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Mindset & Money | Is Your Circle of Friends a Cage?

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Hosted by
Mike Ayala

On this episode of Investing for Freedom, Mike discusses how your circle of friends can be a cage. Mike’s aim for this podcast is to challenge you to change your circle if it’s making you feel stuck. Mike provides you with tips on how to become a better version of yourself by expanding and creating new, inspiring friendships.

“If you don’t look around the circle that you’re in and get inspired, you’re literally living in a prison that’s going to keep you there, it’s going to keep you in mediocrity.”

HIGHLIGHTS:

0:00 – Intro
0:12 – Mike mentions how if you don’t look at your circle of friends and get inspired, you’re living in a prison
0:31 – Mike speaks about GoBundance and how their tagline is ‘healthy, wealthy, generous men who lead epic lives’
1:39 – Your circle doesn’t have to be putting you down to be a prison, if your circle is keeping you neutral you’re in a cage and you won’t excel in life
4:45 – How you handle life and the situations it throws at you is what will differentiate who you become in life and how you grow
4:52 – If your circle gets together and just talks gossip or talks about how bad life is and all the problems going on, you have to get a new circle
6:02 – If your group comes together and talks about neutral stuff like sports, the weather, idle conversation etc, they don’t add anything to your life and that’s dangerous, it’s a cage
7:09 – If your circle meets up and talks about opportunities, side hustles, ways to get promoted at work etc your circle is not a prison, it inspires you to be a better person
12:10 – Mike speaks about how to get new friends and the first step is identifying what you’re looking for and what type of friends you want
13:45 – You don’t have to completely cut your old friends off in order to find new ones
15:16 – You need to eliminate the element of guilt when trying to progress as a person
16:12 – The higher level of thinking you surround yourself with, the better off you’re going to be in life

FULL TRANSCRIPTION:

Thank you for joining me on The Investing for Freedom Podcast. A while back, I think on Instagram, I put up a post and it said, if your circle doesn’t inspire you, you really are just in a cage. If you don’t look around the circle that you’re in and get inspired, you’re literally living in a prison that’s going to keep you there, it’s going to keep you in mediocrity. I have a group of guys who are amazing, that I have a weekly call with. It’s called a pod, and this is from the group that I talked about often called GoBundance, which by the way, if you’re interested in GoBundance, the tagline or the theme around GoBundance is “healthy, wealthy, generous men who lead epic lives.”

If you’re listening to this, and you are looking for a new group of friends, and there is some qualifications, you got to be an accredited investor, basically, million dollars in net worth. And I won’t go into all that right now. But just go to www.GoBundance.com and just apply if you are inspired by this podcast and what I’m about to say. And by the way, you don’t need to join GoBundance, in order to find this, you can find this in your own backyard, I don’t care how small your town is. You might say to me, Mike, well, you know, there’s just no friends around, yada, yada, yada.

The bottom line is if your circle doesn’t inspire you, you’ve got a cage, you’ve got a prison that you’re living in, and you’re probably already feeling this if this is you. And by the way, if you’ve got an amazing circle of friends, congratulations, you know, other than picking your spouse, and, you know, raising amazing children, I think the circle of people that you’re surrounded by are probably the next most important thing in the hierarchy of life. Because honestly, like, if you don’t look around if you’ve got people that are just beating you up all the time, or even if they’re just neutral, and they’re keeping you where you’re at, that’s a prison, and you’re not going to excel in life. There’s one thing that I can tell you again, outside of marriage and a happy family and relationships, there’s one thing that I can guarantee separates most successful people from others. And that is the people that they surround themselves with. Or better said, the people that they don’t surround themselves with. So if you’re listening to this, and you look around and your circle isn’t inspiring you, it’s a cage that you’re living in, I know I’ve already said it, but it’s a prison. And I want to drive that home because it’s extremely important.

