What a Bikini Contest Taught Me About Business

Summary

• I learned that life isn't fair, and business won't always be fair. You still need to meet your commitments, even if you're juggling multiple responsibilities.

• Balance doesn't necessarily mean reducing efforts in one area to focus on another. Sometimes, you must handle everything simultaneously, sacrificing other aspects like downtime or social activities.

• Responsibility comes with a price. You need to fulfill your duties regardless of other personal or professional commitments you may have taken on.

• Acting like a victim or seeking consolation because things are hard won't get you what you want. Embrace the challenges you choose, especially in entrepreneurship.

• Surrounding yourself with people who align with your goals is crucial. If someone interferes with your progress, it's okay to distance yourself from them, even if it seems cold.

• Confidence and fulfillment come from the process, not the end achievement. The character you build during the journey is what truly matters, not the trophy or the money at the end.

• Your thoughts don't determine your success; your actions do. Consistent effort and practice can lead to success even if you doubt yourself constantly.

• Clarity in your goals creates speed and progress. Break down large goals into daily actions to stay on track and maintain momentum.

• Avoiding short-term discomfort for immediate pleasure can hinder long-term success. Immediate escapes like bubble baths or wine won't replace the confidence and fulfillment of sticking to your commitments.

• Always stick to the plan you set for yourself, even when you don't feel like it. Your future self will thank you for keeping the promises you made.

Video

How To Take Action

I would suggest implementing a few clear, practical strategies from the lessons I’ve learned:

Manage Multiple Commitments

• Balance Commitments: Understand that meeting all your commitments might mean sacrificing personal time or social activities. Make sure you’re fulfilling duties in both personal and professional realms.
• Plan Your Time: Create a detailed schedule that covers your business tasks and personal growth activities. This will ensure you’re not neglecting important areas.

Toughen Up to Meet Challenges

• Stop Playing the Victim: Accept that life and business aren't always fair. Embrace the challenges as part of your growth. This mindset shift will help you stay resilient.
• Stay Solution-Oriented: Instead of complaining, focus on finding ways to overcome obstacles.

Surround Yourself with the Right People

• Evaluate Your Circle: Identify if any friends, colleagues, or associates are holding you back. It’s okay to distance yourself from negative influences.
• Seek Out Support: Find people who share similar goals and values. Their support will be invaluable on your journey.

Focus on Actions Over Thoughts

• Prioritize Action: Don’t wait for the perfect mindset. Your actions will shape your success. Make a daily habit of working on your goals, regardless of how you feel.
• Practice Consistency: Develop routines and habits that align with your goals. Small, consistent efforts will yield significant results over time.

Gain Clarity and Maintain Momentum

• Set Clear Goals: Break down your larger goals into daily tasks. This gives you a clear path to follow and helps maintain focus and motivation.
• Track Your Progress: Regularly review your tasks and see how they align with your larger goals. This ensures you remain on track and make necessary adjustments.

Avoid Immediate Pleasures

• Delay Gratification: Understand that short-term discomfort can lead to long-term success. Avoid immediate escapes that don’t contribute to your bigger vision.
• Stick to the Plan: Always follow through with your planned activities, even on days you don’t feel like it. This builds discipline and trust in yourself.

By integrating these strategies, you’ll be setting a strong foundation for both personal and business success. Your journey will be tough, but the growth and results will be worth it!

Quotes by Leila Hormozi#### "Life is not fair and you can want other people to play fair but that doesn't mean they're going to"

– Leila Hormozi

"You can't be everybody's friend and you shouldn't be everybody's friend"

– Leila Hormozi

"Success is about who you become, not what you get"

– Leila Hormozi

"Your thoughts do not determine reality, your behaviors do"

– Leila Hormozi

"Clarity creates speed, speed leads to progress, progress leads to momentum, and momentum leads to success"

