Coffee With Dan

Do you like being told what to do?

I was once a doorman/bar manager at a ‘gentlemens erotic dance boutique’

– aka a strip club –

When I lived up north

At the same time, I was a sales director for a pretty big headhunting firm and in charge (from memory) of a few mill turnover wise on my business unit

I had a base of 70k and took home I think around 120/130 if I remember correctly

Yet Friday and Saturday nights?

I would don the black attire…

Spike up the hair…

(Check out pic in comment #1 🤣🤣)

And do as I was told

Wierdly after a week of meetings, checking KPI’s, spreadsheets and telling others what to do…

…I found it quite refreshing too

All I had to focus on was greeting customers, keeping the ladies in check (I ended up doing this via a packet of liquorice allsorts when they chase out #truestory) and keeping the bar stocked up

That was it

Now I didn’t need the money (it was done in part firstly to stop me drinking and weirdly when I was a PT my entire client base was strippers – I had 14 of em!) but it was a nice ‘break’ from being in charge

What am I going on about?

Let me explain

If you could remotely ‘model’ my approach in any way I think it’s vaguely classed as servant leadership

Liberated from the internet, this seemed to sum it up nicely;

‘In 1998, writer and philosopher Larry Spears distilled Greenleaf’s ideas into ten key servant leadership traits: listening, empathy, stewardship, foresight, persuasion, conceptualization, awareness, healing, commitment to the growth and development of people, and building community’

Kinda an accurate description I would say

I do
I show
I serve
I lead

Mixture of all 4

But I remember what it’s like to be TOLD what to do

Recently, as well as talking more ‘strategically’ with my clients, I’ve found great success by simply telling them what to do

Now you can’t do that without a base of experience and success (IMO) in your niche/vertical behind you

But when your mind is rammed with life and business and clients and family and hobbies and god knows what else is going on (likely at 100mph)

I find it serves people well to be told do this, then that, by that date

Never try make it more than 3-5 times max; ideally one BIG goal to achieve between check ins and some sub goals that – time permitting – we can knock off too

Yes as entrepreneurs we crave freedom

BUT

TOO much freedom can leave you overwhelmed, unsure and expending your energy in a variety of areas that – in all honesty – would of saved you a fuck tonne of time/effort/energy/££ if you would if just sought out expert help to guide you at the start

So if you have been ‘flying solo’ for a while and let’s say in the last 6 months or so haven’t progressed?

Maybe invest in someone who has ‘trod the boards look before you who can tell what needs to be done…

…instead of asking YOU what needs to be done

Just my musings while enjoying an Epsom’s salt bath; be good to hear your take on it as well…

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This is the part that many simply don’t share

Every day – especially when you start out – is hard

It is hard for a while, longer than than you think, and utterly not straight forward

Pretty much every ‘blueprint’ or ‘business plan’ is a best guess – hopefully according to previous experiences

You have to do the work
You have to adapt it for you
You have to stay the course

The amount of time things take to achieve people massively underestimate

It’s quite fun having been around a bit

I remember seeing a post from someone who was a fitpro maybe a few years back with their ‘million dollar blueprint’ they were touting

They have not made a million dollars lol

Because if my hearings issues as a kid, I developed a RIDIK visual memory

I remember the things and stuff

What people day they achieve is often grossly over estimated

What I have now is (if you want to look at another way) slow and boring and at times tedious

Same things
Done daily
Improved over time
Repeat

That’s it

Of course life and business gets easier if you improve over time

But it takes time

Hence maybe be wary of those who are relatively new on the scene of that aren’t open with their past

They may be good

But more often then not many of their claims are a little bit ‘glossy’ and their background a little bit wallpapered over

Look for those who have shown a steady degree of progression – it’s amazing what people say that do but can’t (or that they are shady humans masquerading as ‘doing good’ now…)

Yes you can achieve many, many of the things you want

Just understand that it’s gonna take a bit of time and effort

That’s it

It does get easier

Ya just have to do the work

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Fight to earn what you need to support the ones you love (and get angry if you’re not)

Today was challenging

Peeps in EWD know as planned to do a live so told em; the goat (my Dad) was back into hospital last few days and shits not fab

But the charming old devil was getting the nurses on side when I saw him so he could get extra treats

– I am my fathers son lol –

We don’t have an extended family

It’s me, mum, goat and my sister spud

That’s it

My family have always been there for me when I haven’t been well, and I’m proud I’m in a position to be able to help them when they need me

They haven’t asked

I’m just handling shit

Which is why I truly urge all of you to work as hard as you fucking can NOW so IF you need it?

