Facing Entrepreneurship Realities: Scott Clary's Candid Talk | Digital Social Hour #38

Speaker 1 You know, a traditional career isn't safe anymore. That's hell.
It really is hell. If something is like physically draining my energy, I cut it out of my life, including people.

Speaker 1 If you feel like you're in a shitty situation, remove yourself from that situation, do it.

Speaker 2 All right, welcome to the Digital Social social hour. I'm your host, Sean Kelly, and I'm joining my guest today, Scott Clary.
How we doing?

Speaker 1 What's going on, man? Welcome to Miami.

Speaker 2 I'm in your town, man.

Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah. I love it.

Speaker 2 I love it. You got to show me around.

Speaker 1 After, we will. We will.
We will. Awesome.
So, what's going on?

Speaker 2 Not much. Give people a brief summary of what you've done and what you're working on.

Speaker 1 Yeah, sure. So super quickly, sort of to give you high level on my life.
Background was always in tech, always on the sales and marketing side. So really strong sales and marketing.

Speaker 1 You know, started selling tech and then moved into sales and marketing leadership, um led teams to the companies that i built that were acquired so had some success there now i'm focused on um capital allocation meaning i do some angel investing i'm trying to build a private equity firm um which is a

Speaker 1 wild ride to you know put it lightly i run a really large business podcast um sort of to summarize like the different seasons of my life went from operator into investor capital allocator but this is very recent for me so i'm making the transition at this point in my life because i've had career success i've had entrepreneur success.

Speaker 1 I've had, you know, build a company. It's been acquired.
Never as the entrepreneur CEO founder, but always bolting myself on as like the sales and marketing person to help scale it up.

Speaker 1 And it's tiring as hell. So right now, where I want to be, I like building my own podcast, my own brand.

Speaker 1 I don't mind building companies, but I'd rather work with multiple founders and a portfolio manager or like, you know, you have all my portfolio companies and manage them.

Speaker 1 And I think that's in terms of longevity where most people that build companies eventually end up.

Speaker 1 And then, you know, we can take this conversation a million different ways, but I'm dealing with, do I want to be VC, private equity? What are the differences between the two?

Speaker 1 Why I'm making decisions is to build a private equity firm versus just do angel investing, just do VC.

Speaker 1 Cause there's so many different ways to make money once you have a little bit to play with, and even if you don't have a lot to play with, and I'm sort of learning that end of it now.

Speaker 1 So that's where I'm at. So yeah, long time sales and marketing.
I mean, that's sort of my thing. That's amazing.

Speaker 2 So yeah, your podcast is incredible. You've interviewed some of the most successful entrepreneurs in the world, you know, billionaires, guys like Grant Cardone.
What was it like interviewing Grant?

Speaker 2 Because he's a controversial figure.

Speaker 1 So funny because I actually don't, when you talk to him, I don't find him that controversial. I think he's controversial in the sense that he just doesn't have a filter.

Speaker 1 But when you talk to him like one-on-one, he's actually a really down-to-earth. pragmatic dude.
So he doesn't come across as like an asshole.

Speaker 1 He just says it like it is, which I think for a lot of people, that throws them off.

Speaker 1 He's another marketing guy too. Like he knows that if he says the most ridiculous shit online, like he's going to get clicks, which is cool.
And it's also his personality.

Speaker 1 Like I think his personality shines through. When I spoke to him, it was a pretty normal conversation.
So when I spoke to him, and that was a fun interview because it was during COVID.

Speaker 1 So like it was right when shit was hitting the fan. And we just had a conversation about how, you know, traditional career isn't safe anymore.

Speaker 1 So the things that you thought, you know, you looked at your parents, you saw them work a job for 30, 40 years, and that was like your model of what success was. COVID fucked that all up.

Speaker 1 So COVID screwed that up, 180, turned it on its head. And I mean, like Grant raises money to buy real estate, and that's kind of been his message all along.

Speaker 1 But in that particular conversation, it was like, okay, regardless of whether or not you put money into my real estate assets or you work with me, like find a way to get cash flow so that you don't depend on your nine to five.

Speaker 1 And that, funny enough, a little bit of a segue is sort of what I'm working on in my life right now. So, like, how do I buy cash flow? How do I buy businesses?

Speaker 1 How do I invest in businesses so that I don't have to be working in a business or working for one particular company for the rest of my life to make money? Because that's hell. It really is hell.