– Leila Hormozi

Full Transcript

I run a $500 million portfolio of companies but 10 years ago I was actually a personal trainer doing Fitness competitions and so today what I want to share with you are five business lessons that I learned from competing in bikini competitions so rewind about 13 years ago I was actually about 100 lbs heavier than I am now and I was seeking to lose weight and along that journey of losing 100 PB I decided that I wanted a big ambitious goal to aim for and so what inspired me and terrified me more than anything was seeing all these girls stepping on stage doing Fitness competitions from that point on my focus was I want to get in shape enough that I can actually compete in these competitions I thought it would help my career I thought it would help my confidence but what I didn't realize along the way was all of the lessons that I was going to learn that we going to transfer into what I didn't know would become my life very quickly after which was being a businesswoman the first lesson that I learned through competing in a bikini competition is that life is not fair and you can want other people to play fair but that doesn't mean they're going to so the entire time that I Was preparing for a bikini competition felt like you know what at this point in time I have built up my business I'm not going to try and really get a ton of new clients right now because my goal is to focus the next four months on just crushing this and so I remember I just kind of like didn't do as much prospecting didn't do as much reaching out and eventually my sales manager kept saying things to me of like hey you know like are you going to get more more clients like are you going to go Prospect you going to and I was like I don't want to take on more people because I'm busy in my other hours doing these things to reach this goal and I remember he pulled me into his office one day and he was like listen I understand that you have this other thing going on and I want you to understand that you can't let that affect what you do here he was a very good boss and so for me to hear that I was like well [ __ ] like I I don't feel like I have the capacity for all of these things and he was like well maybe you need to increase it even though I had expectations of myself there's still all these other things I had committed to and the reality is is that I as somebody's employee and as a teammate to other people at that business owed it to them to continue trying my best because I was putting up really good numbers and when I kind of stopped that obviously hit the whole team and I was doing it because I what you wanted to win this bikini competition I remember thinking like that's not fair like dude I want to do one thing for myself and I'm not going to be able to like put 12 out of 10 effort in this entire time like that's ridiculous I was not putting the effort in into figuring out how to do both how both could benefit each other instead I was just like I'll do less of that to do more of this the reality is this is like business is not fair you're going to have times where it conflicts with lots of things you're doing in life and you're going to feel like I'm exhausted I have so many other things to do and you're still going to have commitments to people on your team to customers to Partners that you have to fulfill honestly it doesn't matter that I have taken on extra commitment it doesn't mean that I can let these other commitments drop what it means is like I might be in a season where I don't have any downtime and that is what I went into when I was doing my competition it wasn't that now I had discretionary time and free time it was like okay I have to do both of these things and so like I can't drop the ball on either and so I just don't have time to do other things I don't have time to see friends I don't have time to go out to dinner I am going to have to do both I've just learned time and time again that there's many times in my business where you know a lot of people set out in business and think I'm GNA have all this time to myself I get to dictate my time and what happens at the same time you have this team that relies on you you have customers that rely on you you have made commitments to people responsibility comes with a price and so that price is that you have to determine yes what you do with your time and but a lot of people think that what they do with their time is always going to be what they want but it's not a lot of times it's what's required to get to the next level it's not always going to be exciting and it's not going to feel fair you're going to be like really like I have to do all of these things yes welcome to being a business owner you have to do more than everybody else and nobody cares if you don't feel good about it another way that this came up I was actually leaving work it was probably a week before that conversation with my boss and I was checking my bank account and so I was like holy crap I didn't realize like all the signups I was doing how much money that was making me and I remember thinking okay now I have all these bills I have to pay for this competition and so I was driving looking at my bank account and I literally got pulled over by a cop who was like you're texting and driving and I remember in that moment I was just like dude just [ __ ] give me a break like and I literally show him I was like no I was I start crying I was like I was checking my bank account because I don't know if I have enough money because I'm doing this freaking competition and I'm [ __ ] starving and I'm tired and I now apparently need to go sell more people even though I don't want to fulfill it because I'm busy and I remember this guy just looked at me and he was just like I'm really sorry sounds like you're having a really bad day but I still got to give you