February 17, 2018

The Art of Creating Your Life, with Terry Crews and Tim Ferriss

Ideas, Thoughts and Quotes pulled from…

Terry Crews, Tim Ferriss

How to Have, Do, and Be All You Want, with Terry Crews and Tim Ferriss

Think about your life as a piece of art and you as its creator. Terry Crews on how to have, do, and be all you want by laying off the mask of masculinity and winning the confidence game by backing everything up with thoughtful movement.

Your Life

Chasing Self-Realization

My whole life has been trying to match up with this thing and this vision that I have in my head. I don’t think I’d ever get there, but it’s fun to try.

Terry Crews [00:09:38]

Love the process and the grind more than the pay off.

Internalizing Positive External-Perception

You’ve got to let people believe in you.

Terry Crews [00:13:36]

… and believe them, seeing greatness in you that you can’t see for yourself yet! Become that greatness!

“It is an absolute human certainty that no one can know his own beauty or perceive a sense of his own worth until it has been reflected back to him in the mirror of another loving, caring human being.”

― John Joseph Powell, The Secret of Staying in Love

Doing it for Them

When I see what I’m doing right now, I get to do so many things that so many people never got to see. I get to go so many places and do so many things that none of the people who wanted to were able to. I feel like there is a responsibility, but also if I don’t do it, everything they’ve gone through is nothing.

Terry Crews [00:16:06]

Don’t Negotiate…

In masculinity, we always say, “Hey man, we never negotiate with a terrorist. Never.” but if you talk to a real negotiator, you always negotiate with a terrorist.

Terry Crews [00:23:13]

I had a coach who was like, “Hey man. I like Tyrone.” This is a white guy. “I’m going to call you Tyrone.” I said, “My name is Terry, coach.” He said, “I like Tyrone. Your name is Tyrone.” He called me freaking Tyrone. Do you know how abusive that is? How demeaning that is, but I had to negotiate with this guy, because he had my dream in his hand.

Terry Crews [00:24:04]

Once you reach certain spots and you have to negotiate with these guys long enough to get what you need, to get what you have to have and then you can move on. When I look at what art has done for me

Terry Crews [00:26:56]

… Do Art

One thing is that, it’s really been something that no one can take from me.

It’s something that I can do, all on my own. I don’t care. You don’t have to like it. If I like it, it’s okay. It’s become one of the things that in my life, that’s what art is. It’s literally subjective. It’s what you want to see.

Again, it’s all about can I get this vision that it’s in my head on this piece of paper? Now, it’s almost like my life has turned into art. I want the vision of who I am and who I want to be out in real life.

Terry Crews [00:27:40]

You, an Action-Figure

I like to call myself a motivational-doer. I hate talking so much. I’m a big talker, as you can tell, but the big thing is, I want to back everything up with action. I want to be an action-figure. Always, always, back it up with movement.

Terry Crews [00:28:26]

The Mask of Masculinity

I’ve been a part of the super-masculine, the toxic masculine world for so long,

Terry Crews [00:30:20]

I had to learn you can’t fight your way out of things. You have to think your way out of things, and I noticed how my wife behaved, and I noticed how – actually how women behave. Because women have to think their way out of all kinds of situations, whereas guys we can muscle our way through, and do our stuff and whatever. But I realized that that was not getting me anywhere, and my wife really taught me that vulnerability is not weakness, that I had to be vulnerable, but I had to be authentic at the same time.

Terry Crews [00:31:08]

There’s nothing more valuable than somebody whose going to speak the truth into your life, and she would constantly tell me.

Terry Crews [00:31:36]

Want to read more on how masculinity can stand in your way of self-fulfillment and self-realization? Have a look at Lewis Howes’ The Mask of Masculinity.

Looking for Answers

If we can’t ask questions, we’re doomed.

Terry Crews [00:36:21]

Wanting the Ball

I said, “Wait a minute. If I win or if I fail, is going to be on My terms. It’s going to be up to me. If I have the opportunity, I have to go for it.” Then I felt really good about losing the game. You can call it re-framing. A lot of people have scientific ways or psychological ways to do things, but I learned always to re-frame things so that it’s to your advantage.

Terry Crews [00:41:34]

Busy is a Decision

Debbie Millman, who’s a well known graphic designer and she realized at one point and then made her mantra at one point, “Busy is a decision.” You can’t… you’re disallowed from complaining, responding to someone when they say, “How are you?” with the complaint that you are busy because that’s a consequence of your decisions.

