145: These 6 Habits Will Transform Your Life Before 8 AM | Hal Elrod – POE

What if you could tap into your full potential with as little as 6 minutes every morning? 

In episode 145 of Beyond A Million, Brad sits down with Hal Elrod, author of the international bestseller The Miracle Morning, to discuss his revolutionary S.A.V.E.R.S. method—a simple, 6-step process designed to transform your life in as little as 6 minutes a day.

Hal has already helped millions around the world change their lives with his Miracle Morning routine. Now it’s your turn.

Tune in!

Inspiring Quotes

• “If you don’t start thinking and living differently than 95% of our society, you will end up like them.” – Hal Elrod
• “Measure what matters.” – Brad Weimert
• “The key to success in anything in life is your level of commitment.” – Hal Elrod
• “You just need to keep doing shit. Even if you’re unclear on the grand vision, just keep doing shit.” – Brad Weimert
• “Embrace adversity.” – Hal Elrod
• “How you start your day sets the tone, context, direction and energy for the rest of the day. So if you have that purposeful morning, you have a purposeful day.” – Hal Elrod

• 00:00:00 Intro
• 00:01:46 Understanding The Miracle Morning 
• 00:13:37 The role of affirmations in personal development
• 00:17:23 Does it get boring talking about the same thing?
• 00:22:50 Creating the app 
• 00:33:08 Customizing your Miracle Morning 
• 00:35:16 Biggest mistake Hal has made
• 00:38:11 Biggest mistake new authors make 
• 00:45:56 Fighting cancer 
• 00:54:07 The role of adversity in personal development 
• 01:06:32 Outro

Hal Elrod 00:00
It took me six years to write the book. Robert Kiyosaki probably one of the biggest advocates of the miracle. Morning I handed him a book at a conference that we both spoke at. Never thought he’d read it. He read it three times. He said it’s transformed my marriage, my physical health, my mental well being, and I think he said his business as well. If you don’t start thinking and living differently than 95% of our society, you will end up like them.

Brad Weimert 00:24
Congrats on getting beyond a million. What got you here won’t always get you there. This is a podcast for entrepreneurs who want to reach beyond their seven figure business and scale to eight, nine and even 10 figures. I’m Brad weimert, and as the founder of easy pay direct, I have had the privilege to work with more than 30,000 businesses, allowing me to see the data behind what some of the most successful companies on the planet are doing differently. Join me each week as I dig in with experts in sales, marketing, operations, technology and wealth building, and you’ll learn some of the specific tools, tactics and strategies that are working today in those multi million, eight, nine and 10 figure businesses, life can get exciting beyond a million. Alrod, it’s always good to see you, man, you are in the new studio. You were in the old one, but this is round two of

Hal Elrod 01:09
us. Dude, this is nice, man. You always, I always feel worse about myself when I hang out

Brad Weimert 01:14
with you. So my, my ambition with any studio that we make is to have an environment that I want to just chill in, yeah, yeah, totally, yeah. No, that makes sense. It’s like my escape from the office, so I get to come hang out in the studio. Yeah? See,

Hal Elrod 01:28
I don’t want people to have my home address, and I only have a home office, so I don’t ever bring anybody over.

Brad Weimert 01:34
I know because when you first moved there, every time I would come over, you’d be like, don’t give this address to anybody. I was like, All right, man,

Hal Elrod 01:42
we had some stalker situations, so I was trying to, trying to escape, well,

Brad Weimert 01:46
we can talk about, you know, you moving to Texas and then moving out to the middle of nowhere, to, you know, protect yourself from the inevitable. But, but I want to talk, you know, last time we spoke, we spoke quite a bit about, I mean, last time I had you on the podcast, yeah, we talked a lot about the business of the Miracle Morning and some of the elements of sort of crafting a It’s not even like a perennial bestseller, but it’s a perennial. Is that? Is that, like,

Hal Elrod 02:15
that’s what it is, is it? It’s a perpetual perennials, perpetual basis.

Brad Weimert 02:19
What’s the difference between that and, like, I think of perennial as annual or related to annual. Maybe I just don’t know the word, yeah, perennials also flower. I

Hal Elrod 02:26
think I’m totally lost. So we’re talking about but I think a perennial bestseller is a bestseller. The book just keeps selling. It becomes like a word of mouth phenomenon, right? And so just keep selling year after year after year after year. Yeah?

Brad Weimert 02:38
Well, that’s why I thought year after year, yeah, Ryan Holiday to tell us what the fuck That’s right, but we didn’t talk about, like, what the Miracle Morning was at all. I want to talk about that a little bit. I want to talk about the app a little bit, and and then just sort of the progression of things. So for those that don’t know the Miracle Morning, I will start, and I want you to explain it. But I will start by saying that I didn’t really understand what was going on when you when you first got really excited about it and then launched the book. And I was even though you don’t remember this, No,

Hal Elrod 03:15
you were there buddy, helping me put orders in Amazon until two or three in the morning. Yeah, I have forgotten that a few but a few times I don’t remember. I don’t forget anymore. Yeah,

Brad Weimert 03:24
I remind you. Shane, yeah, that’s why I agree about it, yeah, but you launched it at midnight, Pacific time in 2012 Yeah,

Hal Elrod 03:34
1212, 12. That was a I wanted a date that I wouldn’t forget, right, right? So

Brad Weimert 03:39
what the fuck is Miracle Morning, and why does anybody care? Yeah, anybody

Hal Elrod 03:42
care? Yeah, the short answer, you know, I don’t have those, but the short answer, it is a, it’s a morning ritual, right? And it is what makes it unique. And I’ve realized this actually with, you know, I know we’re gonna talk about the app a little bit, which I think is an interesting development. But I realized when I was explaining the app to people, oh, I go, that’s what makes the Miracle Morning unique. The same thing makes the app unique. And what I mean is, like, there’s a lot of meditation apps out there. There’s a lot of morning routines where you wake up and you, you know, maybe you meditate in the morning, or you go for a run. What I did is, in 2008 when I was, you know, at rock bottom financially, I was like, I need to turn my life around. I need to figure out what the world’s most successful people do every day. What are their rituals and routines? I’m gonna need to start figuring that out so that I can turn my life around. And it was really quickly I went, Okay, there’s six practices that seem to be consistent, no matter who you study or ask throughout history that they attribute their success to. It was one of these six. And these are the savers, for memory’s sake, the acronym savers, the first S is silence, and that’s it started as meditation. But you know, it could be prayer, it could be breath work, it could be reflection, right? Just spending that time in peaceful, purposeful silence to calm your nervous system, gain clarity, get centered for the day. So that’s the s, and savers, the as. Affirmations. And affirmations, I think, are the most misunderstood form of personal development or self optimization, either because of Stuart smalley’s Saturday Night Live skit right in the 90s, I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and dog gun at people like me, or because just a lot of self help gurus have taught like, just affirm what you want to be as if you were the thing, right? If you’re struggling financially, just say I am rich or I will. And it doesn’t work. And people are like, the affirmations are silly. They’re goofy. And so for me, I figured I just I studied all these different ways of doing it. It was like, Oh, you can do affirmations in a way where you’re not just affirming something that you wish were true. You’re actually affirming what you’re committed to in terms of an outcome or a habit, then you’re affirming why it’s a must for you, so that you’re keeping that top of mind. Then you’re affirming which actions you’re going to take and when you’re going to take them, so that you’re keeping the things clear that will get you where you want to go. Right? The V and savers is visualization. And I always say, look at the world’s greatest athletes, like they visualize themselves, not just this isn’t the vision board, right? See the whole goofy like, oh, make a vision board and then all those things will magically attract into your life through the law of attraction. No, this is the way that athletes visualize themselves performing in the midst of difficult circumstances on the court or the field at their best, they mentally rehearse it. So when it’s time to actually play the game, in this case, the game of business or the game of life. You’ve already gone there in your mind and in your body and in your emotions. You’ve mentally rehearsed performing at your best, and then it’s easy when you’re out there. The E is for exercise, just starting the day with some movement. The R is for reading. A lot of the most successful people in the world, they’ll tell you, that’s the books I read, right? And the final S is for scribing, which is a fancy word for writing or journaling. I’ll just, I’ll wrap this up by I’ll quote Robert Kiyosaki. I’ll paraphrase Robert Kiyosaki author Rich Dad. Poor Dad is probably one of the biggest advocates of the Miracle Morning. I handed him a book at a conference that we both spoke at. Never thought he’d read it. He read it three times, and at the end of our he had me on rich dad radio, and he said, Hal, um, before the Miracle Morning, every successful person on the planet swears by at least one of the savers. You know, a lot of successful they do one of these, or maybe two or three at the most. He said, In all my years of personal development, I’ve never met anyone that did all six of these timeless best practices. And he said, I now do it every single day. And he said three areas of his life, he said it’s transformed my marriage, my physical health, my mental well being. And I think he said his business as well. But so that, for me is That’s the miracle morning. It’s it’s not just waking up and doing one, two or three, it’s doing all six of the, arguably the world’s most timeless, proven personal development practices.