Speaker 1 And I mean.

Speaker 1 COVID, everyone is furloughed laid off. So all the shit that we thought was secure and safe and all the big companies that we thought would never let us go, that's what happened.

Speaker 1 People got let go en masse.

Speaker 1 And it kind of hit people that were complacent, like, you know, like it really hit them like a ton of bricks like people didn't expect it so you know whether or not it's investing in real estate it's investing in businesses it's just like understanding how to start a side hustle whatever the fuck it is and i've done like all of the things you can possibly do and i've tried them all tried to figure them all out i think that the message from grant and the message now that i speak about is like find ways to sort of future-proof yourself financially right so that you aren't relying on that one particular job one particular company one particular source of income and yeah I think that's Grant's message, whether or not it's harsh

Speaker 1 and it comes across, but I mean, it's real. Like it's very real.
So it's like a wake-up call for a lot of people. And it resonates with me.
At least that part of it does.

Speaker 2 Absolutely. One of the things I like about you is you're very open with the reality of entrepreneurship.

Speaker 2 People don't talk about the lawsuits. They don't talk about the anxiety, the late nights,

Speaker 2 but you're very open about it.

Speaker 2 What makes you feel so comfortable to be open about it?

Speaker 1 That's an interestingly worded question.

Speaker 1 What makes me feel comfortable to be open about it yeah because i feel like most people don't even want to talk about it publicly because i've dealt with all the shit

Speaker 1 and i don't think it serves anyone to sugarcoat the reality right i don't think that makes anybody's life easier so if you are a good human being and you have experienced something in your life And you've learned from it, why would you not want somebody else that was you 10 years ago to not go through all the bullshit that you went through?

Speaker 1 Like, I don't see how that's a good way to operate through life. I I don't believe in gating knowledge.
I mean, this is sort of like my thesis on life.

Speaker 1 I started a podcast interviewing people, didn't monetize it. I monetized ads later on, but I didn't gate anything, didn't drop a course.

Speaker 1 I was podcasting while I was still working as CRO for a company.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 my

Speaker 1 thought around that was I'm going to get awesome people that have experienced shit. And the podcast is called Success Story.
But I'll plug it. But the point is,

Speaker 1 it's not really meant to focus on successes.

Speaker 1 It's almost like it's uh it's meant to show that somebody who has success has gone through all this bullshit along the way right so that's why i started the show because i wanted people to understand that like life is not black and white it's not easy it's not like

Speaker 1 and it's also not like the people that have achieved the billionaires the people that have made over a hundred million the people that have ipos and exits it's not like they haven't gone through themselves so i think that sort of removing the veil and exposing what entrepreneurship really is is a really healthy way to educate people to show them opportunity but to to not bullshit what they're getting themselves into.

Speaker 1 Agreed. So we just spoke about why jobs are not great anymore.
Why working is, well, people want to work. Not everybody wants to be an entrepreneur.
Not everybody should be an entrepreneur.

Speaker 1 And jobs are great for some people. Entrepreneurship is great for some people.
But the point is, you just have to understand what you're getting yourself into and the potential drawbacks to each.

Speaker 1 There are a lot of drawbacks and putting all your cards on the table in one career for your entire life. There's also a lot of drawbacks in working in a starting a company as a founder.

Speaker 1 A lot of drawbacks. There's a lot of drawbacks raising money from venture capitalists.

Speaker 1 There's a lot of drawbacks even joining a startup as an early employee, getting a little bit of equity in that company.

Speaker 1 There's drawbacks in everything, but I think you have to just be more candid about it.

Speaker 1 And if more people are candid about all the different things that they go through in each of those scenarios, then the person coming out of college can make a really smart, educated decision, know what the fuck they're getting themselves into.

Speaker 1 Because putting all your cards on career is tough. Putting all your cards on startup is equally as tough.
A lot lot of depression, a lot of stress.

Speaker 1 Again, you mentioned lawsuits, but it's not just like lawsuits. It's like you are responsible for everything.
So yeah, you deal with the lawsuits. You deal with the bankruptcies.

Speaker 1 You deal with when you can't pay your staff. You deal with when you pitch a VC and he or she tells you your idea is shit.
You deal with when you sign, you know, an LOI with a VC and they...

Speaker 1 they screw you over on terms. And later on, like you realize when you exit your company, you don't own half as much as you thought you would.

