#94 Why does my life suck?

Rachel Denning (00:01.102)
Good evening, my friends. Welcome to another episode. I'm actually kind of nervous about this one and fired up simultaneously because I feel the workings of a rant here. So a little, little forewarning my friends. If I get some, some energy and some strong words coming, don't, don't say I didn't warn you. No, I actually, I'm going to, I'm going to try this.

I'm trying to share this with a lot of love and firmness and some bluntness and frankness, right? But do it in a way that helps us all get better because this message helped me so much. my goodness. It helped me to just get this concept as part of my life philosophy, right? Because everything we are doing in life,

is really built on our life philosophy, like our beliefs, our foundational beliefs, and frameworks and concepts for our life. And so it really is built around our life philosophy, right? And so this idea really helped shape my life philosophy. You ready? So I love this was years ago. I love devouring.

books and trainings by a guy named Brian Tracy just a superb human being and Just a great guy he's a lot older now, but he's written you know 30 or 40 books and he's a very well -known speaker and presenter especially the business world and the sales and And the guy the guy's just classy just classy and refined just a great human being and he's got all kinds of

programs, audio programs and trainings and books on every subject. I just loved consuming his stuff. He never had a foul mouth or anything. It just, it was great. Anyways, so I'm going along and he was always really very respectful and always, you know, he's done up real well and always very tactful and you know, everything he said and does, it was really thought through. Just, there was nothing, you know, crass or rude or unrefined about him.

Rachel Denning (02:26.062)
And so the one time I'm listening to this training he did and he tells his story and it just caught me off guard. Like what? And he says he's, he had given this big training, this business training and gone. It was like, it was long and a guy, you know, people always come up to him afterwards and talk to him. So a guy comes up, basically says, you know, tells him his story.

and why his life is so miserable and so terrible and blah blah blah and then he says why does my life suck?

And then Brian Tracy says, because you suck, sir. And I was like, what? And his response just totally caught me off guard. I'm like, what? No way did he just say that. That's crazy. And he was teaching a principle. And this is the lesson today. Why does my life suck? Well, because you suck, sir. And there's a.

a lesson there that was powerful for me. This, geez, this was almost like two decades ago or more that I heard that story. And it was, it was so valuable for me to hear it. And had I, had I heard it even a little before that, maybe I wouldn't have received it because before that I was in a position where I would have let something like that, a principle, an idea like that identify me.

And that's not what this is about. It's not about letting our suckiness, the things we're not good at, define us. It's not defining you as a human being, as an individual. It does not in any way, shape or form affect your worth, your value, even your awesomeness. Like I genuinely believe in the awesomeness.

Rachel Denning (04:30.061)
of human beings in you. And even some of you are like, well, you don't know me. I don't have to know you. Like I want to know you, but I don't have to know you to know there's awesomeness in you. There's divinity in you. There's greatness in you. And in human beings, I've interacted with people all over the earth. Human beings are just awesome, just special. And everyone has unique, wonderful things. So this whole conversation does not affect that at all. So please don't.

Don't take this in any way where it's identifying you or defining you or somehow lowering your worth or your value. You are always worth it. You are always special. You are always awesome. But the honest, hard, frank truth is that all of us genuinely suck at a lot of things. Right. And if we suck at the important things, I don't even like using that word. If we're just a really bad.

at the important things, then we are gonna get the negative results and consequences, right? Across every part of our lives. If we're really bad at things, then it's the outcome, right? It's not you, it's not me. It's the skill set. It's the things we're doing or not doing, or the things we're not doing well enough. You with me? And so if I'm really bad at something,

And we're going to get into some specific here specifics. If I'm really bad at something, there is a direct equation tied to that. There are consequences, there are outcomes that are tied to that. So very, very often you and me, I'm included in this, all of us.

If we're sitting there and some part of our life is just not working and it feels really miserable and in our minds or out loud we're saying, why does this suck? Then I want all of us to be able to look in the mirror and say, because you suck sir or ma 'am and do it with a smile and a grin, but like acknowledge like because I...

Rachel Denning (06:46.925)
don't have the skill set I need yet. Now if right now, I know some of you are doing this, and if I were with you I'd catch you right on it, some of you are like, but it's not my fault, it's somebody else, it's them, they're doing it, if they change or it's the circumstances, no it's not me. And I want you to stop right there, just catch yourself. And again, you guys have heard me say this, what if you were to...

