Dan Martell - How To Cut Toxic People Out of Your Life

00:00:00.120 Hey there, Dan Martell here,

00:00:01.200 serial entrepreneur, investor, and creator of SaaS Academy.

00:00:04.200 In this episode, I'm gonna share with you

00:00:05.920 how to restructure, design, cut people out of your life

00:00:09.920 that you feel might be toxic without feeling horrible.

00:00:13.840 Trust me, you're not a bad person

00:00:15.000 if you've had this thought.

00:00:16.080 And be sure to stay at the end

00:00:17.080 where I'm gonna tell you how to get access

00:00:18.240 to my Dream 100 training.

00:00:20.440 It's a specific framework to help you rebuild

00:00:23.160 your network of positive people

00:00:25.960 to help support your dreams and your goals.

00:00:30.000 Now, I know I have a lot of teenagers on my social media accounts, etc., that follow and

00:00:45.420 listen to my content. And some of them, even the startup founders, are early in their career.

00:00:50.660 And what you discover is the more you grow, the more you will realize that people in your life

00:00:56.660 for not supporting that growth.

00:00:58.440 It kind of feels like they're jealous.

00:01:00.600 It kind of feels like they're uncomfortable with your growth.

00:01:04.180 It kind of feels like they think you're better than them.

00:01:07.720 It's just this weird feeling

00:01:09.300 and it usually ends up being that you gotta ask yourself,

00:01:12.900 like, are these the right people

00:01:14.500 for me to be spending a lot of time with, right?

00:01:16.560 Recently, I had a client, Chris, that reached out

00:01:19.340 because he went from about 60K a month in revenue

00:01:24.340 to almost a million dollars a month.

00:01:27.120 And he messaged me on Voxer and he said,

00:01:29.840 hey, I really don't feel like I have a whole lot

00:01:34.800 in common with my old friends

00:01:36.620 and I love them and they're great people,

00:01:38.220 but how do I deal with this feeling

00:01:40.780 of just not wanting, he would rather spend,

00:01:44.800 instead of going to somebody's barbecue or a birthday party,

00:01:48.340 he would rather spend it doing something else,

00:01:50.540 being active, being with his family,

00:01:52.520 Building is building, building is empire.

00:01:55.860 Like, I totally get it.

00:01:58.100 And I shared with him some of these perspectives

00:02:00.780 because I think there's a risk of us feeling guilty

00:02:04.580 for feeling this and honestly, it's just slowing us down.

00:02:08.600 And I'm gonna walk you through exactly how to think through it,

00:02:10.900 the strategies, and also make sure that you can walk away

00:02:14.940 just like Chris did, feeling confident about his next moves

00:02:18.360 and kind of the direction his network with him

00:02:21.020 and his wife and his family were gonna head.

00:02:23.120 Number one, toxic people spectrum.

00:02:25.800 So here's what I've discovered.

00:02:27.860 There are people out there that are just negative Nancys.

00:02:30.460 They're always like, every time they talk,

00:02:32.900 and I know there's somebody in my life like this,

00:02:35.140 and they're a friend, they're a family member of a friend,

00:02:38.140 and they mean no harm.

00:02:41.300 This is the crazy part is they mean no harm,

00:02:42.880 but honestly, every time somebody says anything positive,

00:02:46.420 they're just like, yeah, but, yeah, but,

00:02:48.620 blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

00:02:50.580 Negative, negative, negative.

00:02:51.700 And honestly, I love my friends,

00:02:54.240 so I'm there because they're my friend,

00:02:56.860 and I just accept that that is that person's perspective.

00:03:00.300 Maybe in the past when I was a little immature,

00:03:02.100 I might have engaged with it.

00:03:03.400 I might have chirped back.

00:03:05.620 No, I don't.

00:03:06.520 But the way I think about it is just like

00:03:08.040 there could be people in your life

00:03:09.260 that you can't get away.

00:03:10.200 They're family members, et cetera.

00:03:11.300 And I just want you to understand

00:03:13.140 there's a spectrum, right?

00:03:14.720 There's people that are obviously negative Nancys,

00:03:17.480 and then there's some people that are not, 0.85

00:03:20.180 but they're still a bit of an energy sucker, okay? 0.55

00:03:24.040 They're still an energy vampire, okay?

00:03:27.360 So I teach this framework called the friendventory,

00:03:30.640 how to do a friendventory.

00:03:31.920 Here's my rules, just right off the bat.

00:03:34.320 Social media, if I see you at the mall

00:03:37.120 and I don't want to approach you and say,

00:03:40.160 hi, how's it going, what's new?

