Do you read books? If yes, what kind of books do you read? What's the one book that changed your entire point of view on business and improving yourself?
He reads both fiction and non‑fiction. For fiction, he points to the character Kaledan Storm Bless from the first book of Brandon Sanderson’s Stormlight Archive series, whose relentless choice to do the right thing despite adversity taught him what leadership looks like. For non‑fiction, he cites Atomic Habits by James Clear, which showed him that simply starting and maintaining a habit long enough leads to winning, regardless of how good the habit is initially. He applied this by doing daily lead‑generating activities each morning for about 420 days, which eventually put him on stage alongside major business leaders. He notes that habit‑building generalizes: just as bodybuilders like Arnold Schwarzenegger succeeded through extraordinary habits developed in the gym, cultivating the skill of building habits makes you effective at almost anything. After the book discussion, he shares a health update: he suffered an uncommon nerve‑damage condition (brachitis) that left him unable to lift his hand high, lost weight, and became unhealthy, but recent shoulder presses, gym work, supplementation, and better sleep are already improving his strength and he expects his shoulders to widen significantly in the next 3‑6 months as he applies the same business‑style consistency to his health. Finally, he gives channel statistics: his main channel has ~170,900 subscribers (roughly two full football stadiums), Instagram is nearing 300 k followers, the daily updates channel has about 10,900 subscribers and has crossed $1 000 in ad revenue, and overall growth is strong.
I don’t think sacrificing my health was necessary; I took an all‑or‑nothing approach, and part of the sacrifice was outside my control—I was playing pickleball, got sick with a viral infection, and strained my right shoulder, which together gave me brachioraditis and kept me from doing the health activities I wanted. Instead I went “balls deep into work.” I procrastinate like the average person and mentioned the 20/80 rule (likely meaning 80/20). I understand where you’re coming from. My view on health versus success is that once people reach a certain level of wealth or income, they start investing in health because it’s all they have left to invest in, and many wish they’d done it earlier. Investing in health means different things for different people: for some it’s mental health, walks on the beach, or the right partners; for me it was literal physical health. I see a trend where, after hitting a certain number, people wonder what’s next—and that number varies per person. For me that number was reasonably low; I’ve observed others at ten times that level arriving at the same realization. Chris then asked about the book I referenced—it’s The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfus, and I don’t expect a sequel. Casper praised the breakdown and congratulated me on winning the games, calling it cool and informative and thinking they’d already done it. Before moving on to delegating and outsourcing, I recommended Buy Back Your Time by Dan Martell, which I’d just been tipped about and have in my Apple Books library. Benjamin said it’s incredibly interesting and highlighted the key insight that you don’t need to listen to Hormosi for two hours daily twice while working out because you’re already proficient at what he teaches; I’m doing that by listening to Hormosi at the gym, aiming to watch every long‑form video he’s published (he has too many shorts to count) to see his journey, since I feel mine is similar in a slightly different industry, noting Hormosi was bright‑eyed and young when he started seven or eight years ago and suggesting to check his early videos. I pointed out how funny it is to watch Hormosi walk through a sketchy, trashy gym with no lights, bad paint job, and hear him say, “Look at this thing—who would want to work out here?” while noting he turned that gym into $35,000 in five days, which I think is cool. I also said seeing his shift from management‑consulting style to bro‑gym marketing back to digital because of COVID is interesting and would illuminate my own path. Finally, Beyblade Knight remarked that I don’t have to follow that route.
I think the problem you describe is common. The key for me is not seeing work and breaks as opposites. The most important thing is momentum—making sure I always put in some small daily effort toward an actionable goal, regardless of what I’m doing. Starting small and gradually increasing effort works like progressive overload at the gym: your ability and resiliency grow over time. Most people view work as always on or always off, but I fluctuate—some days I work many hours, other days just a few, while avoiding extreme swings from top to bottom. I always do some amount of work toward my goals because momentum matters; when you get a ball rolling, lead generation, outreach, or content production will eventually yield results if you don’t stop. I avoid all‑or‑nothing thinking—I might work at 40% one day, 100% another, then drop to 30%, 80%, 60%, etc.—and that’s my typical workday. This approach helps reframe work so it doesn’t have to be all on or all off. Books like Atomic Habits and The Compound Effect reinforce this: start with a tiny habit (e.g., run for one minute) and build up gradually; by the end of a month you’ll have a solid habit. This method is far more effective and economically sensible than the all‑or‑nothing approach.
My routine shifts a lot, but the number‑one priority is daily actionables focused on lead generation and marketing. I front‑load growth‑related tasks first. I usually wake up between 4:30 am and 5:30 am, then spend time on community management because it’s high ROI and feeds lead gen. After that I handle client management and fulfillment in dedicated windows. I record content for my channels, work on automation builds, and then hit the gym, trying to front‑load that as well. The rest of the day is a mix of more content creation, client calls, and assorted tasks. I do try to get sleep, because I’ve had virtually no churn and I prioritize rest to avoid hustle‑culture burnout.
That's a great video topic, and I was actually considering doing something similar soon. The core 80/20 lesson I can share is: don’t live according to an environment that was designed for you—design your own environment instead. We’re born into a default setting, like being dropped into an ongoing football game (capitalism) without knowing the rules, and our initial training comes from whatever ‘coach’ happens to be around, often not the best. Don’t assume the lifestyle you’ve been given is optimal, or that the usual advice—go to school, attend office hours, ask questions, study with a specific method—is automatically true. Evaluate everything from first principles and only adopt what makes sense to you. Maker School is a good example: when I started it, people said I couldn’t do it alone, yet we now have dozens of coaches and staff managing replies. I questioned whether I really needed all that and decided to design my own environment first before taking others’ advice at face value. Small lifestyle tweaks—like leaving your vitamins out on the counter instead of hiding them in a cupboard—have led to major results for me. For instance, I wake up, see the vitamins, and remember to take them. I also keep a post‑it on my computer reminding me to send a certain number of Upwork applications each day, mentally queuing the actions needed to reach my goals. These tiny bits of planning run contrary to much of what society tells us to do, but as long as you build your environment from the ground up, you can often achieve the outcomes you want.