Hunting Discomfort

Sterling Hawkins is out to break the status quo. He believes that we can all unlock the incredible potential within ourselves.

He’s on a mission to support people, businesses, and communities to realize that potential, regardless of the circumstances. He’s got this amazing story from a multimillion-dollar startup to collapse and coming back to launch, invest in, and grow over 50 companies. He’s got a new book out, which I am a big fan of, called Hunting Discomfort: How to Get Breakthrough Results in Life and Business No Matter What.

Sterling, welcome.

No matter what. Thanks, John. Great to be back with you. Thanks for having me on.

I want to ask you about three ways that we can start hunting discomfort and how that can help us change our lives for the better. Many of us avoid it. The concept of the comfort zone is what we all know, and I remember hearing years ago that if you’re not actively getting outside your comfort zone, your comfort zone shrinks. That was a shock to me. The majority of the time, I’m trying to be in my comfort zone, not hunt discomfort.

That’s probably the thing I hear most about this book. People tell me, “Sterling, look at my business, bank account, relationships, friends, and family. I don’t need to hunt discomfort. I’m surrounded by it.” My answer is always the same. That means you’re living with discomfort, not hunting it. When you’re hunting discomfort, you are forever free of it. Not circumstantially free. Not like, “I need enough money, then I will. I need to be in the right relationship, then I will.” It’s free based on yourself. It’s the only real freedom there is.

It’s an oxymoron, isn’t it? Our brain thinks, “How can I be free of discomfort if I’m hunting it?” Part of it is we’re in control a little bit. Would that be accurate? If you’re hunting something, you’re not afraid of it.

I found this research at the University of Michigan and they were studying my favorite topic, which is discomfort. They were looking at physical discomfort, maybe you broke something, emotional discomfort, you lost a job, broke up with a loved one, and mental discomfort, on and on. They were scanning people’s brains and their bodies. What they found blew me away.

No matter what discomfort we were experiencing, physical, mental, emotional, or arguably spiritual, but that wasn’t in the study. Our bodies and brains process them identically. So much so, you can take a sip of methapine, and it will help you with emotional pain, believe it or not. That’s not a bio-hack from Sterling, by the way. I’m not suggesting that.

We have mentioned this hashtag that’s part of your brand, #NoMatterWhat. We’re going to get into why some of us back off from the discomfort the minute it starts to hurt but your whole premise is lean into it a little bit.

It will build the muscle for it because if we process it the same everywhere, we can grow our capacity to deal with it anywhere. You go to the gym to build your biceps. If you want to grow your resiliency and ability to breakout growth, will you hunt discomfort? There’s no other way.

You have all these great social media posts about how you yourself physically push past your own level of comfort, like riding a bike up a mountain or all these athletic things you do. How did you first start to embrace this as one of your favorite topics?

It was forced on me. I don’t wish discomfort on anybody, myself included. As you alluded to a little bit on my introduction, I was part of a massive startup. We raised hundreds of millions of dollars, a multibillion-dollar valuation. It was like the Apple Pay before Apple Pay. Hugely successful for a while then long story, very long story, very painful story, very short is when the company collapsed, so did I. My identity, how I saw success, how I saw my friends, and how I saw everything was so tied to it. The company crashed, and so did I.

It was like I was thrown into the unknown or ultimate discomfort. Having some of those dark nights of the soul kinds of moments, I’m asking myself, “Why am I here? What’s my life about? Where do I go from here?” As part of building myself back, I said, “I don’t know what I’m going to do or how I’m going to do it, but I’m going to take steps forward no matter what.” That was the origin of the whole thing.

One of my favorite lines from your various successful and popular keynote is from the boardroom back to?

My parents’ house.

I think that’s such a fascinating, humble, vulnerable way to look at that. Let’s assume now that you have got us to start thinking, “I’m going to start hunting discomfort.” Is there one thing we can start to do that would be an easy first step? Is it take a cold shower, or is there something else you recommend?

You could. I’m a fan of that cold exposure therapy, for sure, but I suggest to people, especially those getting started, to commit to one thing every day that you’ll do no matter what. It doesn’t have to be the same thing. It might be, “I’m going to call my mom and I’m going to send this email. I’m going to make a cold call the next day.” It can be different. When you get up in the morning, you commit to one thing you’ll do no matter what. What that does is it builds your capacity to get things done regardless of the circumstances.

Many people give excuses for why they didn’t return the phone call. “I know I promised I was going to do this and I got distracted by this or that.” At the end of the day, it’s an integrity thing, isn’t it? Keeping your word to yourself is the first step.

It is, and when we are thrown into chaos that is not of our own choosing, pandemic, tech disruption, you lose your job, or whatever it is, we have built that muscle inside of us to get things done.