Brad Weimert 07:35
I guess so. First and foremost, I look at a lot of the the things that you just said in the morning rituals as it’s just good to have good habits, and it’s good to start the day with good habits that reinforce good behaviors that you want. And I look at most of the things on that list that way. Why does this? Why does the idea of the Miracle Morning continue to pick up steam and perpetually dominate and create bestseller status across the board? How much more can you say than wake up early, do your shit and live a good life and

Hal Elrod 08:14
that, and all that’s been said before? Right? Right? The I think there’s a couple of things, you know, I’ve definitely reverse engineered my my book in terms of like, okay, why is answering that exact question, like, why is this such a word of mouth phenomenon? Few things, one is, I think that my story is a part of it, right? So for those that don’t know, you know, though, I was hit in a car accident when I was 20, hit head on by a drunk driver, found dead at the scene, died for six minutes, came out of a coma. Six days later, told I would never walk again, and bounce back, not in this really inspiring way.

Brad Weimert 08:43
And since then, you’ve been taking life head on. That’s right, that was your first book. That

Hal Elrod 08:47
was my first book, taking life at on. Dude. I

Brad Weimert 08:49
actually had somebody in Studio A week ago, and I’m sitting with this kid, and he apparently was from Michigan, where I’m from. Grew up in Cutco, but like, 10 years after us okay? And read, taking life head on, shut up, yeah? And he was like, Oh yeah, I read Hals first book. And when he said that, and I just in my head, re associated it Miracle Morning, yeah? And then he said that, and I was like, oh shit, that was his first book. Yeah, forgot about that. Yeah, yeah. And

Hal Elrod 09:19
so, so that’s a part of it, right? Is that people are a lot of people. When I people, when I meet them, that are Miracle Morning fans or that practitioners, they that my story is the thing they’re like, man, you your story inspired me. So there. So there’s that. That’s a piece of it. It’s like, oh, wow, if this guy, after what he went through, could bounce back, man, the stuff that I’ve been using as an excuse and justification for me settling in my life, and that was a big part of the book, took him on a journey of like, acknowledging that what I called the 95% reality check, and it was based on a Social Security Administration study that said 95% of people at you know, like retirement age, are dependent on either the government or family to take care of them. And I said, Look, if you don’t start thinking and living different. Than 95% of our society, you will end up like 90 you will end up like them. Just never do you think any of them thought they would end up there? No, they all have big hopes and big dreams and thought it would turn out you have to start through like it was a real big gut check in the beginning of the book. Like, Oh, dang. Okay. I like, I have to take my life seriously. Like, this is a serious thing, if I don’t decide now is the time what tomorrow will be different. I’ll decide tomorrow like so it was a real I was it took me six years to write the book. I was so intentional, and I rewrote it, and then I went back and I read it, and I rewrote it, and I rewrote it. And then one other piece is that, um, is the the the way I wrote the book is I wanted it to play like a movie, where I wanted every chapter to end, and it was like a cliffhanger, and they’re like, Oh crap, I gotta keep reading. I gotta keep reading. I gotta keep reading. That was a part of it. And then the last thing I’ll say is the saver’s acronym. That is, I did not understand the importance of that, and that was me writing the book. And one day I was frustrated. I had these six practices, no acronym, and I couldn’t figure out a way to link them. And I was, I went. I went for a walk out of my office to get some air, and just I was frustrated. And my wife Ursula caught me in the hall, and she goes, Hey, sweetie. Hey. She goes, What’s wrong? I said, I got, I can’t figure out how to put this book together. I said, all of the great authors have some sort of formula like Stephen Covey’s got The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People. Robert Kiyosaki has got the Cash Flow Quadrant. I have these six hodgepodge practices that I didn’t invent any of them. They’ve been around for 1000s of years, and I can’t figure out how to organize them. She goes, Why don’t you get a thesaurus and see if you can swap any of the words and then create an acronym that people will remember, and they can just run through the acronym. And I was like, I gave her a kiss. I was like, brilliant. And so meditation became silence, and journaling became scribing, and the A, V, E, R stayed the same, Affirmations, Visualization, exercise and reading, right? So the Savers were born, and I didn’t realize, but if you go into the Miracle Morning Facebook group, there’s 350,000 people in there, more often than not, or as often as people say, I did a miracle morning. They go, I woke up and did my savers today. I love my savers. And even Robert Kiyosaki in the Miracle Morning documentary, he said, I love the savers. He goes because my brain he goes, which is going a million miles an hour. I wake up and I go, okay, S I do that. And then I go, what’s next? A I do that. He goes. So it works for my brain, and for a lot of people, it’s like they just, they can easily do it. So just it, made it accessible, made it memorable and made it shareable.

Brad Weimert 12:36
Yeah, I think that that’s like, a phenomenally important point that people frequently sweep away as a pedantic detail totally. And I think that there are tons of these things in marketing and in life in general, but specifically marketing and design, where people discount the small details and fail to realize that the small details are the big details. Acronyms are one of them, yeah, yeah, any little thing that you can do that will stand out and create memorability, yeah, makes a world of difference. And there are, there are. I mean, Apple is a really good example of design excellence, yeah, but there are tons of things in their esthetic design that is just simple that keeps things together, and naming conventions are one of those. Yeah, absolutely, if

Hal Elrod 13:25
I wouldn’t. I mean, I really believe, if it wasn’t for that moment in the hallway with my wife, or some where that acronym, if it wasn’t for the sabers acronym, the Miracle Morning, would not be a word of mouth phenomenon.

Brad Weimert 13:37
So I want to talk about affirmations for a second. Do you ever feel like a fraud when you’re doing

Hal Elrod 13:42
affirmations? No, because, and that’s because you’re doing them the wrong way. So I’m glad. I’m glad you brought this up. I didn’t say I did. I asked you if you Yeah, sound like you were starting to say like a fraud? Yeah, no, but the way that affirmations are taught, people feel like a fraud because they’re like, I am blank, and it’s an aspiration, not a reality, and so they I am wealthy. No, no, you’re not. You’re broke, damn it. Yeah, you’re right, you know? Well, I

Brad Weimert 14:04
feel like, sometimes I feel like, more accurately, with me, I’ve gone through phases where that’s been a significant part of my life, and phases where it hasn’t. For me, sometimes I feel like I’m trying to trick myself deliberately, if I’m doing affirmations, yeah, meaning that I’m saying something that is reiterating a desire or a belief or a path, and it is aspirational and it’s not I’m not lying to myself, but I’m stating something that’s not there yet or that I’m aspiring towards. At a minimum, sometimes I just feel like I’m trying to program myself manually. Yeah, and I

