3. Think about the leaders in your organization. Who can you partner with for the next promotion, event, or training?
4. Enjoy the time with your leaders!
afterword
Now you know where to start and what to do to become a leader of leaders. Will you succeed? You’re answer to the following question is the one true predictor:
How much do you want to become a leader of leaders in our industry?
This sounds over-simplified, but it’s not. More than 90 percent of the people who read this book will not move past their current level of success in network marketing. How bad you want it is the ultimate determinant. In explaining this to potential leaders, I always share the following excerpt about Hell Week from navyseals.com.
Hell Week consists of 5½ days of cold, wet, brutally difficult operational training on fewer than 4 hours of sleep. Hell Week tests physical endurance, mental toughness, pain and cold tolerance, teamwork, attitude, and your ability to perform work under high physical and mental stress, and sleep deprivation. Above all, it tests determination and desire. On average, only 25% of SEAL candidates make it through Hell Week, the toughest training in the U.S. Military. It is often the greatest achievement of their lives, and with it comes the realization that they can do 20X more than they ever thought possible. It is a defining moment that they reach back to when in combat. They know that they will never, ever quit or let a teammate down.
Over the years, research has been done to determine a common trait in those individuals who make it through Hell Week, without definitive answer. They are not necessarily the largest or strongest men, nor the fastest swimmers, but those with burning desire to be SEALs. Instructors have observed only one true predictor of which candidates will ultimately succeed – it’s those who want it the most – you can see it in their EYES!
To achieve success at the highest levels in your business, you are not going to endure anything near what a Navy SEAL candidate does – on a physical level. But becoming a leader of leaders in this industry requires the same determination and desire of the SEALs who make it through Hell Week. Our industry will test you. How badly do you want it? How determined are you? Just like the Navy SEAL instructors have observed one true predictor in their SEAL candidates, you can predict your own success.
Can You See It in Your Own Eyes?
Wherever you are, whatever you’re doing at this very moment, stop and pause. Make the decision to want this more than anything else in your life. Your success depends on it.
Next steps.
I suggest you read this book from beginning to end once every quarter for the next two years. That is a lot, I know. It’s important to do so. Each re-reading will reinforce pieces of the Build to Last process that you’re implementing. You will also recognize pieces you did not see the last time you read the book. The more you study this book and remind yourself of our way of building, the more natural it will become for you.
If you haven’t done so yet, also be sure to go to www.keithcallahan.com/book and download all the FREE bonuses mentioned in Build to Last. In addition, you can opt to be notified when any new books, products, or programs come out.
Now go out there and become the next network marketing leader. I believe in you and know you have what it takes.
Much love,
Keith
A Call to action
from Liz Hartke
Probably similar to you, Keith Callahan came into my life when I least expected it, but most needed it. I was at a crossroads in my life. I was either going to rise to the calling that was put on my heart or accept life as it was for the next several decades. Like many people do, I went to college, got a “good job,” and nestled into my cubicle and the monotonous routine that comes with mediocrity and acceptance.
But to my core, I was unsettled. I knew I was made for something more, but I felt paralyzed as to how I could bring that truth into the light.
At the same time that I was grossly unfulfilled in my job, I was more than 50 pounds overweight, trying to nurture relationships that didn’t serve me, and disconnected from the value systems I claimed to hold dear. I was living someone else’s idea of what my life should look like, and I was at a breaking point.
I remember sitting in my climate-controlled cube scribbling down business ideas that would someday be my big break! The entrepreneurial spirit was always within me, but I was living as a dreamer at the time, never really taking action. I guess I thought that somehow “time” was going to get me to where I ultimately wanted to go, when in reality, time is a thief. Every passing moment that I wasn’t working toward my daydream took me further from it.
After writing up one of many formal business plans that I was very excited about, I brought it to a friend who is a lawyer in the business realm. Within 10 minutes he had torn it to shreds and written me a list of all I would need to do to even get one foot out the door on this brilliant mess of mine.
I realized that I either had to do the legwork on this thing to make it happen or I had to seriously consider figuring out how to like my life the way it was.
And just at the right time – as I was about to trade in my dream for freedom and fulfillment for a life sentence in my cubicle – I was introduced to my ticket to freedom. I didn’t know it at the time (as a matter of fact, ask Keith, I actually said NO to it four or five times before I opened my mind to network marketing), but I was being given the gift that I had so desperately wanted all along: a platform to live out my passions and purpose that would reward me in ways I never knew possible (financially and otherwise) without the stress of overhead and infrastructure.
Originally, I had reached out to Keith to conquer my health struggles. It was time to go all in on finding a healthy long-term approach to weight loss. I had no idea that there was a potential business opportunity connected to the products and systems he sold. I innocently picked up a brochure in some yoga studio, and there was Keith’s name and email on the back.
I dove in on my health and saw my body transform. That was just the confidence I needed to see what I was capable of. The fire inside me to do more with my life was burning like never before!
