Tony Robbins is in the business of breakthroughs. He helps people achieve personal and professional breakthroughs with his wildly popular motivational seminars, his life strategy coaching to CEOs, U.S. Presidents and billionaire hedge fund managers, and writing five internationally acclaimed books, the most recent a New York Times bestseller.
Clearly, it’s a business he runs well, since Harvard Business Press named him one of the "Top 200 Business Gurus," and American Express called him one of the "Top Six Business Leaders in the World."
In this interview, Tony Robbins shared seven ways entrepreneurs can rewire their brains for success and break through to the next level in their businesses.
1. Realize your purpose.
Robbins says the most successful people in the world are passionate. What fuels that passion? A deep sense of purpose.
“If you’re not passionate about your business, sell it, give it away, or make a change, because you can’t be in a business you’re not passionate about.”
Why did you start your business? Robbins believes there’s treasure in every business, and like a treasure hunter, you must believe it’s there, believe you’ll find it, and believe finding it, finding success, will be worth it.
To sustain his passion through the ups and downs, Robbins decided the “mountain of value” he adds to people has to be enormous. This gave him a purpose and obsession to focus on.
Purpose is also a key component to finding work/life integration, Robbins alternative to the faulty idea of work / life balance. Every member of his family is so purpose-driven, they don’t try to separate work and family.
“When your family is involved in your mission, it pulls you together instead of pulling you apart.”
2. Read your numbers.
Robbins believes the biggest reason most entrepreneurs and small business owners fail is because they don’t know how to read their financials, admitting he didn’t either at the beginning He likened this to flying a plane, explaining: “If you don’t know how to read the instruments, in a storm, you’re going to die.”
3. Recognize your patterns.
Robbins says the biggest drug people struggle with is an addiction to problems. You’ve got to figure out your bad patterns, where your roadblocks are -- and start to work on them. Working on them is the first step to happiness, Robbins explained.
“There’s only one thing that will make you happy: progress.”
This pattern may also be switching from business idea to business idea, as many entrepreneurs are prone to do.
“Switching to a new business and another new business is fun, but usually there is no profitable business to show for it.”
4. Risk failing.
Robbins swears by “deep practice,” which is to put yourself on the line. Early in his career, for example, Robbins publicly proclaimed on national radio that he could cure a women of her seven-year snake phobia. He could have counseled her one-on-one but instead coached her live on stage at one of his packed seminars. This is an example of deep practice, putting yourself in an almost do-or-die scenario.
“I made it so I had nowhere to go but forward. You have to deliver. It’s not practice that makes perfect, deep practice makes perfect.”
5. Renew your mind.
Robbins loves the Jim Rhon quote, “Everyday stand guard at the door of your mind.” This may explain his passion for reading, having read 100 books a year in his first several years on his own.
He believes in NET time -- which stands for "no extra time." If you are doing dishes, stuck in traffic, etc, use that time to renew your mind. Thirty minutes a day is the minimum for keeping your mind engaged, Robbins says, but reading alone is not enough.
“Read and apply. If you just keep reading, it doesn’t do any good.”
Another way to give your mind a break is to quit the never-ending to-do lists. Instead, he uses a method called RPM. R stands for results -- what result do you want? P stands for purpose -- why do you want that result? M stands for massive action plan. To create your MAP, list all of the tasks, but then pick only the top 20 percent of tasks that will create that result.
Lastly, renew your mind by rewiring your actual physiology, using deep practice and incantations. Robbins explained that when you see someone who is amazingly talented, they are getting rewarded in public for what they practiced over and over again in private.
“The more you do something with focus, trying to do it as well as you can, you [build up the fatty layer of insulation around your nervous system called myelin] in your brain.”
6. Recharge your body.
Every successful person I interview takes their health very seriously, because high performance demands energy and focus. However, Robbins definitely has the most unique morning routines to keep up his grueling live seminars and travel schedule.
Every morning, he plunges his body into freezing cold or very hot temperatures. He also does some stretching and incantations, aside from his workouts. He believes that actively engaging your body each day is an important habit for success, because it that flushes your systems with endorphins.
“Even if it’s just 10 minutes that gets your body moving. Fear is physical, so is courage.”
7. Refresh your spirit.
Part of his morning routine is to “prime” for the day, which includes spending three and a half minutes focusing on three things he’s grateful for.
“Fear and anger are the things that mess people up, but you cannot be grateful and angry at the same time. You can not be grateful and fearful at the same time.”
Another crucial element to renewing your spirit is to do something for others everyday. Recently, he paid for a group of California nuns to keep from being evicted, later buying them their own soup kitchen.
He’s also giving his current number-one bestseller, Money: Master the Game,away for free because, he is passionate about helping the average American family with their finances. He’s constantly asking himself, How do I do more for others than anyone else on earth? How do I give them experiences that are lasting? How do I create change where change was impossible?
Many want to know the key to Robbins’ impressive stamina -- both at events and in the longevity of his career. The answer is in giving back, he explained.
“That sense of serving gives me so much energy.”
