Lewis Howes: Creating a Playbook for Life

At the age of just 24, Lewis Howes found his pro football career abruptly ended by injury. He collapsed into a depression, paralyzed by fear and overwhelmed by the prospect of rebooting literally his entire life (with no money, no degree, and nothing to fall back on). But unwilling to accept defeat, he broke the massive challenge of reinventing himself into a series of smaller, manageable goals that he took on way by one. It started with simply getting his butt off the couch, and ended with where he is today— one of the leading voices in the new generation of lifestyle entrepreneurs, bestselling author and host of the wildly popular School Of Greatness podcast.

Join Lewis for an inspiring and motivating conversation about how to push yourself out of a funk, dream big, and use the power of goal setting to achieve things you once thought impossible.

In our talk we discuss:
* dealing with adversity using it propel you
* giving yourself challenge and a deadline achieve your goals
* Creating structure around your day to boost creativity

… and much much more.

Create a challenge with a deadline and a date.

FOLLOW LEWIS:
website | twitter | facebook

Watch the Episode

Lewis’ episode was featured in the 30 Days of Genius series of Chase Jarvis Live on CreativeLive. If you like this, join 50,000+ people who are receiving one of these videos everyday.

Listen to the Podcast

Some Questions I Ask:

Tell us about the history of your tough times when you got injured and were sleeping on your sister’s couch. [2:36]
What was the first step towards getting off your sister’s couch? [5:55]
Let’s talk about the practice required to mastering a process. [14:05]
Tell me about your $1000 speech. [15:29]
How important is goal setting to you? [16:58]
What can you tell us about how to create our own structure? [23:03]
Is the importance of community and connection just for artists, or for all humans? [26:45]
How long was the process of getting out of the mud? [28:06]
What was your mentality towards adding value vs doing a “thing” to make money during your business building process? [31:21]
How do we talk about passion in a non cliche way and how it pertains to all of us? [34:58]
What do you feel like your sports background gave you? [36:31]
Has sports influenced your approach to teamwork? [37:48]
What would people be surprised to learn about you? [39:33]
How important is your morning to you? [40:32]
Why do you make your bed every morning? [41:57]
Do you have a nighttime routine? [44:06]
What kinds of things do you do to play? [44:35]
Do you build or attend community? [44:52]
Is there someone in your life that’s playing an unexpectedly powerful role? [45:06]
Recap the vision of your book, School of Greatness. [46:20]
Where do your ideas come from? [50:45]
Can you give a recap of your CreativeLive class? [54:31]
Give us a few principles from your book. [56:02]
How do you get clear on your vision? [56:50]
What’s the last principle of greatness? [59:36]
Where can we find you online? [1:02:52]
What foods won’t you eat? [1:03:40]
Cardio or weights? [1:04:16]
Morning or night? [1:04:25]
What did you learn yesterday? [1:04:36]
Do you schedule things and what’s your format for doing that? [1:05:27]
What’s a mistake you’ve made in hiring? [1:06:06]
What’s your best social platform? [1:07:10]
Who would you love to interview? [1:07:35]
Who have you interviewed that you’ve gotten a lot of value from? [1:07:48]
What’s missing for you right now? [1:08:23]
What’s something I didn’t ask you that you’d like to tell the world? [1:09:06]

In This Episode, You Will Learn:

Even when we accelerate the learning process, we still have to take the time to practice to get us where we want to be. [6:36]
Lewis’ first step in moving forward: finding mentors. [7:25]
The greatest leaders in the world know how to communicate. [10:17]
How you could benefit from joining a Toastmasters club. [10:40]
How to set small challenges for yourself, to keep you moving forward with your goals. [12:30]
What happens when we don’t challenge ourselves with a deadline and a date. [15:06]
Why artists, including entrepreneurs, need more structure. Because it creates freedom. [18:17]
How football taught Lewis about setting goals with intention and a structure and how that structure allows for more freedom. [20:26]
How to frame your upcoming goals. What do you want to create in the next 6-12 months? [22:12]
It’s not fun creating something fun on your own. Build a team. It’s more fun. [24:12]
How Lewis keeps his team on track. [24:44]
You can’t be angry and grateful at the same time. Try it! [25:34]
Money will come to you when you’re ready for it. [28:30]
If you take a job for $500 and you add more than $500 worth of value, your customer is going to want you back. [31:00]
Lewis’ virtuous cycle for how to add value to make money. [32:00]
To create value for others, you have to work on yourself first building skills. [32:54]
The power of a vision and how to clarify yours. [33:50]
The benefits of playing sports to learning, growth, and teamwork. [37:58]
Two movies that make Lewis cry. [40:14]
The story of how Lewis grew his podcast and made it better and better with every episode. [51:09]
If you want to be great, you have to have a clear vision. [56:27]
Your vision can change. [57:26]
How living a life of service tailored to how you can best serve is the most rewarding thing you can do for yourself. [59:49]
Lewis’ advice on how to build the right team for you. [1:06:08]
“Having gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.” [1:09:43]

This podcast is brought to you by CreativeLive. CreativeLive is the world’s largest hub for online creative education in photo/video, art/design, music/audio, craft/maker, money/life and the ability to make a living in any of those disciplines. They are high quality, highly curated classes taught by the world’s top experts — Pulitzer, Oscar, Grammy Award winners, New York Times best selling authors and the best entrepreneurs of our times.