Hal Elrod 14:41
have friction with that, yeah, so let me so this is the way that I teach affirmations and that I practice. I mean, everything that I teach is what I practice. Miracle Morning wasn’t the book idea. It was my morning routine, and then I, you know, shared with my coaching clients, and it worked for them. And so I wrote a book about it, but with affirmations. So there’s three steps that I do in the affirmation. Step one is, affirm what you’re committed to, right? So. I don’t say I am a millionaire or I am a whatever. I say I am committed to blank. And the blank could be a result that you’re like no matter what, I’m gonna do everything in my power, no matter how long it takes to generate ten million in revenue, whatever it is. So I’m committed to blank. It could be the blank, could be the outcome, or it could be the habit. I’m committed to exercising five days a week, 20 minutes a day. No matter what, there is no other option. And that’s how I word it, I’m committed to blank. No matter what, there is no other option. So that’s step one, and now you’re not a fraud, because you’re only a fraud. Now, if you lack integrity, you don’t follow through with what you said you’re committed to, right? But the statement itself is no longer some aspirational I am, whatever that you’re not yet that thing, it’s no, I’m committed to this so slight shift in language. And here’s the thing, you know, this, the key to success in anything in life is your level of commitment. So the beauty of that is you’re reinforcing that every morning you’re going, I am committed to this. I’m committed to this. If you only said it once and you weren’t committed in the past, then the past is going to win and you’re going to go back into your old habits. But if every day you’re keeping that commitment top of mind, you literally, I always say that what you affirm repeatedly becomes your reality. So if you affirm that you’re committed to this thing repeatedly, day after day after day after day, then you are, you’re becoming committed. Yeah, I

Brad Weimert 16:15
mean, I think I look at it very much like measure what matters. And it’s like anything in life, whether it’s business or it’s sports or if you’re not tracking those things and you’re not looking at what the goal is, the expectation of getting there is ridiculous. So affirmations, I think, are the same way in a lot of ways, if you’re doing them that way, what do you think the value is in saying it out loud versus reading it.

Hal Elrod 16:41
I honestly don’t know I read it. I don’t say it out loud typically, but I’ve heard, you know, I’ve heard people say that, you know, that creates more of a an impact if you I do say, read it with emotion, like, like when you read it, don’t read it passively. Like you say, I’m committed to losing 10 pounds no matter what, there’s no versus I am committed, even if you’re thinking, if you’re thinking it with conviction, with passion. And so, yeah, so I don’t know. I also had people tell me that they will record their affirmations into like, their iPhone digital voice recorder, then they’ll listen to them back while they’re running on the treadmill. So and that I again, I’ve never, I haven’t done it. I get my old habit of how I do with my things, but I think that’s a great idea.

Brad Weimert 17:23
Well, to that end, you have now subjected yourself to a life where you were talking about morning routines probably every day of your life for more than a decade. Yeah. Is it boring? Does it bother you ever that you have to be like, just hammering away at this thing routinely, and you’re constantly asked about it? Yeah? Not

Hal Elrod 17:40
really, because I think that for me, like I just gave I’m doing a five month training for doTERRA, the company, and they, they’re, you know, I don’t know, 100 million dollar $200 million marketing, network marketing company, but, um, the so the first month was Miracle Morning, right then I’m like, Alright, gotta create, back to the when I used to create new content for like, weekly or monthly coaching programs. And so month two, I did a leadership training, you know, and and so, and often I’m talking about my story, and I’ve other books, right? So I’ll do the miracle equation, you know. So yeah, and for whatever reason, I get into a zone of, like, authentic passion, because I’m like, I know this is going to help somebody that’s listening. So I think that for me, right? Because it’s not about me. If I was like, Oh, I’m bored talking about this, that’s making it about me. But I’m like, I’m this is for somebody else, you know. And so how can I deliver this in the most authentic, excited, you know, way that I possibly can? So, yeah,

Brad Weimert 18:37
yeah. Do you think there’s any element of it that is not the passion for helping the other people, but is the realization that because you’ve done it so many times, you’re really good at explaining it, so you know it’s going to hit

Hal Elrod 18:52
maybe, but it depends. I mean, sometimes when I’m explaining it similar to when I’m probably you, like, where you’re in your head going, I’ve already heard this before. I’m going, I’ve already said this for said this before, and am I saying it too much? Am I is this Do they need? Am I giving them enough context? Should I be saying this shorter so, like, there’s a second insecure voice in my head of, like, you know, but like, my speech for sure that, like, I’m really, that’s I. I’m better at, like, when I’m on stage speaking, I’ve done it so many times, and my speech is very close to the same every time, and I know how it’s going to land. I know people are gonna, you know, it’s gonna really impact them. So that for sure the answer to your question that, like, I know I’m good at this, but if I’m on, you know, I don’t know other context podcasts that are fluid, that aren’t right, like a speech, I’m in control of the whole thing, right, right? I’m not in control of a podcast or, you know what I mean, so, so, so even though I’m ex that that’s what’s interesting, too, right? So I’ll explain one piece of it, right, maybe based on the question that you asked me, but in a speech, everything flowed together, where I’m like, oh, did I, should I explain something else before I got to the you know what I mean? So there’s a lot of like. Like inconsistency when it’s an interview. So, yeah, yeah, man, I

Brad Weimert 20:04
think that that’s one of the really challenging things about an interview format. Yeah, absolutely. I think that. And it could be podcasts, could be traditional media podcasts, I think, tend to be easier, yeah, in terms of the format. But when you have somebody that you’re talking to that has a very different communication cadence than you, yeah, that’s probably the nicest way I could say that. Yeah, it’s difficult to deliver complicated concepts. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. You’re like, Hey, calm the fuck down. I haven’t gotten the foundation down yet. Yeah,

Hal Elrod 20:40
yeah, no, no, totally, yeah. I’ve done, I’ve done interviews before on podcast. I remember this one with his name was Mark groves, but I went back and watched it, I was like, oh my god, that was the perfect interview, right? So, and both of us are the one that we did, yeah? Except that was, yeah, that was another one. But no, but, like, it was, and it was, I don’t know if it was, he’s a great interviewer. It was the synergy. It was I was on that day, and probably all of the above, yeah. But I’m literally like, if I could duplicate that interview every time. Oh man, yeah. So

Brad Weimert 21:12
when I was, when I was much younger, I used to, there’s gonna be a point to this. Oh

Hal Elrod 21:17
Jesus, when

Brad Weimert 21:20
I was much younger, I remember women saying, You’re a really good kisser, and I didn’t know how to respond to that. And eventually it came to me that my response would be, no, we kiss very well together.

Hal Elrod 21:38
Good. That’s a smooth line, isn’t it? Right? It’s

Brad Weimert 21:40
a good response, yeah. But I also very much believe that Yeah, and I believe the same thing about conversation, right? I think that it is very much a two person activity, and you feed off each other’s energy. And there are, and I think we all know this sort of through life, there are just some people that charge you, and some people things feel effortless, yeah? And you can just be present and go with it, yeah? And definitely interviews fall into that category for me, yeah, yeah. I

Hal Elrod 22:11
think about Kathy Heller, like they’re just been, I’ve been on shows, and it’s like, this feels so good, yeah, right, this feels so good. It’s fun, it’s easy, it’s I, you know, I love you. I remember when Kathy, this woman, Kathy Heller, her podcast is, don’t quit your day job. She’s phenomenal. But I at the I’m like, I told her, then I’m like, I love you. I felt, I just felt so much love toward her, and it’s just who she was, like, she’s just this really loving, beautiful person, just like you read. I mean, it’s like the same,

Hal Elrod 22:45
you know, I feel like Andy, and you’re

Hal Elrod 22:46
a great kisser. I haven’t told you that in a

Brad Weimert 22:50
while. I don’t know where to go with that. This took a turn. Yeah, where’s Justin Donald always, always give some inappropriate jokes The Miracle Morning thing. You went a bunch of different paths with it. One was creating a documentary, creating the movie, which I’m in. The other important, very briefly.

