Success, Spirituality, and Interconnectedness with Tami Simon

In this 7th and final episode of the Success Fundamentals podcast, our hosts Kris Sykes and Brian Goldsack revisit their favorite interviews, guests, and takeaways. After more than 70 conversations, our hosts look at how their own definitions of success have changed, and why it’s not just about the money anymore. Kris and Brian also talk about their exciting new show, giving us a taste of what’s to come.  

HIGHLIGHTS

• Kris and Brian's favorite guests and key takeaways
• Looking back to the first few episodes 
• How we define success, 78 episodes later
• Introducing: The 8 Questions Show 

QUOTES

Kris: "In anything that you do, I think you have to look at what the intention is. If it's behind the wrong intent, you're never gonna be satisfied. You can have the car or the house or the clothing or whatever you want to have but if it's for you, then it's satisfying to you. If you're doing it to show off or to one up the next person, that's a stressful way to live." 

Kris: "Everybody's perception of what success is has to do with money. And money is a means of exchange. So as long as you're exchanging things, in America at least, it's gonna be of importance but it can't be the end-all, be-all." 

Brian: "If you can somehow find a way to sustain your lifestyle doing something that you love, I think that is the true definition of success." 

Brian: "We're going to ask each guest eight questions with the goal of you guys having an intimate, high level of understanding of each of these subject matters by the conclusion of each series. Each series is going to be a month long and by the end of it, you're gonna be able to go to thanksgiving dinner and speak at length about 12 new subjects every single year."

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Intellectual property can be one of, if not the most valuable asset for many businesses. Therefore, it makes sense that as an entrepreneur, you should be on top of protecting your intellectual property via the proper filing of applicable trademarks, patents, and copyright. In this episode of the Success Fundamentals podcast, Kris and Brian talk to patent law, intellectual property and business law expert Mark Goodman about the many ways to ensure that your IP is being protected to the fullest extent. 

HIGHLIGHTS

• What it really means to own intellectual property
• The difference between a patent, copyright and a trademark
• Why you should protect your business in the first place 
• Can you put a lean on intellectual property? 
• Protecting your intellectual property in every country
• Can you sell intellectual property?

QUOTES

Mark: "A logo can be the subject of a copyright and a trademark. But the trademark is protecting against people using it in a way that causes consumer confusion whereas copyright is just saying you can't make a copy of this artwork." 

Mark: "If you have an invention and you're going for a new business based on the invention, the law makes you file early in the process -- which can trip up some entrepreneurs because otherwise it might make more sense instead of spending a bunch of money on a patent lawyer at the beginning, let's get out there and see if we sell this product, see if it really works and then go ahead later and get the patent." 

Mark: "The problem is once you start selling, in the United States you have exactly one year to file a patent application or else you forever lose your right to do so. It becomes public domain. That is harsh for entrepreneurs." 

Follow Jonathan and check out his work through the links below: 

• Website: https://www.goodmanlawnevada.com/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markgoodmanlaw/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/GoodmanLawNV
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/goodmanlawnevada/

Follow Success Fundamentals on the following links below: 

• Website: https://www.successfundamentals.com/
• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4XCvuwxnFi5_7C6Ncm12xQ
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/success-fundamentals™
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In this episode of the Success Fundamentals podcast, Kris and Brian talk to Award-winning Author, Podcast Producer & Keynote Speaker Jonathan Fields. Their conversation centers around Jonathan’s groundbreaking work that attempts to demystify the different impulses that motivate us to be productive individuals. Jonathan also talks about the state of work today, and how technology has allowed us to redefine our relationship with work. 

HIGHLIGHTS

• The search for the 10 'Sparketypes'
• The 5 components of work that sparks you
• How to show up consistently everyday
• Lessons learned while training to be a luthier 
• Not everything that sparks you should earn you a living
• We all need to do some self discovery
• How the digital medium is changing the nature of work

QUOTES

Jonathan: "One of the really big surprises when we started into this work, I kinda figured there's close to eight billion people on the planet. Well, there must be eight billion unique impulses, because we're all different, we're all individual, we're all special. And it would be nearly impossible to identify eight billion of these different things. What I was surprised by was  how quickly distilled to these 10 universal impulses that just show up in different patterns." 

Jonathan: "When I talk about doing work that sparks you or that makes you come alive, I'm talking about work that gives you a feeling of purpose, gives you a feeling that you have access to that magical time feud state of flow, where the world seems to vanish away and you become utterly absorbed in the thing that you're doing almost losing the ability to distinguish between you and the activity."

Jonathan: "The more that you can line up the work that you're doing with these impulses that are inside of you, the more all of those questions drop away. The more the question becomes actually, how can I make sure that I'm not doing this obsessively and nonstop because I love doing this so much and it's giving me so much back." 