a ticket and I was like life is not fair I think it was really great that he still gave me the ticket because it taught me that acting like a victim doesn't get you what you want life is not always fair and sometimes you just have to toughen up and grow some thick skin I think that entire process realizing that I chose to compete in that competition this wasn't some obligation I had or some like horrible hardship that I had taken on you know that I had not even known and just like been thrown into and that's very similar to business people almost want like this like consolation prize or they want attention for the fact that it's so hard to have business and I've just never taken that stance because this is a privilege I have the same goes for business it's like you chose to get into business and so you can't expect people to feel bad for you because of a dream you're trying to follow people are not always going to understand they're not always going to give a [ __ ] stop acting like the victim toughen up and realize that you just need to go get to work and get results the second business lesson that I learned from competing in Fitness competitions is that it's it's much easier to achieve extraordinary results when you don't hang out with ordinary people this sounds ruthless and listen call me a bad friend call me a bad person but I will never allow a single human to get in the way of me and my goals because my goals are promises that I make to myself and if I don't keep those promises I don't become confident I don't become a better person I don't realize my own potential I left Michigan to go to California to seek out a career in Fitness and to compete in the competitions where was the hardest and I remember a lot of my friends were not supportive in fact it was like the cliche oh are you too good for us now oh now you've got all you know you're in the fitness competition and blah blah blah and are you really going to walk on stage into bikini and that kind of [ __ ] like literally anything and everything you can think of they said to me and I remember thinking to myself gosh this is like what people talk about in the movies and the books that people say like the cheesy [ __ ] that you're like are you really saying this right now and they did and I remember thinking like I just need to get the [ __ ] out of here and get around people who get my vision who have big dreams for themselves and who aren't made to feel insecure those friends that were speaking ill of my dreams they did that because they gave up on their own dreams long ago and I think that's what I had to realize is that if somebody gives up on their dreams it's very hard to keep them around when you're trying every day putting 110% effort in to accomplish yours because you make them feel insecure and you remind them of the person that they could have become but didn't because they stopped and so I remember getting a new job finding new friends I found people that I could do posing practice with I found girls that would share meal PR recipes with me so that I could have people that would hold me accountable and all of a sudden what I realized is that I had been in an environment where everyone had made it harder for me to achieve my goals and now I was in environment where my friends made it easier for me to be who I wanted to be to reach my dreams to achieve my goals and if anything they encourag to me and I remember it was that experience that taught me how important it is who you surround yourself with and how important it is to go against what you've been taught a phrase that I repeated to myself over and over again was maybe I am a bad friend for the fact that now I have no friends that I had in college maybe that's cold and harsh but the thing is is I really looked at every person I decided not to actively invest in a friendship with and ask myself are they going to in any way interfere with me achieving my goals and if the answer was yes how there's billions of people on Earth why should I keep people in my life who make it harder for me to be who I want to be and that was really the biggest thing that I learned through that process is by getting all of these new friends I realized the current group I had had they weren't going to allow me to rise up because you're not going to get to the next level making everybody else happy and sometimes in order to make yourself happy you have to allow everyone else to feel unhappy I had been such a people pleaser and I had wanted so badly to you know make other people happy so many times in my life and I finally realized how much it was holding me back that was a huge unlock for me not just at that point in my life but later on in my business career because when I first started gym launch in the beginning for the first 18 months it was a huge struggle and we were eating [ __ ] and not succeeding and the people I had around me they were trying to encourage me trying to say like keep going you're going to get there but you know what's funny is that when I got there they stopped saying that about 18 months in into just absolutely eating [ __ ] everything turned around very quickly and then it was like we went from zero to making 2 million a month in about 10 12 months time and it was like all these people who had been there for me in the beginning and in that phase where I was first starting the company and they were rooting for me it was like nobody wants to root for the underdog once they're no longer the underdog and they say oh maybe now you're a threat I made them feel insecure and so they were like I don't want to feel insecure therefore don't keep achieving your dreams don't get bigger Lea because I feel smaller if you get bigger I have probably every 18 months had to reassess who I'm friends with because of this now I will say this I do not consider myself to do that