10 times better at that thing. Would that make a difference in the outcome? And the answer is always yes, of course. Yes, of course. So sometimes even if we're good at something, you guys, but we're not good enough. Again, it's not you. Don't take that personally. I can like see into your heads. Some of you are like, I'm not good enough. That's me. I'm a terrible person.

We're not talking about you as a person. We're talking about your skill sets, your abilities, right? Please keep that distinguished as we go through this conversation. So let's, let's go through like some of the common problems that people are struggling with from literally from interpersonal relationship skills. Some, some people are feeling so lonely and so isolated and they,

their relationships are more a source of contention than connection. And I just say, okay, let's take an honest look at your social skills. Some of you just really stink at social skills. And again, this is all with love, right? This is always just total love. And I'm in this too. There are lots of things I stink at. I'm just no good at it.

And guess what? Guess what results I get? Not very good ones because they're lined right up. But every one of us has to be honest enough to look in the mirror and say, you stink at that. And if you want different results, then you got to get some better skills. Again, I'm going to keep repeating this. I know I've said this. I'm going to keep beating this home because I don't want a single one of you to hear this podcast and think how somehow it makes you

Rachel Denning (09:12.973)
less valuable or less worthwhile. You're not a good person. That's not what we're talking about. This is strictly about skill sets. And we will never get to where we want to be and live the extraordinary family lives we can if we can't honestly look at our skills and say, yeah, that stinks and it's got to change. Because as long as we try to beat around the bush or are caught, this is the worst part, if we're caught in some kind of delusion.

where we think we're pretty good at something, but when in reality we really stink. And I think the way to see that, because I know some of the questions right now are going to be like, how do I know if I'm in delusion? Like, how do I know if I'm delusional here? Look at the results. Look at the results.

if you're getting results.

great results Then it's it's probably tied to some skill sets if you're not getting great results. You're getting really crappy results It's most likely tied to just crappy skill set So look at your social skills. That was the first example All right. How are your skills at approaching other people at? Leading meaningful conversations in my experience most people really stink

at leading meaningful conversations. At best, we kind of do some idle chit chats and superficial, I call that frothy frivolous conversation where you talk about the weather and the sports and the news and blah, blah, blah. But like very few people have developed the skill set to have deep, meaningful, powerful, connecting conversations, even with a stranger, but especially with friends.

Rachel Denning (11:06.669)
In fact, I had a conversation like this just the other day with one of my coaching clients. we, we literally were talking about this. He's like, I want to have deeper, more meaningful conversations with my friends, friends I've known for years. And yet what, what brought about was one of his friends had finally, after a long time, just kind of said, well, yeah, we're, we're struggling with this massive problem.

And we have for years and he, he was flabbergasted. He's like, how did I not know that I've known you for years. We've been friends for years and I didn't know you've been struggling with that problem all this time. And part of it is like, we just don't have the deep meaningful conversations. We just, we have this tendency to stay really superficial and shallow. That's a skill set. Right. And so if you want to have, you know, deeper.

deeper friendships and relationships, there's a skill set to that. And this is true for, I mean, we could take every area of life, your marriage, and break that down to how aware are you of your spouse? Like truly, truly aware. How well do you understand him or her?

as a male or female, right? Like I have to make it one of my top priorities to understand like the female mind, right? And all the workings of a woman, because otherwise I won't be able to understand my wife and know her. And then I have to know her specifically as a unique woman. And I can tell you for the first part of our marriage when I did not understand.

her as a woman, the way her mind thinks and works and, and her desires and her love language on and on. We could go on like I could do an entire podcast on each little aspect of life and how this plays in when I was bad at that, right? When I lacked the skillset, the knowledge, the training, it was, there was a lot more friction and frustration, irritation on both of, on both of our sides, right? But when I increased,

Rachel Denning (13:27.373)
my skill set in that, of course it improved. And this goes in for intimacy. It goes for empathy. It plays into like this one, time management. My, my goodness. Most.

people re I'm going to say the word again, most people really suck at time management really suck at it. And so guess what? They're not near as productive as they could be. I read a report recently. I think I shared this before that it takes it takes what was it 14 days to get five hours of really solid deep work from the average worker. We just we just stink at working a

efficiently and effectively and focus right because we're so busy we're busy doing all this stuff and so we feel like we're working but we're not getting anything done we're not moving the needle we're not changing the game we're just doing stuff and the same with time management most of us just stink at time management and so we're frustrated we're hurting and and we're always asking why can't

Why am I not getting more done? What? this is so fresh. And we're so irritated and we feel so stressed and so overwhelmed and I have all this stuff to do and there's not enough time to do it. Those are the things we say when in reality we got to, we got to have this honest, honest look at ourselves. Are you really world -class awesome at time management and at productivity? How about this one at energy management?