Hal Elrod 23:13
The other is you created an app, yeah, and I guess I want you to also created a dozen books. I think it’s important to like the book series was the first thing that we spun off of the initial Miracle Morning book, yep. Then we started a series of books, which now there’s 1215, of, and I want to always acknowledge honor a quarter became an instrumental part of that. She helped me to produce that series, and co authored those books with me. But, and then the movie came out, yeah. And then, and then I think the app is probably the most recent thing Well, and that’s kind of

Brad Weimert 23:43
where I wanted to go with it, because, uh, there is just, I’ve heard you say before that the intention of the Miracle Morning, the mission of the Miracle Morning, was to, originally, it was to change a million lives one morning at a time, yep. And that mission, after selling 3 million plus copies, changed to to elevate consciousness one morning at a time. And if I look at sort of the path that you went down, the miracle morning as a book was consistently the thing that was growing, thriving, accelerating. Yeah, the offshoot books, the rest in the series never sold anywhere near what the original one did, and the movie also didn’t get the same attention that the original book did. Sure, what has your experience been with those at large and what brought you to the app, ultimately?

Hal Elrod 24:34
So what’s interesting, and I did not know this until I don’t know a couple years ago is doing some research for our accounting or something. But, um, the Miracle Morning Series books have sold over a million copies combined, collectively across the series which, but that which is crazy, right? So that’s a dozen books. That’s what we’re looking at. You know, 80,000 some copies per um. So that was, that was wild. I had no idea notable how. Yeah, yeah. And then, but yeah, the original book, still, the flagship book, you know, has done the best. So the app has been the most requested resource, you know, since the Miracle Morning book’s been out, which is, hey, when he came up with an app. And we actually had an app, initially, it was a fellow Cutco guy, had a company, and they built an app for the Miracle Morning. And it was super basic. And then they went out of business, and the app disappeared, like after a year. So that was like a nothing, you know, nothing burger, but, but for years, people have said, how, you know, I use six different apps for my miracle morning. I’ve got a meditation app, an affirmations app, a visualization app, a journaling app. I use, you know, iBooks for reading. I write on I would love to have, like, an all in one app. And so I got quotes over the years, but it was, like 150 200 grand to develop that level of an app. And I just, I’m like, I’m not in the app business. I don’t want to that little I might throw that money away and never see it again. So I was never willing to risk that kind of money. And then our mutual, you know, friend or acquaintance friend, Josh idenberg, he develops apps. And he was always, you know, Hal, you need an app. You need an app. Need an app. And I just kept saying, No, I can’t justify I don’t want to risk that amount of money or invest that kind of money. And he finally, one day said, How much money would you be willing to invest to, you know, to test this out, and then we could sell the app and reinvest the profits to build this ultimate app that you want. But what about for starting a really simple but effective, basic app? And he said, How much money would you be willing to throw at that? I mean, $10,000 I could give you $10,000 I may never see it again. Go create, you know, an app. So that’s what we did, yeah, yeah. And he developed a, it was basically a habit tracking app, but specific to the Savers, right? So every day, you checked off your essay, and it tracked which savers you did each day, and you did a 30 day challenge and that kind of thing. And then we put in some simple like a built in journal, which was very easy to code, right? It was not a lot, not expensive, and then a couple other features. And so that’s what we started at. And we sold it for $5 per app. And the first year, we sold 15,000 of those, so $75,000 and we reinvested all of that money into developing the eventual, the ultimate Miracle Morning, you know, all six practices out, um, year 170, 5000 and then at the end of that year, once we had developed an app, we created a subscription model where we partnered with this gal, Lucy Osborne, she’s, she’s the voice of the Miracle Morning app. She’s amazing and and we tell we vetted a bunch of, you know, we tried different, you know, audition different people. She was phenomenal. She now does. So there’s new content coming out all the time. There’s over 500 affirmations, there’s journaling prompts. There’s so 150 guided tracks, so you literally press play, and it guides you through all of your savers. Or, and you can organize it. You’re like, Okay, I just want to do visualization. So there’s these little symbols for each of the six practices. And so you can go, I want it. I want a track that will do all six, or I want just a track that’ll do a visualization and affirmations, right? And so now business wise, year two, the app did 368 No, sorry, well, year one of the subscription did $368,000 in revenue. So from 75 grand selling a $5 app, we then made the app free. And then a subscription, it was cheap. Initially it was inexpensive. It was like 899, a month, or $38 a year, something like that. Earn $368,000 in revenue year two. And then this is your three and we’re already over half a million dollars in revenue. It’s August. And so I think we’ll do seven, $800,000 in revenue just for the app. So it’s growing rapidly and and this is what I care about as an author. It’s always like, what are the reviews?

Brad Weimert 28:39
Yeah, right, it’s September, also, just so that we’re on the same page. But is

Hal Elrod 28:44
it really? Oh, you’re right,

Hal Elrod 28:47
but yeah, like

Hal Elrod 28:48
on Amazon, right? Like, if the book selling a lot, but you’re getting crap reviews, that’s not going to be a perennial bestseller. If the app is selling a lot because you have an email list or something, but you’re getting crap reviews. So the app has 5000 reviews across the App Store and the Google Play Store, 4.9 out of five stars. Jesus and so many people say, which gets me excited, because I’m not a big app guy. I mean, for certain things, but not for a miracle morning. Ironically. And so many people say that this is what I needed. I needed the accountability and the hand holding of this app. They’ll say, you know, I did the miracle morning for a year. I fell off for a year. I got the app. Now I’m on day 365, consecutively, right? So, yeah. So the app’s been, it’s been a huge win in terms of the value add for people, for readers, you know, and then business wise, it’s, you know, has the goal is that it becomes the next calm or headspace. And last thing I’ll say is that’s the unique differentiator. Calm is a meditation app, right? Headspace is a meditation app, and they might have some visualization in there. Miracle Morning is meditation, Affirmations, Visualization, exercise, reading and journaling all in one app.

Brad Weimert 29:55
How has the Miracle Morning app impacted books? Bills.

Hal Elrod 30:00
I always told Josh, I’m like, because Josh is thinking we got to advertise. I said, Josh, the reason our numbers are so good is because they’re coming from reading the book, right? And in the book, it says, we released an update edition in the book in December, and it has in there like, hey, download the app. If you like apps, it’ll, you know, it’s free, and you can upgrade to the paid subscription if you want. But, but that was always my theory. And so really exciting data that’s come back recently is the conversion for someone who’s read the book is like 28.9% don’t quote me, I’m making up the number, but, but if they haven’t read the book, it’s like 27 it’s like right below it. So people that haven’t read the book are still convert. They they’re liking the free app, they’re converting to the paid app. And then, so to your point, that would also make sense that they’re going to read the book. And right now we’re working on, how do we promote the book better in the app? Yeah,

Brad Weimert 30:49
I mean, certainly doing, you know, like a one click to Audible or something, yeah,

Hal Elrod 30:53
someplace to buy it. And we have book summaries in the app too. That’s we entered for the reading section. And there’s new book summaries coming out every single month. That’s, you

Brad Weimert 31:01
know, yeah, that’s cool. How many books are being sold right now? 12 years later,

Hal Elrod 31:05
we just did our big, huge push with the new the new edition. We did an update and expanded edition in December, wow, added 70 pages of new content. And the reason why is, like we talked about, when you go back and hear your own voice, you’re like, I was this sucks. I was terrible. Whenever I went back and read the Miracle Morning, I’m like, Oh, my God, I could have done so much better at this book. And it was self published, so I was able to, you know, I probably updated it three or four times over the last decade, like I did, make minor changes, but I always wanted to do, like, a full revamp, and I added 270 pages of new content. So I literally got to go back rewrite every page of the book. I mean, it’s the same basic book, right, but I added 25 pages to the saver section. It’s kind of like, hey, when I wrote this book, initially, I was only a year to end of the Miracle Morning, or I guess six years when it finished, but a year when it started. And then I was really a beginner, if not intermediate, yeah. And so now I know so much more about each of these practices. So I was able to, in this new edition, take somebody from beginner, you know, to intermediate to advanced, throughout the savers. And then I added two new chapters, the miracle life, your path to inner freedom, subtitle, and then the miracle evening, which is my evening ritual, which was, that was the one of the biggest questions always like, what’s your evening ritual? Uh, eight. Yeah, exactly 930 early. I do. I do. Yeah, my social life goes the back burner. My miracle morning. But anyway, so, so, so, yeah. So the new edition came out, and we just did a huge push. You know, best seller, USA Today, best seller. And think we sold 33,000 copies. You know when the book came out, that first month, and then now we’re averaging probably 5000 copies a month, if we include audible, right? So across the formats of paperback, Kindle and audible, about 5000 and by the way, we sell more books in Brazil, in Korea, and there’s 40 other countries. It’s published in 42 languages. It’s a better it’s sold more copies in other countries than it has in America, which is crazy.

