 on a piece of software that keeps track of whether or not I'm reading my eulogy. That's how important this is to me. It's in a piece of software. If you go to mydailyplaner.com, yesterday, I've been doing this for years. Yesterday we made it available to the public.

So you go to mydailyplaner.com, you can write your eulogy, your 10-year-five year-one, your vision, your goal worksheets, and a daily planner page. It all comes together as a morning ritual that takes about 15 minutes. And right now, it came out yesterday. Right now, we have 85 people using it. So it's me and 85 people who are doing this. But that's fine with me. I did it because I think it's the life changer. And so it also it also, very, very soon within the next few weeks, the developers are adding a

streak button. So it will keep tabs on how many days you've read your Eulogy period, and then how many days in a row you've read your Eulogy so that you are, you know, this gamified so that you would want to keep your streak going. And it's a super super effective tool but yeah i've probably read it you know it's got to be thousands of times now. And also i'll also edit it because the software just let you change it. I was gonna say i can imagine you read that and you'd be like you know what i'm gonna tweak this little part because of the wall vang and yeah because the point is narrative. The point is I always want to tweak it a little bit so that I stay interested in it. We experience a deep sense of meaning

when we're in motion, not when we've arrived. So the whole point is to keep me in motion, keep me in motion, keep me heading towards something that's really beautiful. We'll be right back after a quick break from our sponsors. Hear that sound, young and profitors? You should know that sound by now, but in case you don't,

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That's masterclass.com-profiting for 15% off an annual membership. Masterclass.com-profiting. So to me, it sounds like your eulogy is basically all your huge life goals. It is your mission statement and then you need to plan, right? Because a goal without a plan is just a wish and a dream. So talk to us about how you go about planning and taking action on all the things you have in your eulogy. Yeah, so the book takes you through the 10 year, five year,

one year plan. By the way, if you want it on paper, it's free. Just go to here on omission.com. You don't even have to buy the book. Just download the pages and it's all there. So everything that you need is right there. And so you, there's a 10 year vision, a five year vision, and a one year vision. And they're exactly the same worksheet. They're just obviously the one year vision is a lot closer than the 10 year. And so, you know, they tell me what I've got to get done by the end of the year. There's two books that I need to finish by the end of this year.

I know that because I read my one-year vision this morning. And then in the next five years, there's certain things that need to happen in the next 10 years. In 10 years, I'm 60 years old. And at that point, the Bill-to-Middle Class platform has 30 million signatures. There are 250,000 representatives

flying our flags all over the country. And the middle of America, the common sense I'm willing to work with the other side to get things done has a voice in this country. And so I know I got to get this done within 10 years. So that means there's a lot of work to do, right? We've got to build some advocacy around this. So, you know, if I didn't read that step every morning, I think within a week, I'd forget the plot. Because I would stop reading it, and then my buddy Drew would say,

they'd go on this golf weekend, with all these people, and then I'd go on the golf weekend, and then, you know, there'd be some optometrist, he says, look, I've got this vision for, you know, starting 25,000 optometry centers around the look, I've got this vision for, you know, starting 25,000 optometry centers around the world. We've got $7 billion, but you come on as the CMO.

I'll give you $3 million a year to do it. And now I'm suddenly building optometry centers. You know, I mean, it's like what happened to build the middle class? Well, you didn't read your freaking five year vision. And you said, yes, to a great opportunity. And, you know, if you're in your 20s, you're listening Yeah, but I don't get those opportunities listen to me You're about eight years from getting those opportunities, right?

The older people die off and you take over and those are the opportunities that are gonna be handed to you And if you're not grounded before you get them You're gonna take some opportunities that you don't need to take and That's why you want to be grounded in the story that you are deciding to live in turn a locus of control. You direct your story, not opportunities and all that kind of stuff. You direct your story so that you decide which opportunities you take and which opportunities you reject. I love that. I think all this material is excellent. We're going to link it in our show notes. So last time you came on the show, I always ask this question at the end of my show, what is your secret to

profiting in life? And you mentioned Victor Frankl, which after reading your book, I learned he was your favorite philosopher and he really changed your life. And I think his story really helps tie all of this together. So tell us in more detail about Victor Frankl and his story and how he transformed from victim to hero, and then we can kind of take a look at his framework too. Well, Victor Frankl was a psychologist in Vienna in the 1920s and 30s, and he developed a theory alongside theoretically, at least Alfred Adler. Certainly, there was some young in instincts in there. Sigmund Freud was alive at the time. Some was going on in the water in Vienna

because those got, a lot of smart folks came out of there. And he basically said, man's dominant desire is a desire for a deep sense of meaning at which feels like purpose in their life. And he developed something called logotherapy, a therapy of meaning, in which he prescribed a certain way of living to people, which gave them a deep sense of meaning and helped them overcome depression, anxiety, and a bunch of other stuff.