But I still didn’t have a plan…
Until one day I was scrolling Facebook on a random weekday and saw this guy out on a mid-day hike with his beautiful wife and kids. It was Keith, the nice bald dude I had bought the shakes from.
“What does this guy do that he can be out hiking in the middle of the day?” I wondered. I flashed to all of those values I said I held dear but wasn’t living by:
Family connection
Freedom of time
Adventure
Health
That morning, a gorgeous summer day, the sun was shining, and there I was stuck in traffic on my hour-long commute to my version of hell when the emotions I had successfully squashed for the last few years came flooding into me. Seeing that picture of Keith and his family, it finally hit me – “There’s another way to live, and I’m not living it.”
I pulled my car over into a parking lot. My hands were shaking, and I had tears streaming down my face. I felt like fear and anger and excitement were all boiling over at the same time. I grabbed my phone and I messaged Keith. “Fine. I’ll learn more about what it is you do, but don’t try to twist my arm. It just can’t hurt to hear about it and then I’ll decide…”
I still look back once in a while and thank God I sent that message.
That day I was introduced to what network marketing really is and what it’s really not. All of my misconceptions were just that – wrong ideas. I didn’t know I could build network marketing as a side hustle until it replaced my corporate income (and eventually multiplied it by more than 20 times).
But Keith’s initial nudge to this business platform is the least of what he has done for my family and me. As months passed and I decided to go all in on this opportunity, there were times I would connect with Keith and ask questions regarding how to grow my business. I was f
ishing for a “Liz, do A, B, C, and you’ll get D” kind of response only to find Keith on the other end of the phone pushing me beyond where I had ever been pushed before.
Almost never were his answers technical. He made me become resourceful and taught me that those kind of answers could be found on my own time if I wanted to know them badly enough (resources are boundless and a successful network marketer quickly learns that “I don’t know” is a BS excuse). But Keith had this knack for challenging me to dig deeper and focus more on the person and leader I was born to become.
He knew that achieving a number or a rank would be a fleeting joy, but fulfilling my purpose through this platform would help me grow into leadership that would take me to the next level not only in my business, but in my marriage, motherhood, friendship, and entrepreneurship. He is the first person in my life who believed fully in me and then showed me the way.
Keith knows I’m not a very touchy-feely type – actually, we joke about it a lot – but I’m willing to put this into writing for the world to see because it couldn’t be more true:
Keith Callahan has been one of the greatest sources of light, truth, and leadership in my life, and I’m hum-bled by his belief in me and how he has loved me through this amazing journey! I think that’s the secret – love. He has always had my best interest as a whole person at heart.
He may have introduced me to the business opportunity that transformed my family’s life (I write this from our dream farmhouse in the country, both my husband and I retired from the rat race before the age of 30 to pursue our passions), but he introduced me to the person that God has called me to become and led me there by example.
Success in this business (in any business, really, but especially network marketing) rises and falls on leadership.
The best advice I could give to someone who comes out of reading this book with some fire inside to go for their dreams is to stoke that fire starting today! You, too, will be presented with opportunities and challenges along the way, and it’s up to you to rise to them.
Leadership is a choice. It’s cultivated through action, growth, vision, and how quickly (if at all) you get back up after each and every failure along the way.
Sure, I had Keith, but now so do you. The wisdom in these pages are the words he shared with me over and over since I started my journey.
If you are at your fork in the road, remember that the choice from here is yours and yours only. Thankfully, I got to a place where my fear of failure finally got trumped by my fear of life remaining the same, and I saw how this business platform was the vehicle to my new life.
What you choose today determines your tomorrow. Choose wisely and act swiftly. Life is too short to do otherwise.
Elizabeth “Liz” Hartke
Acknowledgements
Writing a book with the hope of selling thousands, may-be even millions of copies is not a solo project. Build to Last could not have come to fruition without the entire team.
First, I’d like to thank my wife, Amy, who walks this planet with such grace. You believed in me and supported me every step of the way. I truly am “the luckiest.”
Thank you to my children, Dakota, Daphne, Wyatt, Adeline, and Emmett, for allowing Papa time in his office doing the work I am put on this earth to do. I love each of you with all my heart.
Thank you to my dad. The fortitude I learned from modeling you brought this book to the finish line. Thank you to my mom for your unconditional love and support all the years of my life.
Thank you to Craig Holiday for teaching us the heart and soul of network marketing. B2B.
Thank you to my editor, Jane Bernstein. Your love of the written word and dedication to this project weave through every page. I could not have done this without you.
Lastly, I am deeply grateful to every single distributor on my team, with a special acknowledgement to the leaders who have built their own teams. You know who you are. Continue to dream big and dream beautiful.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Keith Callahan is a husband, father, mentor, entrepreneur and philanthropist. Since becoming financially free at the age of 36, he spends his time helping others identify, begin to create, and eventually realize the life they were meant to live. www.KeithCallahan.com
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