Brad Weimert 33:08
Yeah, you’ve told me that. Then we hit on in the in our first interview, we hit on interview, first conversation, yeah, that we recorded. We hit on kind of that distribution model so people can check that out. They want to hear about how you self published but got paid to promote or to get your book promoted internationally, yeah, which is pretty neat. Yeah, if you’re doing miracle morning and you’re pressed for time, did you do you do less of the six things, or do you do a shorter version of the six things. So

Hal Elrod 33:41
it’s really up to anybody in terms of, there’s like, there’s a chapter at the end of the book, the new book, The original book, it’s always, it’s customizing your miracle morning to fit your lifestyle. And there’s also a chapter book called The six minute miracle morning. And that sounds like hyperbole, a little bit like something six minute abs, right? But it literally was something that I developed. I can picture the morning like I was rushed for time. I’m like, I gotta, you know, I like to do a one hour Miracle Morning, and I had, like, 15 minutes so I’d be out the door. And I go, no point. And then I go, Wait a minute. Something’s better than nothing. Yeah, what if I just did a six minute miracle morning where I set my timer for one minute and I did a minute of meditation, and I just calm my nervous system. And then timer goes off. I reset it. I pull up my affirmations, and I read the affirmations that remind me of the most important things I’m committed to. Timer goes off, right? And then visualization, then exercise. I get up and do a minute of jumping jacks, right? I’m getting blood to the brain, waking up my nervous system. And then I read a page out of a book, and then I journal what I’m grateful for, right? Like, and so I go to the six minute miracle warning, and it was literally six minutes. And I go, six minutes. And I go, Dude, I feel like 80% as fulfilled as if I had done a full hour. That’s crazy. So when I wrote the book, I was like, Well, I’ve got to include that in there. So it depends. And if someone’s using the app, that’s kind of the beauty of it is you can sort app tracks by, okay, I want an app track that does all six. Savers, and I want it to be under 10 minutes, or 20 minutes or 30, like, you can pick it and then that way. What’s nice about that is, it’s a done for you Miracle Morning, right? It’s like, you’re, you’re literally like, Okay, I don’t even think right now I got out the door in 10 minutes. Okay? I want all savers, and I want six minutes go,

Brad Weimert 35:16
yeah. I mean, the the app element is so relevant to all businesses because it facilitates the behavior that you want from your end users. Yeah, and I think that it’s something to think about in business in general, which is, if you’re selling something, if you have a service, whatever that is, what is the element that you can put in that actually makes the client experience not only better, but inevitable. Yeah, what do you think the biggest mistake is that you’ve made in pushing the Miracle

Hal Elrod 35:51
Morning out, probably not finding people that know how to build a business and doing it all on my own. You know, I really believe that the Miracle Morning is a $100 million brand. We should have Miracle Morning supplements and Miracle Morning, you know, smoothie recipes and Miracle Morning, you know, I mean, I don’t know, there’s just, there’s, there’s infinite things that we could have done. I’m building a business. Is not my strength. Whenever I do personality assessments, and I’ve, you know, I’ve stumbled into success and with different aspects of my business, so I’m decent at it, but, um, but the whenever I do, like a personality assessment, it I’m the communicator. I’m the performer, right? Like, that’s where I shine, is, you put me on stage, or rightly i or i can write a book. I can communicate in a way that people get, they understand. But in terms of, like, crunching the numbers, figuring out how to scale, not my strength, Brad, if you and I partnered, if I brought you into Miracle Morning, you could probably turn into $100 million

Brad Weimert 36:49
business. I offered to get your supplement brand off the ground, shut up probably, like, eight years ago, and you’re like, No, no, my pops is gonna do it. My father is doing that’s the worst.

Hal Elrod 36:59
Okay, so you just told me the biggest mistake that I ever made. Let’s do it, man, like it’s a huge and now at another company, they have a Miracle Morning supplement. Get the fuck outta Yeah, and so I don’t know if they have trademarked the category or just the one supplement, but it was when that happens, you go, Ah, why? That’s so stupid that I didn’t do that, what I have thought about, and I shouldn’t, you know, right? Let’s do this before this airs. Let’s go trademark this. Um, but I really do think pre made organic smoothies, Miracle Morning smoothies, that people are deliverables, houses, just packets that you mix with water and ice. Yeah, you know, I think that could be huge. And for me, like, I’m, I mean, you know, I’m not in it for the money. First, it’s got to be valuable, like, so I wouldn’t put out a supplement line. I see that a lot where brands right private label a shitty supplement with all sorts of fillers and crappy ingredients, like, it would have to be, you know, organic and so on and so forth. But, but, yeah, I think that’s the biggest opportunity. Is I if I would have brought someone that knew how to build a huge business, or said yes to you, damn it, then I think the Miracle Morning would be, you know, at least a ten million a year business, you know, yeah, it’s like around two ish. So

Brad Weimert 38:11
one of the things that you tend to do, which I love, is kind of give away the farm when you partner on things, yeah, I’m yeah. So your, you know, your default is to make sure that all people in the equation are winning, yeah. And it’s much more important than even picking the right person, probably Yeah, but certainly more important than trying to optimize for ROI. So I think if we find the right person to help with that thing, that’s probably the best path. Yeah, what do you think the biggest mistake is that new authors make?

Hal Elrod 38:51
Oh, great question. So biggest mistake new authors make is, I would say two pieces of it, I would look at the way they write their book, like the content and and then, and then their expectation, or their plan to market their book and in terms of the content, that’s part of the reverse engineering where I’ve gone, okay, why is the Miracle Morning gone? Why is it so sticky? Why are people actually doing it? Because most books, as we know you don’t actually implement right. People read a book, and they trick themselves into thinking, Oh, wow, now I know all this stuff that I didn’t know before I read the book. That’s awesome. I can’t wait to read the next book on my shelf, right? And then they just go to the next book, and then the next book and the next book, and they they’re delusionally thinking that each book, that reading it is the accomplishment, right? Like checking it off, and there’s some value in that. But of course, if you don’t implement, you know, if you read a book on losing weight, and you don’t do the thing, it’s not gonna really benefit you other than the knowledge that you have. And so the first mistake authors make is they their book does not result in a change in people’s behavior. Yeah, I

Brad Weimert 39:58
love that way. I’d also say that. I don’t, I don’t know that you even get knowledge if you read a book and don’t implement anything. Yeah, I think more than likely you read a book don’t implement then you forget. You forget. Yeah, so you’re probably just a dummy for spending the time reading the book. Yeah, it literally, it’s