And he applied it inside the Viennese hospital system specifically for suicidal high school patients. They had a serious suicide problem around the time grades were released. When he applied logotherapy, when he basically taught them to live as heroes on a mission, suicide rate dropped to zero. And he was writing a book on his theories when World War II broke out. And the Nazis began to collect Jews and put them in concentration camps.

Being a Jewish man, Victor Frankl was taken with his wife who was pregnant. His wife, Tilly, was pregnant with their first child. She was murdered. His parents were murdered, the manuscript in which the thesis was confiscated and taken from him And he spent years I believe in four different concentration camps and survived and after he survived

instead of being Disponded certainly he was in incredible pain, but he rose out of that Victim mentality and began delivering lectures around the world on how life in fact does have meaning and is in fact beautiful. And of course, who's going to argue with him, right? I mean, I'm sorry, your sugar cravings don't measure up to what this guy has been through. Yeah, if he's not a victim, then nobody has the excuse. That's right. And so he was incredibly influential on this book and influential on me, personally, I'd

say you saved my life and maybe saved the quality of my life, but just a wonderful, wonderful person who has proven that life, in fact, has been what's really interesting about Victor Frankl is he didn't actually tell us what the meaning of life was. He told us how to feel it. And he doesn't answer the question, what is the meaning of life or why does life have meaning? He just says, here's how you experience it. And so what it does is it makes the stuff I talk about in the book, and that's what the book is.

It's a prescription for logo therapy. And it makes the work theologically agnostic, philosophically agnostic. You know, I was meeting with a friend having coffee at an acquaintance, I should say, back in Portland many, many years ago. And they were, they was very obvious. They were in Nileist and they said to me at one point, well, you know, life is meaningless. And that could be the state model of Portland, Oregon, right? I mean, it's just, it's

that kind of place. And I, I said something a bit offensive to them. I wrote about it in the book, but I said, what if life is not meaningless? What if just your life is meaningless? And of course, they didn't think that was very funny. But what I meant by that was, what if the stuff that you were doing inside of your story is giving you a bad experience? And what if it's not life itself? In other words, what if you're writing a book

and what you're actually saying is this book is not interesting. And the good news is if we can get ourselves to believe it and understand it is that the book can change. If you know how to live a certain way, the book can get really, really interesting, really fast. And I'm a living testament to that because I really like my life. It's not always easy. It's not, you know, I cried myself to sleep when I had to put my dog down. It's not, you know, I cried myself to sleep when I had to put my dog down.

There are painful, painful elements to it. There are hard things. Today we took Himalayan to get her last shots at the doctor and hold your crying baby while she doesn't understand while somebody's poking her with a needle. They're just tough scenes in life. And of course, I'm being very, very light

and the people listening have some very, very light. And the people listening have some very, very painful scenes. And yet, we can choose to do things with our life that give our life a deep charge of meaning and beauty and go to sleep every night being grateful for the incredible experience that we're having. Yeah. The thing that keeps coming to my mind was this concept of personal agency. As you're talking about the fact that it's not that life is going to be perfect. There's going to be ups and downs, but it's how do you treat those ups and downs? How do you have perspective towards them? Can you talk to us about personal agency and what that is?

Yeah, personal agency is similar to internal locus of control. It's belief that you have the power. And the one thing that you have the power over that nobody can take away from you is your perspective on life, including your perspective on very, very difficult things. And so when painful things happen to us, we can either have a victim perspective,

which as well as me, I'm doomed, please send a rescuer, or we can actually say to ourselves, wait, this is painful, and also it somehow benefits me. It's both. And that's the prescription that Victor Franco would give to his patients. He would say, when something very painful happens, acknowledge it, don't be a delusional optimist, acknowledge it, grieve it, and also realize it comes with benefits. And when the most, in other words, redeem our pain. I met a young man who his son, he came home from church. His wife had stayed back at the church, came home from church and his three-year-old son, they went to take a nap and three-year-old son woke up,

went into the garage, got into, got back into the car, closed the door, and died of heat exhaustion. And he came to me and he said, Don, I want to write a book about this, I need to process it. And he ended up writing a book, and he travels the country and he helps people understand how to grieve the loss of a child. He did something with it. Now does that bring back his son? No, but what it does is it redeems the pain and uses it for good. And that has given his life a deep sense of meaning.

So any of us can do this. And what's the alternative? You know, the alternative is buy a truckload of whiskey, get a divorce, and drink yourself to death. I mean, well, you know, that's the victim life. And we're not going to do that. We're going to redeem our pain. Well, Donald, I feel like the work that you're doing is incredibly important. And I'm so happy that you wrote this book and you shared your story and your perspective on how to have a meaningful life. I think it's really important. So as we close out the interview, I have a new couple of questions that I ask my guests on every show in 2022.