You can be there for the ones you love

My mentor Dex said to me not so long ago

‘Money solves most problems’

And it does TBH

It gives you freedom to help those who need it and help yourself as I’m able to next week when shit needs to be DONE

Which is why I always advise focus on looking after your first

Get your own house in order – get paid – THEN look to help others

You simply can’t pour from an empty cup…

And if you’re not in that position?

You need to harness something deep inside to make you do the work that – let’s be honest – you probably don’t want to do

I’m able to help my family NOW because of the YEARS of 5am starts and 1am finishes, 6 days a week, that built the foundation of what I have now

It was exhausting but I just powered the Fuck through

I got pissed off and used that negative energy for good:

I was angry my folks had to work into their 60’s so hard

I was angry at the fact we (as a family) get fuck all help for my sister what other lazy fucks get hand put out after hand out

I was angry that I couldn’t give my family what they needed when they had given me all I got

I channeled that anger into energy and and I worked my ass off

Balance?

Fuck no

You get balance AFTER the hard yards have been walked

Sure you can have it at now if you want

But you probably won’t achieve all you want to achieve if you do

There needs to be an element of sacrifice if you want to achieve more

– only you can decide at what level you want to play –

But if your maybe a month or two away from being fucked…

If you aren’t where you need to be…

And if people rely on you?

Get angry
Get to work

It will suck ass now, but future you will be be grateful AF

Dan

**post posting edit**

PS Realised this could come across as one of those chest beating look at me raaaa alpha bullshit kinda posts

If it does – soz

I’m angry that my fam have to keep getting kicked in the teeth but I’m proud I can step up when they need

I don’t often think when I write I just share what’s in my head or heart

Hope someone got some value from this – appreciate you reading if you did

PPS in the scope of honesty I vaguely look like I have a bicep here so yeah I’m getting mileage out of it #polishedturd

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[So you know why I’m doing what I’m doing and asking what I’m asking]

Recently you will of seen me ask a few Q’s such as:

– what level of biz are you at
– what goals do you have outside of work

Being the last few (and I have a few more to come)

I believe in adding value

– I hope you know this –

But equally as a leader I believe it is my job to LEAD

You won’t find me asking insipid questions over and over again

Ya know why this is done?

1 – engagement, people love talking about themselves

2 – to feign interest thus building up a picture of your issues/weaknesses/obstacles to make closing you easier as you have told them what cracks to insert the knife and twist

🙃

For me I try use it to get a ‘lay of the land’ and my ego isn’t so fucking massive that I think I know it all

I don’t

Think of it as a ‘pulse check’

And then subsequent content is in alignment with a) my values and b) the greater good of the group

I will personally DM everyone who took time to comment on the pinned post with the content and a few suggestions depending on where they are at

Will I suggest some work with me?

100%

But I’m fucking open about it

I’ll equally suggest some folks invest in trusted partners

And yes I’ll be telling people who and what to steer away from as well

If you lead a group you have a DUTY to lead with courage and conviction and morals

If y’all JUST doing it to make £££

You don’t have a community as far as I’m concerned

You have a farm

How I see it like this

This is like a digital sea

Time to time I fish

If my bait is right, and I have picked the right spot

I’ll catch some fish

I see a fair few with groups – meh – it’s like they have a captive fish farm

There’s no effort because the fish can’t go anywhere due to the manipulation techniques used and because they have been fed the same (shitty) food every day they actually think it’s good for them

Hence when the food (bait) comes in from a fisherman

They just bite – no matter if it’s good or not

I’m not a greedy fuck; I do well and I enjoy what I do – no desperation from me

So when you see me asking Q’s and figuring shit out?