Tim Ferriss [00:44:20]

Create

Role Models – from Being to Doing to Having

One of the concepts in the book [The Master Key System] is, that in order to have, you have to do. And in order to do, you have to be.

Terry Crews [00:45:51]

I heard a great quote the other day like “follow your heart and your body will catch up”. I think that that’s the way it is with everything.

Terry Crews [00:47:04]

Terry’s Example

[…] I always had dream like that one day I may have money, one day, and I say, “Wait a minute. I’m rich. I’m rich now.” This is the thing, I didn’t have a penny. But when you do things and you say, “Okay, now that I’m rich, what would a rich man do?”

[…] What would a rich man do? And I started doing things that rich people did. And once I did it, I had it – How, Do, Be! I was like, “Oh, my God, it works”.

Terry Crews [00:47:18]

You are what you are now. There is only now. This is all you have. […] that’s the way fitness, success, any goal, any aspiration, you must be it now.

Terry Crews [00:48:15]

Tim’s Example

Historically I’ve been really impatient, and for a while, that aggression and impatience was an aid and a help in certain places, but it very quickly, in excess, became a huge handicap and a big problem.

Tim Ferriss [00:49:27]

Sounds quite similar to Ryan Holiday on Tim Bilyeu’s Impact Theory Podcast – “Once you’ve arrived, that thing that has got you there is now in some ways your worst enemy.“.

I would surround myself with people who were more patient, more tempered, calmer, like one friend of mine named Matt Mullenweg. […] I started asking myself when I was going into situations that I thought might trigger me, “what would Matt Mullenweg do?“.

[…] I acted like him, what I did, and I started making better decisions, then, lo’ behold, over time I started to develop those characteristics.

Tim Ferriss [00:49:40]

Do you want to read more on how to remain your temper in situations, stay objective, and actually act and be like the person you wish you were? Go over to this Blog Post and get some help from Ryan Holiday and Tim Bilyeu and maybe even the famous economist Adam Smith can help you out!

You – Unique Creativity

[…] People like Peter Thiel and other people say, it’s very, very similar, “The truth is that competition is the opposite of creativity. If I’m working hard to beat the competition, it actually prevents me from thinking creatively to make all concepts of competition obsolete.”

Tim Ferriss quoting Terry Crews [00:51:10]

Life is not a race, […] it’s not even a marathon, it’s a trail run.

Terry Crews [00:54:13]

What’s crazy is that there are people who are out here running on this track to beat each other. […] In creativity there is no running, youjust do you

Terry Crews [00:54:24]

[…] do not compete. Don’t try to beat whatever is out there already.

Terry Crews [00:55:04]

[…] when you are creative, it takes you to a whole another place.

Terry Crews [00:56:44]

[…] you have to be so far in your own self. This is the greatest thing, that there is no one else is like you. There will never ever be. The world will never ever see another you, ever. No one will even have the temper of your voice. That’s what’s so crazy. And no one can ever do anything like you.

Terry Crews [00:57:06]

Confidence Game

Everything you really want to do is original, that’s just the truth. And once I was able to see that and know and also it’s a confidence game. Because you have to know that your viewpoint is just as viable. For one, I have to say, sometime as a woman or sometime as a person of color or where you’re from and where you go, you feel like, “I don’t measure up”. You feel like, “they’re not going to see me”. I had to fight that, I had to fight all that. I am creative, I’m not competing with you.

Terry Crews [00:57:35]

Reciprocal Success

You need the success of [others] for your thing to be successful. You need other successful [endeavors] because some night, they’re not going to feel like that. [Then] they want yours.

Terry Crews [00:48:14]

[…] His success is my success. Because the bigger he gets, the more opportunities for me. That’s the truth. That’s not even mambo-jumbo, it’s not a joke. If everyone here is successful, it makes you more successful.

Terry Crews [00:58:56]

If the total market size expands, your share will too. Furthermore, you have the chance to diversify and place more products on the market. Diversify your creative realization.

Terry Crews, category of one. It’s easier to create a new category than to compete.

Tim Ferriss [00:59:18]

Parental Advice

Love

Never shame them and literally love them, till they can’t stand it anymore.

