10x like elle

hey legally & not so legally blondes,

as you know from prior posts & last week’s self review, i’m a big fan of achieving more by doing less.

earlier this year, my dear friend, fellow entrepreneur, & kindred leo soul, kendall, recommended a book that expertly explains exactly how to do this. it’s called “10x is easier than 2x” & it’s the 3rd book in a trilogy by dan sullivan & dr. benjamin hardy.

the title initially causes a bruiser woods head tilt, but i promise it’s genius.

so today i’m highlight key concepts from the book that are significantly shaping my business plans paired with a flurry of feel good elle woods memes because she is the perfect example of a 10xer.

what, like, it’s hard? mindset

so, what’s the difference between 2x & 10x?

2x is just doing more of the same – kinda boring & pretty linear.

2x is getting a 3% annual raise, adding 5 minutes of exercise, reading 10 pages per day, moving to a slightly bigger home, being sober curious, or upgrading your phone model.

10x is where the magic happens. it’s all about exponential growth in your thinking, innovation, decision-making, communication, & action.

10x is training for a triathlon, moving to a new country, writing a book, starting a business, doing a language immersion program, going sober, or making a radical lifestyle change.

most of us act like & treat 2x as the only option.

i know i did for most of my career. i always knew i wanted to be an entrepreneur, but i kept on telling myself i needed to learn 2x skills first (e.g., marketing, fundraising, product management).

looking back i see that the truth was that in order to make my first 10x leap as an entrepreneur, i needed the 10x confidence & courage to believe in myself.

10x is always an option.

break up with 80%

my favorite concept of the entire book is how they apply the pareto principle (refresher, this is also called the 80/20 rule & states that 80% of outcomes are driven by 20% of causes).

when we apply this to our lives or our work, this means that 20% of efforts are driving 80% of results.

said another way: 80% of what we do isn’t serving us. 

so if we want to go 10x, we must go all-in on that 20%.

this requires letting go of the other 80%. which is a lot. think about how mad you would be if someone made you give up 80% of your home? you’d have to let go not only of the things that aren’t working, but also of the things that are just working ok.

but we must let go of the good to make room for the great.

let go of last season

letting go is actually, really hard.

because loss aversion is a thing — we fear losing more than we seek gains.

we don’t want to close chapters or disappointment people or go into the unchartered waters when we’re sitting pretty sunbathing at shore.

but here’s the kicker:

we actually gain a lot when we let go.

i’m actively fighting this right now as i look at the all the work i’ve done to build merry makery to where it is today. i’ve put so much into this & i procrastinated like crazy on cutting all the dead weights & sunk costs.

but when i read this book, i realized that instead of seeing this a setbacks in my business building journey, i’m seeing them as set-ups for the next era.

not afraid of a challenge

so after mourning & working to part ways with the 80% that didn’t work, i’m going all-in on the 20% that is really working.

the clients, projects, work, & skills that bring the most value to all involved. which happens to have many names in business: your sweet spot, zone of genius, ikigai, hedgehog, etc.

what’s giving me the confidence for this extreme cut, is looking back at my past 10x life jumps & the sacrifices each required:

• learning to walk

  • let go of the comfort of crawling & being carried around

• studying abroad in vienna

  • let go of my known college life at ut in america

• moving to sf for a job at apple

  • let go of my familiar life in tx & proximity to family

• running two marathons

  • let go of free time & my social life

• training to teach meditation

  • let go of working late hours at the office

• starting my own business

  • let go of my cushy corporate job with a boss & team i adored

have faith in yourself

so just like last week, i share my journey to give you an insider look & to encourage you do the same 2 exercises:

1. ask yourself what’s your 20% that, if you went all-in on, would make you 10x more impactful and valuable?

2. look back at the 10x jumps in your life to see all the good you sacrificed for the great.

& if you aren’t in the mood for homework, then just remember this:

you don’t attract what you want.
you attract who you are.

make it a bend & snap summer,

p.s. after writing this, i was delighted to discover that this past saturday marked 23 years of legally blonde (!!!). crazy to think it’s been more than two decades of saying to myself far too often, “what, like it’s hard?”

p.p.s. an alternative approach to 10X is to master ai, but it changes so fast it can be hard to keep up with. thankfully our merry partner, the rundown ai sends a free daily debrief. sign up below👇️ 

Get smarter on AI in 5 minutes a day.

• The world’s largest AI newsletter, read by over 600,000 AI professionals.

• One free email every morning on what’s new in AI and gives you “the rundown” of the most important developments.

• Allowing for readers to keep up with the insane pace of AI and why it actually matters

Subscribe with one click.