Speaker 1 And even though, you know, Bloomberg is writing about a $100 million exit, maybe after taxes, you're only getting a wire for $5 million or whatever it is.

Speaker 1 Actually, you get the wire first, then pay taxes. But the point is, it's not easy.
So that's why I talk about it so candidly. Right.

Speaker 2 And you mentioned college earlier. Is that something you will recommend to your kids, or would you recommend going to college for upcoming entrepreneurs?

Speaker 1 Dude, that's a good question.

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 I think there's... There's reasons why people should go to college.
I learned a lot of soft skills in college. So I learned to not fuck around in college because high school was super easy for me.

Speaker 1 So high school was super easy, barely tried, always killed it.

Speaker 1 That didn't fly so well with college when you're managing that many classes, that many courses, at a like a higher level of sophistication.

Speaker 1 So I think it allows you to be very pragmatic about where you place your time and your energy and just be a great time manager and then also understand how to go into a particular topic that you may not care about and learn enough to be proficient at it.

Speaker 1 I think that's a good skill to use and learn. But after college, like I got my MBA, all the shit that I learned in in my MBA, I had already learned that.

Speaker 1 The majority of it working in startups and working in even large companies. So college is good for a variety of reasons.

Speaker 1 I don't think it's necessary, but I think that it can help someone structure their life better so that it's a little less chaotic. Because I can go into a new topic.

Speaker 1 And because of what I took away from university, I'm Canadian, but college, same difference.

Speaker 1 What I took away from that is I can go into any topic and reach a certain level of proficiency in that topic to at least be knowledgeable in it.

Speaker 1 And I felt that like being exposed to a wide variety of things in college gave me that skill set.

Speaker 1 But in terms of does it place me in a, in a career that I need?

Speaker 1 Well, there's some degrees that you actually have to get to, I mean, like we're talking like lawyer, you know, doctor, dentist, whatever. But outside of that, it is starting to lose some of its value.

Speaker 1 I agree. And I also don't believe that it's worth the price tag.
And especially if we're talking about Ivy League shit, I mean. You better network the shit out of that institution while you're there.

Speaker 1 Or if not, it is not worth $100,000 a year. It's a lot of money.
And I think business, it's a ton of money, dude.

Speaker 1 And a lot of business leaders, CEOs, people that are hiring are understanding that there's a lot of things that they will look for that is not a Stanford or a Harvard MBA. Yeah.

Speaker 1 I mean, I don't look for any of that. There's things that I will look for in somebody, but it will never be that.
Right. So,

Speaker 1 you know, it has some merit if you take the right things away from it. If you're just going to fuck off for four years completely, then it's not worth it just to get the degree.

Speaker 2 Yeah. As someone who hires people, I think that's a unique perspective.
What stands out on a resume for you?

Speaker 1 What stands out on a resume? So it depends on what I'm hiring for. Let's talk about startup land.

Speaker 1 It's somebody that, funny enough, the most important thing is somebody that actually hasn't done the job in a Fortune 500 or Fortune 1000 company.

Speaker 1 So when I'm hiring for startup, I want somebody that is hyper ambitious, like all the buzzwords, right? Grit, ambition, like all those things are great to look for.

Speaker 1 But you always want people that are okay trying to do things the way that it hasn't been done before so the worst hires that i've always made are people that i thought were hyper experienced and they come from enterprise like really really really large business ton of skills like on paper awesome you put them into a startup they fuck it up they always fuck it up because they're like it can't be done without resources without a team supporting me without an ea or whatever support they had in that big ass company and then they end up sabotaging their own success because that's the only way they've ever operated.

Speaker 1 So you got to think, even as an entrepreneur it's very hard to make the shift from working in a large company to working in a startup it's it's exceptionally hard for you imagine how hard it is for somebody who has never worked in a startup before and you're hiring them from and then you're putting them into that startup that always screws up people and it screws up that team it screws up that you don't do it i can see that so find somebody that has the basic skill sets that is proficient that is an a player um because a players are very important to hire you don't want to hire b's and c's and and you know you want somebody that will set the bar.

Speaker 1 In a startup environment, you're usually hiring somebody that's smarter than yourself at that thing, but they haven't done it or they haven't.

Speaker 1 You don't want to be the first time they've moved away from large enterprise. That's the best way I can put it.
Interesting. That would be my best advice.