to other people and that's because I'm highly aware of it anybody who I'm friends with I want to make sure that I make it easier for them to achieve their goals and I consciously think about that I do not think many people do this what I found is that each time I've reached a new level of success there's usually a few people that start to interfere because it reminds them of the person that they could have become but chose not to because they decided to opt out or quit I'll find people who start disagreeing with the way I'm doing things like they're not bad people but if somebody speaks negatively of my dreams to me they will not remain in my life and I feel very very convicted about that because it worked then it worked later and it works now if somebody's going to interfere with my goals there's no space for that in my life you can't be everybody's friend and you shouldn't be everybody's friend the third business lesson that I learned from competing in bikini competitions is that success is found in who you become not what you get when I was going to have my competition and how I was going to feel the day that I won like I would visualize how different I would feel after I don't think at that point in my life I had had any huge successes I had this dream of what it would feel like to stand on stage and receive a trophy how confident I was going to feel after I think that's actually what I really wanted was like I I thought that winning would make me confident and so I remember I showed up the day of the show and I go backstage and I'm thinking these are my people I'm going to suddenly meet all these people that I'm going to be friends with and we're going to all root each other on we're all going to want to win and and help each other instead there's girls crying in the corner you know about how they look fat there's other girls like taking drugs which I didn't know was a thing and I was like oh gosh well this is not what I hoped for and then finally the time goes where I have to step up on stage when I got second place thinking like I was going to feel so good for being like a firsttime competitor in a nationally qualified show to get second place I felt nothing I remember stepping off stage and going to dinner afterwards with some of my team and I was like I don't feel any more confident I thought that if I competed in a bikini competition I would have confidence and I wanted all those things so desperately because for so long I had felt so terrible about myself because I'd been so overweight and I just wanted so desperately to feel good about myself and I thought that for some reason receiving a trophy would make me feel good and it would suddenly change my entire self-perception and none of that happened I remember leaving and I woke up the next day and I was like I feel the same and when I looked back on it I realized you know life happens on the way to your goals not once you get there all of the confidence that I did get I got through the process I didn't get when I stepped on stage all of the respect I gained for myself was in all the little moments when I said no to going out I said no to a drink I said no to dessert I stuck with the plan it wasn't when I stepped on stage and received a trophy this was the first time in my life when I realized that every time I aimed for a goal it was often because I thought that goal would make me happy and this was like the Pinnacle moment for me where I finally realized no goal was will ever make me happy I've already said goals would make me happy and guess what they didn't but the process the process of achieving the goal that was what was worth it and the funny thing is this is the entire process of getting ready for this competition and putting myself through this and losing the last however much weight and getting stage ready and doing it while I was still building my business and new to California it was hard as [ __ ] it wasn't enjoyable it really taught me that success is about who you become it's about the character that you build and most of that is not found in Easy times and it's not found when you're handed a trophy and this really translated when I sold my business you know I think there's this huge illusion that when you sell your business there's going to be this pinnical moment where everything's going to change when that money hits your bank account and I was recently on a podcast where it was actually Ed mlet he asked me he was like how did it feel to sell your business and the funny thing is I remember the moment that we sold the business I I remember the same feeling I had then it was the exact feeling I had when I had been on stage and got the trophy like aren't I supposed to feel different now but different is created through the process not this artificial ceremony of what you just did and I remember thinking you know what that's okay it wasn't about winning it wasn't about the prize it was about who I was going to become on the way and it was a huge frame shift for me because I think those two moments together have really positioned me for where I am now which is like I am all about the process and I am not focused on the outcome for the hope that it's going to suddenly change me as a person that's not what it's going to do no success does that it's the process I will forever be an advocate of striving for Success not because of of of getting a lump of money or of having a ton of fame or of having a giant business and there's so much status like it's not about that it's about what you learn along the way about yourself and doing it in a way that builds your character rather than tears it down doing in a way that is ethical and that you build respect for yourself rather than some people who do it in a way that it tears them down and they lose respect for themselves for the way that they build their business