How This E-Mail Will Change Your Actions: You will use the Power of Comparison to Realize Your Full Potential while Staying Positive.

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What’s A Lot of Money?

Recently a Mentor told me a story about John Paul DeJoria (Founder of Patron & Half of Paul Mitchell).

While staying at a hotel in Italy, JPD liked the swimming pool so much that he bought the pool and paid to have the entire thing deconstructed, tile by tile, flown to America and reconstructed in his back yard.

Now, I don’t imagine that pool was available for sale, so you can run the numbers on what this purchase might have cost. Not only was the purchase itself a lot of money, but to have enough money to make the purchase without worrying about it, now that’s a lot of money.

Many people’s reaction to a Billionaire flaunting their wealth like this a feeling of unfairness or worse, jealousy.

But not you, your reaction is now one of Abundance. Your reaction is now the same as mine:

“Wow, there is so much money in this world. All I have to do is get a tiny piece of it for myself to live an incredible life. If JPD could make so much money he was able to buy an Italian swimming pool for his back yard on a whim there is no reason I can’t do 1/100^th of that.”

This is the resulting mindset of Comparing Yourself to the Best.

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Step 1: Realize Comparing Yourself to Yourself Does Not Maximize Your Potential

You’ve heard the saying a million times “Only Compare Yourself to Who You Were Yesterday”.

Well it’s Bullshit.

It may be a great saying if you want to prevent any negative feelings of pressure, urgency, failure, underachievement etc. but if you want to become Excellent it is no way to live. I will explain.

Let’s pretend your Potential is 100/100, today you start at 0/100 and the only thing you ever do is make sure every day you get 0.001 points better than yesterday and then stop working.

Assuming you are 20 years old and live to 80 you will live 60 years at 365 days a year for a total of 21,900 days. If you get 0.001 point better every day you will have improved by 21.9 points for a total of 21.9/100.

Yes, you read that right, 21.9/100 or 22% of your potential despite getting better than your previous self every single day of your life.

You may feel “Happy” doing this, after all you are “Improving” relative to your prior self, but eventually you will realize that you could have done so much more, you could have been 100/100.

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Step 2: Comparing Yourself to Your Potential

Instead of Comparing Yourself to Yourself let’s run the same equation but now you Compare Yourself to Your Potential.

This means instead of looking backwards at the 0 and building on that number daily, you look forward at the 100 and build towards that number.

You now have 60 years or 21,900 days to reach 100. This means you must improve by 0.0046 points a day.

This is approximately 5x what you did when you were Comparing Yourself to Your Previous Self.

How are you going to accomplish this?

You are going to set Bigger, more Aggressive Goals.

You are going to take more Risks.

You are going to use Leverage (Financial Capital, Human Capital or Technology).

You are going to work Harder and Longer.

You are going to be more Disciplined.

You are going to Sacrifice Things that Don’t Matter.

You will get it Done, after all you have the Potential.

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Step 3: Comparing Yourself to The Best

This is where we take things to the next level, by doing the opposite of what Normal People tell you to do, by Comparing Yourself to The Best (Others).

If you do this incorrectly you will absolutely end up feeling inadequate – feeling that you are underachieving or that you are not good enough. But lucky for you, I’ve done that myself so you don’t have to.

All you have to do is remember that when you Compare Yourself to The Best you are not comparing where You are now to where The Best are now, you are comparing what you think is possible to what The Best have accomplished.

Said another way, you are re-evaluating Your Potential based on new information regarding what is Possible.

Let’s take this back to the numbers, using me as an example.

When I was a recent college graduate with a score of 0/100 trying to work towards a 100/100 my vision of what 100/100 looked like was $10 MM. I believed this was My Potential.

If all I ever did for the rest of my life was Compare Myself to My Potential, I very well could reach that potential and get to the $10 MM mark. But what then? If I actually achieved the $10 MM mark before dying then obviously My Actual Potential was higher than $10 MM because I'd still have time to surpass that.

If I had known that more than $10 MM was not the ceiling of My Potential, that $100 MM was within My Potential I would I have made different decisions over the course of my life? Probably.

I would have set Bigger, more Aggressive Goals.

I would have taken more Risks

I would have used more Leverage.

I would have worked Harder and Longer

I would have been more Disciplined

I would’ve Sacrificed Things that Don’t Matter

Would I have actually made it to $100 MM?

That is not the point, the point is Your Potential is higher than you believe it is now.

That is what I am saying when I suggest you Compare Yourself to the Best. Look at people you admire, look at people who are absolutely crushing it, not to put what you have to what they have, but to compare what you believe is possible in your life to what they have shown is possible.

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Bringing it All Together

Though it does not make a controversial, widely shared Tweet, the reality is you need to use all three of these comparisons.

First, Compare Yourself to The Best to realize Your Potential is higher than you originally believed.

Then, regularly Compare Yourself to Your Potential to ensure you are making progress towards the Life You Desire in a timely manner.

Finally, Compare Yourself to Your Prior Self daily to stay positive and grounded and recognize you are on the right path and are making progress in the Journey.

If you can do these three things I have no doubt you will be on the correct path to getting what you want out of life.

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One Sentence Summary

Compare Yourself to The Best to Set Your Potential, Compare Yourself to Your Potential to Measure Your Progress Towards Your Goals and Compare Yourself to Prior Self to Remain Positive and Focused on Moving Forward.