So back to the pod, I have a call every week with my pod. And I was just so inspired. You know, a few weeks ago, we came back from the GoBundance event, and immediately went on an RV trip with my family, which is what really motivates and what I live for is just you know, spending time with my family. And I’m so fortunate and blessed that the life we’ve built around freedom This podcast is called investing for freedom. We’ve built a life that allows us to go and work continues on and I’ve got passive investments and everything else. But here’s the thing, when I’m on this call every week with my pod, I’m just so grateful and thankful for them. Because it is a circle of guys that inspire me to greatness, they also call me out on my bullshit, they don’t leave me where I’m at. They challenge me to higher things, they challenged me on my limiting beliefs. And so what I’m not saying is that we’re looking for a circle of a bunch of Yes Men or Yes, women that are just going to tell us how beautiful we are and how amazing we are. And when we are, you know, down that just, you know, make excuses with us.

The challenge in the world is you know, people are full of excuses my screensaver for the last probably two years on my phone is it literally says no more effing excuses. We’re not looking for people that are going to placate us and you know, make excuses with us, and sit in our folly and our sorrow and just be like, you know what, I completely get you I understand you, and I’m with you, our lives both suck. That’s not what I’m talking about.

So life happens. We all have things that are coming at us all the time. I’m not saying that when I’m on a call with my pod, you know, generally speaking, when there are five or six people on a call, you know, somebody’s usually got something going on, nothing goes perfect in the real estate world. Anybody that’s telling you that, you know, every deal that we closed has gone perfect. It’s just not true. I mean, we’re, if you want to make more money, you have to solve bigger problems and really growing into your highest version of yourself. The more success you achieve in life, I’m going to argue that your problems, your challenges just get bigger, but also the solutions to those challenges get bigger, you have to become a bigger person. And so if you’re looking around, and that circle that you have are not challenging you to become a bigger person. Again, you’re in prison and I’m going to just share a few things with you today. And hopefully, if you’re feeling stuck or that circle isn’t inspiring you, maybe I can just tweak a couple of things in your mind and just challenge you to go get it done.

So we all have things coming at us in life, life happens to us. The way that we deal with those outcomes is going to differentiate who you become in life and how you grow. So let’s talk about a couple of different types of circles. So if your circle gets together and talks about how bad life is constantly, you know, there’s nothing to do in this town, neighbors, gossip, I was thinking, as I was putting notes together for the show, the majority of my memories from when I was little, like, you know, sitting around, as a little guy listening to my grandma, talk to my aunt’s and my mom and that kind of stuff. It was like a lot of gossip. It was just a lot of gossip happening, we’re talking about the neighbors. I remember, literally, I don’t know why I’ve thought about this so many times. But I remember several times my grandma hearing me or hearing my grandma say that you know, somebody went to the pen, meaning the penitentiary, my grandma used to call it the pen. And there was just always just like all this, just worthless talk like it just doesn’t benefit you.

If your circle gets together and talks about how bad life is all the time, gossip, you got to get a new circle. Now, this might even be even worse because this next thing is challenging to see how bad it is. When we’re constantly gossiping and talking negative and stuff, you know, you get that feeling you know that, that it’s not an environment that you want to stay in, especially when you start looking for more out of life. But this is the one that can be really challenging. If your circle gets together all the time and just talks about like neutral stuff. You know, we’re talking about sports, work, the weather, Netflix, you know, I got my brakes done yesterday, just like idle conversation, this is the one that will get us. Because the majority of us spend a bunch of time talking about things that just really don’t matter.

Now, if you’re passionate about, you know, shooting, or hunting or sports or whatever, and that’s what you and your buddies are going to get together and talk about, like, that’s fine. I’m not saying you can’t have fun and you can enjoy, you know, your hobbies. I love hunting. So I love having conversations, sharing pictures, best-hunting stories, it’d be the same with sports, or whatever. But when that’s all we’re talking about, we’ve got no conversations that are happening that are escalating our mindset, that are escalating our net worth, that are escalating the contributions that we’re giving to the world, that are escalating, you know, our happiness index in life that are challenging us to get better in certain areas. That’s where the challenges come in.