the reason I'm such an advocate of it like of the fitness competition and of building a business and of doing things that are hard right that you don't need to do right and that people will always tell you you don't need to do any of this right you have enough if you set out with the intention that who you become is more important than what you get that was one of the most invaluable lessons I could have learned and I'm really grateful I take it with me to this day because you know in building acquisition. comom I'm not thinking yes do I want to get to a billion yes but why do I want to get there I want to get there because I want to see how I can do that while maintaining my values and character how can I become a better person of higher Integrity with stronger character and hit ailon that's what I want to see what's possible it's not about the money it's not about like of course not the fourth business lesson that I learned from competing in a bikini competition is that your thoughts do not determine reality your behaviors do I cannot tell you especially around the time when I was competing this was almost 10 years ago the amount of things out there like your thoughts become reality you manifest it into life and and I was like well then I'm [ __ ] because all I was picturing was like me eating [ __ ] on stage me stepping on stage and people laughing at me me tripping on my routine everything I pictured it was just awful and what I know now is the reason I have positive thoughts I had know evidence to support that this was possible I had evidence I'd been fat I had no evidence to show me that it was even possible for me to win a competition you know let alone like step on a stage I had all these terrible thoughts about what it was going to be like on show day and I remember the moment they called my name up I was like oh my gosh like I just pictured myself tripping and blacking out all this stuff what happened was I did black out I was so nervous that I stepped on stage and I truly don't remember what happened I remember feeling like shaking uncontrollably and thinking God they have to see how badly I'm trembling and how much I'm sweating then all of a sudden I was on the side of the stage and that was what was at where I was at ironically that didn't happen I had practiced so much that my body knew what to do without me even having to think it was so subconscious and so what I realized in that moment and afterwards was that practice and and behavior and action dictates My Success Not My Thoughts my body had practiced the routine so much that no matter how nervous I was it still knew what to do because I had put in the [ __ ] work this is what has translated to business for me every time I used to think I had to think really happy thought I had to visualize My Success are those things nice yes they're nice to have I would prefer to think good thoughts about where I'm going to end up but guess what my brain don't work that way all the time and if you watching my channel like yours probably doesn't either you're not always thinking you're like what if it all goes to [ __ ] what if I lose all my money what if everyone [ __ ] quits what if my customers leave me what if this guy steals from me what if the like of course because that's how your brain's supposed to work you w supposed to survive and so I have never pictured any business that I had I would say until very recently being a Monumental success because one I didn't have evidence and two that's not the way my brain works I don't subscribe to my thoughts have to be positive and I have to be visualizing My Success to have it and instead I focus on my behaviors now here's where people get twisted is they think you have to think a certain way so that you can have it happen no often times when people visualize success they're then more likely to take actions that then lead to success because they believe it's possible now where you can interfere is you can have thoughts that it's not going to be successful and you can say I'm going to take successful actions despite my thoughts because I want to prove myself wrong and that is what I do on a consistent basis in my business when I was competing in the competition I was like I'm going to outwork my self-doubt and so you don't have to get yourself to some State of Mind where you're like visualizing this crazy billionaire millionaire whatever success like you just need go out there and do the [ __ ] work success does not discriminate to who is taking the actions or to what thoughts are in your head you're going to get the result you can think all day you're not going to lose the weight if you eat less calories and work out you're going to [ __ ] lose weight what you want to do is if you're in that period where you haven't realized this yet and you haven't learned this lesson is just trade the time that you spend visualizing success for time spent practicing success that is the way I phrase it to myself it is more valuable and you will learn more if you practice being successful than if you visualize being successful now obviously guys I'm human it would be nice to have both but we don't always get that and that's not always where our brain is at and so we have to learn to act despite that and this taught me that because I truly was like I'm not going to win I'm going to be like I'm not even going to get place in top 10 and then I remember my friend who I thought I swear every time I looked at her I was like this [ __ ] looks better than me and she didn't even place in top five and I remember I was like I don't even get it and then I was like you know what I can't trust my thoughts CU my thoughts were still stuck on the version of me that had been 100 pounds overweight I couldn't even accurately perceive myself and the funny thing is when I got first into business I couldn't accurately