1 00:00:01,030 --> 00:00:03,010 - There's a really significant cost 2 00:00:03,010 --> 00:00:05,010 associated with spending time on something 3 00:00:05,010 --> 00:00:07,050 that you're not obsessed about. 4 00:00:07,050 --> 00:00:11,020 It's easy to talk about opportunity cost of time 5 00:00:11,020 --> 00:00:13,040 or knowing that you have 6 00:00:13,040 --> 00:00:14,080 a limited number of hours a week. 7 00:00:14,080 --> 00:00:15,080 You have a life to live, 8 00:00:15,080 --> 00:00:17,030 so while you're working on your business, 9 00:00:17,030 --> 00:00:18,080 you have other things that are going on, too, 10 00:00:18,080 --> 00:00:22,040 even if you're working 100 or 120 hours a week. 11 00:00:22,040 --> 00:00:24,060 The cost of not working on something 12 00:00:24,060 --> 00:00:26,000 that you're obsessed about 13 00:00:26,000 --> 00:00:28,040 is that you can't really put the time and energy 14 00:00:28,040 --> 00:00:31,040 into the thing that you're obsessed about. 15 00:00:31,040 --> 00:00:32,060 It sounds kind of obvious, 16 00:00:32,060 --> 00:00:34,030 but it's actually really subtle. 17 00:00:34,030 --> 00:00:36,080 What happens is that over time, 18 00:00:36,080 --> 00:00:39,000 the energy that you have to put into your company 19 00:00:39,000 --> 00:00:42,010 as you're getting started increases, not decreases. 20 00:00:42,010 --> 00:00:44,010 It increases because the number of things 21 00:00:44,010 --> 00:00:45,050 that you're dealing with as you go 22 00:00:45,050 --> 00:00:47,070 from that initial seed of the idea 23 00:00:47,070 --> 00:00:50,000 to now a product, now customers, 24 00:00:50,000 --> 00:00:52,070 now the business continues to expand and expand. 25 00:00:52,070 --> 00:00:53,090 And so, the amount of things 26 00:00:53,090 --> 00:00:56,010 that are pulling at your attention 27 00:00:56,010 --> 00:00:59,010 get more and more broad, more and more diverse. 28 00:00:59,010 --> 00:01:00,060 In the context of that, 29 00:01:00,060 --> 00:01:01,080 if you're not working on something 30 00:01:01,080 --> 00:01:03,040 that you really care about, 31 00:01:03,040 --> 00:01:05,080 you're going to spend an increased amount of your time 32 00:01:05,080 --> 00:01:09,070 on a larger number of things that are irrelevant. 33 00:01:09,070 --> 00:01:11,070 Your energy level for what you're doing 34 00:01:11,070 --> 00:01:13,020 will start to diminish. 35 00:01:13,020 --> 00:01:15,010 The best entrepreneurs are the ones 36 00:01:15,010 --> 00:01:18,060 who continue to stay focused on things that really matter 37 00:01:18,060 --> 00:01:20,010 to them as individuals 38 00:01:20,010 --> 00:01:22,010 in terms of where their business is going, 39 00:01:22,010 --> 00:01:23,010 and as a result, 40 00:01:23,010 --> 00:01:26,030 they don't get distracted by all of these other things. 41 00:01:26,030 --> 00:01:27,030 There's a syndrome that you see 42 00:01:27,030 --> 00:01:29,020 with a lot of entrepreneurs, 43 00:01:29,020 --> 00:01:31,040 which is bright shiny object syndrome. 44 00:01:31,040 --> 00:01:32,050 You're building your business, 45 00:01:32,050 --> 00:01:33,050 you're making some progress, 46 00:01:33,050 --> 00:01:35,030 and then there's this cool thing over here, 47 00:01:35,030 --> 00:01:36,070 and you go, oh, I want to do this! 48 00:01:36,070 --> 00:01:38,050 And then you get bored with that, 49 00:01:38,050 --> 00:01:39,060 oh, I want to do this! 50 00:01:39,060 --> 00:01:40,040 And as a result, 51 00:01:40,040 --> 00:01:42,070 your business never really continues to move forward 52 00:01:42,070 --> 00:01:45,090 because you're constantly chasing these random things. 53 00:01:45,090 --> 00:01:48,000 Having clear focus on what it is 54 00:01:48,000 --> 00:01:50,050 that you want to go after is so key, 55 00:01:50,050 --> 00:01:52,080 because the cost of not having that clear focus 56 00:01:52,080 --> 00:01:54,020 is that you're endlessly distracted 57 00:01:54,020 --> 00:01:56,000 by stuff that just doesn't matter.