Hal Elrod 40:12
just an emotional high, right, right? I’m reading the book. Aha, that feels good. You’re entertained. Um, yeah, and so Miracle Morning, it leads to a change in daily behavior, and that’s why it is so a effective in terms of creating lasting transformation for people, because it changes their behavior. They start actually doing the Miracle Morning. The entire book is designed to hold their hand through all of the self doubt, fear and mental objections and obstacles that they might have. The entire book holds their hand through, getting through all of those and then leading them and setting them up for success, mentally first, and then logistically, to implement a miracle morning and commit to a 30 day challenge with the idea that after 30 days you’re going to this will be a habit. It will be easy for you, and then you sustain it beyond that, and just live your life in 30 day challenges. So that that was a big part of it. And for most people, again, your book, it just changes their thinking. So every author, they their book should guide people to a behavior change. And again, we there’s so many nuances in that like, Okay, if I just said, change somebody’s behavior, but you don’t actually handle the objections that they’re having. For me, my entire writing process was like, Okay, what are they thinking after this sentence? What are they thinking after this sentence? What are they feeling after this sentence? What objection do they have after this section of the book? Right? What? What’s their fear, their doubt, and that’s why I was so six years and meticulously writing it. And so it handles all of the objections, all of the fears, all I’m not a morning person. I’ve never been a morning person. I’ve tried and I failed. I suck at changing habits, right? All of that. So that’s the first piece, in terms of the content. And then I can talk about the promotion part. Sure, yeah. I

Brad Weimert 42:00
mean, I think, you know, the promotion part’s interesting. To me, because we talked about this last time we spoke and recorded, and you had spent the first year promoting the Miracle Morning, basically to no good end. Yeah, yeah. You promoted for a year. You were on a fuck ton of podcasts. You spoke a shitload all over the country, and you sold like, 14,000 copies or something.

Hal Elrod 42:24
Yeah, my goal was 1 million copies, and that was like, everything in my heart and soul. I was doing everything I could to sell a million and I was 986,000

Brad Weimert 42:32
copies short. Now, at some point you got on Pat Flynn’s podcast, which was a lever to get more exposure sell more. You had a convert. Pat was a curmudgeon in the morning. Yeah, and it the book changed his entire approach that’s unique to you, perhaps. What are the things from a promotional perspective, that a new author can do to get a fast start for launching a book? You know, I

Hal Elrod 42:55
don’t know about a fast start. I think that’s the biggest that’s actually the biggest mistake, is authors focus on their start, and then they based on how successful they are out the gate, determines how motivated, motivated they are to keep going and out the gate. Now, I mean, I did I use my Cutco skills? I got on and I cold call or not? Cold called. I warm called. I called every one I’d ever spoken for. I called you. I called all of my friends, all of my clients, I pre sold 5000 copies over the phone, not over email, over the phone, 5000 copies with a printed out spreadsheet, right? Like and I would sell 50 copies. And I created packages. I modeled Tim Ferriss, you know, his book was the big book when I was writing Four Hour Workweek was the hit when I was writing the Miracle Morning. So I was like, how did he launch his book? So I was modeling, oh, he created this, like, all these awesome bonus levels, where if you buy this many copies, you get this awesome bonus, if you buy 100 to buy 250, 500 1000 so I modeled his, his promotion, and then that’s, I called people to sell those. So that was that. So I had a huge I had a good start, like 5000 copies out the gate, but then it dropped to like 300 copies a month because I had no audience. So there was nobody to sustain it. People were just reading the book. So for me, here’s the mistake authors make, is they, they don’t commit for the long haul, I committed that I will keep promoting this book until I reach a million, until I change 1 million lives one morning at a time, and I thought I could do it in a year. And I was again, 98.7% 987,000 copies short. So I tried again in year two, and I went from 13,000 copies year one to 23,000 copies year two. And I mean, this is like full time job, pretty much, right? I’m right, but I’m, yeah, I’m making in the hundreds of dollars a month out, deflated for these efforts, right? Yes, but I’m getting feedback of this book radically. It saved my marriage. It changed my life. It got me off my depression, you know, whatever. And so I’m like, okay, so I know it works. I just have to keep going and it. And I will say this by the time I got on Pat Flynn’s pocket. I was averaging 2000 copies a month. That was a year and a half later. So after a year and a half, I got for I was averaging 2000 copies a month, and that was word of mouth that point. So that’s because of the way I structured the content to guide people to changing their behavior. And let me say this on that the reason that’s so important is not only for the personal impact of the person, but if all they do is read your book and feel better and then read the next book, they’re not going to talk about your book when they’re reading the next book or the next book or the next book. But if your book changed their behavior and they’re doing the thing every day that you taught them to do, now they’re going to keep talking about the thing they’re doing and pointing back to your book. That’s why the Miracle Morning is such a word of mouth phenomenon, and that’s why, a year and a half later, after all those podcasts, most of them which were nobody, you know, small podcasts, no big name podcast, it was averaging 2000 copies a month because of the word of mouth that I had built, month after month after month after month because people are reading it and they’re talking about it. Yeah,

Brad Weimert 45:56
that makes sense. The Passion Driven thing for entrepreneurship is interesting because I think it’s unusual, and I very much am of the belief that you just need to keep doing shit. And if you’re unclear on some grand vision, just keep doing shit. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. If you don’t know the answer to something, you can act your way out of zero results by just continuing to do shit, your path changed rather radically. A handful of years ago, you had moved to Austin, and you text me and said, Hey, I don’t know what’s wrong. I’m going back to the hospital again. This is the second time, and the first time I went, they drained some fluid from my lung, and I’m back again. So I came to the hospital along with David Osborne, and we were waiting for the result, and I remember talking to David about it at the time and sort of expressing concern. But back to what we were talking about before we started. I was sort of emotionally dead, yeah. And I was like, I don’t know. I’ll be fine. Maybe it’ll be cancer, whatever. It’s fine, and there’s no reason to be concerned about it until we know. And sure enough, it was cancer, yeah. How did and so you had a couple year bout with cancer. How did the experience with cancer and the treatment impact your connection to the mission of Miracle Morning and impact the business in general? Yeah, yeah. And

Hal Elrod 47:38
I think it’s important. I’ll just, I’ll mention that the survival rate was 20 to 30% for my cancer, right? So this wasn’t a common cancer, it was a very rare cancer. And when I went into the hospital, you mentioned, my lung being drained, my lung, my heart was failing and my kidneys were failing. So my they gave me one to three weeks to live. They said, If you don’t start chemo, you have one to three weeks to live. And I don’t fully trust the Western medical system. So I said, let me do my own, you know, due diligence. I called some of the best holistic oncologists in the country. I was like, Hey, can I avoid this really intensive chemotherapy regimen they want to put me on? And two of these very well respected holistic oncologists said, Nah, unfortunately, your particular cancer, there’s no other option, like, you will be dead in a week. You know, your organs are already shutting down. You. Chemo is the only thing that can save you at this point. So I reluctantly did chemo. So, um, what it did for me? You know, I don’t know. I guess, actually, I do know, um, the when I had my car accident, I was 20 years old, and I immediately was like, How can I use this experience to help other people, and where that comes from is when I was eight years old, my baby sister AMRI died in front of me. She died in my mother’s arms at home and heart failure, and my mother, who is, of course, devastated, I think she was probably 30 at the time, 30 years old, and my sister was 18 months old, and I was eight years old, my mom and dad were devastated, especially my mom and but within I think six months or so, my mother was leading a support group for other parents who had lost children and and then my dad and our whole family. But my dad headed it up. He started a fundraiser to raise money every year. We sold newspapers for an entire day out, like on street corners and stuff to raise money for Valley Children’s Hospital, where they tried to save my sister’s life, and they treated her while she was alive. And so I didn’t realize it at the time, right? But the seed, I think, was planted that when you go through adversity, when you go through difficult times in your life, whether you say it’s I think it’s our responsibility, but that’s a choice that you could say, I don’t I don’t owe anybody anything. That’s a choice too. That’s fine. Either. Both are equally true, but I believe that it’s my responsibility to share what I can that can help other people in any way that I can. And so when I had my car accident, I was like, oh. Go, okay. I remember, I told my dad. The doctors called me, and they thought I was in denial, because I was so happy and upbeat when I’m being told I’m never going to walk again. I’ve got a my femur is broken in half. My pelvis is broken in three places. My arms broken in half. My elbows shattered. My eye sockets shattered. I’ve got, you know, I’m in bad shape. I’ve, you know, I’ve got metal rods my body, and I’m in a in a hospital bed, like I can’t move and and I’m all happy drugs. It was the drugs. No, I actually got off the drugs almost immediately. But, anyway, but, but no, that’s, that’s a potentially that. But I So, so I told the doctor, or I told my dad. I said the doctor said I was in denial because I was happy that I was delusional and in denial. And I said, dad, my dad talked to me about it, and he said, Hey, you know, how are you really feeling? How when the doctors aren’t around, we’re not around and your friends aren’t around to distract you? Are you depressed? Are you scared? Are you, you know, worried about never walking again? What? How are you feeling? And I said, Dad, I can’t change what happened to me, so there’s no point in being all the things that you just mentioned. I’m just grateful that I’m alive, and I’m trying to figure out how, why did this happen to me, not from a victim perspective, but from a How can I use this experience to help other people? And I said, Dad, I always wanted to be a motivational speaker, ever since I started speaking at Cutco conferences a year and a half prior, I said, maybe that’s why this happened. Maybe I’m supposed to get through this car accident, this recovery, this experience, in the most positive mindset and the most proactive approach that I possibly can then I can go teach other people how to do that in whatever challenge they’re facing. So you’re blaming Cutco for your car accidents. Yes, well, if I wasn’t speaking at a Cutco conference that night, but anyway, all that is to lay the foundation and say that that when I had my car accident, or, sorry, my cancer. You know, 17 years after the car accident, I was 37 with the cancer, the day that I was diagnosed, the day that I was given a 20% chance of surviving, I called my wife. She was out of town. She was distraught, bawling her eyes out, thinking about her husband dying, understandably. And I said, Sweetheart, I know you’re scared, I said, But you know, I mean, I’d be lying if I didn’t say. There’s a twinge of fear inside of me, but I really, I’m not even thinking about that. I’m thinking about there is no doubt in my mind that I’m going to beat this cancer. I have unwavering faith in that possibility, and I’m going to learn from it. I’m going to help more people as a result of this. And so going through, I mean, you watched it like when I was in the hospital, going through chemo. I’m doing selfie videos. I’m sending them out to the Miracle Morning community, you know? And that wasn’t, I’m not trying to sell books. It’s just trying to take my experience and help other people. And I just, I’ll wrap it up, and I’ll turn it back to you in a second. I’ll just say this as cliche as the Zig Ziglar quote is, it is as accurate as it can be, which is, you can have everything in life that you want if you help enough other people get what they want, Right? Steve Jobs helped everybody get a smartphone, you know, and he got everything he want. Well, I mean, that’s, you know, well, a sensor on cancer, on cancer. Yes, right? But, but, like, I really believe, and I think that for certain people, and I’m not pointing fingers, but, but I think a lot of us like being selfish and self centered is a very real you know, it depending on how we grew up and the environment we grew up like, depending on our psyche, how we’re wired. Maybe it’s my parents, but at one point in my life, I was like, I want my life to be about serving other people. And I believe that if I genuinely focus not on making money, but on helping as many people as I possibly can in all the ways that I can, and I’m smart about it, and I figure out there’s got to be ways to monetize the way. You know, monetize the way, you know, I’m doing that. I think that that that will come back to me and, you know, and I’ll be, I’ll be good financially, and so that really making it my focus. And so that’s it is when I had cancer, it was like it just amplified, oh, I’m i This can’t be for, for no reason, I’m going through this so that I can become a better version of myself on the other side and help even more people.

Brad Weimert 54:07
Are you glad that you went through that experience?

Hal Elrod 54:12
Yeah, yeah, I don’t know. You know, it’s kind of a what is that Byron Katie, who wrote the book loving what is have you read that? By the way, no such a good book, dude, you

Hal Elrod 54:21
should read it. Byron Katie. Katie, Byron, no Byron Katie, but phenomenal book. I just reread it a few months ago. But basically, she talks about, she’s a lover of reality. You know, when people are like, you know, do I wish this didn’t happen? She’s like, Well, yeah, but it did. So you can either love that it happened and be totally not just at peace, but actually love it and embrace it and look for the value in it. So she’s kind of like what I’ve always taught, which is like, accept the things you can’t change and be at peace. She goes further. No, no. Love the things you can’t change. Love the divorce, love the cancer, love the bankruptcy, right? Because What other choice do you have? Right? You can hate it and be miserable. But since it’s reality, so she says, she just says repeatedly throughout the book, I’m a lover of reality, and so I think it’s easier said than done. There were definitely times when I was going through cancer, when I’m like, if I I was so sick and so miserable that I wanted to die. And I said, if I didn’t have a wife and kids, I would just let myself die right now. So for sure, I got in really dark places. But overall, it’s just like it is what it is. It’s what happened. And so how can I love that reality, and how can I use that to amplify the good that I do in the world, and, and, and, you know, in my own quality of life?

Brad Weimert 55:35
I mean, obviously that’s a I think there, there are people that look at that and critique that, and sort of think, oh yeah, that’s some silver lining bullshit. And yeah, you’re making the best of a bad situation. But sort of assessing life through the lens of for me, it’s assessing life through the lens of regret is a waste of time and everything that got me to this moment formed who I am now. In every difficult situation created a better, stronger, more valuable version of me. Yeah, leads me to believe that going through that I would respond with some sense of, I’m glad that I experienced it, yeah, and you don’t, yeah, you don’t like as somebody that’s never had cancer, surely. And

Hal Elrod 56:30
I mean, what a wild experience. Like, you know, it was, it was, I was on death’s doorway, like, you know, it’s, I love my my father in law, Merrick, my wife, Ursula, her dad, obviously, father in law. In case you didn’t put those together. Thanks. I appreciate that. Yeah, yeah. The but like what we’re going through right now in society, and depending on the listener, they might think everything’s just normal, and this is, I don’t think it’s normal. But anyway, he escaped communist Poland, and so he sees a lot of what happened that rolled communism out in Poland happening in America, right? So that’s each person to Oh, wow, determine. And but he smiles, and he goes, What a fascinating time to be alive. And he said, I, you know, I’m just grateful I’m alive to see this play out like, what he’s, what he’s, what his biggest concern is, like, the worst case scenario in America. But he’s just, he’s fascinated by it, and so I want to, I wanted to speak to what you said, which is, oh, some people listening go, that’s silver lining, bullshit that’s making the best of a bad situation. Bad is, it’s a word, it’s a label, like, who’s to say it’s bad? Yeah, in fact, I’ll give you an example, and you can call this silver lining. But like, to me, you literally, there are people that love pain, yeah, right, um, and so you’d say no, pain is bad, and go, says, Who, right, Adversity is bad, says, Who? Well, no, no, those types of things are to be avoided. Says, Who, yep, so. Or if you and if that that’s the thing, that’s our if that’s our perspective, our paradigm, which is difficult, things bad. Must avoid them at all costs. Oh no, they’re happening. This is terrible. My life is over. God, please. I don’t deserve this, right? It’s all perspective, yeah? So you can genuinely, authentically embrace adversity and actually go, God, I’m grateful for this pain. Yeah? And I’m gonna tell you a weird story. You wanted some weird stories. I don’t know if I’ve ever told this on a podcast. I was at a party. I was 20, early 20s. I was at UC Davis. I was dating this girl, and I went to a party, and I got hammered. I got I drank, so I was so drunk, and I was out on, sitting on the porch. I think it might have even been raining. So I’m like sitting out on in the rain, on a bench, everybody’s having fun in the party, and I’m sick, and I just start throwing up. And I go, and I think I was reading some sort of book on enlightenment at that time, like a cartoli or something, right? Perfect physical. And so I catch myself going first before I throw up. I go, God, I don’t want to throw up. I hate throwing up. And then, because I was reading that book, I realized, Wait, I’m resisting reality right now. And then I started throwing up, and I go, how can I love this? How can I genuinely love this? And I sat there just smiling, heaving and thanking God for that experience, because it was an experience that I was blessed to be having. So that was a really, and I love, like, that’s a story don’t tell very often, but it was like a monumental pivotal shift. Like, who enjoys throwing up? Maybe no one. And so I go, if I can enjoy this moment feeling sick with this pounding headache, throwing up, I can enjoy any moment in my life, and that, by the way, is the premise of the miracle life, which is the chapter in the new book. And the book I want to it’s my next book that I want to write. The premise is, how do you emotional freedom? How do you choose any emotional state you want to experience in any given moment, authentically, not faking it, not suppressing the real emotions, but actually be at peace. With the things you can’t change. You know, enjoy reality, and so, yeah, throwing up at a party was a shift in my consciousness. There’s

