What’s Your Why?

What’s up, freedom fighters? Hey, welcome back for another episode. Today, I am your guest, Mike Hambright. I’m going to talk to you a little bit about something that’s been on my mind, something I’ve been, actually, struggling with a little bit personally, and that is a . . . it’s a little bit cliché, but “What is your why?” And I’ve been struggling with it myself. I actually asked this question in the Facebook group the other day and want to share some thoughts with you.
Welcome to Real Estate Investing Secrets. We’re all looking for freedom and the opportunity to live better, more fulfilling lives. But most of us were trained our entire lives to work for someone else and chase their dreams.
How can we use real estate investing as a vehicle to achieve financial freedom? My life is dedicated to answering your real estate investing questions and helping you build an investing business that allows you to change your life and the world around you, and to enable you to turn your dreams of financial freedom into a reality.
My name is Mike Hambright from flipnerd.com and your questions get answered here on the Real Estate Investing Secrets Show.
So, what I wanted to talk about today is your why. Why are you doing this? Why do we work so hard? And I’ve been struggling with it myself here lately a little bit. Just, you know, I’m working hard. Truthfully, I’m at a point . . . I’m not saying this to brag, but I’m at a point where I don’t have to work. I don’t have to work as hard as I have in the past anymore, but I don’t know how to not do that. I don’t know how to not crank. I don’t know how to not come up with new business ideas, honestly, if I have to be honest with you, or find ways to take things to 10 levels above where I’m at. Not that it always works, but I’m always kind of cranking on that.
So, you know, it’s interesting. A little bit of a side note, I just got back last night from John Martinez’s REI Sales Academy. John Martinez is the top sales training expert for real estate investors in the country. And he had about 100 real estate investors from all over the country come in to be trained on sales techniques. And it’s a three-day event.
And the first two days . . . I actually got there on the second day because I really came more for the back half of the event, and to support John, but his training is great. I’ve been through it myself and it’s really good stuff.
But what happens the first two days is the general training, and then the third day is really what he calls owners day. And so, some of the business owners, things at different level, right? Usually as an owner that has sales staff, you’re operating at a different level typically.
And I had been thinking about this, “What’s my why?” stuff and what is this all for, and I had actually posted a message on my Facebook page the other day. If we’re not connected yet, go connect with me. I’m Mike Hambright on Facebook. By the way, apparently, there are some other people named Mike Hambrights that are not me. So, I think if you do a search, you’ll figure out which one is me. There actually was a guy, side note here, some total redneck guy with a big swastika on his chest or something. So, when I told you to go look for me, hopefully, you won’t find that guy. I guess his name is Mike Hambright, but no affiliation at all in any way.
But, you know, I posted a message on my Facebook page the other day. And I was asking for, “Why do you work so hard?” Just asking others and had hundreds of comments there. You can find it and add your thoughts to it if you want to.
But I started to get a lot of responses, and, you know, a couple of things that I want to talk about are . . . By the way, the reason I mentioned John’s training there is hearing . . . I know that people who were in this first couple of days of the sales training tended to be . . . you know, there were some newer investors there that are doing some deals, but they’re still very much in the hustle of trying to get their business off the ground probably doing more of the work themselves.
And then on the third day, there were more owners there, and you could just hear the questions in the room are different. They’re trying to figure out how to build the business to have impact, to support their team. I heard some people say, “Look, I’m trying to do these things so that I can provide a better life for people that work for me.”
And so, that stuff is awesome, right? I mean, that’s when you get to a point where your why becomes . . . you know, it’s not about you feeding your family anymore. It’s about your impact.
But if you’re listening to this, no matter where you are, these are important things. And it’s just got me thinking about why I work so hard and why am I doing what I do? There are some things that I love that I do and some things that I do that I’m just like, “I don’t really love it anymore,” but I still do it because I feel like it’s part of my identity. And so, it kind of forces me to question those things every once in a while.
So anyway, I wanted to share some things that I saw. These were the responses in the Facebook post. Again, go find this post under the Mike Hambright profile and share your thoughts. I’d love to keep the conversation going.
I was kind of asking, “Why are you in the grind?” And I used that word on purpose because I know it resonates with a lot of real estate investors. Now, the truth is I don’t think that it’s about the grind.
And there seems to be this badge of honor. You know, Gary V. talks about “work your face off” and stuff like that. If you’re a newer real estate investor or a new business owner and you’re trying to get your business off the ground, well, that might be where you are. You have to grind. You have to work. You’ve got to get up over that hump, right? You’ve got to build the business. So, there’s nothing wrong with that.
But for somebody that has a little bit more of a mature business and they’ve been doing this for a while, grinding is not the goal. That should not be your goal. Most of us got into this because we wanted a better lifestyle, a simpler lifestyle, right? Have more control over our time, not grinding it out.
