by MJ DeMarco
A formidable “why” is all you need to turn your daily activities into passionate motivation —the “get up in the morning” metamorphosis to bust open a Fastlane road. What are your WHYS, and are they strong enough to motivate you into process?
Passion Erases the Suffering of Work
When I was in startup mode with my company, I worked long hours. Was I suffering? No. I enjoyed it, because I had my “whys” and I was moving toward them. The journey hardened me, challenged me, and yes, it was even fun! I was passionate about what I wanted and I was going to get it. The Fastlane isn’t a destination but a personal journey.
Writing this book has been an enduring journey, and I admit that I gave up three times. Why? After a year of writing and not finishing, my love for writing evaporated. My love became a hate. I was “doing what I love” and suddenly that love faded because people started to expect a book. I confided to a friend, “I quit. I no longer enjoy it and I don’t need to finish it.”
So how did I finish if my love for writing evaporated? I found my passion, which compelled me to finish: I love to see the dreams of others become reality. When a dead dream is given sudden life, I feel invigorated. Any time I wanted to give up, I’d receive an email that applauded me: “Your forum changed my life” or “Thank you, my life has turned for the better.” That is passionate currency that repositioned my writing effort into action. I went from love, to suffering, to passion.
Get Your Road to Converge with a Fantastic Dream
A road that doesn’t converge with your dreams is a dead end. When you concede dreams, life withers. Reflect back to childhood, when you heard: “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Underneath this question, what’s it really asking? It’s a probe to find the road to your dreams, and it was usually answered in a phantasmal vision. For me, I wanted to be an astronaut (blame Han Solo) a filmmaker (blame George Lucas) and an author (blame Isaac Asimov).
How about you? What is your outrageous, fantastic dream? And the real question of concern: Is there any chance you are doing it, or will be doing it? More than likely, you’re not, because the Slowlane has killed it.
I asked my friend Rick this question. Guess what. He didn’t answer this question with “I want to be a sales representative at Verizon Wireless.” Nope. He answered with “I wanted to be a race car driver.” So, why is Rick selling cell phones today? Is there any chance in hell he will actually become his dream, a race car driver?
There isn’t. The dream is dead and the road is derelict. Nonetheless, as Rick sticks to his job and waits for a promotion, he wonders, “There’s got to be more than this.”
And then there’s Sarah. She didn’t answer this question with, “I want to be a shift manager at Taco Bell.” Nope, she wanted to be an artist. But today, Sarah finds herself working the graveyard shift, mopping up the floors in the dining room from slobs who have mistaken sour cream for finger paint. As she slams the mop-head in the wringer, Sarah has a moment of disquiet. “Is this what my life has become?”
The problem with these people is not their jobs. We’ve all had crappy, embarrassing jobs that we hate. The problem is their dead-end road will never converge with dreams. Dreams are forsaken to pay the bills. Instead of a convergent road to dreams (or a chance of a dream), their road goes through an inescapable hell. Life becomes suffering. There is nothing wrong with working at Verizon or Taco Bell. Heck, these jobs would have been promotions compared to the meaningless jobs I’ve held. But please, don’t make these jobs your end, your final road, because the “end” most likely will never come.
You see, if your dream is dead, so is your passion. “No passion” numbs you to the greatest violinist in the world while he plays in the train depot. “No passion” leads to mediocrity and the land of everybody. “No passion” leads to unhappiness. “No passion” equals no wealth.
If you’re struggling for motivation, re-energize your dream and align it with a road capable of burning a trail to its reality. Dead dreams can’t burn trails of passion. Passion fires your will to do what is necessary beyond what others can’t. Fastlaners work unlike everyone else so they can live unlike anyone else. Take four years of hard work in exchange for 40 years of freedom. Unfortunately, most people take 40 years of hard work for four weeks of freedom, or however long their paid vacation lasts.
Find Your “Snow in the Toilet”
How do you find your passion, a meaning or a why? It comes from either excitement or discontent. Take this story posted on the Fastlane Forum (TheFastlaneForum.com):
I grew up in a poor family and lived in an old run-down barn that had been converted into a home. One of the worst times of the year was the winter, because our water pipes would freeze and we would have no running water. The only way to flush the toilet was to bring snow into the barn, pack it into the tank behind the toilet, and wait for it to melt. I saw my mom putting snow in the toilet bowl just for us to flush. The worst part was that it had to be refilled every time someone did their business. I thought to myself, “I never want to live like this again!”
What is your passion—your perennial “snow in the toilet?”
Leslie Walburn is passionate about animals. Disillusioned by county-owned shelters that euthanize dogs, her dream is to own a no-kill dog rescue shelter. While she can “do what she loves” and get a job at a shelter, it doesn’t bring her closer to her dreams, nor will the job help her amass the wealth needed to pursue the dream. Yes, dog shelters are expensive. Instead, Leslie allows her passion to fuel her motivation—she starts a Fastlane business (unrelated to animals) that eventually funds her dream. Her passion leads to a dream without the crucible of money.