What is the one actionable thing that our listeners can do today to be more profiting tomorrow. Okay, I love this and your listeners are going to hear this several times throughout the year. On the daily planner that I give away, there's one question, there's a bunch of questions, but one of the questions is the answer to your question. And that is just to answer the question, what am I grateful for? What am I grateful for? One thing that victims and villains do not have in common, or do have in common, forgive me, is they're ungrateful.

If you ever find yourself playing the villain or playing the victim, stop and ask yourself, what am I grateful for? And you will immediately exit victim and villain mentality, because you will never ever hear a villain in a story say, you know, I'm so grateful for my friends. They will never say it. And no victim will sit there in a dungeon and go,

I'm so grateful that there's a shaft of light that I can study the sun. Well, I mean, they don't do it, because that would transform them into a hero. And so if you want to go from victim to villain to hero, real quick, just ask yourself what you are grateful for. So that's the one thing that I would say leave with. I love that.

And that reminded me of something that I didn't get to ask you. Why is the question, who am I becoming a really important question to ask? Because it does two things. It defines a direction for your life, for your personal life, for your character. And we all need a direction. We all need someplace that we're going. Otherwise, we wander around and we walk in circles. And it also reminds you that you are not a fixed static creature.

You are somebody who changes. And so yes, you may struggle with that right now, but a year from now you probably won't because you are somebody who changes. And it's very, very dangerous to think of ourselves as bad at math. You're not bad at math. You're somebody who hasn't applied yourself to learn math.

But you're not bad at math. It's not your identity. So we want to have a growth mindset as Carol DeWek would say. Hmm. Okay, and the last question that I ask on my show is what is your secret to profiting in life? Well, my secret has always been and I didn't know it

early, but I do now my secret has been delusional optimism. I just believe ridiculous things are possible, ridiculous things and you know, I say delusional in quotations because it's not. But other people would see it as delusional optimism. Your friends are not going to understand or not believe in you until strangers see you do it and say, no, that is who he is. And then your friends will go, I guess that is who he is. It's so true. The people who are closest around you are the ones who cannot see your growth because they're just seeing it too closely. And it's all this, it's so true.

That's why strangers and those are the mere main supporters in this journey. Yeah. Yeah. If your friends take a minute. Yeah. Okay. So where can everybody go get this new incredible book hero on a mission? Amazon.

There's a website called Amazon.com. And if you go there, you hit the buy now button and it shows up at your door. And I would, I would love to love for folks to read it. Awesome. We're going to stick all those links in the show notes. So you guys have easy access to all his free resources, his book on Amazon. Donald, it is always a pleasure. You're always welcome back

to the show whenever you have something new to talk about. Thank you so much. It's always a pleasure. It's always a yes when you're about going because it's an honor. Thanks so much. Thank you. I am so happy that Donald came back on the show. I love it when we talk to each other. He's just such a brilliant man and I'm so happy he was able to share more of his wisdom and life experiences with us. He's got such an inspiring story, and it was a wake-up call, I think, for everyone tuning in to step out of their victim mindset. In his mid-20s, Donald said that he had an attitude of doom.

He was overweight, he was completely controlled by his moods and emotions, and he did not realize that he was actually choosing this victim identity. And when he began to see himself as a hero, everything in his life changed. He said this change when he began writing better stories for himself, ones that he now enjoys living inside of. Donald quickly realized that there was a lot of people out there who don't realize that

they're identifying with the wrong character of their story. And in his new book, Hero on a Mission, Donald uses his own experiences to help us recognize if the character we're currently identifying with is helping us experience a life of meaning or completely the opposite. He breaks down the transformational yet practical plan that took him from being a mediocre writer to the great businessman that he is today because he gained a new perspective on his own life and his own life's meaning and that ignited his motivation, his passion, his productivity, and you can do the same. Donald and I talked about the four types of characters in

every story. And the reason why Storytellers always choose these four characters to write about is because these four characters are inside of us all. We can all choose to be these four characters to write about is because these four characters are inside of us all. We can all choose to be these characters and we're probably these different characters depending on our environment and our situation. It's our decision to decide which character we want to exude or emulate in that moment. Donald said that the victim mindset is a coping mechanism.

