SPI 720: I Swore I Wasn’t Going to Do It, but Then I Did.

SPI 720: I Swore I Wasn’t Going to Do It, but Then I Did.

Announcer: You’re listening to the Smart Passive Income Podcast, a proud member of the Entrepreneur Podcast Network, a show that’s all about working hard now, so you can sit back and reap the benefits later. And now your host, when he listens to music on Spotify, it’s usually the same song on a loop for an entire day. Pat Flynn.

Pat Flynn: Alright, I did something that I told myself I was never going to do. And the reason I did it is because people I trusted told me it was worth it. And this episode is a reminder of how valuable and powerful trust can be. And how much responsibility comes with that trust. Trust between colleagues, trust between family members and friends, and trust between you and your audience and your audience and you.

So, what did I do? Well, this might sound surprising. Some of you might not even know exactly what I’m gonna even say here or what it means. But I finally started watching an anime called One Piece. That’s right now at this point, you might be familiar with One Piece as a title because that is a new live action that’s gonna be available on Netflix soon.

That’s not why I watched it. The reason why I hesitated to watch this thing is because there are over 1000 episodes. A thousand episodes! Starting a show knowing that you’re not going to get to the end at least after a thousand episodes is wild. Literally over a thousand episodes. And, to make matters worse, they say, they being people who’ve gone through and watched the series, they say that it doesn’t even get good until episode 300! That’s bonkers! I said, why would you waste that much time? Oh, the story gets that good. It gets that good. I heard that for the first time, I was like, no way, dude. Like, I got businesses to run, I got a channel to produce videos for, I mean, that is hundreds of hours of time. Every episode is about 22 minutes, so like a normal TV show. But that’s a lot of time after a thousand episodes.

And then I heard the second person say, Yeah, but I mean, man, I gotta tell you, it’s the best story that I’ve ever heard anybody tell in any medium ever. No way. And then I had two trusted friends of mine who heard that I was getting into anime. I watched Hunter x Hunter. I finished like four or five different anime series.

Attack on Titan, Demon Slayer, and a few others. I gotta say, the storytelling’s been really great. I’ve, I have been really enjoying storytelling. Part of the reason why I’m watching the anime is that I’m allowing myself to do this. Because, you know, I’m very protective of my time. But in thinking of the next ten years of my life, one thing that I do want to do is to start… writing fiction. Whether it gets published or not, I don’t care. I just wanna write fiction. And explore those parts of my brain that I’ve never explored before. And what better way to do that than with the entertainment, anime, and the plethora of stories that are available. And I’ve watched a lot of them.

From Death Note, to Demon Slayer, to Hunter x Hunter, to… Some movies, like Your Name. A beautiful movie, I highly recommend it. It actually made me cry. But anyway, One Piece, a thousand episodes to try to find this treasure. He hasn’t found it after a thousand episodes? Like, what’s wrong with this pirate? I’m not gonna spoil anything and I’m not even saying this to try to convince you to watch it, but I swore That I was not going to start this thing.

And currently, I’m on episode 82. So I haven’t gotten to the good parts yet. But I do gotta say, I have been enjoying it. It’s been nice to put on sort of at night, right before bed. Or when I have some time, just kind of over the weekends, I’ll watch like 4 or 5 episodes in a row. I haven’t been sort of just like sitting in front of the TV watching this whole thing.

I got sick at some point a couple weeks ago, I watched it then. So, you know, when I can fit it in, I’ll watch it, but I swore I was never gonna watch this thing, and then here I am, and I’m, and I’m in it, I’m in it, I’m committed to, to getting through to the thousand plus episodes, and to seeing what all the fuss is about a couple hundred episodes from now, but the point of this, and, and sharing this story with you is that it was a couple trusted friends who, who finally convinced me to do it, they didn’t force me either, they weren’t like, Pat, dude, we’re not gonna be friends anymore unless you watch One Piece.

Like, Monkey D, Luffy, come on, man, you gotta join the club. No. It was, it was, there was no pressure. It was literally because they said they enjoyed it. These are two friends that I care about and love. And, I wanted to share this with them. That’s actually it. I wanted to share this with them and I trust them.

Now, if I get through episode 1000 and it’s not good, then I also know who to blame. Which is a very real thing, right? Your recommendations to your audience are very important. And if they trust you, you got to make sure you make great recommendations. But these, these guys, I trust them and I haven’t enjoying it.