Reflect on a time when your life was turned upside down with excitement and/or discontent.
That is your passion. For me, excited passion was when I saw my first Lamborghini as a teenager and I decided “One day, I will own a Lamborghini.” For me, discontented passion was watching my mother struggle in dead-end jobs, trying to raise three kids without a husband. Both fueled my passion; I wanted a Lamborghini and I wanted to help ease the burden for my mother. Excitement (wants and desires) serves as passionate fuel, as does discontent (undesirable situations).
Both allowed me to do what others wouldn’t.
If you find yours, you will too.
Chapter Summary: Fastlane Distinctions
➡The Commandment of Need states that businesses that solve needs win. Needs can be pain points, service gaps, unsolved problems, or emotional disconnects.
➡Ninety percent of all new businesses fail because they are based on selfish internal needs, not external market needs.
➡No one cares about your selfish desires for dreams or money; people only want to know what your business can do for them.
➡Money chasers haven’t broken free from selfishness, and their businesses often follow their own selfish needs.
➡People vote for your business with their money.
➡Chase money and it will elude you. However, if you ignore it and focus on what attracts money, you will draw it to yourself.
➡Help one million people and you will be a millionaire.
➡For money to follow “Do what you love,” your love must solve a need and you must be exceptional at it.
➡“Do what you love” sets the stage for crowded marketplaces with depressed margins.
➡When you have the financial resources, you can “do what you love” and not get paid for it, nor do you have to be good at it.
➡Slowlaners feed “do what you love” with “do what you hate.” Five days of hate for two days of love.
➡“Doing what you love” for money can endanger your love.
➡Passion for an end goal, a why, drives Fastlane success.
➡Having a passionate “why” can transform work into joy.
➡“Doing what you love” usually leads to the violation of the Commandment of Need.
➡The right road for you is one that will converge with your d
reams.
[33] - The Commandment of Time
The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run.
~ HENRY DAVID THOREAU
Break the Binds That Tie
The most loved (and misinterpreted) commandment is the Commandment of Time. The Commandment of Time requires that your business and its income detach from your time. Can your business work for you while you aren’t? The Commandment of Time’s objective is passive income and a vibrant money tree.
C – E – N – (Time) – S
A profitable business doesn’t guarantee wealth or time detachment. Some business owners are married to their businesses. Their business ostensibly is a job and a lifelong prison sentence.
While giving up your heart and soul for a business is perfectly normal in the startup, growth, and maturation stage, it isn’t a prescription I’d want to endure for 40 years. The Commandment of Time asks:
✓Can this business be automated and systematized to operate while I’m absent?
✓Are my margins thick enough to hire human resource seedlings?
✓Can my operation benefit from the introduction of a money tree seedling?
✓How can I get this business to operate exclusive of my time?
Jobs are time trades for income, and yes, so are some businesses. The goal of the Fastlane is a disconnection of your time from income, even if that income isn’t millions. Would you rather work 10 hours a week and earn $60,000, or work 70 hours a week for $140,000? I’d take the former over the latter every time.
Ashlyn Gardner loves the arts and literature. Following the prophetic advice of gurus, she sets off to “do what she loves”—she opens a coffee shop featuring local artisans and hosts weekly literature readings. Like a new love relationship, her new business starts with a bang and is the source of excitement and eagerness. However, after two years, her business normalizes and the luster fades into hardship. Ashlyn realizes that she doesn’t own her business; it owns her.
She is up at 4 a.m. to open and has to be there at 8 p.m. to close. The 24/7 of business is a perpetual nag. Employees come and go, and the good ones demand pay she can’t afford. Her social life dies and her boyfriend breaks up with her because she never has time. Her gym membership expires and, with it, her weekly yoga class. Seeking to reclaim her time and her life, Ashlyn considers hiring a general manager. Unfortunately, hiring a GM would put her margins in the red. She won’t work the business for free and the cost to her life isn’t worth the profit she makes. Three years into the business, she closes up shop and looks to return to the ranks of employee over employer.
Ashlyn didn’t fail at business. Her coffee shop was successful and earned her a modest living. Where did she fail? She failed the Commandment of Time and like most business owners, didn’t think beyond the excitement.
A Money Tree That Never Grows
A successful business isn’t fun and games, especially one that violates the Commandment of Time. Often people get into business with the wrong idea of what it will be like. Fueled by gurus and life coaches, many are misled, believing that “be your own boss” and “do what you love” is enough motivational fire to sprout success. Unfortunately, these would-be business owners merge onto roads that may as well trail through desert. And sorry, money trees don’t grow in the desert.