It’s so I can do my job and serve the masses not so I can prey on your weaknesses

For those that want to be caught – if my bait is good and nourishing – they will bite

May not be the smartest From a making all the £££ point of but fuck it

Sits right with me

So yeah if I think I can help – and I’m the right person to do it – I’ll say

If I’m not, I’ll recommend

But know this

What you a) have seen me ask and b) will see me ask is to benefit the group overall

I’d rather create LESS content that’s fucking gold and actionable than shitty post after shitty post- with a giggle and a competition and a challenge from time to time

Your time is valuable and if ask yourself to engage it’s for you as well as me

Anyways

Just to show you a little of what’s going on behind the eyes and why I’m doing what I’m doing

Any Q’s ask away, feedback welcomes as well as suggestions

Hope y’all having a good day

😘

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Are you working on your weak points (or even worse kidding yaself that your working at all)

?

This week

Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu

Is gonna be a bastard; I’ve got a pretty cool goal for my 40th in June and I need to be a) lighter, b) more flexible and c) with able to withstand rapidly changing g-forces/impact

– it’s gonna be legit fam –

Anyways

It’s VERY easy to focus on the areas we are good at – I could it cracked on with my nutrition and lifted heavy assed weights (I’m relatively strong)

BUT

That’s all the shit I’m good at

This week – and the next 94 days are all about the weak points I have in not just my body, but my mindset, relationships, businesses, happiness

Tweak
Test
Adjust
Tweak
Test
Adjust

6 hours of my day, every day, is all about weakness in ALL the areas above

I’ve read the books
Had the calls
Consulted the experts

Thing is MOST people do exactly that – just what I’ve outlined

But they do DO THE WORK that needs to be done after knowing WHAT to do

– it’s not fun
– fairly boring most of the time
– painful (physically and mentally depending)

But the thing where most fuck up is the fact they want it NOW

Wanna feel good now?

Have a wank

Ya good?

Right

Now do the fucking work 😘

Twattery aside the stuff I’m doing now is really just not what I wanna be doing as I get no pay off NOW

I want the £££ NOW
I want the body NOW
I want the freedom NOW
I want the happiness NOW
I want the relationship NOW

– we all want it now –

And I’ll have all the above, I have a fair bit already – but there’s bits I don’t have

And for those bits I have to do the work

And the work that gets me those bits isn’t fun but it IS crucial

Everyone wants the end result no on sees the fuckery it took to get there

So if you aren’t there yet

KEEP FUCKING GOING

Because – and I can’t say when because there’s no way of knowing – but it kinda just ‘happens’ one day

And that ‘happening’ (surprise surprise) is after a sustained period of work for time

Shocker eh?

Keep it up y’all

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“What are you doing here, shouldn’t you be in the aerobics class twilglet?”

At 19 years old (and thats me in the picture!) that charming comment was levelled at me by what can only be described as ‘bigger boys’ when I joined David Lloyd ( – my first *proper* gym as a skinny young man.

After being quite a chubby (aka fat) teenager, I want though what I lovingly call my ‘manorexia’ phase where I only ate dinner, and ran 6 miles a night

Resulting in this 154lb physique, at 6ft tall as looked ill, as you can see

So, as a young man who was quite say and rather rubbish with girls did, I joined the gym

Which is where on my SECOND day, I heard that when I ventured, timidly, into he weights room.

I diligently went 3 times a week, **thought** I was giving it my all, and after a year of solid, hard work I had gained all of 10lbs

Thats it

Now as someone who truly hated how he looked, and didn’t enjoy confrontation I spent most of my nights out on the town in fear, worried if anything kicked off? I would be battered

Scared
Shy
Araid
ZERO confidnce

Great way to hit 20 eh?

Do you have ANY idea how many times I wanted to give up and say ‘fuck it’ Im always going to be skinny?