But some of the things that people posted were awesome. You know, a lot of people said that they’re doing it for their family. “I’m doing it for my kids. I’m doing it to build a better life.” And I appreciate that. What I’m going to caution you to do . . . and I’m guilty of this too, right? I’ve found myself doing this too. So, you have to be very careful that you don’t say that and that’s just an excuse to spend less time with your family.
And I know a lot of successful business owners, we’ve had this conversation too. I say I’m doing it for my family, but then I’m not around for my family. And the truth is, once your family can eat and you’re not worried about paying the bills, or you’re not in survival mode anymore . . . if you have young kids, they don’t care about the money. They would rather have you around more.
So, I understand why you say that. And I say that I do everything I do for my family. If something were to happen to my family, my priorities would change really fast. I would be all in. But you shouldn’t wait until that happens, where somebody were to get sick or, God forbid, hurt, or anything like that, that forces you to do something different.
So, anyway, my point is don’t use that as an excuse, like, “I’m doing this for my family,” if you’re not spending time with your family too. I’ve found myself doing it, and, you know, it’s not . . . just be true to yourself at the end of the day.
So, some of the other things were around control. A lot of people like me, corporate refugees, what I call us. People that had a job, worked for corporate America, worked for somebody else, and we just got fed up or something happened. We don’t ever want to go back. So, a lot of people were saying, “Look, I’m never going back to that J-O-B.” And I appreciate that. So, that drives probably a lot of us.
One of the things about . . . I feel this way too. I don’t necessarily say it, but somebody said it really well, is that, “I want to show my kids that there’s a better way.” Now, when I was growing up, my family was very much blue-collar, hard workers, laborers, things like that. And so, I learned a lot of my work ethic there, but what they thought was how to get ahead was working harder, like physically working harder, working more time, or whatever. They were hourly employees for the most part, so trading time for dollars.
And I don’t think I knew . . . I’ve been thinking about this a little bit lately. I don’t think I knew a single entrepreneur or business owner when I was growing up. I was surrounded by, in a relatively small town, people that just worked physically, worked in factories, distribution centers, teachers, doctors, you know, people that were physically doing work and had to be there or they weren’t getting paid.
I was never taught the whole issue, and if you’re listening to this show, I know you understand, is trading time for dollars, right? And that’s what we’re trying to get away from or what we don’t want to do.
And so, teaching your kids that lesson . . . my son knows now the power of creating your own business. He sees his parents as entrepreneurs working hard, and he doesn’t quite understand everything yet, he’s 11 years old, but he’s getting it pretty well.
He understands the importance of creating value and impacting others and making money from that and not just, “I’m going to go do something with my hands or physically work.” Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but I’m not here to try to sugarcoat that maybe there are some good parts of a job. There are, but none of us that are listening to that probably want that or that’s not our goal long-term.
So anyway, that was some really cool stuff to see about people, like, “I want to show my kids there’s a better way. I want to build a better life.”
So, some of the stuff that really resonated with me that I saw here is “to do meaningful work,” like to impact people or impact sellers, or impact buyers. When we rehab houses and we resell them, even if you’re wholesaling, you’re kind of downstream from that, but you’re in the supply chain to create properties that are going to have a family there that is going to create memories. And so, those things are all awesome.
And one of the things that really hit home with me that my buddy, Jason, commented is building something . . . he said, “I feel like I have these God-given gifts that I can create something that creates jobs and a legacy, and build something big that allows me to ultimately give back.” And so, that really resonated with me because sometimes we feel like my why has to be like, “Well, it’s for my wife or it’s for my children or it’s for my sick parents. It’s to be able to care for people close to me.” And that’s all fair, and that’s all true. What I found is that sometimes it might be okay to not really know what your why is to the point to where you have to have some why to justify moving forward.
Sometimes it’s just, “I just want to have an impact that I want to do big things.” Sometimes it’s just the game, right? This is a puzzle, and if I can put the pieces together and build something that creates a legacy for me, my family, other people around me, I’m impacting other people in a big way, then that’s awesome.
And it resonated with me because I’ve struggled to say, “Why am I doing these things?” It’s not for me anymore. Don’t get me wrong, I like to win. I like to make money, all those things. Those things are important and I’m not saying that I don’t want to make money, but what’s going to make me go out and work twice as hard tomorrow as today? It’s got to be an impact of some sort.
So, what’s your why? Why are you doing these things? Why do you work hard? Or if you’re gearing up to jump into real estate investing and you’re doing something else right now, are you prepared to work hard and what’s it all for?
So, I’d encourage you . . . I wish I could share a link with you to where to go find this post, but just look up my Facebook page. It starts with, “For those grinding, what drives you to continue to work so hard?” That was my question. Go find that post and leave your response there. I’d love to hear about it. We’ll continue the conversation online.
So, I hope you’ve enjoyed this conversation. I’d love to hear what your thoughts are on why you work hard and what’s important to you in your life. We’ll continue this discussion inside of Facebook on my wall here. So, I appreciate you so much. Until the next episode, keep on fighting for freedom. We’ll see you then.
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