Physics Explains Why Hustle Culture Fails

00:00 If you've been investing a ton of time into your business

00:04 or anything for that matter, like writing a book, going to the gym, whatever it is

00:08 and you're not seeing the results that you want from the work that you're putting in

00:13 this video is for you.

00:14 Because physics actually explains what work is, and how work works.

00:20 Why the hustle and the grind, and "you just gotta work more, more units of input, more effort"

00:26 why that misses the mark—because you know you can work your ass off and not go anywhere.

00:31 And also why, "Hey just do a couple hours of deep work in the morning," right?

00:36 Like that's all you gotta do and then you can just drink margaritas on the beach.

00:39 Why that mindset kind of misses the mark too.

00:42 Because you know, "Hey well I'm not gonna get very far if I'm not actually investing a lot of effort."

00:46 So, I'm gonna take this physics formula, I'm gonna break it down in a really simple way to define what work is.

00:51 And explain why some people manage to get a ton of results for the unit of input or effort that they're putting in

00:58 and why some people seem to just bust their ass endlessly and not go anywhere. So, let's dive in.

01:03 In physics, work has only happened if you actually apply force and move something in the right direction.

01:11 And there's a simple formula for this in physics: Force times Distance times Theta.

01:18 I feel really douchey saying Theta, so we're just gonna call this Alignment.

01:23 And I'll break down what this means and how it relates to work.

01:25 Force times Distance times Alignment is what gets you actual work.

01:30 In physics, Force is Effort. Okay?

01:34 Say you're making outbound calls for your AE and your job is to set appointments so that they can close deals.

01:41 The effort is probably going to be something like number of calls.

01:45 Now say, I'll use a few different examples just to put it in context.

01:48 Say you're going to the gym and you're lifting some weights.

01:52 That's, let's call it the number of reps, right, that you put in. So we'll say the number of reps at the gym.

02:00 And let's say you're an author, you're trying to get your book published and you sit down to write the book and you invest 10 hours a day.

02:08 Right? Like you just sit down, you get to work, you block the time. That's gonna be number of hours writing.

02:15 All right. Now, Distance is going to be the Results that you get from that Force.

02:23 In this case, if we just carry this over, the number of calls that you make...

02:28 let's say number of appointments booked. Cool. Good metric.

02:35 All right, number of reps. Like you go to the gym, you lift the weights, and let's say it's gonna be the amount of muscle gained.

02:45 And then if you're an author, say number of hours you invest... let's go with number of words written.

02:52 Okay? You could say pages written, something like that.

02:57 But you get the gist. It's the amount of output that you get from this input.

03:03 Now, for most people, this is where the equation stops.

03:07 You say, "Well Ray, like I'm a BDR, I'm making the calls, I'm setting the appointments. That's my job. I've done work."

03:15 Well at the business level, what I would look at and I'd say, "Has this actually gotten us to our real goal though?"

03:22 And this is where Alignment comes in. And Alignment is gonna be the impact that that distance has on your actual goal.

03:32 For example, I push against a wall really hard, right? I'm expending a lot of effort.

03:38 That is going to be a lot of Force that I'm investing.

03:42 But what if I push the wall 15 feet that way?

03:46 And I expend a ton of effort doing it, but in reality, I needed that wall to go that way.

03:52 I would look at that and say, "I did a lot of work though, Ray. Like I put in the effort, I moved the damn thing."

04:00 And somebody else would say, "Yeah but the thing was supposed to go that way."

04:04 So you know what physics says? Physics says no work has been done.

04:08 If you needed the wall to go that direction and you spent all of your effort pushing it that direction

04:14 no real work has actually been completed as a result.

04:17 And this is like a really bitter pill to swallow for those of us who have invested a shitload of energy

04:24 and a shitload of time and a shitload of hours into something, only to see zero meaningful results from it.

04:29 If we look at this, just using the examples that we have, if we said the real goal was Sales...

04:36 if I made the calls and I got the appointments, but I didn't get any sales, then no real work has been completed for the business.

04:44 Just the fact of the matter.

04:46 If I go to the gym and I put on 15 pounds of muscle, but my goal was to lose weight... no work has been completed.

04:55 If I invest the time writing, I write the pages, and nothing gets published... no work has been completed.

05:03 And that is what makes this piece so critical.

05:07 That is the amount of Alignment that your effort, and the movement—the results from that effort—are towards your real goal.

05:17 If this is zero, like we all know, any of these variables zero, this is gonna be zero.

05:22 So if it's not aligned with what you're doing, you're not doing real work.

05:27 You are wasting your time, you are wasting your energy, potentially moving yourself backwards.

05:32 The hustle culture gets one thing absolutely right. It gets Force. Okay?

05:38 They say, "Dude you just gotta try harder. You gotta put more hours in. You gotta make more phone calls. You gotta put more reps in."

05:44 "You gotta invest more energy, more time, more effort, more work."

05:49 But it's not really. Right? Like we've established that. They get that piece right.

05:53 But if all of that effort doesn't go anywhere, then you haven't done any real work.

05:58 And if all of that effort does get you somewhere but it's not aligned with the actual outcome that you want, then you haven't done real work.