A lot
Daily in fact

Now I can’t explain to you how disheartened I was to look essentially like a stick man, and after I managed to secure an amazing but utterly cut-throat corporate job – I knew something had to change

Do you know what I did?

I bought 200k’s of weights

Bribed my parents to let me turn their garage into a gym

That, and told my friends I had left town

For just over 7 months I didn’t go out, didn’t see anyone (I was always ‘away’ working) and forced down 6500-7000 calories every day.

I ate until I was sick, was sick, and then kept eating

I woke up in the night (twice!!) to eat

That, and every single evening I did heavy assed basic as balls lifiting to th one tape that was stuck in the machine, Linking Parks first album

6 days a week

Never missed a workout

Never missed a session

And the result?

I went from around 165 to 240lbs in 8 months

No supplements
No drugs

Just consistent, hard, boring, daily fucking work

Thats it

So when people (and stuff gets back to me, its all good – people are entitled to their opinions) throw the ‘overnight success’ shit at me?

Go back though my feed

Everything, EVERYTHING I have done since I went ‘online’ has been pushing me towards where I am now

15+ international flights
45+ internal flights
100’s of thousands in masterminds, events, coaching and calls
1000’s of hours in training
20 A4 books of hand written out fucking pages of bloody copy (can you tell I liked that one ha)
18 hour days
Handfuls of nootropics, BUCKETS of coffee, sleepless nights and panicked mornings
That, and untold failures and fuck ups on a weekly basis!

(yeah, NO ONE hits a home run or has a clean sheet – i assure you…)

When it comes to ‘success’, or achieving ANYTHING the simple fact of the matter is nothing, NITHING beats consistent, forward momentum towards your goals

You are not going to get there in a few fucking months!

Sure, you can make some quick cash (if we are talking business here), but I guarantee you will be spending your life between feasts and famine

Building something, a business, a movement, a legacy

Takes a combination of time, relentless action, thick skin, sacrifice and constant, constant forward motion

Was it fun essentially putting my life on hold for 8 months to gain the muscle and strength I craved since I first saw ‘Arnie’ in Running Man?

Was it balls

Am I glad I did it?

I would change ANYTHING

And the same goes for your business, career, physique, health – whatever it is

If you want ‘it’, and I mean TRULY want it, you are going to have to put in the hard yards

But I’ll tell you this

You will look back on the journey FONDLY when you get there

That, and I don’t want to be on my death bed thinking ‘what i’…

Would you?

Dan, aged 35, November 2015

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What do you think of this:

PIZZA & PRODUCTIVITY….if I built it, would you come?

So I’ve been musing

2020?

An interesting year so far… 🙃

One thing I put on my own personal ‘danifesto’ was to being people together more

I’ve mapped out a few ideas, but kept coming back to this:

1. I like spending 4-6 hours with groups of people
2. I like pizza
3. I like getting shit done

Now due to the fact I shamelessly talk to everyone, I’ve befriended a local cafe biz who I swapped some meal prep for biz advice

We get on
It’s a cool venue
They have dedicated pizza ovens
There’s lots of space but not so much it’s too much
The pizzas are RIDIK

I believe in serving and longer term vision (the latter now thanks to the cartoon…) and here’s the seeds of the idea

1. Once a month I hold a ‘Pizza & Productivity’ session
2. Thinking will be Wednesday, 5/6pm kick off and will be in Portishead (it’s near Bristol UK
3. We get shit done. Eat pizza. Network. Go home with a plan (and yes there’s vegan options!)

Price wise had two musings

Sub £50 if you are willing to do some form of testimonial/post for CWD/the session/EWD/my book etc….

…probably double if you aren’t

All profits go to charity

(And yes I **could** do it for free, but quite frankly people don’t value free shit so a few quid invested in YOU helps others AND yourself)

Now when I do posts like this I always get ‘if love to come but I live in X’

Well, we may come to ‘X’ one day – but when I was starting out I travelled 56,000 miles across the UK, Europe and America

So yes, effort would be required – BUT I also have logic in this

When you travel HOME, that’s when the next bit of the magic happens

You subconscious will do it’s thing and your mind will be POPPING

The ideas, clarity and breakthroughs you get AFTER our time together are just as valuable as the ones in the session

(And I’ll show you how to maximise it and give you some tools to use as well)

This is not a thing yet

If you want it to be; you need to TELL me – and that’s what the comments below are are for

Let me know your musings; if enough of you are prepared to do this?

I’ll do what I need to do (can even get the goat to do shuttle runs from the station…I’ll make him wear a hat 🤣)

Lemme know

Dan

PS i really really love pizza, and FYI if I ever meet anyone wearing what I’ve posted in comment one (plus a few more criteria haha you know me)

I’d probably marry them on sight 🤣

PPS I won’t be cooking the pizza lol

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When was the last time you did this

1. Had an idea
2. 80/20’d it
3. Said ‘fuck it’ and just DID

?!

I had someone very successful DM me on IG yesterday saying they admired what I have done and how did I do it

Of course a mixture of:

– self development
– network
– coaching/mentoring/courses
– books
– learn from experts and my own mistakes

But the main thing I do

Is I just DO

There’s LOADS of stuff that I’ve tried that doesn’t work; but I still gave it a go

And plenty does work

– this group
– HTBFA
– my gyms
– my copy and marketing agencies (back in the day)
– 9’s and 10’s 😏

You have to TRY

People aren’t talking about you as much as you think they have their own shit to handle 😘

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There’s nothing worse than getting aroused and then not being able to ‘finish’

Conversely

Would you rather have a good experience or a half arsed one that your companion isn’t into?

I’d much rather a good one

Hence I’m asking a favour from you

Seems this week, lots of you have massively resonated with my stories from my past

If you havent read them so far, part 1, 2 & 3 are here:

Losing it all –
Part 1 https://www.facebook.com/groups/coffeewithdan/permalink/2459878084130510/

Hungry and hating life –
Part 2 https://www.facebook.com/groups/coffeewithdan/permalink/2461852747266377/

The lowest point –
Part 3 https://www.facebook.com/groups/coffeewithdan/permalink/2463808823737436/

Now as promised the final part will – I hope – be a massive pay off for you

I went to london to reconnect with a part of my life – and a part of myself – that I had lost touch with

But I was struggling

There was an element that I was torn between sharing or not

Some of you will judge me
Some of you will resonate

– that’s ultimately going to be down to you and your filter –

So like I did earlier this week I went for a walk

And this?

This inspired the ‘missing piece’ for the finale to my ‘RECONNECTION’ series

(I think it’s going to be some of the best content I’ve written for a while)

I have what I need

But I need something from you

This?

Will
All
Make
Sense

I promise

It’s how I can wrap this up in a way that’s valuable to you and your business

This isn’t ‘engagement hacking’ (ugh)…

This isn’t laziness on my part…

This is simply me wanted to honour the 1000’s of you that have read my post and the 80a+ DM’s I’ve received

I owe you my best

And I need your help – and a bit of time – to give you my best

So the favour?

Simple

Inspired by this woodland discovery:

‘What wish, if it came true, would make you truly happy’

I don’t care what it is

Money
Health
Looks
Fame
Prowess
Power

I just want to know what – if you chucked a coin down this well – what you think would make you truly happy

(Can even be as ridiculous as being a famous celebrity type or have a foot long ‘sausage’ – whatever’s good for you)

ITS YOUR WISH

what is it?

Don’t low ball it

If you have limiting beliefs around what you think you deserve/want/can have

For this?

Park them if you can

You want it – thinks it’s the thing you want – I wanna hear it

Go nuts

And you could let me know what it is by Sunday night?

Then part #4 can be completed Monday….I think when you read it you will see it’s worth the wait

As well as that, any feedback, comments, breakthroughs or musings on the previous 3?

I’d be greatful to hear them

Once again, thank you for your time

😘

Dan

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