perceive myself either and sometimes to this day I still can't which is why it's hard sometimes to visualize being successful because we don't really know where we stand the only thing that I have found that has worked for me is just successful Behavior precedes successful outcomes so focus on the behavior focus on taking actions as if you will be successful and then you will get there the fifth lesson I learned about business from competing in a bikem competition is that Clarity creates speed speed leads to progress progress leads to momentum and momentum leads to success when I set out to do this competition I wanted to break down my goals so that I knew exactly what I need to do on a daily basis on a weekly basis on a monthly basis on a quarterly basis to hit my one-ear goal which was to compete in a competition I essentially made this giant board instead of making a giant visualization Board of all the like things that I would like to have I was like let's do something practical I'm going to break my year-long goal down into what need to do in these time increments and I also want to put down what I'm going to need to do from a business scent so I can do both and so I had this giant board and I broke it down into what I need to do within 12 months within four quarters of the Year each month each week each day and then every day I would check off the items that I knew I need to do on a daily basis to hit my goals and I did this so I could remind myself of how taking small actions every day can lead to big success but you can't do that if you're not clear and what I had at that time and I didn't even realize this was I had maximum Clarity I didn't even know just what I need to do over a year's time span I knew what I needed to do within a day every single day I knew what top five things I needed to do so I was on track to hit my goals so I had taken the time to get really freaking crystal clear on what I need to do to hit my goals and then I wrote it down and I put it somewhere that I would never forget I put it right in front of my door so every time I would before I would leave I would see it and I make sure I would do those things that day and the funny thing is that this is the same process that I have learned to use in business I've learned that I need to get Crystal Clear what do I want 12 months from now and then I'm going to reverse engineer into what I need to do on a daily basis to hit that goal and the the reason a lot of people guys I think burn out is because they are not able to tie the actions that they do on a daily basis to a large goal if you want to delay gratification you need to learn how to reinforce behaviors on a micro level because on a macro level like I'm not going to hit my goal for a year 2 years three years but if I know that every day I'm chipping away at it and that the things that I did that day are going to One Day lead to that success you're going to gain a lot more momentum than if you're just Flying Blind this only works if you stick with it so if you're the type of person that writes down what you're going to do and then you sometimes do it you sometimes don't you're breaking promises to yourself the reason this works for me and it continues to work for me is that because when I write it down for Better or For Worse it's going to [ __ ] happen I'm going to commit to it no matter what if it's on my calendar it's happening so if I write a list of five things that I'm going to do and I miss one every day I'm 20% behind at the end of the year and so because of that I asked myself this question most days what was the plan last night before you felt like [ __ ] today before you were nervous about today and I'm like all right whatever the plan was last night I'm [ __ ] sticking with it and I I think nowadays you know a lot of people when they're trying to achieve these big goals instead of seeking out Clarity they seek to avoid their goals and here's the thing about achieving big goals is that once you get really clear you don't want to stop because it feels really good to gain momentum getting there now a lot of people what they don't do is they don't get really freaking clear on what their goals are and then what happens is they get into this place where they start to feel tired they start to feel exhausted and they start not to see everything adding up into that goal and then they start to avoid the work it takes to achieve that goal they might say oh you know what I need like a self-care day I need a this I need a no you don't need a self-care day you need to stop avoiding the sacrifices needed to achieve your goals that will ultimately make you happier than any bubble bath ever could people I remember would say to me when I was competing they're like oh just you know maybe take the day off and that's not the [ __ ] plan dude the plan to achieve my goals is I need to do this today so stop telling me to take a freaking bubble bath me becoming the person that's capable of doing this is going to make me 10 times happier than any freaking bubble bath could and so when people say that I think it's ridiculous because we've conflated self-care with avoidance like yes let me avoid achieving my goals that's going to make me feel better like sure in the moment you're going to feel better if you have a glass of wine take a bubble bath but at the end of the day me keeping my commitments to myself that makes me feel better about myself than any moment of Escape ever could for anybody out there that's watching this that's trying to achieve your goals like I just want tell you like it's okay to stick with the plan when you don't feel good it's okay that you're very clear on what you want you understand the sacrifices and you're willing to make them and I think at the end of the day I've never been told to stop or slow down by anybody who is ahead of me