Terry Crews [01:00:31]

Own Lessons

You spend so much extraneous energy and time trying to do things and figure it all out for them when you have to let their consequences teach them.

Terry Crews [01:01:39]

Allow your kids, in a controlled and acceptable way, to take stewardship of their time and energy, on how and where they want to spend it. Make them responsible for the results. Incentivise them to use their creativity to find a way and methods to get their desired results, in harmony with correct principles that you, as a parent, have to set, off course. However, focus on the results instead of the methods.

To read more on how to set up and get control over your life, that is applicable for leading a family, group of friends or company alike, have a look at Stephen R. Covey – The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

Shame & Guilt; Punishment & Discipline

[…] that’s the vulnerability, that’s the authenticity. That’s where real healing takes place because shame wants punishment. It just wants to get back, boom boom, and it’s temporary. But guilt develops discipline when you admit “I was wrong”, because shame is secrets and you don’t say anything, but guilt says, “I did it. I’m sorry”. Then you develop the discipline to change.

Terry Crews [01:10:29]

“God will not have His work made manifest by cowards.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Terry Crews [01:13:14]

Fear begets more fear, but courage just begets more courage. You don’t even get to be born unless your mother has the courage to have you. Any great thing, any. Literary, creating a business, to make art, it takes this courage. It takes this willingness to be looked at, to be judged, you have to face down your fears. You have to step outside and go. It helped me to just lay out what I was afraid of. Because that’s the big thing. You have to ask yourself, “what are you scared of?”, and then you have to attack. […]

Terry Crews [00:13:38]

That quote, just when you think about anything that’s made, anything that’s created, anything that you see, that you admire takes so much courage. Because people are going to judge it and people are going to say, “Ah, that sucks.” Especially in the age of the internet, everybody is coming in and chipping in with whatever they have to say and you have to be willing and you have to be vulnerable in order – This is why vulnerability is actually strength, because the vulnerability is part of courage. You have to be willing to let people judge your stuff, willing to let people hear your song, willing to let people hear you sing.

Terry Crews [01:15:24]

Entering Flow

If you’ve ever been in a flow, it’s amazing. [..] You’re like, “Man, I can do this all day” that’s by practicing, facing that fear. Fear – just going in, going in, going in until you hit that zone. Man, it’s the high you will never, ever, ever experience. I encourage everyone. I’m here to demystify it. You will be nervous, always, but go anyway. It’s beautiful.

Terry Crews [01:19:12]

Courage begets Courage

I usually want to go off the beaten path because this is where the excitement is. I’ve never wanted to be safe and comfortable. It’s exciting here. Another thing is, is that with every person that comes out after and says, “You adding to the story helped me.” Courage begets courage. That’s the way it’s supposed to be. I’m with it.

Terry Crews [01:22:30]

Relationships

Every relationship in my life must be voluntary. […] I make all my relationships in my life love based. Meaning, you want to be here.

Terry Crews [01:41:31]

But that works the same way for me too. If I want to go, you’ve got to let me go.

Terry Crews [00:42:12]

In this way, all your relationships are really good ones because everybody wants to be there. It’s a beautiful thing.

Terry Crews [00:42:28]

Embodying Boldness

I think that people have confused boldness with being an extrovert, but I’ve seen very amazingly bold introverts who just know who they are and what they want. You don’t have to be loud, you don’t have to be brash. […] Boldness […] doesn’t take a lot loudness. She just knows who she is and she knows what she wants and that’s all you need.

Terry Crews [01:44:54]

If you are so good that people cannot ignore you, you will not be denied.

Tim Ferriss [01:45:59]

“Embrace your weird self” as my friend Chris Sacca would say.

Tim Ferriss [01:46:18]

Living in the Now

[From Dale Carnegie – How to Stop Worrying and Start Living] living life in day tight compartments.

Terry Crews [01:49:13]

Those bubbles, that anxiety, the whole thing and when you’re just living, they are like just today done. Today. Don’t worry about tomorrow. Don’t worry about yesterday. Just today.

Terry Crews [01:49:35]

Everyone’s Inner Child

When you look at another person, see them as a child. We’re all like kids. And all of a sudden, you can see it much more differently because you can instantly love a child. You can feel the love for a child. A child doesn’t know. A child is figuring it all out. The truth is we don’t know and we’re all figuring it out.

Terry Crews [01:51:58]

Links for You to Follow Up on

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