00:03:42.800 I'm not friends with you on Facebook.

00:03:44.760 Just saying, like to me, Facebook is for friends.

00:03:48.320 You can follow me.

00:03:49.600 I share all my stuff publicly,

00:03:51.380 but in regards to the people that I am friends with,

00:03:53.780 I am a big fan of curating that

00:03:56.320 because I don't want your default reaction,

00:03:59.400 content share, whatever blurb you write on Facebook

00:04:02.800 to show up into my world

00:04:04.640 because I believe I'm responsible for the energy

00:04:07.140 I allow into my space and I want positive vibes, okay?

00:04:11.060 So understand a friend-ventory sometimes can be definitely

00:04:14.520 a social media curation process.

00:04:16.460 That's why I think birthday notifications

00:04:17.980 are a beautiful thing.

00:04:18.980 I'm always like, yep, nope, nope, follow this.

00:04:22.320 And it evolves, just like, think about this.

00:04:24.740 Just because you were born in a specific city,

00:04:26.940 ended up in a school system,

00:04:28.860 and you made friends with the people

00:04:30.100 that sat around your desk does not mean

00:04:32.400 that you need to be friends with them

00:04:33.480 for the rest of your life.

00:04:34.320 Like that, I don't know where that belief comes from,

00:04:37.820 but at the end of the day,

00:04:39.200 like I'm gonna choose my friends.

00:04:41.740 I'm gonna choose the people that lift me up,

00:04:44.800 that brighten my day, that support me when I'm down.

00:04:47.680 not by default, so I call it design by default.

00:04:51.380 So you need to understand there's a spectrum of toxicity

00:04:53.880 and then there's also a friendventory process to do that.

00:04:57.620 Number two, love from a distance.

00:05:00.420 So I was sharing this with my coaching client Chris

00:05:03.120 about like, look, just cause you spend less time

00:05:06.340 with somebody does not mean that you don't love them.

00:05:08.440 I have a lot of people that are on their own journey,

00:05:11.880 their own process, you know, they're dealing with things.

00:05:14.200 I'll be there, if they ever need me, I'm there.

00:05:16.440 But what changes is the commitments that I make to them.

00:05:21.400 You know, when they invite me to the barbecue,

00:05:23.400 I just say I already have something going on, which is true.

00:05:26.980 I don't have a lack of things I could be doing,

00:05:29.540 and I just would rather not spend three hours

00:05:31.980 engaging with these people, right?

00:05:34.400 So like maybe you say yes to the Christmas party

00:05:36.560 and not to the barbecue.

00:05:37.820 Maybe you say yes to this and less to that.

00:05:40.260 You just kind of think about like,

00:05:42.380 okay, last year maybe I spent 100 hours with this person.

00:05:44.660 Maybe this year you spent 15 hours.

00:05:46.220 and you just start loving from a distance.

00:05:48.920 You can be their family member, you can love them,

00:05:52.020 but you can start to pull yourself back, right?

00:05:55.580 Because my whole thing is how deep do you cut?

00:05:57.860 I don't think you should cut people out of your life.

00:05:59.860 That's a misnomer.

00:06:01.240 I think that that's a really bad attitude.

00:06:02.900 You're just like, block, block.

00:06:04.760 You know, that's not what I'm talking about, right?

00:06:07.140 That's not human.

00:06:08.080 I just don't do that.

00:06:09.480 But in regards to like, I have a best friend

00:06:11.860 that I had in high school and then kind of into my 20s.

00:06:14.940 and then one day I seen him attack somebody on Facebook

00:06:19.020 and I just totally didn't agree with it

00:06:22.760 and not only that, I realized that

00:06:24.740 every time I hung out with this person,

00:06:26.780 it didn't feel good.

00:06:28.420 I always felt like they were trying to like

00:06:30.840 share all this stuff that they were up to

00:06:32.740 to try to like prove to me something

00:06:34.340 and like I just wanna hang out with people

00:06:36.160 that are easygoing, positive, you know,

00:06:40.080 not talking about other people

00:06:41.440 and it's just, it didn't feel good

00:06:42.800 And I didn't say like, hey man, we're no longer friends.

00:06:47.280 I just decided to not call them anymore,

00:06:50.920 to not respond to text messages fast

00:06:53.280 or even respond honestly if it was like a group text

00:06:55.620 and just start to create some space and some distance.

00:06:58.800 Now, when I see them at the coffee shop,

00:07:01.400 which I do once in a while, we politely do this.

00:07:04.100 How's it going?

00:07:04.860 Good, kids are good.

00:07:05.740 Yeah, awesome, it's good to see you.

00:07:07.580 That's fine, right?