06:06 I can't tell you how many times I've thought "More Force is the answer." And when it's not.

06:13 Like more Force isn't the answer if you're not moving something, or if you're not moving something in the right direction.

06:19 Maybe lay off the Force and spend some time thinking about, "is this... what is the outcome?" Right?

06:25 "Is this aligned with what I'm trying to do? Am I making any meaningful progress? Am I getting any results from what I'm doing?"

06:31 Like stop putting in Force. That's the challenge with the hustle culture.

06:35 Now on the flip side of things, you've got the other extreme which is, "Nah dude just get up at like 4 in the morning, do you know a few hours of deep work, and you are good."

06:44 Maybe. Like that's really great for Focus. And by the way, I do some of this, right?

06:49 Like I go for a two, three hour walk and I do a lot of deep work and it's instrumental. Like it's very helpful. Like it's very valuable.

06:57 So long as that deep work is actually aligned with what you need it to do.

07:01 If I go do a bunch of deep thinking and I come back and I'm an author and I'm like, "Man that was really good. Thought a lot. That was phenomenal. Like I have a good solid focus session."

07:13 Did I get any words on a page? Any Distance as a result of that? Did anything happen? Was there any movement? Any real results?

07:22 And, even if it is, is it enough Force? Is it enough Effort to get you where you really want?

07:28 Like yeah, it's great to go out and spend your time doing deep work if you're gonna write a book.

07:33 But if you don't sit down and actually invest the time, and you don't get words on paper, your shit will not get published.

07:40 Where you put your time, your most valuable resource that you have as a human being

07:45 where you invest your time, where you put your energy... making sure that it's actually doing something

07:51 and then that the thing that it's doing is what you really want it to do.

07:54 So how do you apply this? Like what's it actually mean to you?

07:58 Because of how important Alignment is, we need to understand what we're aligning to.

08:02 Right? So I would say number one: Clarify your real goal.

08:06 So I'll just use, because this is my world, I'll just use a salesperson.

08:11 The real goal is not necessarily appointments booked. It would be appointments sat, right?

08:17 And then it would be appointments sat with qualified people.

08:20 And it would be appointments sat with qualified people, why? Because we want Sales.

08:24 Okay so we clarify the actual real goal. In this case we'll say it's Sales.

08:30 Then what we need to do is define our Distance metric.

08:34 What I mean by this is—if you've ever seen any of my videos or heard anyone talk about working backwards on the math—this is like

08:42 okay understand your goal, now what are the measurable markers along the way, the milestones along the way

08:48 that tell you whether you are A) making distance and B) if you're making distance that's aligned with the actual outcome that you want.

08:55 This is where you do that. You define your Distance metrics.

09:00 This will depend on your sale, but it might be Proposals, and it might be Discovery Sat, and it might be Appointment Sat.

09:08 But understanding what those real metrics are are going to be essential to determining, "Is the distance that I'm moving this thing actually happening,"

09:16 first of all, like is there real progress? And then is it going the right direction?

09:21 Okay. And then the third thing we want to do: Apply necessary amount of Force.

09:27 This is somewhat of a dynamic metric. So this may mean, you know, the number of calls that you're gonna make for something.

09:34 Like you look at this and you just work backwards. But the important piece is what you've really done when you do this properly is you've said:

09:41 "I know what the goal is." I'm using every layer on here. "I know what the goal is."

09:47 Right? I've got this. I understand what the real outcome is. And that's gonna give me my directional angle. That's gonna give me my Alignment.

09:54 So these are the metrics that are gonna tell me if I'm on track or not.

09:58 And this is the amount of work that I'm going to put in to get there.

10:02 And if I put in a shitload of work and I've got the metrics that are on like the right ones, and I know that this is what the goal really is

10:09 then what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna get a ton of work done. Okay?

10:14 But if I don't know those things, then I'm not.

10:17 And if I just listen to the Hustle Culture crowd, I'm not. If I just listen to the Meditate and do three hours of work in the morning, I'm not.

10:24 It's not either/or. It's all of the above. Like you need all of these. It's why it's an equation.

10:30 And when I saw this, it resonated so deeply and I said, "This is what real productivity is about."

10:36 And this is why some people stay stuck forever. Because they just focus on one of these metrics. They don't look at the entire equation.

10:44 And they don't take the time to let off the Force pedal sometimes to make sure that there's measurable distance that's occurring

10:50 and they're taking the time to measure it and see if there's real results, right?

10:55 Or they're so focused on high leverage work and you know making sure that like unit of output per input

11:03 that they miss the point, which is: a lot of Force is still going to produce a lot more Work.

11:07 Right? Like if you go do the few hours of deep work and hey that's great.

11:12 But you know if you invested the other, the rest of the day into applying what you just did, you would get there faster.

11:18 You would get more work done. It's simple physics.

11:21 Effort doesn't impress physics. Motion doesn't impress physics.

11:26 Like real Work is done when you apply effort and get distance and it's aligned with what you really want.

11:32 I hope this has been helpful. If it has, go ahead and subscribe to my newsletter. There's a link below in the description.

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11:41 Drop any comments that you have below, I'll do my best to answer them. Thanks for watching. Adios.