Brad Weimert 1:00:07
a delineation between these two concepts, but there are experiences that you put yourself into that create discomfort or pain, and then there are things that happen, happen to you and you cannot experience your change. And I had a realization in the last few days, actually, that I, for many, many years, I have spent a lot of time, and it’s gone in waves, but I’ve spent a lot of time doing endurance events, yeah, and longer and longer runs. You know, weird ways to put myself through extreme discomfort and pain, and I got injured and have not done any of that in the last almost two years now. And what I was reflecting on was how the deliberate conditioning and the absence of it have changed how I interact with the world. So because I’m not living in a state routinely of discomfort that I am consciously overcoming, yeah, meaning I’m going out on an eight mile a 10 mile a 20 mile a 30 mile run, and inevitably, during those times, there are really challenging periods where I am talking to myself and saying, no, no, get your shit together. You’re just here doing this. Yeah, you’re gonna keep doing it. Yeah, we’re gonna keep moving. And part of your brain is going stop. This is uncomfortable. I don’t want to do this anymore, absolutely. Yeah, but because consistently I’m conditioning myself and building another and another and another. Data Point the other areas of my life. I tend to do the same thing, and with the absence of that stuff, it seems to rub off on the other areas of my life. And I was thinking about just sort of flexing that muscle, and if you’re not flexing that muscle consistently, maybe you lose it? Yeah, it

Hal Elrod 1:02:03
would make sense. So is that what you kind of feel like you’re not as I don’t know if resilience the right word or but like,

Brad Weimert 1:02:09
I feel like I have. How would you describe it? I feel like I have. When I’m in that mode, I have a much stronger mindset, yeah, when I’m consistently pushing myself to do tough things. And when I’m not pushing myself to do tough things, I find myself in a place where I bail, yeah, and not in, you know, tremendous, seemingly life changing ways, but in the little things, yeah, but the bitch is, the little things make the big picture. Yeah, right. It is your whole fucking life. And nobody’s holding me accountable, you know? Yeah, no. Nobody’s like, Hey, Brad, get your shit together. What are you doing? Yeah, every like, literally, this morning, you were like, Hey, Brad, why don’t you maybe chill out and take care of your body a little bit. Maybe you’re a little hard on

Hal Elrod 1:02:58
your body, Brad, yeah, you don’t like accountability. Because you immediately were like, I have to go. I’m gonna go I’m going to go to work. As soon as I tried to hold you accountable and give you a little love, you were like, get off the phone.

Brad Weimert 1:03:07
I did. I literally said, I got to go to go to the gym right now, right? It’s pretty funny, but I think that one of the things to me, one of the most valuable things about your work and how you spend all your time and energy, is that it helps indoctrinate people into patterns that have created an accountability in their life, that will have other that will have other ripples in

Hal Elrod 1:03:36
their life. Well, the beauty of it is doing it in the morning. It then affects the whole day. Yeah, right. Because if you have a shit day, and then at the end of the night, you’re like, all right, I should do some, you know, personal development, and do some good habits, and then you’re like, I feel disciplined. But then you’re right, you might lose it while you’re sleeping. So the idea that you start your day, you know, I think how you start your day sets the tone and the context and the direction and the, you know, the energy for the rest of the day. So if you have that purposeful morning, you have a purposeful day. So yeah,

Brad Weimert 1:04:06
cool, man. Well, I have a bunch of random shit that we talk about, but I think we’ll save it for another time. All right, maybe we’ll record in your studio, because I know the address. Oh yeah, and actually, I’m

Hal Elrod 1:04:14
about to kind of have a studio now, because before my office was too small, was little home office. But now, have you been out? Oh, you’ve

Hal Elrod 1:04:20
set up, right? Not since the same office for the Fourth of July, nice. He’s

Hal Elrod 1:04:23
got a nice couch in there. And, yeah, I mean, it’s not like, you know, your office, but we can lock the doors and then your animals can come. That’s right, yeah, exactly. It’s funny. I was, I was doing a face, or I was on a zoom call, and I was sitting on my couch in the office and my laptop, and they go, are those chickens out? I said, actually, that one’s a turkey, but those are chickens, yes.

Brad Weimert 1:04:44
Well, you have a giant tortoise too, right? Tank, oh, man, do

Hal Elrod 1:04:46
you want it? Dude? Do you want a tortoise I have been trying to get rid of. I mean, no, he’s a wonderful and I’d hate to lose him, but if you want, he’s 37 years old. He’s very mature. Him and professor would get along phenomenally. Yeah, they’d be perennial, perennial best friends.

Brad Weimert 1:05:03
I would totally have a tortoise. But, you know, I live downtown, dang it. I don’t know where it would go.

Hal Elrod 1:05:10
Is there a yard here?

Brad Weimert 1:05:11
There is a yard here? There you go, dude,

Hal Elrod 1:05:13
tank and his tank. I mean, it’s a cool tank. The tortoise, like, it’s kind of cool. Chicks dig them. God, I wish I was single with him.

Brad Weimert 1:05:21
I saw tank eating apple once, and it was, I was like, I’m keeping my fingers away, dude.

Hal Elrod 1:05:26
He devours it. I know. I’m like, the first I’m like, oh, shouldn’t we cut that up for him? And oh, no. Oh, he can, yeah,

Brad Weimert 1:05:32
he could destroy anything. No,

Hal Elrod 1:05:34
we just finished. On a really strong note, I think we should.

Brad Weimert 1:05:39
We did. We’ll get a picture a tank. Where, where do you want to point people? That’s where we end is, where do you want to send people? In general, Miracle morning.com

Hal Elrod 1:05:47
is the hub. You can watch the Miracle Morning documentary for free, which has Mel Robbins and Lewis Howes and Robert Kiyosaki and Brendan Burchard and Robin Sharma and Brad weimert. And most importantly, so Miracle morning.com you can, you know, it’ll point to the app. It points to the book. If you wanted to go to Amazon and buy the books, of course, but that’s where I would have people download the free app, watch the free movie, and, you know, and buy the book, I mean. And you do that, you’re gonna have a really successful start your miracle morning. And if you read the original book. Last thing I’ll say is, you know, the new, updated, expanded edition. It is a new edition. I mean, 70 new pages of content, new chapters. So even if you read the Miracle Morning like five years ago now is, I mean, it’s a great time like this is a great refresher. Go get the updated and expanded edition.

Brad Weimert 1:06:32
Love that man. Well, it’s always good to hang out. It’s fun, yeah, for me anyway. I

Hal Elrod 1:06:37
mean, half the reason that we did this is because you’re like, all right, me and how not hanging out often enough, we should do a podcast. That’s completely true. I knew it was. I was gonna start the podcast by saying, and I forgot we started the podcast by saying, what

Brad Weimert 1:06:49
should we talk about? Yeah, we should talk about the business behind the Miracle Morning. I’m like, no, no, we did that last time. That’s right. Love you brother. Love you too, man. All right. I hope you enjoyed the episode as much as I enjoy doing it, I need your help. There are three places you can find beyond a million. The podcast itself, beyond a million.com, which has some cool free resources, including a free course. And we finally launched the beyond a million YouTube channel. I would love it if you would go there and subscribe, and if you don’t want to, you still would probably enjoy seeing the visual content. Check it out, youtube.com, forward slash at beyond a million.