That's another one. I would say the vast majority of people just stink at energy management, managing the energy levels of their bodies. And again, I could do an entire multiple, I could do a whole series of podcasts on that one because there's so many facets in there that we have to get skilled at from the kind of food we're eating and, and knowing how that affects our gut and how it affects our brains. Like I talked about last episode and how,

Rachel Denning (15:43.213)
like getting our sleep dialed in. And then the amount of energy that comes from our emotions and our spiritual side. And again, from our social side, there's so much of a social aspect that plays into our energy levels. You guys get what I'm saying here? Now this whole topic might start to seem overwhelming, right? Because you're like, in fact, I can see some of you right now saying, I suck at everything.

And I've heard you say this to me before. Like, no, but I suck at everything. And in a sense, you guys, we all do. And that's okay. Again, this doesn't define you. It doesn't mean your life is over or lame. What you do is you just start choosing important skills that mean a lot. And we know we'll make a difference. And just start working on that skill set and watch.

how it literally starts to change and transform your life right away, right away. It is, it's so incredible. Here's another one with parenting. Like all you have to do is just go out in public and see a plethora of examples of really bad parenting. Man, just go to the park, go to the mall, go to Walmart, just interact with humanity and you will see.

the worst examples of parenting. In fact, you can go out day by day and just take notes on what you see and the vast majority of it, you'll go home and say, don't do that. And if you just went out and made a list of what you observed and made it your don't do list, you'd probably have way better shots of parenting because we see it all the time. Now, I'm not judging or condemning anyone. Even in this whole conversation, I'm not trying to be condemning. So please, please don't misunderstand me. I'm not trying to be mean or rude or condemning her.

the vast majority of people, they just don't know. It's not their fault. Most parents are just doing, they're just repeating what was done to them. They're just in repeat mode. Because they were given a mindset as children, and then they just grow up and they do what they know to do. Which is usually like yelling, scolding, spanking, criticizing, and again.

Rachel Denning (18:05.133)
for the vast majority of people, it's not their fault. They don't know. And for you and for me, a lot of it, not our fault. We don't know. We don't know what we don't know. And then sometimes even worse, we really think we know something, but we're actually wrong. And that makes it even worse. So parenting, you study that and you get some tools and resources. and you guys, I'm so stoked. Tomorrow, March 1st, we start.

our extraordinary parenting 28 day challenge. So all of March is gonna be about parenting, training resources. I'm so stoked. So if you're not in that, get in on that. If you have children or you're gonna have children, like get in on the parenting thing. It's so important. But if we develop that skillset, like I've seen this happen, like overnight sometimes where...

You just, you throw in some skills, a philosophy, some mindset, some pieces, and you can go from being just really stinking at parenting to maybe a couple shifts. And it changes the whole dynamic of the relationship with each child, the feeling in the home, the family culture. It's really transformational. And a lot of us are just, can I be just absolutely honest and loving with you?

If we're having some struggles at home.

have the courage and the strength and the honesty to look in the mirror.

Rachel Denning (19:39.766)
I can just picture it and I've done it. Look in the mirror like you just stink at parenting right now. Let's get to work, right? Again, we're not beating ourselves up. We're not defeatist. We're not letting define us. We're not saying I stink at parenting. great. Now I've ruined my kids and there's nothing I can do at all. That's the fixed mindset. I'm going to look in the mirror and say, Greg, you stink at that. Get to work.

Learn the skills, get after it, change it. It's within your circle of influence. It's within your power to get better. That's what I want to encourage all of us to do. To be honest about what we just stink at. And there's some parts of life you won't be able to master everything, right? So like in business, if you want to have a business, you're not going to master every single part of the business. You can't. You outsource those things.

But we gotta know what to outsource and what cannot be outsourced. Nobody can be a parent to your children. Only you can. But anybody can mow your lawn.

Excuse me? And nobody can do your pushups for you.

But anybody can wash your car.

Rachel Denning (21:05.805)
And so we can start finding ways to outsource things that anyone can do so we can focus on the things that only we can do. Because we've got to get great at those things that really matter and that are within our circle of influence. And that are most our biggest responsibilities.

