How to Stop Blind Blaming and Unlock Growth in Business, Health, and Life with Kevin St. Clergy

Kevin St. Clergy

[00:00:00] Hey, Kevin. How are you? Welcome to the show. I’m great. Thanks for having me. Glad to be here. Oh, my pleasure. Yeah, listen, we had a great off-the-air conversation. I love the green room conversations, and yeah, you’re really, uh, somebody I was super excited to have on the show. You know, your business acumen is unbelievable.

[00:00:19] Um, and I think that you’re gonna help a lot of us health coaches get off the ground. So I just wanna give you an opportunity for us to get to know you a little bit better by just telling me a, a little bit about your origin story and how you came into what you’re doing currently. Yeah, sure. So, um- I, well, I started in the medical field.

[00:00:36] So as we talked about before we started, I’m actually an audiologist. My aunt is an audiologist, my cousin was an audiologist. Unfortunately, they both passed away. Uh, but that’s a hearing and balance specialist. Mm. Which is interesting to where I’ve gotten before. But I had one clinic, then two, then three, then four with the company that I was working with, and I became an area manager.

[00:00:53] So I got really good at growing hearing practices. And so the company kind of gave me two career paths years ago and said, “Look, you can, you can definitely be an area manager, but we’re starting this new division where we work with other private practice owners, and I think it’ll be- give you a great chance to not only get back to the South,” which is where I wanted to get, “and then it’s another way for you to see hundreds of different ways of, of growing a b- or, uh, how people run their businesses.”

[00:01:17] And it was in that audiology profession. So we went out there and we made our money by as long as they bought their medical devices through us, we would give them a discount on the devices because we had group purchasing power, and then we would provide consulting services as part of that, that agreement.

[00:01:32] And so we were doing about half a million dollars in wholesale, uh, medical device sales when I started in, in my territory, which was the Southeast, and we grew it to $5.5 million in four years- Mm … a year. So it was phenomenal growth. And all I did was get really good at going in and analyzing a business, seeing where the holes were, then trying to fill the holes.

[00:01:52] Now, keep in mind, I was 26 years old, and back then, one of my best referrals that I ever got, and it’s still one of my favorite and he’s still a friend of mine today, is my buddy Ken, who’s now retired and he sold his business. But he sa- he used to say, “Listen, this little kid’s gonna come into your office and tell you that he can help grow your business.

[00:02:09] Just listen to what he says, don’t argue with him, and just do everything he says, ’cause we’ve doubled our business.” It was really funny. Mm. I’m gonna get him on video for that. But we had some success with that, and then I think I made too much money in corporate America. So I made a quarter million dollars back in 2004, ’05 with the company I was working with, so they promoted me, and then the next year I made 130,000.

[00:02:29] I was like, “Well, that’s not gonna work.” Mm-hmm. So I had this idea of, of developing an education company. So we developed this virtual consumer seminar where we spent about 40 grand developing this really cool video to put on people’s websites, and then we wanted to lease it for $50 a month because they didn’t know what they were doing and they didn’t know how to do that.

[00:02:47] Mm. And this was back before people really thought the internet was gonna be anything. Mm. So I saw a trend. But it was interesting ’cause we got to a couple hundred people that were paying us that 50 bucks a month, and back then that was a pretty good amount of money. It still is. 10 grand a month rolling in, whether you work or not, was pretty amazing, but it was my first taste of recurring revenue.

[00:03:05] Mm-hmm. But what started to happen was we’re like, “Hey, Kevin, now I’ve got this really great video on a not so great website. Can you help me build a website?” I’m like, “Well, I guess. Well, then, but there’s a very specific way that I would do it if I was doing these.” So I found some people to help me build websites.

[00:03:19] Then we started doing SEO, then we started doing pay-per-click, and we turned it into a full-fledged agency that at the time we sold, we had 450 clients with 900 locations that we were working with. Wow. But what happened is about- A year or two into it, we started to figure out that a lot of the small businesses that we were working with, private practice owners, didn’t know how to run their business.

[00:03:41] And so it didn’t matter how much marketing we did because it wasn’t gonna do any good. Mm. So we really turned our marketing agency into a coaching platform. We switched away from selling a service and we sold a coaching program w- that we just promised people we would grow their business, kinda like you do, which I love what you’re doing by the way.

[00:03:58] Thank you. And so we had massive amounts of success, so even if the digital marketing wasn’t working that well, we knew that we could go in and analyze the business and tell them where they were not doing the right things. And so we built that up, like I said, we sold it, had a great exit, um, big, big exit, life-changing.

[00:04:16] I can’t go over the figures publicly, but, uh, it was fun. And after that, I came home. I got my one stupid purchase, I got the Lambo. It’s in the book so it’s no big surprise, and, um- … came home to a small gathering of people, and one of my buddies kinda knocked me off my chair by just asking one question.

[00:04:33] He’s like, “So Kevin, what’s next?” Mm. And it bugged me. I, I still remember it. I’ll, I’ll get, uh, teary-eyed here in a minute. But came into my office and I was like, “Well, what is next?” And I was… He’s like, “Look, you’re only 50 years old. You’re not done.” I was… I didn’t really think about it ’cause when you go through a purchase and a big thing, there’s this due diligence period which is nine- 90 days of hell, and then it’s really stressful because you don’t know if it’s gonna close or not, and then the company finally closes, and then it’s just like this whoosh where you’re done.

[00:05:01] But he’s like, “Look, I know you’re not done because you’ll probably be day drinking if you don’t find something else to do.” And he was totally joking, but it got me thinking, like, “Man, he’s probably right.” So when I came into my office, I put on my little virtual whiteboard, “What is next?” And I saw a book on the shelf that said how to write a TED Talk.

[00:05:19] Read the book. I was like, “Well, that’s a different thing. I’ve been speaking all over the world in this industry for 27 years. Let me see if there’s something else I can do to, to create a, um, a message for the masses,” if you will. Mm-hmm. And so she hooked me up with these writers, and they went through this really cool exercise for two weeks about all the life lessons I’d had in the 50 years on this planet, and we settled on this story when I was 10 years old.

[00:05:40] And when I was 10 years old, I was a phenomenal baseball player. I had a batting average of 550. Ooh. I wasn’t just good, I was great. And for those of you listening who don’t know much about baseball, that’s not… Babe Ruth in his heyday had a 394, so 550 is awesome. Yeah. Where my dad and other coaches were like, “You really need to start working with him on his mindset and get him a swing coach ’cause we think he can be even better.”

[00:05:59] And so we went to work. In the off-season, we played every day. My dad even built a, a baseball diamond in the neighborhood. He got permission for the neighborhood to, to pay for it and build a baseball diamond so we could practice all through the off-season, and we did it. Now we were in San Antonio, Texas at the time, so we could play all year round.

[00:06:15] But then, so when I stood up to bat for the 11-year-old league, totally ready, totally prepared, even had a swing coach that worked for the Dodgers that was a buddy of my dad’s. I mean, I was ready, and I was knocking the hell out of the ball when we were practicing. But when I stood up to bat that next year, I started swinging and missing.

[00:06:32] In fact, I missed every single pitch the next year. I literally went from hero to zero. My batting average in the 11-year-old league was zero. And you can probably guess what I heard from the stands. “Come on, kid, keep your head in the game. Play to win this time.” And then my dad, you can probably imagine the lectures I got on the way home from my dad, ’cause my parents pushed me the hardest.

[00:06:50] Hm. And then my attitude kind of went to, you know what? And then the next year I was so pretty down on myself, I only played two games. I- it’s the first time in my life that I felt like a complete failure. Hm. And then so I quit. I was done with baseball, and I said, “That’s it. I don’t wanna do this anymore.”

[00:07:06] I had really big dreams of playing for the Rangers and hitting against Nolan Ryan, you know, back in the day. Oh, yeah. And then two weeks after I quit, we found out what the real problem was. At a fluke eye exam, we figured out that I just couldn’t see the ball. I needed glasses. The doctor said, “Sorry, kid’s practically blind without glasses.”

[00:07:23] And here’s the real problem. The adults in my life for that almost two-and-a-half-year stint s- never stopped blaming me for something that was completely out of my control. Hm. And we call that blind blaming, and it’s at the core of every relationship problem, business problem, coach’s problem, since that’s who listens to your podcast, or, um, even fitness problems.

[00:07:44] There’s a lot of things that we blame, but it’s, it’s not that people are failing at solving their problems. They’re solving the wrong problem perfectly. Hm. And it’s keeping people stuck for years. And so I had this TED Talk, and I had a podcast at the time in that specific niche that we talked about before.

[00:08:00] It’s called Audiology Mastery And I had really cool guests like John Gray, who wrote Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus, and, uh, connected with Jack Canfield. I had some really cool guests. I had a really cool podcast, uh, booking agency that was getting me some amazing guests, some of these with 10-figure, uh, or nine and, and 10-figure businesses that were on this, like Dave Liniger, founder of RE/MAX, things like that.

[00:08:23] And when I started sharing the TED Talk with them, they started saying, “Gosh, this would make a great book. This would make a great book.” And I’m like, “Ah, guys, I’ve written six books. I have no interest in writing another book.” And then finally somebody said, “Kevin, I think you have a duty to write this book.”

[00:08:36] And I was like, “Ah, okay.” So we went to work, and from 5:00 AM till 8:00 AM every morning for about eight months I wrote this book called Beyond Blind Blaming. Mm. And it is really, really having an impact out there for people. And it really doesn’t matter what you do. We’re all guilty of blaming something that’s not the real problem.

[00:08:53] I mean, how many times as you as a coach where your client thinks it’s one thing, and you already know that it’s completely something else. So what we also did is we developed a framework to help people break or move beyond blind blaming, and start looking at different areas of their life and their business to see where the real problem is.

[00:09:10] And from there we developed some coaching programs to help people with their own business, uh, grow. Wow. So that’s the short story of where we are now. So, uh, and we’ve grown. Uh, we’ve got a seven-figure coaching business ourselves, um, me and a partner. Uh, we have some high-end mastermind groups for million-dollar businesses and above, and we have some coaching programs for the folks under a million.

[00:09:31] But our, our high-end masterminds are 25 and $50,000, and we have almost 40 people at that $25,000 level, and we have about 10 people to 50 in the one group. We have a real estate group as well. We’re launching another dental group, uh, very soon and, and some other groups that have just come to us after they’ve read my book and said, “Look, I’m really interested in doing something like that.”

[00:09:50] Uh, so anywho, that’s my short story long if that helps. Oh my God. What an amazing story. I got so many- Yeah, it’s killer … off, off that, but, well, I, I, let me get l- some selfish questions out the way, right? Um, I know you’re super successful obviously, uh, do you regret not being a baseball player? Very much. I still struggle to watch baseball to this day.

[00:10:13] Really? Yeah. Oh. That’s what I wanted to do, man. It was all over my walls. I mean, I was… It was, I, I wa- I don’t know if anybody listening has ever, if you’ve ever watched the, uh, the Tiger Woods story Oh, I, no, you know what? I have not Oh, it’s so good. It’s so good. I mean, I’m not gonna trash anybody on your… I mean, well, there’s some differences in, uh, core values that we have, I’ll say that.

[00:10:36] Okay. But his, uh, his, his origin story, the, the movie they made about what he did as a kid and how he primed his mind, and he would listen to himself saying, “I am the best golfer in the world,” and things like that, that’s the stuff that my dad and I were doing back then. Mm. He wanted me to be the best of the best of the best.

[00:10:52] Yeah. And if we would’ve just caught the vision thing a little earlier, I may not be here. But even though I didn’t hit any home runs on the baseball field, I did manage to hit a lot of home runs in life and business, and I’ve helped a lot of people over the years, and it feels really good. And we’re continuing to help people grow and thrive, just by getting to the root cause of a problem they can’t seem to fix.

[00:11:14] Right. Right. No, that’s for sure. Yeah, no, that’s why, I, I think that’s a, it was a, a good thing. I mean, that obviously you’re, you’re helping us. We’re thankful that it didn’t work out in the other areas, so. That’s right. But obviously- It all worked out. I don’t regret my life at all. You do good. I had… I think every time you fail, you need to see it as a learning experience, and I have been dead freaking broke six times in my life.

[00:11:35] I mean, there was a time that I had to live… We- I made a bad hiring mistake in that agency that I talked about, and it nearly sunk the entire company, and I had to live off a title loan for six months. The only asset I had at that time was my Tahoe. Mm. And by the way, title loans are the worst way to go raise money.

[00:11:54] Uh, lesson learned. But… And it took me a long time to get out of that. Wow. But yeah, I’ve been broke six times. I learned every time. You know, what I did, my big hiring mistake, just to let everybody know, is I hired a friend and a neighbor. Mm. And it didn’t go well. That’s all I’ll say. Wow. Yeah, no, no, it- those are lessons that you can’t really unlearn, you know?

[00:12:16] And they, they actually, like I said- Yeah … failure’s actually a good thing. So I, I definitely wanna ask, because obviously you have such a robust, uh, client list, what is, like, the main source of our coaching problem, right? Like, uh, w- when you’re helping people, is there something that stands out f- kind of commonly as far as, like, what our shortcomings is?

[00:12:38] What is that blind area that we’re just missing, like, on a regular- Yeah, I’d say, well, there is, um… Like, we developed this readiness thing for coaches, and, uh, what I’m finding, though, is it’s different for every person. Here’s, here’s a great example. So there’s an individual that I know quite well that was struggling with his business.

[00:12:56] He got to a million dollars a year. Different industry, but same. I mean, mo- if you have some coaches that are doing a million a year, that’s awesome. It’s, it’s kind of a cool thing to shoot for, and it looks really good on paper when you hit that seven-figure mark, which a lot of us strive for in the beginning, right?

[00:13:08] I would think you work with a lot of coaches who would really love to have a multimillion-dollar coaching business. Yeah. We all do. It’s, there’s nothing wrong, ’cause number one, we have bigger impact ’cause we’re helping more people, and of course, I do believe that if you’re gonna go out and take the risk to start your own business, you do de- deserve to, to live a life you wanna live and not worry about money anymore.

[00:13:26] Yeah. But it’s different for everybody, but this individual had hit that seven-figure mark, and it looked really good on paper, but he was struggling. Behind the scenes, his clients were getting upset with him because he was forgetting to do things. His team was getting really frustrated because he was forgetting to do things and wasn’t following up like he should, and they started to see clients leaving.

[00:13:43] Some employees were threatening to leave, and he had a business partner at the time who was so frustrated with him. He, he knew deep down in his heart this guy had crippling ADHD, and he wasn’t dealing with it. Mm. Went so far as to hire him an ADHD coach, too, and after working with a coach for about six months, the ADHD coach said, “I don’t, I don’t think you have ADHD.

[00:14:00] I’m gonna send you to your doctor and see if there’s something else going on.” And so he got to his doctor, and the doctor said, “So you struggle with ADHD your whole life?” And he’s like, “No, and I wish people would stop saying that. It’s kinda pissing me off ’cause they’re trying to help me with block scheduling and, and, and managing my time, and they’ve given me three different planners, and I’ve just had it.”

[00:14:17] And the doctor said, “You know, I think there’s something else going on,” which is the core of, of that. We’ll get into the process of how to get beyond blind blaming, but the first stage is called reflect, and you ask a simple question: Is there something else going on that I can’t see? And so when the doctor put him through the test, it found, he, uh, she found out that he had sleep apnea.

[00:14:37] Oh, wow. He didn’t have crippling ADHD. He didn’t need another planner. He didn’t need to block his schedule. He wasn’t doing too much. He was just chronically exhausted. And once they fixed that, the business grew by five times. Mm-hmm. And that guy was me. Oh. So it, it happened around, I would say it’s about 2012, ’13, somewhere in there, and I struggled for a couple years with just managing my time and everything else.

[00:15:04] It had nothing to do with that. And then it happened again with my… These are three health examples, but… And we’ll go over that, that process in a minute, but a few years later after I sold, I was like, “God, my energy’s down, and I’ve gained a bunch of weight, and I’m really fuzzy and not focused.” And, and come to find out, you know, I thought it was just motivation.

[00:15:22] I thought it was my nutrition. So my coach, ’cause I was, uh, being, I was, uh, until recently, I had two physicians that were leading my health journey, ’cause I lost 40 pounds, uh, last year. Huge difference in my life. Feel much better. Um, but they were like, “Uh, I don’t think it’s your nutrition. You’re eating perfectly.

[00:15:40] You’re walking 15,500 steps a day. You’re working out four days a week. You should be dropping weight. Something else is going on that we’re not seeing.” And I had low testosterone. Mm. And so once I got that fixed, boom, everything started to come into, into play. And it’s interesting, ’cause I put that specific example in the book Beyond Blind Blaming, and I’ve had several women who have come to me that are coaching clients, and some not, just read the book, that, uh, went through the, the process, which we’ll get to in, in just a sec, and they’re like, “You know, Kevin, I, I took that hormone thing to heart, and I went and got tested, ’cause I’ve had a trainer for two years and never lost any weight.

[00:16:16] And come to find out I had low testosterone, and nobody told me about it except you.” Right. Right. And so that kind of is a perfect segue into the, the methodology to break free. So we came up with this thing called the RCD method. RCD is simple, but as you know, simple doesn’t always mean easy. Right. Right.

[00:16:33] So R stands for reflect, and the question I, I mentioned before is, is there something else going on that I can’t see? Now, in the book w- and in coaching programs, we go through five different areas that people need to check in a person’s life and their business to see if- If there’s something else… It’s not about finding one thing in each of those five areas, and it’s like health.

[00:16:54] Do you have a growth mindset or a fixed mindset? Resources, do you have the resources to do what you need to do? Do you have good relationships in your life? Things like that. And it’s not about finding one thing in each of those areas, and in the book we made it kind of a workbook style writing. Uh, a lot of people, it’s kinda humbling to hear people say, “You know, you’re the only book that I’m actually gonna go back and read again and do the exercises at the end of each chapter.”

[00:17:15] We just had two this week, which was… I love it. Um, but it’s not about finding one thing in each area, it’s about finding that one thing that creates a ripple effect across your life and your business. You know, for me, those examples I gave you is just getting glasses would’ve made me a, a baseball player.

[00:17:28] But I was so damaged after that, it was just too late. I was done with baseball. Like I said, it’s even hard for me to watch baseball to this day. But other people that we’ve helped Sometimes it is, um, a mindset problem. Sometimes they are just not doing what they’re supposed to do. They hate what they’re doing, and they’ve just never looked at, “Is there something else that I can do?”

[00:17:49] I had, um, a fractional COO read the book, and I called him to see how he’s doing, ’cause he’s, um… We met at a conference or something like that, and he got the book, and he’s like, “Hey, I’d love to talk to you a little bit.” And I was like, “Great, I’d love to hear what you thought about the book.” You know, and I get on the phone and he’s like, “Look, I quit my job yesterday.”

[00:18:05] I was like, “Whoa, wait a minute. That’s not what I wanted. That’s not what the book’s about, man. Don’t- … you gotta feed your family.” He’s like, “No, no, no, you don’t understand. My wife came to me and gave me the best compliment I’ve ever gotten in my marriage. She said, ‘I don’t know what you did or, or who you, who you talked to to change, but you are the man that I married in the beginning.

[00:18:22] You’re present now at dinner, you’re more interactive with me and the kids.'” And I’m like, “Well, what’d you do?” He’s like, “Well, I just figured that I had a problem. I wasn’t really passionate about what I was doing as a fractional COO, so I wanted to start an AI company. And I started the AI company and I did more business in two months than I made in a year at that other company.”

[00:18:41] And I was like, “Wow, man, congratulations.” But he figured out that he wasn’t passionate about what he was doing. The core problem wasn’t the job or making that better or getting more clients, he was just doing something he really didn’t like deep down inside, and some of the exercises we took him through in the book helped him.

[00:18:56] Wow. Yeah, no, listen, I mean, I think it’s amazing that, uh, that this book has helped so many people. And I think, w- you know, you describing the process, a lot of people don’t have the most important thing it seems, is like the ability to reflect on what is actually wrong. I mean, I, I think, you know, a lot of people may not have the time to do that or the willingness to, to do that.

[00:19:20] Yeah. I think about my, um… I’m gonna put him on the spot, but my father, right? You know, he, he, he won’t change, right? Like I, I don’t, I don’t think that’s something that he’s ever gonna do at his age. It’s one of those things. Do, do you find that a lot in people generally, that that’s like a, a big obstacle for them to actually just sit back and, and try to find that thing?

[00:19:44] Yeah. ‘Cause even like I think about the guy who you mentioned, he, you know, he’s making a million dollars a year- I, there’s nothing wrong with that, right? You know? Yeah. You want more. And, you know, like, it’s, it’s interesting. I just, I find this, uh, fascinating that you can always keep growing and you always keep been getting better, but- Yeah.

[00:20:00] I mean, some people are stuck and they don’t know why, but they’re always… I mean, just look at the world right now. I mean, there are some people that think the world’s a dumpster fire because there’s so many fi- m- so much finger-pointing going on in the world at the moment. Nobody’s taking responsibility.

[00:20:12] So part of that reflect stage we teach people is, look, you have to take 100% responsibility for everything in your life, but sometimes it’s out of your control. Mm. But still, there’s a philosophy that I truly believe in, and I learned this originally from Jack Canfield. He kinda liked how we took it a step further.

[00:20:27] And for those of you who don’t know, Jack Canfield wrote Chicken Soup for the Soul. Mm. Uh, but he also, a lot of people don’t know that he wasn’t really passionate about that, and he sold that business for a gazillion dollars. Oh. And then he started… He’s always wanted to be in self-help, so he wrote a book called The Success Principles.

[00:20:41] Mm-hmm. And he’s always been a hero of mine. I finally got to meet him for my birthday one year, and then he was only the second person I had read the book. And it was in this author retreat, it was pretty cool, um, because he was coaching people that wrote their book. And I was like, “Well, let me get…” I was so nervous about releasing the book.

[00:20:56] This is one of those, those belief lids that we all have. Um, so I go through this coaching program, and I’m like number seven in line, and he’s such a sweet man. If you ever meet this guy… I was on his TV show recently, and he was like, “Man, you really got this dialed in. I love what you’re doing. It’s so much simpler than my book that had like 38 different principles.

[00:21:14] You’ve got one. I think you’re gonna be massively successful,” which was a huge compliment. But when he’s a coach, dude, he is brutal. He’s like, he’s talking to these first few folks. He’s like, “Your book’s… You know, this sucks all, all around. I think you need a better story. There’s mistakes in the book.

[00:21:27] You’re not ready for this to be launched. You need to go back to your editor, and you need to start over, and let me give you some advice on the story.” And then he’s like kinda doing this in a nice, you know, not horrible way, making people feel bad, but he’s, he… That’s what we had joined the group for, to have him help us.

[00:21:41] Then he gets to my book, and he’s like, “Oh, Kev, yeah, I’ve stayed up till midnight reading your book. Your, your book’s gonna be a classic. I absolutely loved it, and I pulled out some things that are gonna make a big difference in my life, and I think you’re gonna impact millions. You just gotta figure out how to market it.”

[00:21:53] Wow. Which was really cool. So but, um, going into the next stage, though, so you’ve reflected, and then that’s R. So C stands for connect, and this is why it’s important for your coaches that you’re working with or the listeners, because I am a big believer in coaches. But I’m shocked at how many people across the country don’t know that they need a coach or that they should be hiring a life or a fitness coach.

[00:22:16] You know, I’ve got a fitness coach. I’ve got a life coach. I’ve got a therapist, and I have a mastermind that I’m part of. And I just hired my coach for this year. I mean, my coaches are pretty high, but I’m at a different level. But just remember, every new level, there’s a new devil. And my coach is 100 grand a year, so this is…

[00:22:33] I wanna be in the room with other people ’cause my next goal had, you know, a big exit. I want that $100 million exit next. That is my new goal, so I found somebody who’s doing $100 million, and I’m gonna have them help me get there. So C stands for connect, ’cause once you reflect and you try to see, okay, well, here’s what I think’s going on.

[00:22:51] But a lot of times what you think is going on isn’t the real problem. That’s why there’s a lot of things out there called the root cause analysis, and I did a lot of research when I was writing the book. They call ’em RCA and… RCAs. And root cause analysis is where you… There’s several different methods out there, but it’s where you sit in a room with your team in business and you’re like, “All right, why is this happening, and, and what are we not doing, and what can we do to solve this?”

[00:23:14] The problem is when you’re trying to solve a problem and, and you’re doing it within your sphere of influence, it’s almost physiologically impossible for you to see a different way of doing something. And there’s these cognitive biases that get in the way. There’s three fatal flaws of blind blaming that we talk about.

[00:23:28] Cognitive biases, for those of you listening, these are the things that our brain has to help us make decisions faster. They give us frameworks to make decisions, but sometimes they get in the way. And if there’s any psychologists listening, I know that’s not the best definition, but it’s the most simple one that I have.

[00:23:42] Mm-hmm. So the first fatal flaw of blind blaming is, it’s, um, it’s called availability bias. This means the first thing that you think of in your head, just like when my business partner and my employees thought I had crippling ADHD and I need to get on medicine, I need a coach. That was the first thing they thought of because I couldn’t manage my time and no planner they gave me, so it’s obviously ADHD.

[00:24:04] Mm-hmm. Nobody thought it could be sleep apnea. It took somebody from outside of my sphere of influence, my primary care physician, to do some tests to see something that they couldn’t. And that connect stage is why we always recommend people work with a coach and that they join a mastermind group. I like the two because your coach is gonna help you see somebody that you can be.

[00:24:25] This is what you guys that are listening, all of you do if you… I’m assum- I… Well, from what I read, your, your group is, is coaches. They’re fitness coaches, right? Did I get that right? Yeah. Fitness- Your listeners … coaches. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah, so- They, uh, and well, so you gotta get some opinion. This is where you help your coaches.

[00:24:42] You’re the coach that coaches the coaches, so this is what you’re helping people do, and I’m sure you run into this all the time. And I think if you read the book, you’ll have a new framework to help your coaches help more people and have more of an impact. Mm-hmm. But there’s this book called The S- uh, Structure of Scientific Revolution.

[00:24:55] I’ll save you the whole read. It was written for researchers, and the guy got kind of mad, and we started applying it to business years ago. It’s written in the ’80s and ’90s, I think, uh, late ’80s, early ’90s. But I, I just learned recently that it’s the most quoted book in history. But this Structure of Scientific Revolution talked about scientists when they were doing their research and their studies, and when the results of those studies fit into their paradigm, their way of thinking, what they thought would happen, everything was fine.

[00:25:20] But when they were doing the studies and then the research gave a different result, something they didn’t expect, it was almost like the data wasn’t real. It, it was like, “Okay, well, this doesn’t work. This isn’t what we expected.” So guess what they did? Do it again. They ran the study again. And they got the same results, and they kept doing it over and over again.

[00:25:39] And he’s like, “Wow, this is crazy. Why are they doing that?” It’s just human nature. Mm-hmm. So when we do that, we have that availability bias. The first thing we think of, that’s it. And I see this a lot with no matter what business you’re in, whether you’re fitness coaches, regular coaches, business owners in any industry.

[00:25:54] Things like, “Man, I had a really slow month. I didn’t get any signups. It’s gotta be my marketing.” So they fire their marketing agency, and this is the scars from owning a marketing agency, and they hire another marketing agency. Well, that marketing agency sucks too, so they go hire another marketing agency.

[00:26:10] And so one of the things that we were different when we had that, when I was in that line of work, is I would say, “Well, look, before you, you quit your marketing agency, do you know how many marketing calls you’re generating each month?” And I would get answers like, “What do you mean?” I’m like, “Okay, wrong answer.

[00:26:22] You should know how many calls a month you’re getting from the marketing that you’re doing.” And I’ve seen so many businesses in a lot of different professions that were, they’re doing their marketing. Like, the one that always sits in, there’s an example in the book. “Look, you got 22 calls from your marketing last month.

[00:26:37] Your cost per lead’s like 20 bucks.” Right. “That’s really good.” “Yeah, but we only scheduled two appointments, Kevin.” And I’m like, “Okay, well, that’s not my job. That’s blind blaming. You’re blaming the marketing agency when the real problem was your front desk, who’s not, or your person that’s answering the phone is not converting calls into an appointment.

[00:26:55] And then when they do answer the phone, they’re only converting, uh, 20% of the calls because they have a really poor script.” Mm-hmm. But it took a coach for them to see that. And sometimes, like in masterminds, the reason I like this is when you join a mastermind and you’re part of a group that, um, has similar goals and they’re in the same industry as you, and you have protected territories where people can be more vulnerable.

[00:27:17] We had a, we had a fun mastermind in paradise in Orlando. We were in this big mansion ’cause it was so much cheaper than a hotel, and had a great time. But I’ll always remember this, and my friend Kristen gave me permission to share this story, but she was up there saying, “You know, I’m just… I can’t scale the business.

[00:27:31] I’ve had two bad hires in a row with the providers that I’m, I’m using, and I just can’t do it.” And one of the audience members said, “Look, you’re where I was two years ago. You don’t realize this, but that’s your fault.” Mm. And she’s kind of surprised, looked at the person in the audience and said, “What do you mean?”

[00:27:47] She goes, “You haven’t given yourself permission to grow yet. You’re self-sabotaging yourself. You don’t even know it. You’re underpaying for the providers that you’re hiring because you’re scared to death you’re gonna hire somebody and they’re not gonna perform, and they’re not gonna sell to justify their salary.”

[00:28:02] Mm. “Take a risk. Give yourself permission to grow,” because the person in the audience said, “Is there anybody in here that paid somebody what they’re worth in a sales position that didn’t get a return on their investment?” Now, these are multimillion-dollar businesses. Nobody raised their hand. And so she did.

[00:28:18] She’s like, “Well, I do have this audiologist that I can call right now,” blah, blah, blah. And they’re, everybody in the audience is like, “Well, then call her. But pay her the $120,000 that she’s worth to get them on board to make sure they perform.” Mm. And she’s up, like, 35% this year after that, after that meeting.

[00:28:34] Wow. So that’s another example of, of the benefit of a coach in a mastermind, which everybody listening knows the benefit of being a coach. That’s why you do what you do. And then finally, we have D. So you have R, reflect. C, connect with a professional coach or, um, a mastermind, and then D is decide. And so I had a client who had the chance to acquire another business, and so I’d hooked her up with a couple of funding sources, and both funding sources kept coming back to her with different offers And we were on the phone and she’s like, “Man, they just keep coming back with this, and it’s been two months.

[00:29:07] What do you think I should do?” And, um, I’ll ask for permission. Is it, is it okay if I cuss a little bit on the show or do I need to keep it- Oh, for sure. Yeah … kinda… Okay. Well, you are from New York. So it’s funny when I go- … with my New York clients and then I get on the phone with my California clients.

[00:29:19] They’re like, “Kevin, language.” I’m like, “Oh, sorry. I was just talking to my friend Lori” And so Kayla asked, and her name’s Kayla. She’s given me permission to share the story as well. She’s like, “What do you think I should do?” And I looked at her on the, on the Zoom call and I said, “Kayla, you just need to make a fucking decision.”

[00:29:33] Mm-hmm. And I said it just like that. I’ve known her, I helped her start her business seven years ago and she’s like, “Okay, you’re right.” So we hung up. The next month we’re on the phone again for our next, our next call. And I always start my coaching calls with, as a takeaway for you guys, I stopped asking people how are you doing, ’cause the world seems to be a dumpster fire for some folks.

[00:29:49] Mm-hmm. Uh, I started asking what’s going well. Mm. And that was one of the best things I learned several years ago. But I want you guys to watch it when you start saying, “Hey, what’s going well?” Watch people go, “Oh, shit. I don’t know. Uh, I was perfectly willing to blame and complain.” So, uh, I said, “What’s going well?”

[00:30:06] And she’s like, “Kevin, man, I’m MFD’ing all over the place. You’ve changed my life. We, we did the loan, we got the acquisition, we’ve made some changes. I already got rid of the old owner and, man, even my husband notices.” And I’m like, “Kayla, wait a minute. Stop. What are you talking about? MFD?” She’s like, “Yeah, make a fucking decision.

[00:30:20] I’m doing it. MFD.” And I’m like, “That’s awesome. Can I use that in my book?” And she’s like, “Absolutely. Absolutely.” So reflect is where you think you know what the problem is, share it with a coach or mastermind group. Connect, connect with somebody outside of your sphere of influence so they can see something you can’t.

[00:30:36] And then MFD, make a fucking decision and move forward. Mm-hmm. You might make a mistake, maybe it’s the wrong problem, but at least you’re moving forward. And I didn’t realize it at the time, but when I ask people, a lot of times about 80% of the time when I ask people, “What’s your biggest takeaway from my keynotes or podcast guests or the book itself?”

[00:30:53] MFD comes up a lot. People are putting it on their coffee mugs now. I think we need to develop some swag. Yeah. Somebody even put it on their tennis shoes so they see it when they’re in the gym at the bottom it just says MFD on their tennis shoes. And of course we’ve got the shirts and swag going there, but that’s it.

[00:31:06] So to break free from blind blaming, first you have to stop blaming and complaining. No excuses. Then you reflect. Is there something else going on that I can’t see? Connect with somebody outside of your sphere of influence, a mentor, a coach, a mastermind. I prefer paid coaches, paid masterminds, ’cause people that pay pay attention.

[00:31:24] Mm-hmm. And then finally, MFD, make a decision That’s it … nah, the, you know, the analysis paralysis, right? I, I- Yeah … very, very common. And again, like, when you make the decision and then you, you have the ability to course correct, right? That’s just, that’s like the beauty of it all. Like, right, where it’s just i- instead of just not doing anything, like you said, make the decision, keep it moving, and then if you see it’s, it, it, something needs to change, you can make another deci- kind of- Yeah

[00:31:52] it’s very, it’s a lot about momentum, so I really definitely appreciate that. Um, y- yeah, I, th- this has been amazing. I have so many questions for you, so I, I- Yeah, keep going. We got plenty of time Which, you know, uh, I, I, we, I like to keep it between the 30 and 40, but it’s just, um, uh, there’s just so many aspects especially that you brought up.

[00:32:13] I thought that one of the most powerful ones as well is as coaches, it’s pretty shocking how many of us don’t have coaches ourself. Like, you ha- we wanna be hired as coaches, but we don’t have our own coaches. Yeah. Yeah, it’s- Do you see that a lot, uh, as well? Well, say that again. I, I, I was talking. Did you see that concept a lot as well?

[00:32:36] Oh, yeah. Like, coaches are the worst. I’ve got, um- Someone read my book. It’s actually a podcast guesting agency that helped me get on your podcast. Um, Interview Connections, a great company. I love them. Uh, but she read my book and she’s like, “Will you coach me? I, I need a coach. I, I’m not sure what’s happening here.”

[00:32:53] And she sh- she’s very public about all this, so I’m not sharing anything that, um, she doesn’t want to. But she was, uh, they were- she’s got a very successful business, but she wasn’t hitting the numbers she wanted to hit. Mm-hmm. And she thought it was one problem, and we went through the, the whole framework, and we figured out it was something else.

[00:33:08] We changed her completely business model. We got her laser focused on… I just asked her one question, like, “Who’s your favorite clients?” And boy, her face lit up, and she’s like, “Oh, this, this, this, and this.” And I was like, “Well, then why aren’t you focusing on just them?” Mm-hmm. And it had nothing to do with her marketing or her sales, even though we tweaked the sales approach once we got her target market down.

[00:33:27] But when she got laser focused on who she was targeting, everything changed because we redid her marketing, we redid her sales approach, and it was interesting ’cause she… I mean, we just did a, a podcast together where she actually started crying. She’s like, “I don’t wanna go through another sales training.”

[00:33:41] I was like, “You’re not,” This is the thing. When you know who you serve, you’re not selling anymore. You’re interviewing. Mm-hmm. Are you the right client for me? Is this something that you can do? It, it’s a complete mindset shift when you start interviewing. In fact, when we had our agency and coaching program before, we used to call the first call the discovery call.

[00:34:03] We wanted to discover if this was the right type of client for us, because we had about a, w- we had a 95% success rate because we were very particular about the people that we let come into our world. Mm-hmm. And it’s a very different thing, ’cause sometimes we get, you know, back in the day before that, I would just pitch anybody.

[00:34:20] Right, right. When I started interviewing people and saying, “Mm, I don’t, I just don’t think this is a good fit. I don’t think you’re ready yet.” And we created a waiting list of people who wanted to be on board, and we had very slow, controlled growth. Between 20 and 30% a year is w- all we wanted to grow, because we were able to do the, handle those 450 clients with five full-time coaches, and it was 450 clients with 900 locations.

[00:34:42] It’s, it, we scaled it really well, and the margins were pretty fantastic as well. Do you think that’s a good approach for a, a health coach starting out? ‘Cause I’ve, I’ve gone through- Well, not starting out. I w- ab- oh, yeah, absolutely. I mean, you gotta make a living, I get it, but you can’t… The most important thing a new coach can do, because I had to start over, so you, when you sell your business, you forget how hard it was to start over and- Yeah

[00:35:06] you know, we’re three years in now, and now we’re finally breaking free and we’re doing well. It took me three years to, to start getting up to the numbers we wanna hit. But when you’re first starting out, I know that desperation in your heart and your soul that’s like, “God, I just need to get a few more clients.”

[00:35:20] But if you take on the wrong clients, you’re not gonna get the right testimonials or reviews- Yeah … that you can use to go, to move forward. But you have to take a stance where if somebody’s not ready or they’re not prepared to do what you teach, you shouldn’t be working with them. Wow. ‘Cause the worst thing in, in the world that can happen is you take on a client who’s not ready- And then they don’t get the results, and they blind blame you.

[00:35:46] Yeah, yeah. And so, and I see this a lot in, in fitness coaches. I went through a lot of fitness coaches before and I think because I was working with physicians, you don’t have to be a doctor just, uh, I think you can get some ideas if you read the book. Not, you know, shameless self-promotion, but I do think my book can help any coach be better.

[00:36:04] When I was writing it, it was kind of writing it for myself. Mm-hmm. Because Beyond Blind Blaming made me a better coach. And I always hoped that my book would kind of connect with, with coaches and, and consultants. And in fact, we’re gonna write another edition called Bl- Beyond Blind Blaming: Coach’s Edition.

[00:36:19] Uh, that’s the next version that we’re kind of in the middle of. I’m, I’m nuts now and crazy because now I, as much as I didn’t want to write Beyond Blind Blaming, now it’s been so successful I want to kind of niche it out a little bit. Right. But I think I see a habit where coaches have their framework.

[00:36:33] They don’t interview somebody correctly and they just throw them into it. I’m seeing my girlfriend go through that right now with her coach who she loves and she’s got a great relationship with, but the coach went to work and she went to work on her program and started kicking her ass and, and not treating her like shit, but you know, just training her really hard but Jen wasn’t seeing the results.

[00:36:52] And I’m like, “Well, do you want my he-,” you know, helping your spouse or your partner is… If anybody’s married or has a long-term girlfriend, you know what it’s like to try to give your girlfriend or wife advice. It does not go well. Uh, sometimes. But finally she was like, “What do you think it is?” I was like, “Well honey, you haven’t been to the…

[00:37:09] Y- I know you’re younger,” and she’s 43. I was like, “You haven’t been to the doctor,” and you know, her hormones are all out of whack. Mm. Out of whack. So I, I think there’s, if I would give any advice to coaches is just don’t forget to send your folks to the doctor first and have them do the blood work so that you can see where they’re at.

[00:37:26] A lot of times there’s something going on that they can’t see or they’re not aware of. Right, right. Uh, what I’m seeing the most is, ’cause you know, uh, what is it? One out of three Americans are overweight, something like that, some scary stat. Yeah. Sleep apnea. Hormones are low, especially in older individuals like myself.

[00:37:42] I would have never known to test the testosterone and my primary care physician didn’t do it. Right, right, right. And now she does ’cause now she’s doing the pellets and the pellets work for me by the way. Um, if there’s any older people listening, I get the pellets every five or six months depending on when my testosterone drops.

[00:37:57] That way I don’t have to take the shot. It’s all natural. Mm. Uh, it’s completely changed my world, especially with my relationship with some other reasons that testosterone’s important. Yeah. But I just see a lot of coaches who just throw their people into their program and then they don’t get results and they wonder why, and it’s because there’s something going on that they can’t see.

[00:38:15] Right. Right. But next is though, when you look at some of those that they’re… We have this thing called the obstacle deep nexus analysis. We call it the ODNA. And there’s a reason we, we call it that because there’s five areas that I kind of gave a preview of before- We find a lot of times that I see a lot of fitness coaches who don’t work on a person’s mindset first.

[00:38:35] So I would advise everyone listening and to, to try to find something that you can do to help somebody develop their mindset. One of my favorite books to use with coaching clients, and you can just take this, uh, it’s called The Mountain Is You. Okay. The Mountain Is You. Because people always ask me… The testosterone thing definitely helped me lose the 40 pounds, but what I really feel like helped me the most was my mindset.

[00:38:58] I never wanted to be that gallon-toting gym bag douchebag who skipped out on wine night to go work out when he’s at a conference. Well, guess what? Now I’m that gallon-toting gym bag douchebag who skips out on wine night, and that’s how I lost the 40 pounds. But when I read that book, the very first chapter is called Self-Sabotage.

[00:39:15] Right, right. And it talks a lot about identity. And so I would try to learn as much as I… If I was a coach, a fitness coach again, I would… Or again, if I was a fitness coach, I would really work hard on some NLP training. I would also work hard on, uh, trying to diagnose the real problem that people are going through, and put that as part of your coaching program.

[00:39:35] Have some, even if it’s some basic work or just as simply as giving them that book as part of your coaching program as a bonus. It changes lives. I’ve had, I’ve got three coaching clients reading it right now. That’s our focus right now. Because when you have the wrong identity, it will help you self-sabotage yourself with everything you do.

[00:39:53] Right, right. And I see this a lot in business. So our business coaching program is called M3 Mastery, and M3 stands for mindset, uh, margins, and momentum. We’ve always felt like if we can build the business owner that builds the business, we’ll be much more successful. And a lot of times we have to raise that belief lid.

[00:40:10] Like I just had somebody, uh, she’s a coach in a different profession, just met her at a conference one time, and she’s like, “Well, I’ll never be as big as you.” And I’m, and then she’s like, “But I’ve got these other… I think I need to work on my marketing.” And so she just… And I was like, “Okay, wait a minute.

[00:40:24] This is not a marketing problem. This is not a sales problem. I know you think it is, but let’s go back to what you just said. I’ll never be as big as you. Why?” “Who’s told you that?” And she just immediately said, she, her head went down and she said, “My mom.” Mm. “My mom is still blown away that I’m doing this.”

[00:40:41] I’m like, “You’ve created an $800,000 a year business. You did it.” Mm. “Many people would kill to be where you’re at.” Yeah. “You absolutely have the framework to get it back,” but I said, “Who do you think’s holding you back?” And she’s like, “Well, I really…” She went back to the, the thing, the story we tell ourselves.

[00:40:59] Change your story, change your life, as, as Tony Robbins says. She was, went back and said, “But my marketing, if I just had better marketing, I could grow.” I was like, “No, no, no, no, no. I think you need to set a goal to get to $5 million.” And you could see her face kind of tense up. So I gave her the book The Mountain Is You.

[00:41:15] She read it. She’s like, “Oh my God. You’re so right. Let’s go. Five million, that’s our new goal.” So there’s more to it than that, but I think if you guys just read Mountain Is You or give it to some of your clients, you’ll start to get better results because you’ll start helping your clients with their identity, who they identify as, and it’s getting them to stop saying things like, “I’m fat.

[00:41:36] I drink too much.” Right. And when I started saying, “All right. Well, I’m an athlete. I walk 15,500 steps a day,” you know, I stopped drinking- It just was easier. Does help when you have a girlfriend who doesn’t drink, but I do miss my wine, I’ll be honest about that. But, uh, so yeah. So anyway, uh, is this helping?

[00:41:55] Is this the kind of stuff… I, I just think that more fitness coaches need to work on the mindset of the individuals they’re working with, because that’s why people get stuck. And my question for all of you listening, and, and you as a coach too, is how many times have you had clients you just can’t seem to get them to break free?

[00:42:10] Oh, yeah. No, absolutely. Or they won’t do the work that you’re supposed to do, but then they keep coming back to you for help. Yeah. That’s why I wrote Beyond Blind Blaming, is to help people, coaches, uh, leaders get to the root cause of a problem that their clients, their employees, their team can’t seem to fix.

[00:42:26] And when you start to develop, you gotta start with yourself first. And sometimes that Mountain Is You book might be the solution. My book might give you some other ideas. Um, but I just think as coaches, we need to do a better job of finding out what is the real root cause, and nobody really has a methodology until now, and it’s working really well.

[00:42:43] And it’s really, as I said, humbling and exciting for me, ’cause y- everybody on this call or that’s listening knows what it’s like to pour your heart and soul into your coaching program and then get frustrated when people don’t get the results you want. Right, right, right. Wow, this has been fantastic, Kevin.

[00:42:59] I, I really appreciate you jumping on the show. I, I have two books now that I have to dive into. Yours, of course, um, and The Mountain Is You. So I, I, I, I, I always throw an audio book on every time I go to the gym, so I burn through books like nobody’s business. So I’m exci- Nice … I’m always looking for some new stuff, so I thank you for sharing that as well.

[00:43:19] Yeah, I look forward to hearing what you think. Absolutely. And I’d love to talk again once you get through it. So I always- Oh, yeah … I always enjoy talking to people after they read it, like that COO that, that switched to his AI company, and another woman who’s a real estate agent who just said, “Gosh, you’ve completely changed my business, uh, and my life.”

[00:43:34] It’s just fascinating what people get out of the book. It’s very, as I said, humbling and, and exciting. Oh, yeah. No, I’m gonna read it, and I’m gonna have you back if you want. And, you know Oh, yeah. I’d love it. Yeah, let’s do it. Love to have you. Would love to have you back after you read it, ’cause you’ll get a better idea of, and probably come up with a lot more questions.

[00:43:49] Oh, absolutely. Yeah, no, I’m looking forward to that. I’m gonna definitely… That, that’s, that’s my Saturday to-do list, for sure. Awesome. But, uh, Kevin, again, you’ve been great. Please tell us how we can get in touch with you, how to get your great book, and anything that you wanna share as far as website, social media handles.

[00:44:06] I wanna give you the opportunity to do that. Yeah. So I’m on, um, blindblaming.com is the best place you can go. Blindblaming.com. And the book’s on Amazon. That’s where I prefer people get the book. Awesome. Uh, if you’d like a signed copy, just let me know and, and we can, um, get a signed copy out to anybody that’s listening as well, so.

[00:44:21] Excellent. Wow, that’s awesome. Okay, appreciate that, Kevin. All right, so listen, thanks for jumping up early with me today on a Saturday morning. Yeah. Hope you enjoy the rest of your day. You too. Thanks for having me. It’s great. Okay, thanks.