00:07:08.780 I always believe there's people that come into your life

00:07:10.620 for a reason, a season, and a lifetime.

00:07:13.480 And if it's not for a lifetime, don't force it.

00:07:16.460 Just accept it what it is and move on because trust me,

00:07:19.860 and I'm gonna get into how do you find new people?

00:07:21.640 There are some incredible folks out there

00:07:23.800 that are gonna make your life so much more fulfilled.

00:07:27.580 They're gonna bring joy.

00:07:28.500 You're gonna be like, wow, I still remember

00:07:30.440 there was a time when my friends made me feel X

00:07:32.440 and now I feel Y, and Y feels incredible.

00:07:35.140 Why did I take so long to just make

00:07:37.320 some different set of decisions?

00:07:39.120 Number three, get busy with others.

00:07:41.360 This is, to me, the idea of like where to look.

00:07:44.420 How do you find other positive people?

00:07:45.900 What are kind of the activities that you can think about?

00:07:47.960 Well, here's a whole bunch of ideas

00:07:49.560 I'm just gonna throw out there.

00:07:50.740 Number one, there's a ton of industry groups in your city.

00:07:55.260 Doesn't matter how small the city is,

00:07:56.840 there's the kings, there's like literally,

00:07:58.780 I'm not even gonna list them,

00:08:00.000 because I want you to search.

00:08:00.940 Business groups in enter your city name.

00:08:03.940 So there's that, there's non-profits, right?

00:08:07.040 if you have an interest in an area of your business,

00:08:10.580 people who volunteer for nonprofits,

00:08:12.500 you know, surprise, surprise,

00:08:13.540 they're ridiculously good people,

00:08:15.120 good hearts, passionate, positive, et cetera.

00:08:18.240 So I'm a big fan of nonprofits,

00:08:20.240 maybe even sitting on a board, joining other sports leagues.

00:08:24.200 So what happens with a lot of folks,

00:08:26.380 and my client, Chris, he's an introvert, right?

00:08:28.600 So he did, he's like, I don't,

00:08:30.800 I'm not somebody that's outgoing and wanna make new friends.

00:08:34.440 And I said, look, if you just put yourself

00:08:35.880 on a team sport, even if it's like, you know,

00:08:38.720 and just, this is a crazy thing, Chris,

00:08:40.560 you might have to say hello, okay?

00:08:42.380 Like, you could, cause he was in a, you know, hunting.

00:08:45.060 I'm like, if you go to the gun range and you look over

00:08:47.420 and somebody makes eye contact,

00:08:48.760 you're gonna have to say the words, how's it going?

00:08:52.120 All right, so Mr. Introvert,

00:08:53.560 I'm gonna have to give you some cues to just stand out

00:08:55.800 because look, at the end of the day, nobody's gonna,

00:08:58.240 like, if you wanna make new friends,

00:08:59.600 you gotta have a conversation.

00:09:00.900 I mean, it's kind of part of the dealio.

00:09:02.740 So just think about like the groups, the sports groups,

00:09:07.520 the activities, Facebook events page

00:09:09.920 has a ton of stuff that you could be using

00:09:12.000 to find people that shared similar passion and interest.

00:09:15.360 And within those groups,

00:09:16.620 you'll just be exposed to some new people

00:09:18.100 and say like, I really like that person

00:09:19.440 and decide to like, hey, you know,

00:09:22.320 are you free Saturday morning putting together this thing?

00:09:25.180 I mean, I literally like to do runs

00:09:27.520 and founder dinners and all that stuff.

00:09:28.720 You can be inspired.

00:09:29.540 I've done episodes on founder dinners

00:09:30.940 and building networks and,

00:09:33.020 but get busy with other people

00:09:34.580 because if you're busy with other positive people,

00:09:37.400 you can't help but say,

00:09:38.820 hey, I'd love to have come to that birthday party on Saturday,

00:09:41.200 but I already got one that I already committed to,

00:09:44.100 you know, et cetera.

00:09:44.940 And it's just the way it is,

00:09:47.020 is you wanna upgrade your point of view,

00:09:49.380 you wanna upgrade the five people

00:09:50.620 you spend the most time with

00:09:51.700 because you are definitely influenced by those five people.

00:09:54.280 And if those five,

00:09:54.920 if you're trying to go on a health dirty, for example,

00:09:57.600 you're trying to get your fit on,

00:09:58.800 try to sweat every day,

00:09:59.800 you're trying to run an Ironman

00:10:00.780 and you're hanging out with people that like to go to the pub,

00:10:03.000 eat wings, nachos, and drink every night

00:10:05.120 between like 6 p.m. and 11 p.m.