Jonathan: "I don't believe that just because something sparks you, means that it necessarily should be the thing that also gives you your living." 

Follow Jonathan and check out his work through the links below: 

• LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathanfields1/
• Podcast - https://pod.link/1610198312
• Website - https://www.jonathanfields.com/

Get a copy of SPARKED: Discover Your Unique Imprint For Work That Makes You Come Alive by Jonathan Fields

Follow Success Fundamentals on the following links below: 

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• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4XCvuwxnFi5_7C6Ncm12xQ
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/success-fundamentals™
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In this episode of the Success Fundamentals podcast, Brian talks to the host of The Mindset and Self-Mastery Show, Nick McGowan. Nick talks about masculinity and whether or not gender has a role in success. 

Nick claims that there are no true masculine or feminine traits that lead to success, only principles that one should live by which we often learn from role models such as our parents, who just happen to be the closest to us. However, as our societies grow, these typical role models archetypes are already changing, signaling the need for us to expand our understanding and unlearn our old beliefs. 

HIGHLIGHTS

• What does it mean to be masculine? 
• Masculine and feminine traits may not exist 
• Principles are agnostic to sex
• We learn from people who are around
• Some things we learned since birth need to be undone

QUOTES

Nick: "At the core of a man, I think, there's really that honor, that courage, and that leadership that comes from within. That ties in to other pieces too. It's kinda like one of those big brain maps where you start with one bubble and opens up 15 others." 

Nick: "We as people, as humans want to find boxes and sit our ass in that box because we want to be part of something. So it can be easier to just jump at the masculine side and say well I'm just gonna take this and run with it." 

Nick: "I think there's a lot of men that run things, and it's great to see that women are starting to run things. And I'm not pro men, pro women, or against one of the other at all, I'm pro us figuring our stuff out."

Follow Nick and through the links below: 

• Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mindset-and-self-mastery-show/id1604262089
• Website: https://nickmcgowan.com/home
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thenickmcgowan/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheNickMcGowan
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thenickmcgowan/

Follow Success Fundamentals on the following links below: 

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In this episode of the Success Fundamentals podcast, Brian talks to campaign consultant Anthony Miragliotta about the role that governments have in the success of their people. As a believer of small government, Anthony believes that the role of governments in your individual pursuit of liberty and happiness should be minimal. 

As Ronald Reagan once said, “When the government expands, liberty contracts." However, whichever side of the political spectrum you lean towards, the main thing is to be more actively involved in matters of government, because it’s the government’s job to represent you and your interests. If you’re unhappy with the way the government is doing its job, the citizenry needs to have its will known. The power is in your hands. 

HIGHLIGHTS

• The government shouldn't tell you how to live your life 
• A properly functioning government is a limited one
• Lessons in governance learned during the height of COVID-19 
• Citizens need to be more involved in their governments
• Politics is a game of give and take 

QUOTES

Anthony: "Government is known for spending money on wasteful matters. Right now, we're 30 trillion dollars in debt. And who's gonna pay it off? If I'm ever gonna have grandkids they're gonna be paying it off."

Anthony: "One thing the COVID-19 pandemic really taught a lot of people is the bigger the government, then the less freedoms your people have. I go back to Ronald Reagan, another quote he said that I like, is 'When government expands, liberty contracts.'"

Anthony: "One of the biggest things to do if you're really unhappy with the current political climate in your local town, your county, your state, or even America, the easiest way is to just get involved. I don't care what political party you belong to, but if you really believe in certain causes but you really think that the people who are in-charge of that are not doing effective jobs, get involved." 

Follow Anthony and through the links below: 

• LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthony-miragliotta-aa9167161/
• Podcast - https://open.spotify.com/show/0F0d6jYcgm7vVuy7EyCDmb
• Website (Priscilla Mangini Enterprise): https://linktr.ee/priscillamanginienterprise

Follow Success Fundamentals on the following links below: 

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In this episode of the Success Fundamentals podcast, Kris and Brian talk to Senior Vice-President and Head of Global Communications and Public Affairs for Starbucks, Aranthan “AJ” Jones II. AJ shares good advice for people wanting to climb the corporate ladder and achieve success by working with some of the biggest companies in the world. 

Besides all the technical requirements that every would-be c-suite executive needs to have, AJ also reveals that it’s about how you communicate your value and your relationship with time. Whether or not being at the helm of one of the world’s biggest companies is your idea of success, AJ’s advice is bound to help you achieve your goals, one way or another. 

HIGHLIGHTS

• The Starbucks brand is beyond coffee 
• Follow the impact you want to make, not the fancy job title 
• The elevator route vs the scaffolding route 
• You won't get a c-suite position via job searches
• The relative nature of time can be for or against you
• Social media has eroded long-term thinking

QUOTES

AJ: "I start by saying, ask yourself the question, not what job you wanna have, but what impact you want to make. Because it's a lot easier to align your ambitions, your skill sets, your knowledge, and quite frankly your energies around the impact you believe you can make versus what job you can have." 