A lot of people have goals and dreams, and they get stuck, or they give up on their dreams, but you’re saying that we start working this muscle of hunting discomfort. It gives us more tools in the toolbox to make those dreams come true. Do you have a story of that happening?

I would say it a little bit differently. I would say that you get the discomfort out of the way that’s in the way of reaching your full potential. I think there’s an innate love, joy, happiness, and gratitude inside each of us. That is I promise you greater than whatever is in front of us. When we get the discomfort out of the way at that, we become literally unstoppable.

One of our mutual friends, Emanuel, who’s part of the #NoMatterWhat community, is a great example of this. He lost his job as many did going into the pandemic. He was confronted with this question, “Where do I go from here? What are my next steps?” I think you know this story but he was walking by himself somewhere in the suburbs of New York. He stumbled into this tattoo parlor and said, “I want to get a tattoo of the business I want to start on my left bicep.” He did. It’s massive. It takes over his whole bicep. I don’t know how he explained that to his wife when he got home, but he committed in a way where there was no going back.

It’s a very important part of getting results. I would call it getting a tattoo. Proverbial, but he got literally a tattoo. Within weeks of that, he had moved to Texas. He had started his business. He started working with many clients, myself included. We started doing some work directly with him, and he’s built an eight-figure company.

He and his wife are traveling in Portugal.

They’re in Peru at the moment. They’re living the dream.

I’ve seen that tattoo, and I thought to myself, “That is a level of commitment.” I’ve only seen it when people were drinking the proverbial Kool-Aid at Nike, and they’d get the swoosh tattooed on them. What I love about what he did is he had the tattoo before the outcome. I think that’s what you’re talking about.

That’s critical. Otherwise, it’s a memory, which is fine. This is not a critique of tattoos, obviously, but when you commit and don’t know how you’re going to achieve it. You know it’s not impossible but you’re not exactly sure how. That’s a real commitment that is going to make a difference for you. It worked for him, me, and anybody that uses it.

Yes, and one of the things I admire about him is his willingness to give people a sample at no charge of his work because he believed in it so much and knew that he would pay for it.

I don’t think he’s doing that anymore.

No, he doesn’t need to, but that reminds me of Mrs. Fields’ cookies that used to stand outside. You’d smell it, but they go, “Do you want a free sample?” Everybody would come and eat multiple cookies. When you’re starting out with that commitment, it’s a total belief and has something of value. If I have to give it away or a sample of it, prove it. I will, and most people aren’t willing to do that. He came from a very humble place of that. Look how it’s paid off. It’s great.

You introduced me to him. I introduced him to people here in Austin who since have hired him. It’s very cumulative. That energy is very contagious, and you want to help someone like that. Do you think it’s ever too early or too late for someone to hunt discomfort? They’re like, “I’m 100 years old or I’m only 20 and whatever.”

Only the people that aren’t born yet or are already dead. For everybody else, it’s not only helpful but it’s critical and living a meaningful life. One of the reasons I wrote this book is because I want myself and the people I work with to be able to look at their life on their deathbeds and say, “I lived something that was true to myself.” The number one deathbed regret is, “I wish I had the courage to live true to myself.” If this movement can give even a couple of people that courage, that’s what it’s about.

You talk about self-doubt and how our brain is wired to look for patterns of failure if we let it. The awareness is that it’s a fight or flight response. It’s why of doing that but we need to override that. How do we do that?

It’s something that we can have worked to our advantage. There’s something in our brains called the Reticular Activation System, RAS for short. It works like the bouncer of our conscious mind. It looks at all the things in the world and says, “These are the important things for you to pay attention to.” The reason why I bought a new car and now I see that car everywhere. It’s the RAS kicking in, knows that it’s important, and now it looks for it. It’s not everybody bought the same car on the same day I did. It’s the fact that I started noticing.

When we succumb to self-doubt, what happens is that RAS is tuned, looking for reasons to give us an out, to make us fail, to have us crash and burn, especially if we failed in a similar way before. The good news is that RAS also works the other way. This was a perfect segue, John. When you make that big commitment, you’re behind it, and you are all in no matter what, your brain will start to look for openings for action, new opportunities, and new potentials like it did for Emmanuel. That RAS, when we’re a victim of it, it will kill you. When you use it to create breakthrough success, it’s the tool that will let you see things that are invisible from where you sit now. It’s hugely powerful.

Click through to read the rest of the interview.

If you want help on how to craft a better story, my The Sale is in the Tale online course is for you.

Are you tired of coming in 2nd place when you pitch?

Are you struggling to be persuasive without being pushy?

Are you looking for a way to become irresistible to your ideal clients? 

Then The Sale is in the Tale is for you.

If you want a private 15-minute strategy call to discuss how my course can help you be a revenue rockstar, click here to book in a time.