00:10:08.220 and sleep in the morning, all that stuff,

00:10:10.040 good luck, like mental will and all that fun stuff.

00:10:14.540 You know, if you think you can do it, go for it.

00:10:16.220 But I'll tell you, you know,

00:10:17.540 if you want to get healthy and you're not healthy,

00:10:19.900 you're one of those people that might, you know,

00:10:21.600 have dessert with every meal, et cetera,

00:10:23.340 go hang out with some fit people

00:10:25.080 that do like Ironmans or CrossFit, et cetera.

00:10:26.940 And trust me, you will feel awkward, you know,

00:10:29.400 ordering dinner when they all order like chicken salad

00:10:32.640 and you order the nachos and the wings

00:10:34.980 and then they come dessert and they all say no thanks

00:10:38.020 and you go, yeah, I'd love the cheesecake.

00:10:39.980 Like just, it's that same concept applied to your life

00:10:43.900 and I think it's just smart.

00:10:46.360 It makes, if you're here to live the most epic

00:10:49.300 and achieve goals and dreams

00:10:51.720 and support other people in your life

00:10:53.720 and I'm gonna talk about why this is important in a sec,

00:10:55.560 then it's you have a responsibility to make those corrections number four shine your light so this

00:11:02.560 is the big thing for me if you decide to go on a path of betterment of curating a different group

00:11:09.320 of people my wife and I do this every year we start off in December we plan the next year and

00:11:12.880 we ask ourselves what are other families and couples that we want to spend more time with

00:11:16.540 because you know that we just don't we need to like lock it into our calendar and not make it

00:11:20.960 by default but make it by design because there are people that share our parenting style or

00:11:25.500 They're people that we just love to talk to,

00:11:27.400 but we, for some reason,

00:11:28.200 have never figured out how to spend more time.

00:11:30.300 So we'll schedule some vacations, et cetera.

00:11:33.060 I share that because you improving your situation

00:11:38.120 will inspire other people.

00:11:40.320 Trust me, because I've been there.

00:11:41.700 When I went from, and if you don't know my story,

00:11:45.500 of going from 17, in jail, drug addict, to rehab,

00:11:51.060 to the person I am today,

00:11:52.900 you know, financially wealthy and millions of followers online, you know, that I get to impact

00:11:59.880 and I'm privileged to support and, you know, dozens of companies that I've been lucky enough

00:12:05.580 to invest in, et cetera. And just the world I live in today, I just feel like it's your

00:12:10.780 responsibility to shine your light and share it with other people. And here's why it's powerful

00:12:14.480 in regards to the creating a different network is because as you grow and you go on this journey

00:12:22.460 of personal development and success.

00:12:24.420 You're inherently one to share it

00:12:26.520 with the people you care about the most.

00:12:28.260 But this is what I've realized

00:12:29.360 is everybody's on their own journey.

00:12:31.220 And unless they ask you, it's actually rude

00:12:34.260 and gives them 100% reason to think you're a dink 0.78

00:12:37.120 to always like being like, 0.57

00:12:39.180 every time I hang out with Dana,

00:12:40.300 he's always talking about his workout stuff.

00:12:41.860 He's always talking about his business.

00:12:43.580 He's never asking me any questions about me.

00:12:45.100 He's always telling me all the things

00:12:45.980 I got to change in my life.

00:12:47.160 It's like, don't be that guy, okay?

00:12:49.480 Let's call that person, I don't want to give a name

00:12:51.560 because I have so many friends with names.

00:12:54.000 Don't be that guy.

00:12:55.320 Don't be the person that is always criticizing other people

00:12:58.900 because now you gotta, I'm a member of my buddy, okay?

00:13:02.260 He lost like 35 pounds and all of a sudden

00:13:06.720 he was the fitness expert talking about this person

00:13:11.040 that's overweight and this person that's not doing anything

00:13:13.240 and I was laughing because six months ago

00:13:15.520 you were that person and all of a sudden

00:13:17.620 six months later because you lost some weight

00:13:19.160 you're feeling confident to just criticize all these people

00:13:23.060 and it's just, don't be that person.

00:13:24.500 Shine your light.

00:13:25.620 Be the example.

00:13:26.720 I got this from my buddy Jesse Elder.

00:13:29.160 Jesse Elder shared this.

00:13:30.240 It's a tugboat versus a lighthouse.

00:13:32.140 And the lighthouse, you know,

00:13:34.200 functions the same function as a tugboat.