So I, I definitely don’t feel like I’m going to feel like any regret or anything like that, but rather. That is how much trust can influence a person and what they do with their time. And the fact that this is about time makes it probably the highest kind of recommendation I could ever listen to because it’s not just, Oh, like buying something and maybe I could return it or whatever.

I cannot return the minutes I get or that I put into One Piece. It is the power of those relationships and trust that has gotten me to change my decision. My decision was final and then it wasn’t because of a recommendation. So, how does one earn this kind of trust with their audience? Well, in some regards, it’s never going to happen, but in many regards, it will.

And I say that because these are two lifelong friends, and there’s not really any way a regular audience member would ever understand or get to that level with me as far as… Lifelong relationships, right? I mean, these are, we’ve had memories and ups and downs for over three decades together kind of thing, right?

So no, it’s not going to get to that level, but in your world with your niche and the audience that cares about that niche and that passion to go along with it, I mean, it can get pretty darn close, right? Even in a brand new relationship, somebody who proves themselves, somebody who vibes with you. They could easily take your recommendation and that comes with a lot of responsibility.

It’s very important to recommend the products that you know would make sense for them. You got to be very careful, especially if you’re talking about anything related to health and fitness and finance, right? Like you can have a direct impact on a person’s body and a person’s mental state as a result of the things that you share and say.

But that’s also a very powerful and fulfilling thing, right? The ability to share something, to talk to somebody, to tell a story and positively impact a person’s life is absolutely incredible. And I don’t even know the impact that SPI has made. I know it’s made an impact. I’ve spoken to thousands, tens of thousands of people over the course of the last 14, 15 years who have directly said that SPI has changed their lives in one way or another, but you know, they say that and then they leave and it’s like, you don’t experience that, but each and every one of those individuals is now living a different course in life because of what we do here on the show and what we teach in our courses and in our All Access Pass and in our communities and now the impact that community members are having on each other.

It’s so freaking fascinating. I absolutely love this and I don’t think about it enough. Yes. But this is what spurred it on, this recommendation for One Piece. And so, perhaps to bring this full circle, you know, in the story, the One Piece is like a treasure that a very famous pirate left, and everybody’s now trying to find it, right?

Very similar to the story in Ready Player One, where the developer left his treasure inside of his own game, and people have been spending years trying to find it. Perhaps before we consider the fact that this treasure exists, And even if it does, it’s that journey to find that treasure that allows us all to connect with one another, to find new relationships, to meet new people, to build on those relationships and experience that, that joy and that fulfillment of community.

You know, even if I go through the thousand plus episodes and you never find the treasure, I think it will still be worth it for the story. And then now the conversations I can have with people about this story. I am now able to open up and speak the same language as some people, even through just 82 episodes.

And it’s really neat. I’ve found some new friends, actually, through my new viewing of One Piece. And I’ve become deeper friends with my buddies as a result of this. And, even if there is no treasure on the other end, I will treasure the moments that happen while trying to find that treasure. So, anyway. I don’t know if that brought it home in a nice eloquent way or just, I’m just, you could hear me trying to make up something, but I appreciate you, honestly, the 10 minutes even today, just that we spent together means so much to me.

And I want to say thank you to my friends and thank you. You are my friend, you listen to the show, you spend the time, and I do not take that lightly, to listen and learn. I hope that you, in addition to learning and absorbing all of this, you take action. You go and you help others. You go out there and serve and figure out, like I talked about last week, who your up and comers are in the space that you’re in, who are the people that you can serve right now.

Even if you’re just starting out, there are people in this world who need you, who you won’t even know that you will have even made an impact on them until maybe in the far distant future or maybe even never. But you gotta go. And help because I think that’s what’s needed in the world. We need you. So step up.

You got this. Take care. Thank you so much. I appreciate you and I’ll see you the next episode. Cheers.

Thank you so much for listening to the Smart Passive Income podcast at SmartPassiveIncome.com. I’m your host, Pat Flynn. Sound editing by Duncan Brown. Our senior producer is David Grabowski, and our executive producer is Matt Gartland. The Smart Passive Income Podcast is a production of SPI Media, and a proud member of the Entrepreneur Podcast Network. Catch you next week!