Think about Ashlyn and her quaint coffee shop. The coffee shop didn’t necessarily fail, but it failed her. Was Ashlyn her own boss? Sure, but it wasn’t enough. She was motivated by her passion for art and literature, and to be her own boss. While such dispositions are healthy, it doesn’t change a deficient road. You can’t sprout flowers from arid soil.
As a Fastlaner, you can start any business but eventually you must strive for automation. You want passivity and a living money tree. When you fail the commandment of time, the failure is cause by one of two obstacles. They are:
(1)The seeds are inaccessible because your business road started with a deficiency.
(2)The seeds won’t grow in infertile soil.
If your business is based on a money-tree seedlings, it should be capable of growing a money tree. Content systems, computer systems, software systems, distribution systems, and human resource systems are all seedlings to money trees. If your business isn’t based on one, can one be added to make it passive?
For Ashlyn’s coffee shop, she recognized she needed the a money tree seed—human resources—in the form of a general manager. She couldn’t justify the cost, and the seed was inaccessible. Her road started deficient. If she ignores her finances and hires a general manager, hence planting the seed, the seed won’t take because the margins aren’t there. Infertile grounds cannot grow money trees. And the failure starts when you choose a business not based upon a money tree seedling.
The problem with most business roads is that they are inhospitable for money trees simply because they fail the Commandment of Time. The seeds aren’t accessible and those seeds that are accessible, won’t take to the soil.
Chapter Summary: Fastlane Distinctions
➡A business attached to your time is a job.
➡A business that earns income exclusive of your time satisfies the Commandment of Time.
➡To satisfy the Commandment of Time, start with a business that uses a money-system seedling, or introduce one.
[34] - The Commandment of Scale
In business, to be a success you only have to be right once.
~ Mark Cuban
Speed Limit—15 or 150?
When your business road violates the Commandment of Scale, wealth acceleration is restricted. In other words, you’re given a speed limit. Drive any road with a speed limit of 15 and you aren’t going to get anywhere fast. Scale is about leverage and leverage is what gives the Fastlane wealth equation its power.
C – E – N – T – (Scale)
Business leverage is like a playing field, or a habitat of water. You can choose to inhabit the ocean or a pool at the local park. There are six business habitats:
(1)Local/community (pool)
(2)County/city (pond)
(3)Statewide (lagoon)
(4)Regional (lake)
(5)National (sea)
(6)Worldwide (ocean)
Scale is difficult to find locally or in a pool that fits only a small number of people. Sure, it can be done, but it requires magnitude, and magnitude doesn’t come cheap. If you own a tanning salon, your habitat is local. If you own an upscale restaurant, your habitat is county/city. If you own an Internet company, your habitat is worldwide. The larger the habitat, the greater the potential speed, or leverage, of your Fastlane.
Swing for Home Runs, Not Singles
Billionaire Mark Cuban recently wrote on his blog that it doesn’t matter how many times you strike out in business because you only have to be right once, and that “once” can set you up for life. In other words, be in the business of home runs.
Business is like baseball. Play on a field where you can hit home runs; don’t play on a field where they’re prohibited! For example, if you own a clothing boutique on Main Street, you violate the Commandment of Scale because your pool of customers is drawn from the local trading area. To break scale, the business owner needs to introduce leverage in the form of replication: Open more stores, sell franchises, or sell on the Internet.
Unfortunately, most entrepreneurs undertake “singles-only” businesses. Their playing field is stunted. Their road screams “Speed Limit: 15.” The home run is impossible and their habitat shriveled. If you’re a massage therapist, you’ll never have 10,000 patrons outside your door. There is no leverage! And if you don’t have leverage in the Fastlane equation, you don’t have a chance! The Commandment of Scale is like a tollbooth on the road to the Law of Effection!
The Fastlane Wealth Equation: Disarmed
When you violate the Commandment of Scale you disarm the Fastlane wealth equation and demote its power to Slowlane s
tatus. Recall the Fastlane wealth equation:
Wealth = Net Profit + Asset Value
Asset value is predicated on net profit, which is predicated by unit profit multiplied by units sold.
Net Profit = Units Sold × Unit Profit
If “units sold” has a ceiling, you stifle leverage. Without leverage, you can’t create wealth exponentially. When you travel a business road incapable of scale, you render the Fastlane wealth equation impotent.
My favorite example is the guy who buys a popular sandwich franchise in his local neighborhood. This business violates the Commandment of Scale because the variables—units sold and unit profit—are implicitly limited.
How many sandwiches can this guy humanly sell in one day?
Fifty? A hundred? How many hours are in the day? Twenty-four?
See the similarity? The objective of units sold is to have an upper limit greater than 100. How about 10,000? Or 100,000?
Is there anything this sandwich shop owner can do to sell more sandwiches in one day?
Under his current structure, there isn’t.
He is limited in scale to his local trading area. He’ll never sell a cold-cut combo to a man living in Australia, let alone the neighboring city. Scale is limited, causing this road to have a constricting speed limit, just like a Slowlane road.
