What Are You Wasting?

People look at me now and think ‘wow, that Carl has an amazing life’ – sometimes they even tell me that when they see where I live and how I work. And, to put it right out there, they’re right! But it wasn’t always like this for me. I grew up without a lot of money and I had to work hard. Someday, I’ll tell you about my first few jobs and how they didn’t go the way I (or anybody else) wanted.

The point is that I grew up knowing not to waste things. “Clean your plate – kids are starving in Ethiopia.” “Close the door – you’re letting the air out!” “Turn off the lights when you leave the room!” “What’s wrong with wearing hand-me-downs?” You probably heard those things too. Back in the day, society wasn’t quite so disposable as it is now. We had to fight and scrimp to get resources together. Some people still have to… there’s nothing wrong with that.

But now we have different problems… back then, you could touch the things you risked wasting. Now we waste intangible things – time, energy, knowledge, passion, youth, health, discipline… to name a few. In some weird way, it’s easier to waste things you don’t actually touch. Except that now the things we waste last more than a meal or a pair of jeans – the things people waste now can change the rest of their lives.

What does that mean? Well, I would say that knowledge un-invested is wasted. When you know something and you choose to not use it to create benefit for you, your business and the people in your world, that is what business people would call an ‘opportunity cost’. You might not be able to say exactly what applying that knowledge would generate – but the loss in potential gain could be exponential.

For example, let’s say a young family comes to you with newly-established credit and wants to buy a house. Or a vet wants to buy her first home, has a down payment but has a low credit score from being deployed. Or a son wants to help his parents out financially by buying their house but doesn’t have his professional act together for verifiable income. Now I’m stretching these scenarios to pull at your heartstrings, for sure, because these are not ideal clients. But with what you know, you could help each of them get a game plan together – and that would change the rest of their lives.

Let’s say you’re making your calls, picking up the phone and mowing through your past database. That’s great! That’s a killer strategy, calling your database, but you could also get somebody else for around minimum wage to do that activity for you, and using a system like PhoneBurnerFreedom.com, getting the same results as if you did it yourself.  That could save literally hours of your time every week. What could you do with an extra 5 – 10 hours / week?

What if your passion is to work with top agents who swing big in their business and win, but your client base is primarily lower-level “vanilla loans” types? Of course, you have a good business there… but what’s happening to your passion? It’s wasting away while you’re focusing on the money vs. your passionate quality of life. Money is a nice outcome but it’s just a by-product of being smart with passion. Be passionate about your life and business, and they will pay you back beyond anything you can dream of today. Believe me.

Like I said at the beginning, I have a pretty awesome lifestyle. And I have worked hard to get it. I still work hard for the 20 or so hours I work each week. (And yes, there are a lot of ‘guru-types’ who work less than that – some of them are my best friends so I know that’s true.)

But for me, working hard is the same as playing hard. I love what I do to point where it’s hard to know when I’m working or playing. I invest what I’ve got to make a bigger difference for people. I believe that, at a certain point in success, the reason you have it all is to give it away. The very most valuable thing I can give anybody is the mindset, the perspective and the strategies that I have earned my way to using well. I do not waste what I have come to know, have or be along the way.

When I think about it, the only thing people might or could accuse me of wasting now, is time… because I like people. I like good food. I like hanging out and sharing jokes and being with all my rowdy friends. It makes me happy. So do I take a little longer over a good meal or enjoying an occasional cigar or taking a country ride on my Harley with my son on his? You bet I do, because I’m not watching the clock. If I’m too rushed to create a memory with somebody, then that’s the real waste of those opportunities. I’m clear on my values. My focus over the years, making the most of every resource, has afforded me the life I have today. And it happened because I didn’t waste anything as I went. I took it all in and made it work for me.

So now I ask you – what are you wasting? Where do you look at your life and think ‘hmm… that doesn’t bring me joy?’ Who could you be helping if you went just a little further in sharing what you know? How could your team benefit by following through on something you’ve learned to help your business? How could you improve the quality of your life by leveraging what you know?

These are serious questions – I really want to know. When you share, I also want to know your intention to change that starting when you post it. Awareness is the first step toward living a fuller life.

So, let me hear it from you… and know that, when you share it, there will be a shift. Just like a car speeding up and changing gears, you will feel the shift that comes from being willing to harness more of your potential to help, have, do and/or be more… I’m proud of you, friend. Just do it.

Carl White, Chief Officer of Coolness

Article Originally Posted on LinkedIn

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

#LoanOfficer #LoanOfficerFreedom #LoanOfficerFreedomPodcast #LOFPodcast #LOFBlog #LoanOfficerFreedomBlog #TheMarketingAnimals #AgentMastermind #MortgageMarketing #MortgageMarketingAnimals #TheMortgageMarketingAnimals #FreedomClubFriday #LOFreedomClub #FreedomIs #MastermindRetreats #ThorsHammer #AxeOfFreedom #ChiefOfficerOfCoolness #WorkWithWetPants #BeMoreFootbally #LORollerCoaster #StopTheRollercoaster #GreenOnAPickle #AlwaysBeClosing #MortgageIndustryGoingStrong #MortgageCoaching #LoanOfficerCoaching #HighEndCoaching #LifeCoach #LoanOfficerLife #LoanOfficerLifestyle #LoanOriginator #LoanOriginators #LOCoaching #Mortgage #MortgageAdvisors #MortgageBanker #MortgageBanking #MortgageBrokers #MortgageCoach #MortgageConsultanting #MortgageExperts #MortgageGuru #MortgageIndustry #MortgageIndustrySpecialist #MortgageLending #MortgageLife #MortgageLifestyle #MortgageLoanOfficer #MortgageLoanOfficers #MortgageLoanOriginator #MortgageLoans #MortgageOriginator #MortgagePro #MortgageProfessionals