00:13:36.840 Tugboat goes out if the ship is off track,

00:13:39.320 your friend's off track and you're bumping into it,

00:13:41.040 trying to realign it and get, you know,

00:13:43.780 get back on track in your life and you're like,

00:13:45.760 you're the preacher, okay?

00:13:47.940 You can do that, but guess what?

00:13:49.660 They don't want it. 0.99

00:13:50.660 It sucks. 0.99

00:13:51.120 You're banging it on the side of them. 0.99

00:13:52.280 It takes a lot of energy and it's frustrating.

00:13:54.400 What I encourage you to do,

00:13:56.160 which is how I live my life,

00:13:57.140 is be the lighthouse.

00:13:58.840 Be the example.

00:14:00.160 Shine your light as bright as possible.

00:14:01.960 And guess what?

00:14:02.820 It'll help other people see where there's pitfalls.

00:14:06.540 Okay?

00:14:06.720 They'll avoid the big rocks of life.

00:14:08.880 They'll also be inspired

00:14:10.300 because they'll see what you're accomplishing

00:14:12.540 and they'll know where you came from

00:14:14.380 and they'll be inspired by the fact

00:14:16.140 if that person who I wrote off in high school,

00:14:18.820 trust me, I'm speaking from experience.

00:14:20.540 Literally, I have people that message me

00:14:22.000 every day on Facebook that I haven't talked to

00:14:23.660 in 20-some years, and they're like,

00:14:26.200 I can't even believe that the person

00:14:28.460 that was in my class is,

00:14:31.160 what you, like, I don't get it.

00:14:32.900 What did you learn?

00:14:33.920 What did you, what happened to you, right?

00:14:38.200 Because it's like, it's just,

00:14:39.920 they're not even the same thing.

00:14:41.740 And I just, you know, I jokingly say to a lot of people,

00:14:44.280 like, my growth game is strong.

00:14:45.540 You know, if I haven't seen you in a while,

00:14:46.800 let me reintroduce myself.

00:14:48.200 My name is Dan Martell.

00:14:49.220 Like, and I don't say that arrogantly.

00:14:51.040 I say it because I'm proud of the work

00:14:52.920 that I put into myself.

00:14:54.860 And if you have the ability and the privilege

00:14:56.660 to, you know, go after your dreams

00:14:59.640 and get to a point where you're trying to like

00:15:02.080 restructure your friend group to support you,

00:15:06.300 be loud and shout out loud,

00:15:09.680 share on social media what you're doing

00:15:11.400 to improve your life.

00:15:12.640 Don't do it one-on-one with people

00:15:14.340 that don't ask for.

00:15:15.720 However, when they finally send you that message

00:15:18.860 and say, hey, John, Brad, Chris, whatever your name is,

00:15:22.900 Lisa, you know, Megan, Lauren, how did you do that?

00:15:28.500 I want you to take the time to explain to them

00:15:30.540 because there's very few and far between, actually,

00:15:32.420 that people will do that.

00:15:33.500 And that is the idea of shining your light.

00:15:36.680 So how do you cut people out of your life

00:15:38.440 without feeling horrible?

00:15:40.640 Number one, toxic people spectrum.

00:15:43.440 Assess.

00:15:44.240 Number two, love them from a distance.

00:15:46.500 Number three, get busy with others.

00:15:48.940 And you don't have any time for them anyway.

00:15:50.560 And number four, shine your light as bright as possible.

00:15:53.700 So as I mentioned at the beginning of this episode,

00:15:55.380 I wanna share with you an exclusive resource

00:15:57.320 called the Dream 100.

00:15:58.740 It's a training I created for my coaching clients

00:16:00.800 to help them understand the 100 people

00:16:03.140 that you should identify

00:16:05.120 that would literally transform your life.

00:16:07.640 And it's the 10 mentors, the 30 advisors, and the 60 peers.

00:16:10.840 Now don't worry, I'm gonna teach you

00:16:11.880 how to find those peers and advisors in your neighborhood.

00:16:14.480 You can click the link below to download that specific training,

00:16:17.600 get access to that.

00:16:18.420 That is my gift to you.

00:16:19.840 And if you like this video, be sure to subscribe to my channel.

00:16:22.580 Click the notification bell so that when you get,

00:16:25.860 when I upload, every week, every week,

00:16:28.120 I want you to get notified so you don't miss out on that.

00:16:31.560 And as per usual, I really, really, really today,

00:16:34.140 I want to challenge you to live a bigger life

00:16:36.380 and a bigger business, and I'll see you next Monday.

00:16:39.380 Test, test, test.

00:16:40.060 Yo, what's up, everybody?

00:16:40.800 Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Dan Martell - October 19, 2020

How To Cut Toxic People Out of Your Life

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