Speaker 1 If they have moved away from enterprise, they've navigated that transition,

Speaker 1 and then you can find them at a later point in their career when they understand what startup is and they've shown success in startup, preferably at a similar stage company in a similar role, fine, you can bring them in, but just don't be that first point of transition.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 2 So, like we said earlier, you've interviewed some of the most successful entrepreneurs, centimillionaires, billionaires. What are some common traits you've noticed from interviewing all these people?

Speaker 1 So, one of the most common traits is probably one of the reasons why it's important to be very candid about entrepreneurship.

Speaker 1 It takes an unreasonable, like an unreasonable amount of energy and time and commitment to be successful at building something.

Speaker 1 So,

Speaker 1 you know, hustle culture is not great.

Speaker 1 But candidly, if you are going to build the best thing in that category and you're going to take a business from zero to, you know, 100 million, 500 million, a billion IPO, like

Speaker 1 there will be a period of your time where you will not have balance.

Speaker 1 And I think that that's what people have to understand about entrepreneurship. I don't love hustle culture, but it's a reality if you really want to take it to the next level.

Speaker 1 And I think that there's obviously some exceptions to the rule, but the majority of people have

Speaker 1 disclosed that there are very real periods of discomfort in their life that they had to take on and they were willing to take that on to take their business to the next level.

Speaker 1 And I think that that's the reality that people have to understand. It impacts your life.
It impacts your relationships. It impacts your mental health, your well-being.

Speaker 1 It could impact your money if you aren't finding product market fit, if you aren't scaling quick enough. It can be very stressful.
So,

Speaker 1 yeah, don't love hustle culture, but you will have to hustle for a period of time. I mean, even myself,

Speaker 1 I built a podcast while I was working full-time in a startup environment.

Speaker 1 So, you know, I'm putting in 10 hours a day in the startup and then evenings and weekends are all podcasting, sourcing guests, doing interviews. Day one, I had no budget for it.

Speaker 1 Now it's, now I get ad revenue. So I roll that back into the team.
But day one, I'm doing all the shit myself. So video, audio, and that's because I chose to do it that way.

Speaker 1 I mean, you can be successful and then you can have a whole team supporting you at a later stage in your career. But like at that point, I knew I wanted to start it early.

Speaker 1 I wanted to get it off the ground and I knew it was going to take hours and energy and effort to do.

Speaker 1 But I'm also a firm believer that if you do anything for 10 years, you will see success at that thing. And the day one version of that thing may not be the day.

Speaker 1 year 10 version of that thing but if you iterate over 10 years you will build success in that thing and there will be some measure of success. So, I stand by that completely.

Speaker 1 And I'm like, okay, if I bust my ass for five to ten years of my life doing this one thing that I know will pay off, I have no problem with that.

Speaker 1 That's a very small portion of my life for something that honestly is an asset that I'll use till the day I die.

Speaker 1 So, that's sort of the reality of entrepreneurship and the reality of a lot of people that have built things. And you'll also see, you'll notice when people build things,

Speaker 1 they'll build it, they'll exit it, and there's a kind of person that's an entrepreneur. And once they exit it, most people are not comfortable.

Speaker 1 Most people are not just comfortable just like sitting on your ass.

Speaker 1 So, again, I interview a lot of people. I'll give you two very good examples.
One of my good friends, Yosef Martin, he sold his company, Bossy Charm, for 520 million.

Speaker 1 I think about three years ago now.

Speaker 1 Took some time. Last.
I think three days ago, actually, and we won't put dates, so we'll keep it evergreen, but three days ago, we're sitting at a coffee shop.

Speaker 1 He's like, Scott, I need to figure out what to build next. The guy never really has to work ever again, but it's like it's a mindset.

Speaker 1 So, when you build something once and then you sell that thing and you have nothing going on really in your life compared to previously to that exit,

Speaker 1 you do have to go into something. And a lot of people feel that drive and that need.
I'll give you another example. So, Matt Higgins, he's a founder of RSE Ventures.

Speaker 1 He was a guest shark on Shark Tank. So, obviously, super successful guy, put in his time, built a massive private equity firm, investment firm.
He's like good friends with Gary Vee.

Speaker 1 He just launched a book. He just wrote a book.

Speaker 1 You're talking about the process of writing books. I'm thinking about doing this too.
And he was like, listen, Scott, I like went full entrepreneur mode. So I wanted this book to be successful.

Speaker 1 So I was like sleeping four hours a night for like a month or two, writing.

Speaker 1 promoting, getting on podcasts, traveling, doing in-person, doing as much PR as I could, going on Fox and MSNBC and CNNBC, whatever.

Speaker 1 He's like, but that is my version of how to take something to market.

Speaker 1 So there's going to be a period of my life that's going to be super uncomfortable, but I know that when I get over that hump, it's going to be good.

Speaker 1 But I have to like be okay with that of, you know, those four hour, you know,

Speaker 1 sleepless nights and just putting a ton of work. And he said, like, even now.

Speaker 1 It was strange to me because he built his company successful, but now this book was like a passion project for him. And he said, it was, it took a toll on my health.

Speaker 1 Even though I've done this a thousand times, I have all these portfolio companies. I work with founders all the time.
Even doing it again at this stage in my life, I thought it would be no problem.

Speaker 1 It still takes a toll on your health. And he's also very passionate and very much an advocate for if you want to take something to the next level, sometimes that's what it actually takes.
Wow. So.

Speaker 2 Yeah, sometimes you got to sacrifice your health. And it's pretty crazy.
I did that in college. I slept like four hours a day.

Speaker 1 It's not.

Speaker 1 Yeah, dude, that's a, that's a very dangerous thing to say. You have to sacrifice your health to be successful.
I think you you can be careful about it.

Speaker 1 But

Speaker 1 it's not relaxing.

Speaker 1 That's the best way I can put it. It's not relaxing.
I mean, my health is fine. I mean, I still sleep six hours.
I work out, but like,

Speaker 1 but, but, I mean, could I have spent more time with my girlfriend? Could I have seen my family more while I'm in that season of building in my life? Totally.

Speaker 1 So I think another, and, you know, I've gotten sick. I've gotten burnt out.
Again, not a badge of honor, just a reality when you're really passionate about something and you're putting the time in.

Speaker 1 yeah and it's not like it's going to be like this all the time but if you're building something you're working full-time um and you have like you know you have to go travel like you're trying to like maintain the same schedule you're going to get burnt out you're going to get sick it's just a matter of doing all the things and trying to make everything work managing your whole life and it's difficult but i think that outside of just you know there's obviously a lot of things you could do for your health and well-being mental and physical but also the relationships you have that's another thing that people don't really understand about entrepreneurship and this is like a very there's going to be a lot of like very negative a lot lot of positive about entrepreneurship as well.

Speaker 1 But I think that there's realities that people don't talk about a lot.

Speaker 1 Like you mentioned before, that I'd rather people understand some of these things going in as opposed to just being blindsided by them later on. Right.

Speaker 1 So relationships, friends, family, spouse, better half, girlfriend, boyfriend, whatever it is.

Speaker 1 Those are things that sometimes do not survive somebody that is working at full capacity. And like multiple examples of that.

Speaker 1 So I think I'm blessed because I have a girlfriend that we've been together before and a half years and she's building her own thing. She operates at the same level.

Speaker 1 But like many examples, people that I've interviewed on my show, and I won't name names because this is a very personal thing, but a lot of people that have divorced, broken up with

Speaker 1 after 10, 11, 20, 30 years because it just drift away. Time and focus is not on that other person.

Speaker 1 And unfortunately, that hurts a lot of relationships, especially if the two people don't understand what they're getting into when they start building something.

Speaker 1 So say I'm dating a girl and we're both working nine to five jobs, just got out of college and I'm like, I want to start a business. And she's like, yeah, sure, go for it.

Speaker 1 I don't know what I'm getting myself into. I'm not setting expectations.
When she started dating me, she did not expect somebody working 80 hours a week, never going out, anything.

Speaker 1 And I haven't really prioritized her in a while. That causes strain.
That causes relationships to break.

Speaker 1 So it's not that relationships can't work, but you better be sure that you're setting expectations and that you're purposefully trying to make the relationship work because more often than not, it can cause enough strain to break it.

Speaker 1 That's something that people don't think about ever.

Speaker 2 Yeah, I feel like a lot of entrepreneurs, almost everyone I know at least, has issues balancing work and their relationship.

Speaker 2 Like it's it seems to be a common issue.

Speaker 1 It's work, it's money. And it's like, it's funny enough, it's never like lack of money.
It's like when one partner is way more successful than they thought.

Speaker 1 I've actually, I haven't seen this as much.

Speaker 1 I haven't seen this as much with

Speaker 1 men being more successful. Maybe, yeah, men get money and they get an ego, then they cheat, and that's horrible.
But I've actually seen when two partners, I have a friend,

Speaker 1 she was with her, I'm assuming fiancé. She's with a man for 11 years.
She started building a company, hyper-successful, generating multi-million dollars in revenue per year.

Speaker 1 And the man couldn't deal with it. And they broke up because of that.

Speaker 1 So the the man couldn't deal with the woman being the breadwinner in the house, which is that's that's a wild thought to me, but I mean there's a variety of things that basically impact the the power balance of a relationship that

Speaker 1 people going into that day one, they did not expect. So there's a shift in the energy in the relationship that caused some sort of friction.

Speaker 1 And when you when you take on entrepreneurship, there is such a massive shift, whether or not it was that very weird but specific example or it's you're working too much.

Speaker 1 there's a shift in the energy between the two people that I think a lot of people just don't think about going into it which will basically

Speaker 1 if people don't level themselves up and and be okay with the the new version of that relationship then of course they're not gonna be comfortable with it like if you if you dated somebody and they were this kind of person and then 10 years later they're a very different person that stresses you out and entrepreneurship is forcing you to evolve very quickly always yeah it is that it is like there is never a situation where you go in to build a business, even if it's not successful, where you will not evolve as a human being.

Speaker 1 So you better be sure that your partner is cool with that and is willing to join you on that ride. Because if not, that's when shit's not great.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 No, I love that. I never thought of it that way.
That's really impactful.

Speaker 2 Earlier, you mentioned burnout, and there's all these new studies on how stress is really harmful and can potentially take years off your life.

Speaker 2 How do you deal with your stress and what advice would you give to people that are feeling stress?

Speaker 1 So for me, a lot of it,

Speaker 1 yeah. So I work on things that I do enjoy doing.
So I'm very quick to, if something is like physically draining my energy, I cut it out of my life, including people.

Speaker 1 I really don't have energy or time for that. And I feel like people keep,

Speaker 1 and you know this, when you go into a room, you talk to somebody, it's just a negative vibe. You know, these people.
And I think a lot of people keep those individuals around too long.

Speaker 1 And it's not just individuals.

Speaker 1 It could also be, It could also be you're working for a job too long while you're trying to build something and like maybe that thing that you're building is successful, but you're still working for a boss you hate because you're scared, but like that nine to five actually makes you depressed.

Speaker 1 And you feel like you walk into that office and you feel the energy drain.

Speaker 1 Like when you feel like you're in a shitty situation and hopefully you have the ability to remove yourself from that situation, do it as soon as possible. Like rip the band-aid off.

Speaker 1 Everybody knows when they're around people or doing things that don't give them energy, kill that shit because that compounds your burnout exponentially.

Speaker 1 Other things that can easily lead to burnout is multitasking. So

Speaker 1 I'm speaking about working a nine to five while starting a side hustle. People are like, well, isn't that multitasking?

Speaker 1 Yes, but no, meaning that if I'm working my nine to five or if I'm working on my side hustle, I'm not bullshitting with other stuff while I'm doing that very specific task. So burnout is a real thing.

Speaker 1 People that multitask think they're good at it. They're not.

Speaker 1 There's studies done on what's called attention residue, which means that every time you switch tasks, you get slightly less efficient and you really build up residue in your brain that allows you to, or doesn't allow you to operate as efficiently as if you were just hyper-focused on one task.

Speaker 1 And there's actually studies, and I'm not pretending to be a doctor, but there are studies that are done on attention residue.

Speaker 1 So to avoid burnout, focus, hyper-focus on the thing that you're doing in the moment and only that.

Speaker 1 And then if you do need to switch tasks, there's actually a strategy that you basically time block how long you're going to be working on the new task and the plan that you will have to return to the old task.

Speaker 1 And when you do that, you mentally sort of enable yourself to switch to that new task without causing additional attention residue, which

Speaker 1 again, over the course of the day, if we're constantly switching tasks, builds up and then increases fatigue, decreases the ability to make decisions, increases the feelings of burnout.

Speaker 1 So, hyper-focusing is one way, like a very, a very tactical way to reduce burnout as well.

Speaker 1 again

Speaker 1 everything in your life that isn't in line with what you're doing can increase your burnout so if you have a partner that isn't supportive if you have parents that aren't supportive if you um

Speaker 1 i'm trying to think you're saying to cut your parents off no i'm not saying to cut your parents off but i am saying that if they are not supportive of you then you do have to limit if you're talking to them every day and you're calling them every day and every day they're giving you shit that's not conducive to building something

Speaker 1 So, fine, talk to them once a week, or talk to them once every two weeks. But the point is, if they are draining your energy, you have to be cognizant of that.

Speaker 1 So, okay, are you going to kill the relationship with your parents? No, obviously not. But you also can't let them sabotage you every single day.

Speaker 1 Right? That's it. That's it's tough for a lot of people that have really great relationships with their parents.

Speaker 1 But I would say, like, your relationship isn't great if they're not supporting what you're doing and they're not supporting what you're passionate about.

Speaker 1 So, don't break it off, but understand that it's hurting you and it is helping, it is causing burnout. So again, so relationships, focus,

Speaker 1 trying to think of what else. I would say physical health

Speaker 1 is a big one.

Speaker 1 So if you aren't in great physical shape and you don't have to be like a, you know, you know, 5% body fat, but if you aren't going to the gym, if you aren't working out, if you aren't eating right, if you aren't understanding what foods sort of optimize your energy levels so that you can perform at like peak performance all the time, like I have a very specific diet that I use that's worked for me me that I've sort of tried to perfect over, you know, my entire life.

Speaker 1 I think that that can lead to burnout too. If you're always eating garbage, I mean, if you're always drinking and all the same bullshit.

Speaker 1 I mean, most of the people that I know that are high performers also try and biohack to some degree. Yeah.
So they're always trying to find ways to operate at like peak. capacity, right?

Speaker 1 Peak performance.

Speaker 1 So whatever the food they eat, the, you know, the workout routine they do, the sleep schedule they have, it's all, they, they all try and like maximize their day yeah as much as possible and when you maximize your day and you are hitting walls at 4 p.m.

Speaker 1 because you didn't have a shitty lunch yeah it it will help you it will help you do more it will help you um

Speaker 1 i guess not just do more but like do it better so that you're not you know writing shitty emails or you're you're not the work that you do or the you know the document you're putting together it's not like filled with errors and shit like that when you are operating at high energy so i'd say that also helps avoid burnout um but it's it's not like one thing it's like a combination of like everything but being aware of all the different things that can sort of like hijack your day in your life I think that's the number one way to avoid burnout absolutely what are some biohacks do you that you do do you fast do you take pills yeah so uh i'm pretty i'm a pretty heavy coffee drinker um i've i've i've fucked around with nootropics but i don't really like them that much i find that most nootropics like they give you some sort of focus but then you personally i get like a massive down after nootropics and like we're not talking at at all we're talking like actual nootropics.

Speaker 1 So like I don't love the feeling. For me, my perfect day is coffee, 9 a.m.
1 and usually around 5. So like three cups a day.
That's late. Yeah, I'm fine with that though.

Speaker 1 But I'll go to bed around like 1 o'clock. So it's not too, too bad for me.
I'll do intermittent fasting.

Speaker 1 So that means like a 16 and 8. So 16 hours fasted, eight hours eating.
Sometimes I even do like a like a 20 hour fast, four hour eating window.

Speaker 1 And I'll do that in the morning. So I won't eat until around three or four.

Speaker 1 And for me, coffee plus fasting in the morning gives me optimal energy. So I feel like on, like zoned in, like candidly, better than most nootropics.

Speaker 1 And there's no massive down because the only stimulant you're on is caffeine. Right.

Speaker 1 I mess around with diets. Like I operate better on a low carb diet.

Speaker 1 So what I'll try and do is like Monday to Friday, I'll usually do keto or low carb as much as possible. Saturday, Sunday, I'm like, I'll refeed and do like a higher carb diet.
Like

Speaker 1 really don't care what I eat on Saturday Sunday and I found that that sort of combination is the best for like energy levels

Speaker 1 just for like operating for being alert for being like like cognitively present and

Speaker 1 I also find like of course like that diet plays into like my workout routine too so that's like my best possible diet for working out I don't do a ton of cardio I should do more I don't do a ton of cardio I love lifting always love lifting um

Speaker 1 yeah that's pretty much it how many days a week do you lift four Four. Okay.
Usually four. It's pretty doable.
Yeah, it's like it's very doable. Yeah, it's like really not a lot.

Speaker 1 And like, I mean, like, this is not

Speaker 1 a fitness podcast, but I mean, like, I'll do like

Speaker 1 a like a chest and tries, back and buys, leg, shoulder abs, like very basic split. Yeah.
Pretty like normal bodybuilder split. But I find that works.

Speaker 1 And combined with like a keto diet or a low-carb diet, which is

Speaker 1 it's also a very high-protein diet. Yeah.
It's like you end up looking good too, and you end up functioning better. Yeah, so for me, it's a win-win.
But I mean, like

Speaker 1 nutrition and diet recommendations, it's really dependent on your schedule. It's dependent on like how food interacts with your body.
I know people that die on low carb.

Speaker 2 They die?

Speaker 1 Not die. Like, like, like they're no energy.

Speaker 1 Like, like, they don't die. Like, I mean, like they have no energy.
Okay. Not actually die.
No, like, they're just like, they're not performing well. Yeah, no, no, not die.

Speaker 2 No, it's interesting you said that. I found out last week I'm actually allergic to most carbs.

Speaker 1 Like like

Speaker 2 fortified and enriched stuff.

Speaker 1 But is that like that's not, what's the word?

Speaker 1 Like glucose intolerant.

Speaker 2 No, there's a gene. So I took a 10x health systems test.
Oh, that gene.

Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 And I found out America, for some reason,

Speaker 2 they do a lot of fortified and enriched grains.

Speaker 1 The food here is garbage.

Speaker 2 Yeah, so I'm just going to drink. The food is absolutely garbage.

Speaker 1 I mean, most of my diet, like, you're talking about keto and low carb. It's mostly meat.
Yeah. Like, it is mostly meat throughout the week.
I eat very few grains.

Speaker 2 What type of of meat? Like organic, grass-fed?

Speaker 1 I mean, any type of meat is better than eating shit that you'd get from a restaurant. But yeah, organic, grass-fed,

Speaker 1 sometimes kosher as well. It's pretty well taken care of.

Speaker 1 Chicken, beef, nothing too crazy.

Speaker 1 Find different ways to make it not monotonous, but like, yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Would you ever do the carnivore diet? Isn't that just pure meat? Just pure meat. Yeah, I would.
Okay. I would.
I get bored, though. Yeah.
Rogan does it, but I'm not sure.

Speaker 1 I don't feel like it has enough benefit because I would like literally lose my mind just with how bored I'd be about the food that I'm eating every day.

Speaker 1 I feel like low-carb or keto, where you can include cheese and maybe some nuts as well, at least it gives you enough variety throughout the week to not be bored. Yeah.

Speaker 1 I mean, I don't like being bored with my food. If I like a dish, I'll eat it, but I don't want to just eat meat.

Speaker 2 Yeah, you know, those people that meal prep the chicken and rice every day.

Speaker 1 Well, that's, that's like, yeah, that's like a hardcore bodybuilder.

Speaker 1 I don't like that. I also find that boring, but I enjoy eating heavier fat foods because I find it tastes better.
Yeah. Versus, because you, there's so many different diets, right?

Speaker 1 Like all diets, ultimately what you're trying to do is you're trying to optimize like your your

Speaker 1 like your workout and your fitness performance. But then you also want to like make sure that you have energy levels and you're not like peaking and valleying all day.
Yeah. So.

Speaker 1 Chicken and rice is really good for like a like a you know high protein moderate carb low fat diet.

Speaker 1 But when I do that kind of diet I'll maybe perform like 10% better in the gym because I do have a few more carbs going through my body.

Speaker 1 But I find that like my peaks and valleys, like I'll hit, I'll hit walls throughout the day and I'll be like, I'll be very tired. Right.
So I'll be tired like right before lunch. I'll be super hungry.

Speaker 1 I'll be tired around three, four o'clock.

Speaker 1 My sleep won't be as good if I have carbs in my diet. Like there's a whole bunch of reasons.
Like it's not like you can't do it. It's just I don't enjoy it as much.
I don't operate as well.

Speaker 1 Yeah, that makes sense.

Speaker 2 Scott, it's been a pleasure, man. Any closing comments or where people can find out more?

Speaker 1 No, dude. That's awesome.
I love it. Short and sweet.
Okay.

Speaker 1 Scott scottdclary.com. Everything's there.

Speaker 2 Perfect. Cool.
All right. You heard it there, guys.
Digital Social Hour. I'll see you next week.