And then, man, just get it dialed in. Say, what's hurting right now? What's frustrating? You might just hate your work situation. And you might be like, why does this job suck? Why do I suck at this job? Why is it so frustrating? If you're having financial troubles, it's because you suck at finances.

I'm just going to be totally honest and I love you. I wish we were to get, I'd give you a big hug right now and be like, you just are terrible at that right now. Let's get it going. Come on, let's get after this. And each of us can make dramatic improvements to those, those skillset areas.

Rachel Denning (22:18.221)
Are you with me? Gosh, I don't want this to be misunderstood. I really want you to know that I'm not judging. I'm not condemning. Like with all the love and honesty, I think this is a really healthy way to see things sometimes is just to stop and say, you know what? Darn, I'm not feeling very healthy right now, for example. And there's honestly say it's because I stink at taking care of my body.

And I'm going to learn about it and I'm going to discipline myself and I'm going to get after it. I'm going to make and create those changes. And again, like every, every day people I'm doing coaching sessions and meeting with people. I get phone calls and emails constantly all the time. And it's such a privilege. I love it. I love working with you guys and helping people. I genuinely love it.

but it's everything from porn addictions to substance addictions to psychological, mental frustrations and struggles to emotional struggles of even, you know, what one today we, we talked through and this comes up often of like having this hypersensitivity to the opinions of other people, right? How do you deal with that?

of just not constantly thinking, they don't like me. No one's going to be my friend. This will never work out. I'm terrible. I'm not worth it. I'm not even worth anyone's effort. Right. And so that again, it's literally that is a skill set. It is a skill set of managing our minds because a lot of those frustrations, psychological, emotional frustrations come from all it is. Literally all it is is

is poorly managed minds. And that is only because you just haven't developed the skill yet. It's just an underdeveloped skill set of managing your thoughts. That's it. And we are 100 % responsible for our feelings because our thoughts create our feelings. And we're 100 % responsible for our thoughts, but most of us just don't know how yet. We've never been taught how.

Rachel Denning (24:40.045)
and never practiced long enough to really develop it just rocks solid mind. And so we're managing our mind very poorly. And so it's leading to all these thoughts and feelings. And then of course we, we roll into self -sabotage. We have really unhealthy relationships with food or with money. Some of us are out shopping because we think that will bring us fulfillment, but it doesn't. It's a bottomless pit.

We constantly eating food because we think that'll assuage our, you know, tender feelings, but it doesn't. It just makes us get out of shape and overweight. And it doesn't really solve any problems. But again, I'm not condemning anyone here. We just stink at that. And so someone comes to me and I just lovingly say, hey, you really stink at, you know, your relationship with food. Or you really stink at your relationship with money. Or...

whatever it is, right? And you guys, I have my list too. I've got my list and I am keenly aware of my list. Greg, you stink at this. Here's the results you want. Here's the results you're getting. Do you know why? You stink at that, right? You're not good at that yet. Get after it. Develop the skillset, the knowledge, the discipline, the work, the practice, the habits.

And, and it's just so healthy to have just a real honest conversation with ourselves and, and look at that part of our lives. Say, why does this part of my life suck? The answer because you suck, sir or ma 'am. You suck ma 'am. It's just, right. Are you guys with me? I hope, I hope you're getting this and getting the feeling where this is coming from. It is really coming from a place of love and growth and that every one of us, when we went,

because we'll never get better in that area until we first acknowledge that we need to get better.

Rachel Denning (26:37.325)
We just have to get better at that. Some of us have just lost the edge. So we're just binge watching Netflix and scrolling on social media.

And so we just think it motivating ourselves. We think it our input. We're just consuming the news and all kinds of negative junk. That's a skill set there like protecting our input and filtering it. And so we some of us like you might be in sales or marketing or some part of your business or creation or management or whatever. And if you have a real management frustration right now just honestly look at it and be like.

Is it because I lack management skills and leadership skills, sales skills, marketing skills, product development skills?

If there's an area of your life that's really struggling and has been for a while, and especially if this is a pattern, you guys, if you have this pattern of you change something up and then guess what? The same problem surfaces again. and you're like, wow, it must be the circumstances. And so you change something up and then it surfaces again later and you think, yeah, it's different circumstances. But, and you keep blaming, it must be them, must be them, must be them. But it keeps happening. You got to stop and go, wait a minute, is this me?

Do I just really stink at follow through? Do I really stink at being consistent? Do I lack determination?