It's a way to stay complacent with our lives. If you think about it, a person whose surrenders their life to fate is the essence of a victim. By surrendering your story to fate, you allow fate to decide whether you succeed in a career or set an example. Victims believe they are helpless and they flail until they're rescued. Actual victims do exist and they do, in fact, need to be rescued. Victimhood, however, is a temporary state. Once you're rescued, the better story is that we return to the heroic energy that moves

our story forward. Beautiful things come from pain and victimhood. You can become self-aware with great grace once you can overcome that victim mindset. The villain, on the other hand, makes other small. They try to get back at people, and they think that other people are lesser than them. What separates a villain from a hero is that heroes learn from their pain, and they try to help others avoid that same pain. The villain on the other hand seeks vengeance against the world that hurts them. If we're honest, we all surface villain energy from time to time. Sometimes depending on whether or not we've skipped a lunch, for example.

The victim is like the villain because they experience pain, but the villain rises up in strength. They rise up in strength not to help others but to seek vengeance upon the world. The hero rises up in strength and vows to defend people so they never have to experience that pain. If the hero responds with a purposeful action and a sense of hope, our story will move forward and become interesting.

But if they respond with a sense of hopelessness like a victim or they lash out at others like a villain, the story will break down. A hero wants something in life and is willing to accept challenges in order to transform into the person capable of getting what they want. Living like a hero is actually nothing like you might think. They're not strong and capable and perfect. They're actually simply victims who are going through a process of transformation.

Donald reminded us that heroes can't make it on their own because they don't know how. The hero needs a guide. When you watch a story, it's not about the guide. It's actually about the hero transforming, but the guide is the strongest, most capable character in the story. They're also the most caring and compassionate. Becoming a guide then is really the ultimate destination. That is the most meaningful transformation that can happen in your life. We may root for the hero, we may hate the villain, but our utmost respect is reserved for the guide. Positioning your brand as We may root for the hero, we may hate the villain, but our utmost respect

is reserved for the guide. Positioning your brand as a guide is also the secret to business success. We talked about that in episode number 120 with Donald, where we focused on storytelling for business. When it comes to marketing your brand, you are not the hero of your brand story. You're customers. So you may be thinking, if I'm not the hero, what role do I play in my business? You're the guide. You're the person with the right kind of heart and the right kind of experience and knowledge to help your heroic customers overcome their problems, transform and win the day. Remember, heroes are always transforming and you are the one helping your customers transform on their journey. In order to be a guide, you need to be a hero first. You need to have transformed

yourself before helping others do the same. Remember, we all have these four characters inside of us. And we likely take on different roles based on our various environments and the situations we're put in. Evaluate where you are right now and then act accordingly. If you're in the victim mindset, move to become the hero. If you're the hero, move to become the guide. I want to end with Donald's advice of remagining your life story by writing down your own eulogy. He says that writing your eulogy opens a story loop in your brain and it's like willing yourself to live life a certain way, which leads you to be more intentional about what you do every day. Donald said that this

eulogy practice has helped him know what his life story is about so he can actually get that story done. Processing your own death sounds more bad, but really it helps you realize that you won't be here forever and it creates a sense of urgency. We've talked about this a lot on our podcast and a lot of successful people practices.

It also creates a sense of focus. Donald reads his eulogy every single morning and he reminds us to keep it short, consistent, and to be the author of our own lives. Thank you so much for listening to this amazing episode of Young and Profiting podcast featuring Donald Miller. If you want to learn more about Donald and his business,

go to storybrand.com. You can also check out Business Made Simple. I was on that podcast a few times, and it's an amazing podcast. And make sure you go check out his new book, Hero on Emission. If you guys want the links to any of these items, go check out our show notes. Be sure to connect with me on social media. You can find me on Instagram at Yap with Hala or LinkedIn. Just search for my name. It's Hala Taha. Big thanks to Yap team Mezzali. This is Hala signing off. Are you looking for ways to be happier, healthier, more productive, and more creative?

I'm Gretchen Ruben, the number one best-selling author of the Happiness Project. And every week, we share ideas and practical solutions on the Happier with Gretchen Ruben podcast. My co-host and Happiness Guinea Pig is my sister Elizabeth Kraft. That's me, Elizabeth Kraft, a TV writer and producer in Hollywood. Join us as we explore fresh insights from cutting-edge science, ancient wisdom, pop culture, and our own experiences about cultivating happiness and good habits. Every week we offer a try this at home tip you can use to boost your happiness without

spending a lot of time, energy, or money. Suggestions such as follow the one-minute rule. Choose a one-word theme for the year or design your summer. We also feature segments like know yourself better where we discuss questions like are you an over buyer or an under buyer? Morning person or night person, abundance lever or simplicity lever? And every episode includes a happiness hack, a quick easy shortcut to more happy. Listen and follow the podcast happier with Gretchen Ruben. At Kruger, you can find the highest quality products at a great price in every aisle

every day with Kruger brand. So you can stock up on your household favorites that are tried, tested, and loved by you. Because when you get the products you love at great prices, it feels like winning. Shop now in store or online. Kruger, fresh for everyone. -♪ They're playing the best, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah