Kay:

Hey there Questers and welcome back. Today is Monday, February 15th, and we hope that you’re enjoying your post-Valentine’s day hangover! This is episode 291, and we have a great quote for you today from the one and only Russell Simmons.

Shi:

Russel tells us, “If you wake up deciding what you want to give versus what you’re going to get, you become a more successful person. In other words, if you want to make money, you have to help someone else make money.”

Kay:

I love this quote. One thing that Shila and I kind of came about and came to in the last two years is the idea that oftentimes many of us seek to start something brand new when there are already people down the path of what it is that we’re looking to accomplish. In the effort of trying to start something from scratch, sometimes we shoot ourselves in the foot by harming our momentum.

Shi:

When it’s probably far more advantageous for us to learn along the way, helping somebody else who’s on that path a little bit further down that path and help them make money with that idea, with that concept or that charity or that organization and then maybe decide to branch out and do it on your own and have that education be funded on the upfront. But I think more than that here in this quote, we’re really looking at that generous spirit and that ability that if you give in that integrous way, you’ll get 10 times more.

Kay:

Well, I think that this is well underlined in the accounts that we often get from celebrities when they talk about dealing with the masses, dealing with the major population of people and that Michelle Obama talks about this in her book “Becoming” where she has to actually tell her daughter’s, “Look out because everybody wants something from us. We’re in a position in our life where people get close to you, not because of who you are, but because of what you can give to them.”

Shi:

I know. It certainly is probably trapping youth, and as you’ve aged you’ve probably noticed that when you get more generous, you feel that fulfillment more in that it nudges you towards being conscientious in that way. It’s almost consuming, when you’re very young, just to want things for yourself. We like to joke that the kids are bottomless pits of desire. We all start out that way. So, in your youth, it can be really easy to simply focus on yourself. But the earlier we learned this lesson about waking up and deciding what you want to give versus what you’re going to get, is that kind of transformation of perspective that allows the receiving for you to be so much better than it was when you were focused on the receiving.

Kay:

When you focus on that receiving portion oftentimes what ends up coming out is kind of this action that is only focused on the end game. So, we find ourselves becoming inflexible. We find ourselves really honing in on what I am in this to get. When that end game gets threatened, the journey starts to look different for the person, and oftentimes we don’t end up finding that we have that tenacity inside to keep going because we started out for the wrong reasons.

Shi:

Yeah, right. That can be tough. One of the things that he says here in this quote is “if you wake up deciding what you want to give,” then I think that begs the question. How do I wake up that way? Which rewinds us to, how did I go to bed? What was I focusing on? What mindset and psychology was I really focusing on as I went to bed? So, if you’re like, “I could maybe use some help and some support in this area of shifting this perspective,” it might be worth it for your own self-examining what it is that you do right before you go to bed at night.

Kay:

Even thinking into the energetic signature can be helpful too. Let’s just say your goal is to become more fit. That’s my goal. That’s a goal I’m working on right now is my fitness. So, if I decided every day that instead of thinking 30 pounds, I’ve got to lose 30 pounds, I got to lose 30 pounds. I’ve got to gain 15 pounds of muscle. I’ve got to gain 15 pounds of muscle. Is that a motivating pole to get out of the bed or I want to go give it my all to this workout for my body? I want to give my all for that versus, I want to get. Now those incantations come from a completely different place, but that internal dialogue is going to really dictate how we show up in our day-to-day world.

Shi:

And here in the second half he really talks about that almost “Ziglar approach” to help enough other people get what they want, and you’ll get what you want. How if you want to make money, you have to help someone else make money. It’s one of those principles that illuminates the fact that you’ve got to become valuable so that you can earn more value and be more valuable and it’s just an interesting thing to bring forward.

Kay:

So, just a reminder, Russell Simmons tells us, “If you wake up deciding what you want to give versus what you’re going to get, you become a more successful person. In other words, if you want to make money, you have to help someone else make money.”

Shi:

Alright. So now it’s your #MoneyMondayquest. Make your Monday filled with abundance by going out of your way to help someone else make money today, just like Russell Simmons tells us. So, it might be a creative collaboration with a friend or supporting a startup, or saving your Starbucks five bucks for the homeless person on the corner. Some way that you give money to someone else. Make sure somebody else makes some money on this Monday and watch for when it circles back right on around to you. Are you ready?

Kay & Shi:

Let’s quest!