Rachel Denning (28:13.709)
Am I just, is there something I don't know that's hurting me? Or is there a skill set that just isn't enough? And what's interesting is, as the world becomes so much more advanced and dynamic and new stuff, we gotta stay on top of our game. I don't know that there's any industry that can just sit back and be like, I got this. In every profession, from doctors to lawyers to accountants to engineers to teachers to you name it.

We got to be on our game and we're going to get passed up. And if we get passed up, it's because we stink. We lack the skillset. We stink at something. Anyways, you guys, I love you. I love you so much. You are incredible human beings. I mean that. I mean that. I believe it. You're awesome. We're not talking about you as a person, but we're talking about your skillsets. And the honest truth is,

You and I, we just straight up stink at certain skills. We just lack the skills and the knowledge. And in that thing, we have power to get different results.

Rachel Denning (29:30.669)
Again, I feel like I'm just repeating myself here, but I want to drive this home. Look at any area of your life where you're feeling frustrated and just own it. Own it as a skill set.

And if you genuinely there are exceptions, you guys, there are exceptions. It's not this isn't 100 % black and white. There are exceptions. But for the most part, if something's pretty consistently frustrating and off for us, look at your skill set and say, do I do I stink of this? Is that why? Is that why this is such a problem? And if it is, how can I get just 10 times better at it?

How can I transform my results here by getting really, really good at this and just become obsessed, become obsessed with developing skills in those key areas, especially I would say marriage, health, parenting, finances, spirituality, lifestyle. Some of a lot of people just, they suck at lifestyle.

And so they live a boring life when, and here's the frustration, right? We get, we just, we feel so much turmoil and hurt in this gap between the ordinary life we're living and the extraordinary life we could be living. And why is that? Because we suck it. We suck at creating extraordinary lives. And so what do you have to do? Get better at it. That's all we have to do is get better at it. Like this is.

For me, this is like the most hopeful, encouraging message. Somebody comes to me like, Greg, no, no, look, the thing you want but you don't have, the only reason you don't have is because you suck at it. I'm like, okay, sweet. All that means is I just gotta get better at this thing. Done. Let's go.

Rachel Denning (31:33.901)
And then I devour everything I can and I practice and I drill and I get coaching and mentoring and training. yeah. This stuff is awesome. So if you need some help identifying, cause it's not always easy to see your blind spots. And especially if we are, we believe something and we're actually wrong about what we believe. If we're just certain like, no, this is the way things are, but we actually are wrong.

It's hard to see past that in the blind spots. So if you have a hard time seeing this, like, wait a minute, I don't know. I don't know what I suck at. Like you might be, and I've been there, right? Where you're like, okay, I get it. It's, it's gotta be me. There's something I need to change here, but I don't know what that's where coaching is so powerhouse. And then maybe you do know what you're like, okay, I really suck at this. Like, how do I get better?

and with rocket fuel. I don't have time to sit around for the next 20 years figuring this out. Like, I need to figure this out now. What works? What are the high performance practices in this thing? Right? That's another piece where coaching comes in. So if you're ready to level up and you want to get past this, I suck at that face. Right? Which we all do. I know you do. That's why you're listening to this. You guys are awesome.

Thank you for being incredible human beings and for wanting to live intentionally and deliberately and live your best lives because you're just radiating out awesome energy to the world. You being alive and living a good life is making the world a better place. Literally, I mean that. So thank you. I honor you for that. That's awesome. That's so awesome. But if you're ready to level up and you want some help with that, sign up for coaching sessions.

go to gregdenning .com and sign up for a coaching session. Let's dig in. I'll send you over this full assessment, full life assessment. And just that assessment alone helps you get so much clarity about where you're at and where you need to go and where you want to go. And it'll help you identify some of those suck areas where we can start working on. And then get dialed in for high performance practices and habits and the skill set that'll make the difference.

Rachel Denning (33:54.477)
Again, the proven strategies that really just work. All right, you guys are awesome. Love you so much. Thanks for being extraordinary human beings. And let's have that honest look in the mirror and say, hey, because you suck, sir. Or add a specific thing. You suck at that, right? You're just not good at that. Go do it.

and develop that skill set and it'll literally change your life and change your results. So awesome is always an option. Remember that we're training for greatness day in and day out. We're training for greatness. So any area in your life where you don't feel like it's great, because I'm going to quote, I quote this all the time and we keep doing it. Excellence is an art that is won by training and habituation, training and habit. And so any area of your life where it's not excellence,

not greatness, that's where we level up. We dial in on that area and we level up. All right, my friends, reach upward.