AJ: “The best communication you can have about your ambitions is somebody else communicating about your ambitions.” 

AJ: "Most positions you will get at this executive level won't be through applying to Indeed.com. It won't be there. It'll be through a search process or it'll be through a connection or a related relationship to that particular opportunity. Those are not gonna come directly to you, they are often gonna come by way of someone else to you." 

AJ: "If I go from farmer to retail, retail to entertainment, entertainment to oil and gas, I am searching you my ability to take the same skill set, repackage it and repurpose and restructure it to be able to deliver on behalf of any industry. That is way more valuable than being able to say, you know what, I've been in this industry for 35 years."

Follow AJ  and through the links below: 

• Email: aranthan@yahoo.com
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajjonesii/

Follow Success Fundamentals on the following links below: 

• Website: https://www.successfundamentals.com/
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• Instagram: https://instagram.com/successfundamentalspodcast

Success is very hard to define because it means different things to people. However, what’s universally true is that the feeling of success should come from within yourself, and not from outside. In this episode of the Success Fundamentals podcast, Sounds True founder Tami Simon talks about how achieving a true interconnectedness with something outside of yourself or your tribe will help you find happiness that is far beyond mere pleasure or material delight. 

HIGHLIGHTS

• You need to define success for yourself 
• Find that one thing that really connects you to your conscience 
• Going outside your tribalism will help you grow 
• We're gradually recognizing our interconnectedness 
• Doing something right doesn't always have to feel good 
• Success is inside-out, not outside-in

QUOTES

Tami: "Just imagine you're lying in bed and you're dying. It's not that hard to imagine. You look back at your life, what would it mean, in your own heart, for you to have been wildly successful? What would it mean to you from that perspective, knowing you're saying goodbye to it all?" 

Tami: "We have to first allow ourselves to be explorers. Try a lot of different things. And when something feels like, 'oh my, this feels really good! I love this, it feels natural to me. It tastes right,' then we have to follow it. Give ourselves permission." 

Tami: "I think that the ecological climate change crisis we're in is driving us. We're seeing how what happens in this part of the world affects another part of the world. We're seeing that if we want to survive as a human species, we all have to work together to accomplish that and what a huge thing that will be."

Tami: "It's not just feeling right in terms of joy, joy, joy, pleasure, pleasure pleasure, tiramisu, tiramisu, tiramisu. It's not just like that. It's... this feels like a fit and it feels so right that I'm even willing to sacrifice for it. I'm willing to do hard stuff for it. It's so valuable, it feels like such a fit for who I am, I'll do what it takes." 

Tami: " At least in my experience, success is an inside-out phenomenon versus an outside, you know, let me just accomplish all these things. When you feel inside rich and abundant, and you have all of these capacities to listen to other people, to be in the unknown and think creatively, to bring out the best in other people on the team and have exceptional teamwork. Before you know it, your business life is growing and changing. You're becoming more and more successful."

Follow Tami and her work through the links below: 

• Learn how to lead from within: https://innermba.soundstrue.com/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tami-simon-1061224/

Follow Success Fundamentals on the following links below: 

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A lot of people dream about retirement and living in a perpetual state of leisure or pursuing a vision of their life that they’ve always wanted. Some people even go so far as to live a “deferred lifestyle” and save up to 70% of their income for a few years to retire as early as possible. However, when they get to that stage they discover that retirement isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be. 

After a successful software engineering career, TheirStory Chief Technology Officer Dennis Mnuskin had the option to go on sabbatical and not work for the first time since coming out of high school. However, he quickly went back to work after coming across an interesting opportunity, and he hasn’t looked back since.

In this episode of the Success Fundamentals podcast, Dennis talks about his ideas of success, and how he came to the realization that he was already living his lifelong dream all along.

HIGHLIGHTS

• Dennis' journey so far
• Why the FIRE movement doesn't make sense 
• Structure your life around living your lifelong dream 
• Success does not always mean getting to the top
• Defining your dream is crucial but can be difficult 

QUOTES

Dennis: "For us, the grass is always greener on the other side. Like every single time you go on vacation, and you're working down the street of London, and you're like man, I wish I lived here. Or you go to Scotland and it's like oh wow, can you imagine if we had a house on this hillside how awesome would that be? And there's a guy living on that house, on that hillside, thinking man, I wish I lived in New York City."

Dennis: "We all love vacation and we idealize it because it's something different, but when vacation becomes our fulltime existence, it's no longer vacation. It's no longer fun."

Dennis: "Our work is what actually enables us to make a meaningful difference in the world. Going on vacations and jumping from one sailboat to the next sailboat, it sounds like fun but I can't imagine I would be doing that for more than a month or two."

