Focus: Lessons from Liam Neeson and Chess for your Entrepreneurial Journey

Imagine harnessing the singular focus of a character like Liam Neeson's Brian Mills in 'Taken', and applying it to your entrepreneurial journey. In the episode, we explore this concept, discussing the power of unwavering determination in achieving one's goals. Drawing from the film's narrative, we underscore the importance of cutting through the drama and distractions to get the job done, a mindset every entrepreneur and business owner can benefit from. 

As the conversation evolves, we pivot to a personal anecdote about mastering the game of chess, another metaphorical exploration of strategic focus and planning. The essence of chess—concentrating on the ultimate objective of checkmate—parallels the approach of categorizing life goals into daily steps and habits. We dive into this transformational journey, how it's reshaped life over the last four years, and present practical insights to help you apply these principles. Reach out at [e-mail] with your thoughts, struggles, or questions about goal setting or any other topic. Let's sculpt your life, one goal at a time.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
In the movie Taken.
Liam Neeson's character, brianMills, is a retired CIA
operative who's forced to go ona mission to rescue his daughter
, kim, who has been kidnapped.
Here's a spoiler alert ifyou're 15 years late and
watching the movie.
I don't really like to get intoviolence at all in this podcast
, but there's a singular,perfect metaphor contained in a
specific scene from the end thatI absolutely have to use.

(00:21):
Brian Mills finally getsthrough all the bad guys and
gets to the big boss.
Bad guy walks into his officeand sees his daughter.
Big Boss Bad Guy stands up tosay something or to negotiate
and Brian Mills shoots him deadbefore he has a chance to even
talk.
It made absolute sense to meand it was exciting to see a
scene that didn't use movie ordrama cliches but, more

(00:46):
importantly, it showed the powerof Mills' singular focus.
He didn't care who or how orwhy anything was happening.
He saw his daughter and wasfocused on getting her back.
The whole movie goes over this.
In all the fighting that he did, he wasn't doing it for revenge
or to harm anyone or to proveto them how amazing he is.

(01:06):
It went back to that onesingular focus getting his
daughter back.
Skip the drama, skip the posing, skip the posturing, skip the
acting if you'll allow me thatawkwardness acting and just get
his daughter back asentrepreneurs and business
owners.
It's good to skip the drama, tostop trying to prove anything

(01:30):
to anyone and just do what ittakes to get the job done.
Now, I saw the movie a longtime ago and I thought the end
was cool.
I did notice Neeson's singularfocus, but I applied it only to
the movie.
I thought it's really cool thatthey did that in a movie,
because the bad guy usually getsto talk and negotiate and allow
some buffer time to try to getout of the mess, and this ends

(01:52):
up making things harder for theprotagonist, as bad guys usually
do.
This was entirely different,but I only applied it to the
movie.
I didn't see it back then as alesson in my life.
After I dove into this wholepersonal growth mode in 2019, I
began digging into the game ofchess to see if I could improve
my skill.
That was one of my goals and Idecided to jump on it.

(02:15):
The chess lessons I took werehelpful.
In fact, my chess rating jumpedfrom 650 to 1150 in a matter of
a year.
I used the chesscom app andtook all of the lessons from the
very beginning.
But one thing that sticks withme is this chess rush game that
the app has, where you're givena chess puzzle and your

(02:36):
objective is to make the bestmove on the board.
At the beginners level, thebest move on the board was less
than three moves away every timefrom checkmate, when I realized
, as I played the game, how Icould use that entire strategy
to improve my life, because asthe puzzles progressed, I would
look at the board and startanalyzing pretty quickly what

(02:58):
the best move was.
It was a singular focus tobring about checkmate.
No posturing, no trying to makeimpressive moves, no attempt to
create unnecessary traps of thequeen or traps of other pieces
on the board, but to do the bestthing that I could do to go
after the singular objective ofputting my opponent's king in

(03:21):
checkmate.
I applied both of these lessonsto my life by making a list of
the most important things that Iwanted.
So I divided my goals intodifferent categories.
I used health, relationships,impact resources, lifestyle and
personal development those sixthings, and those are still the

(03:42):
six things that I use even todayand I set to work making the
goals under each of thosecategories, a singular focus.
I broke the goals down intodaily steps and daily
disciplines, so habits and steps, the tasks that I need to
accomplish.
Then I planned each task anddiscipline to figure out where

(04:03):
they would fit in my day and Ibegan to execute the plan, and
my life has never been the same.
That singular focus on thegoals I decided I must have in
this life has caused me to takesteps every day for the last
four years and my life looksnothing like it did in 2019.
And more than I could havehoped for a great career where I

(04:25):
get to choose when I work andhow long I work, a cash flowing
real estate portfolio that nowmakes more money than my
marketing consultation business.
I have improved relationships,and so much more.
I want to help you, throughthis podcast, get focused on the
most important things, and Isay all of this because I'm

(04:46):
thinking out a new directionwith my show and my second mixed
business.
I've been taking courses,classes, attending mastermind
groups, and the current wisdomis that I have to niche down and
find a focus and a specificaudience, and I believe that I'm
going to really start diggingdown into how to focus, using
goal setting, breaking downthose goals into steps and

(05:08):
planning out how to executethose steps.
That's one of the hardestthings to do, and actually, when
you really get into it, ittakes a long time.
It's not like this easy thingwhere you sit down, write your
goals down in 10 minutes andyou're done.
This took me 30 or 40 hours andto upkeep my goals and to ask
myself further what I want fromlife.

(05:28):
This is a thing that keepsevolving, it keeps changing, but
it keeps getting better.
It gets better, and I go afterbigger and bigger goals.
One of my favorite groups thatI'm involved in right now is
Vincent Pugliese's mastermind,and I will actually put a link
to his podcast, total LifeFreedom, in the links in the

(05:52):
description here so that you cancheck that out, because that is
absolutely worth it.
But I'm working with Vincent onfiguring out what my niche is,
and I think that I've found it.
So the one I'm heading towardis goal setting and mindset for
entrepreneurs and small businessowners.
I'm going to continue toprovide the same type of content

(06:13):
that I have been, but nowthere's a more focused direction
.
I would love to hear yourthoughts and opinions, though,
so shoot me an email at matt, atsecondmixnet.
I don't hear enough from myaudience and I would love to
communicate with you all more.
Let me know what you're goingthrough.
Let me know the strugglesyou're having.
I know the goal setting isdifficult because there is no

(06:34):
right or wrong answer.
You are ultimately the judge,jury and executioner over what
you want your life to be.
You get to decide.
That's a hard thing, but it'salso a beautiful thing.
You get to decide how you'regoing to sculpt your life.
So for right now, the mostimportant question that you can
ask yourself is what do I wantmost out of life?

(06:55):
What do I have to do to get itand what do I have to become to
get it?
Then make that your singularfocus and cause it to happen in
your life.
All right, send me an email.
I will see you soon.