Combat veteran, Justin Myers, joins Tonya Dawn Recla to discuss the relationship between top entrepreneurs and discipline. As a signage, marketing and business expert, Justin knows what it takes to be successful in business. Justin believes that there are 3 major keys to success: be disciplined, be efficient, and develop daily. He’s also the Vice President of The Sign Chef, a company that provides custom business signs in the entire United States, Canada and even internationally. Listen in as he shares his deep knowledge about being a top entrepreneur and the necessity of discipline.
Hello, everyone. This is Tonya Dawn Recla, your Super Power Expert, and I have with us today such an amazing person. He’s such a special guest, and first and foremost, I want to give him a shout-out and tell him to thank you for his service. He happens to be a disabled combat veteran. Justin Myers and his anti-piracy training with the Navy and the work that he’s done in the world is pretty remarkable, and I know, for those of you who are aspiring business owners, aspiring entrepreneurs, or are just wanting to figure out how to expand on what you’re already doing, you’re really going to want to pay attention to what we’re talking about today, because we’re discussing top entrepreneurs and discipline. And this man knows about both of those.
I’m going to let him tell you a little bit about what he’s been able to accomplish in the signage industry, really impressive stuff. For most of us, it’s like the holy grail of growing a business, and it’s really impressive. But before I let him do that, I really want to just emphasize the fact that coming out of that combat service with the Navy and moving into business, I know what that takes, and there’s a whole kind of reprogramming that goes on. And so for any of you who are sitting around thinking that you can’t do what he’s about to tell you he did, or that it’s too hard or any of that stuff, just stop. The only thing that’s going to stop you is you and what you think is possible, and I love these living, breathing examples of what can be accomplished.
And so without further ado, please join me in welcoming to the show Justin Myers. Justin, thank you so much for joining us today.
Hey, my pleasure. Glad to be here and glad to help provide value to your audience.
Oh, absolutely. You provide value with just the very essence of your being, so the information is kind of secondary in my opinion, but let’s jump in and ask you really quickly what are your Super Powers?
It’s all about a mindset control.
I think I’ve got a couple of them. One is discipline. I know how to separate what actually must be done no matter what, ifs, ands, buts about it, and the ability to focus and make it happen. Discipline’s all about doing what you don’t want to do, and it’s about doing it at the worst points. When you really, really don’t want to do it is when you absolutely must do it, so it’s all about a mindset control of knowing what you absolutely must get done, whether you like it or you don’t. It’s sucking it up and getting it done.
I want to jump in here before I let you talk about your other Super Powers, and I’m sure you have many. I was kind of laughing internally when you’re like, “I think I have a few.” I’m like, “Yeah, I’m pretty sure you do.” But I really want to emphasize what you just talked about. I think that we did some entrepreneurs and folks, especially in the personal development arenas, a disservice with the whole, “Find what you love and do it, and be passionate about it,” and all this stuff, but what you just said was it’s doing what you don’t want to do. Well, we have a whole industry telling people, “Don’t do what you don’t want to do. Why would you do something you don’t want to do?” Talk to me a little bit about that, because I think you just pounded the nail on the head.
When you get into the business, you can do what you love. Don’t get me wrong, you can do what you love, but if you don’t learn how to do the shit that you just absolutely don’t like doing, you’re not going to blow up. It’s never going to happen. When you get into the business, it doesn’t matter what your goals are if you’re not going to do what’s required to actually achieve them. So I have a goal of nine figures. That’s my personal goal. I know what’s required. I have mentors that are past that level, and there’s a lot of shit that I just hate. I’m not going to lie.
I love that.
There’s a lot of that that I just don’t like doing, but you know what? At the end of the day, it comes down to me, and I have to make it happen, and it’s my name. It’s everything that I’m building, and if I’m not willing to do it, how the hell can I ask somebody else to do it?
Well, and I think that’s so crucial, and I remember what you’re reminding me of, when I went into counter intel with the Army, my path was a little bit kind of obscure. I was 27 with a master’s degree, and I enlisted so I could get specifically that job. But I remember the path that led me up to that was I didn’t really know what I wanted to do, and then I had my master’s degree, 9/11 happened, and I knew I wanted to be a part of that whole process. But I didn’t really know why. But it was fueled by this idea of like, “What do I want to be when I grow up?” kind of concept, and I remember sitting there one day at my desk … I was working on an investigation, I did espionage and terrorism investigations … and at the end of the day, it was like I was kind of wanting to internally bitch and moan a little bit about a report or some tedious task I was doing. And we had just gotten done cleaning weapons, and I was just like, “What did I get myself into?”