And so here’s the positive thing, if your circle gets together and talks about opportunities, area to improve themselves, business opportunities, you know, a side hustle, ways to get promoted at work if you’re in the W2 area. Just things, opportunities, let’s just leave it at that. Dreaming together, visioning together, hey, what would it be like if, you know we got together and booked a trip as couples or as families, you know, what would it look like if we started saving for you know, maybe a cruise, those kinds of conversations, bigger dreaming? Making more money in life.

Look, we’ve gotten to the point where money is a taboo conversation, but it’s only a taboo conversation when you don’t have it. People that have money, people that have wealth. And by the way, I’m going to just throw this in there. Some of the most generous people that I’ve ever met in my life have wealth. Now, are they generous because they have wealth? Or do they have wealth because they’re generous? I’m just going to leave that for you to decide and think about. But I’ve said this so many times before, money doesn’t change who you are. It just amplifies who you are inside. So is there a bunch of wealthy people out there that you know, are assholes and self-centered? Yeah, sure, but they were probably that way before they became wealthy, or before they inherited it or whatever. I don’t know what their situation is. But there’s also a lot of people out there who are very generous, very giving some of the best people in the world, they love their families, they’re successful business owners, and they keep their family intact.

We have this idea that it has to be one or the other. You can’t have success, and a family intact. You can’t have success and have a successful marriage, you can’t have success and own your time. None of that is true. These are all ideas that are planted in our head. And most people that think that way are people that don’t have it. We spend more time, I’ve just laughed at conversations where I’m just listening to people that have no idea what they’re talking about. You know, I don’t want to start a business because it’s going to take all my time and energy. And by the way, that was what I thought. The main reason that I started my first business was because I was working over 100 hours a week working with someone else. I was working out of town, I missed my wife’s pregnancy with my third child, my daughter. And so I said to myself, Well, you know what? If I’m going to be working over 100 hours, and I’m going to be a slave to something, I might as well be a slave to my own business. But what I realized quickly, by hiring consultants, coaches getting around bigger circles, as I’m talking about was that you don’t have to give up your freedom. You don’t have to give up your dreams and goals in order to be wealthy, successful, own your own business, any of that. You choose, and really, this is a different conversation, but that comes from leveraging other people’s time, money, energy, resources, etc., vendors, contractors, employees, on and on and on. You can have all of that.

But if your circle gets together and talks about opportunities and growth and all that stuff, then congratulations, you’ve made it, that’s going to be one of the things that really sets you apart. But if you’re hearing this, and you’re realizing that you need a bigger circle, that you need some new friends. Here’s what you really need to do about it. Number one, you’re on your way. Step one is identifying a problem, it doesn’t matter if you’re an alcoholic, it doesn’t matter if you’re tired of being poor. It doesn’t matter if you’re lazy and on the couch. Step one is identifying the problem. And then you can actually start working on the problem, your mind will go to work on it. And as Dan Sullivan always says, the eyes only see, and the ears only hear what the brain is looking for. So when you start deciding when you start thinking, and there was literally a point in my life where this happened to me, I woke up one morning after an evening out with some friends. And I literally woke up one morning, and I told Kara, I said, we need a new group of friends, like I need a new group of friends. And so I made a list of people that I wanted to hang out with, you may have heard this story before if you’ve listened to me for any period of time, but I made a list of people that I thought were successful and wealthy. And as I was looking at this list, I realized too, and I told Kara, I said these are not people that I actually want to hang out with I made this list based on how successful and wealthy they were in life. But if these were people that I actually wanted to hang out with, I would have been hanging out with them already.

So what I’m not saying is that you have to go out and hang out with people that you don’t know, or excuse me that you don’t like or that you don’t have anything in common with or whatever. What I am saying is that when you identify what you’re looking for, which is probably more around people that are positive, they’re encouraging, they are growth-oriented, they’re family-oriented, if that’s what you want, they’re focused on their marriage, if that’s what you want, you know, they’re successful business owners, etc. The eyes only see, and the ears only hear what the brain is looking for. And so you’re probably not going to find your type of friends at a sports bar every Saturday and Sunday, if you’re there every Saturday. And there’s nothing wrong with that. I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with going and watching sports all day Saturday, and all day Sunday, if that’s what you and your wife like to do.