Dennis: "If I align my life and what I'm doing with what I actually value, then I'm happy, I'm successful, I'm content. But I don't want to be sailing around the world. I do not want to own a cattle farm, I do not want to be a farmer. And so the question becomes, what am I gonna do?”

Follow Dennis and his work through the links below: 

• Website: https://dennis.mnuskin.com/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dxm/

Follow Success Fundamentals on the following links below: 

• Website: https://www.successfundamentals.com/
• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4XCvuwxnFi5_7C6Ncm12xQ
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• Instagram: https://instagram.com/successfundamentalspodcast

Whether it be in business or in your personal life, it’s always about the relationships. However, not all relationships are built equal, and certainly not all are meant to last. In this episode of Success Fundamentals, Kris Sykes and Brian Goldstein talk to coach, speaker, entrepreneur, and founder of Ellingson Enterprises, Fletcher Ellingson. 

Fletcher takes us down to brass tacks on when and how you should sever ties with somebody, and even defines specific elements to consider, such as our own standards and values. Ultimately, Fletcher argues that severing ties should not be done from a place of victimhood. Rather, it should be done from a place of empowerment, where we take 100% responsibility for the decisions we make. 

HIGHLIGHTS

• Are you playing the victim role?
• Most people are always doing their best with the tools they have 
• Try to give people the benefit of the doubt 
• Always take 100% of the responsibility for your life 
• Do not lower your standards to accommodate a relationship
• Standards vs values 
• We don't always live according to our values 
• Tolerance can lead to discomfort as well
• How to cleanly sever ties 

QUOTES

Fletcher: "I want to make sure that we're operating from a place of empowerment, not disempowerment. If we're playing the fair-unfair game in any way, you can guarantee the deck is stacked against the other person. That's why I want to say, just check yourself." 

Fletcher: "A value is simply an indicator of preference. I value honesty. I value financial freedom. I value health and fitness. But how many of us have a standard that actually backs it up?" 

Fletcher: "If I had to let somebody go or sever a relationship business or otherwise, I will forever use this now: 'This isn't working for me, and I have not been able to make it work. So this is the end of our working relationship.' Ultimately, if I'm their employer, I wasn't able to bring something to the table to elicit the level of performance that I desired." 

Follow Fletcher and his work through the links below: 

Website: https://fletcherellingson.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fletcher-ellingson-4067072/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gocoachfletch

Follow Success Fundamentals on the following links below: 

• Website: https://www.successfundamentals.com/
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Everybody wants to eat, but few will hunt. Everybody wants the best results, but few will ever have the tenacity to put the work in. But that’s the beauty of it, you just have to outwork everybody else. In this episode of the Success Fundamentals Podcast, Kris Sykes talks to fitness coach and owner of Believe Elite Athletic Training, John Rahn.

As a former federal agent working with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, John was already set for life in his career. However, his true passion lay elsewhere, and he eventually founded his own fitness gym. Today, he coaches some of the top MMA fighters, including Shane Burgos. Besides physical training, John also works with athletes on their nutrition and mental fitness to give them holistic training that sets them up for success in their respective fields. 

HIGHLIGHTS

• The road less traveled is the entrepreneur way
• A chance meeting that started the coaching business
• Brush with cancer and switching careers 
• Everybody wants to eat but few will hunt
• Nutrition is as important as training 
• Go hard then go harder a little more
• Don't let yourself fall towards comfort
• Entering the MMA world and coaching Shane Burgos 
• Evolving through the pandemic and writing a book

QUOTES

John: "Go all in, and stay consistent with your effort everyday. Have faith and just be willing to outwork everybody. Put the work in." 

John: "You can't take J.J. Watts' workout and try to go do it on the field. The guy literally flips a thousand pounds higher, 60 times. He's a freak of nature. But you know what you can try to do, you can try and emulate his nutrition. Start with his mental performance, then build your body." 

Kris: "People who normally lose or don't have longevity, defaults to comfort. The moment it gets too hard, whether you're running, whether you're lifting, whether you're starting a business, the moment it gets too hard, okay, let me just go back to the business or maybe it's just not meant to be."

John: "Anybody can be an athlete and transform their body and mindset. ANd I think that's what my gym is seeing and shown. Believe Elite is adult and youth athlete, pro athlete and college athlete, the doors are open to anybody who wants to better themselves and better their life and health and fitness."

John: "You could talk through nutrition, you could talk through mindset and mentality. You can't talk through a training session." 

Follow John and his work through the links below: 

LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-rahn-758b2b178/

Website - https://believeyouareelite.com/

Book - https://believeyouareelite.com/mindset/

Follow Success Fundamentals on the following links below: 

• Website: https://www.successfundamentals.com/
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