And then I sat back, and I said, “You know, at the end of the day, that was the goal.” I knew exactly what I wanted to do. I knew on some level that it served a bigger purpose, but there were all these tasks that had to be done. Now, of course, in the military and government and all that stuff, you don’t have a choice. You have to clean the weapon like it’s your weapon, you have to clean it. Nobody’s going to come and save you and clean it for you. There is no choice. It doesn’t even enter your mind to say, “Um, what if? I just don’t do this.”
And I think that we talked a little bit before the show about this, and it’s certainly inculturated through the military process. Nobody’s coming to save you. Not only do you have to save yourself, you have to know how to save everyone around you. And so I think that there’s something to that with regard to what you’re talking about, and for those of us who have that training, it doesn’t even enter your mind not to do it. It’s like, it has to get done, just freaking do it. And it’s not really as painful as you want to make it out to be.
So as you’re talking, it’s like all of this is kind of coming together, and I think that the discipline conversation is really missing. And I wonder if when people get to, let’s say, the nine figures, if they just kind of forget. It’s kind of like they say about childbirth like once you hold your baby in your arms, it’s like you forget everything you just went through to make it happen. But I wonder if that’s kind of part of it. It’s like, “Oh yeah, it was easy. I did all this.” And it’s like, “No, it wasn’t. There were moments when you didn’t want to do it. There were moments when you were doing things you didn’t really want to do.”
And I love the delineation that you made between, of course, you’re on track to do something that you want to do, and you have this big goal, but along the way, there’s going to be tasks, like you have to make your bed, you have to clean dishes. It’s just how it works.
Absolutely. Yeah, it’s a never-ending battle. I mean, what a lot of people don’t understand is the more you grow and the bigger you grow, the more the challenges and the more discipline is going to be required. The bigger you grow, the more you grow, the more that gets put on your plate, the more you have to be able to manage, the more you have to be able to delegate, the more you have to be able to read the numbers and understand and build a team and lead a team, and there’s more responsibility. And that’s just one aspect. That’s the business. You still have what are you doing at home? Just because you’re not in the office doesn’t mean you’re not working.
I’m up at 4:31 every single day, seven days a week.
I’m up at 4:31 every single day, seven days a week. It doesn’t change, and I get up, I get my stretch done, and I go out and I do my PT. I do that every single morning, seven days a week. You have to have discipline in all aspects of your entire life, and if you’re not willing to be disciplined in all aspects, you won’t hit massive success. You’ve got to be willing to sacrifice to get there. It’s not a negotiating atmosphere.
Yep. And I talk a lot about the influencer role, and when you step into that space, the influencer role stands on top of the discipline and the work that we’re talking about, that total self-dominion. And it is not just highly attractive, but it’s this feeling like people can’t help but be attracted to it in the sense that we’re starving to connect with people who freaking know what they’re doing, are confident they know what they’re doing, that they have viable solutions. I know when our businesses moved from a startup into the emerging business space, it was like a ghost town. I was like, “Where are the service providers that feed this market?” It’s like, “Holy cow,” all of a sudden there was no one there anymore.
Our businesses got to the point where they were starving for viable solutions. It’s like we found ourselves in that chasm between those who feed the startups or the kind of entrepreneur sector, versus those that feed the corporations, and it’s like, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait. Hey, we need help here.” And so we had that experience of we needed viable solutions, exactly what you’re talking about. I mean, we own a corporate counterintelligence firm. We don’t move into vendor relationships easily without vetting them first, and so there was that component too.
And everything that you’re talking about really played out for us in the business component, but only because we had done all that work prior to, to get the place where we knew what we were doing, we knew where we were going, and we knew what we needed. So I love what you’re talking about, about people picking up the phone, saying, “Hey, this is my problem. I need a solution,” and you being that guy that they call for that because you’ve done the work to get to the place where you excel in what you’re doing.
We need to take a quick break, but when we come back, I really want to talk about what you accomplished. I know I teased that a little bit at the beginning. I told you all this was going to be a really powerful conversation. We’re talking with Justin Myers, and we’re talking today about top entrepreneurs and discipline, so stay with us, and we will be right back.
Find out more about Justin Myers at facebook.com/JustinMyersEnterprise.
To listen to the entire show click on the player above or go to the SuperPower Up! podcast on iTunes.
Podcast: Play in new window