But the reality is, you’ve got to identify what you’re looking for. And so if you’re really looking for a group of people who are going to inspire you to greatness, you’ve got to go to places where you’re going to find those. So maybe it’s a chamber of commerce meetings, maybe it’s joining an association, maybe it’s looking at the meetup groups, you know, if you want to get into real estate, look at a real estate REI, it’s a great place to start. If you want to get into buying businesses, find a business buying mastermind. Where do your local people who are looking for business opportunities, where do they meet up? Where do they get together and hang out, those are the kinds of things that you need to be thinking about.

If you’re looking for a new type of friend in your life, you’ve got to be doing something different than what you are. And so here’s a couple of things that you’re obviously going to run into. I say this a lot, but who do you have to become in order to find that circle of friends. If you are wanting to be hanging out with a new circle of friends, a new group of friends, you’re probably going to have to become a higher version of yourself. That doesn’t mean you have to be fake or somebody that you’re not, it just means that you have to start talking a different way. And by the way, if none of these meetup groups exist, or you’re in a community where there are not big networking opportunities or stuff, go create it. So many people have created businesses and the life they want because it didn’t exist. And so they went out there and they did it themselves.

Now, there’s a negative to all of this too. I’ve had so many conversations with people who feel guilt around growth, they feel like they have to abandon their friends that they’ve been friends with for years, you know, maybe you and your wife and another couple, you know, you’ve gone to dinner once a month. And you can keep doing that. You don’t have to, you don’t have to completely get rid of your friends, you just have to understand and respect them for who they are. There’s obviously a reason why you’ve been hanging out with them for the last 5 or 10 or 15 years because you like them. And so just go ahead and give yourself permission to continue to hang out with them for whatever reason it is that you hang out with them. You’re good friends, you guys get along, you have fun together, you laugh together, you enjoy drinking wine. Whatever the reason is, your kids play well together. Those are all very valid things in life, maybe you just work together and you just like hanging out or maybe you like to go to sporting events. I’m not telling you that you have to abandon your friends.

And so a lot of times there’s guilt around growth, but just know that when you start expanding, the way you think, your mindset is going to be different. The way you show up, it’s going to be different. And so the people that you’ve hung out with, they may begin to change, or you may begin to change and that’s okay. There doesn’t need to be growth around that. You just have to know that when you’re going to dinner with Jane and Sally, or Jim and Sally or whatever. That there’s a purpose for that. And it’s just fun. And so you don’t have to abandon your friends, you don’t have to feel guilt around it. But let me pull this together for you, if your circle doesn’t inspire you, you literally just live in a cage, you live in a prison. If you really want to make changes in your world, you’re probably going to have to look at your circle of friends first. And they didn’t do anything wrong. You chose them just like they chose you. So let’s just get over that right now, they didn’t do anything wrong. It’s just you wanting more out of life. And if they choose to come along with you, great, maybe you’re going to inspire them to get out of the cage too. And so let’s just like eliminate the guilt around it. But again, the eyes only see, and the ears only hear what the brain is looking for. So if you’re looking for growth and expansion opportunities, then I would encourage you to just do a little internal check, do a little external check with the people, the type of conversations, the activities that you’re surrounded by, and the things you’re doing in life, because I can guarantee you to go to the next level of where you want to go, the things that have got you to where you are today are not going to get you to where you want to go, especially if the things that have got you today are negatives in your life and you want to start moving away from those.

The first thing that I would encourage you is to find a new circle of friends. You know, there’s the old quote, you’re the average of the five people you spend the most time with, and I think it rings true. So I’m going to leave you with that. Again, not everything’s rosy but you know, the higher-level thinking that you surround yourself with, the better off you’re going to be in life. Go out there and make some amazing things happen.

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