Welcome to my office. When people come to see me in my office, they ask a lot of questions and you’re going to see why in just a minute.
When you enter my office, it is a place where I want to be creative. I want you to think about this for your own offices. Even if you’re in a business type of setting, still you’ve got to bring art. You’ve got to bring creativity. The people that are going to be The Best going forward are going to have the most creativity.
So, when you walk into my office, the first thing I wanted, I wanted a chalkboard. I love chalkboards. I want to be able to write. I want to be able to create. What we did here was we hired a chalk artist. I mean this gal is amazing. Her name is Laura Stewart. She created our logo. She created certain pieces of dialogue from Runt of the Litter that people like. She created a game plan that I often say.
One of my favorite sayings is “Being the best is an art and a skill that is perpetual.” My friend Jeff Spencer gave me that line and I just want to be able to see it. I want to know where I am going this year and the years beyond. So, there is some open space for me to create in, for me to write in. You can see the locker up there, all kinds of different things.
Now when you get to this wall, and all the walls that are behind you and the lighting is not going to allow us to see. I put these big pieces of paper on my walls. This is how I create. This is how I write. This is how I write a speech. This is how I write a screenplay. This is how I write a play. This is how I write any presentation that I’m doing. I want to see it and I want to see it for months at a time. I don’t want to be at a computer, going like this. I don’t want to be necessarily at a legal pad sketching like this, although I do it sometimes. I want the words and the sentences that are haunting me that I just can’t get out of my mind. You must have those all the time.
Like you see something happening in your culture, in your world, and I have to put it down, because I’m upset about it. Or I see something, I don’t like that I want to change and I want to teach. I want to lead and help people. So, I put it up.
Now, let’s just look at an example real quick, here. I need access to your raw animal instincts. You probably never have heard me say that sentence before yet. But this piece of paper is going to be up there for the next, it’s been up there for the last maybe 3, 4 or 5 months. It’s going to be up there another 3, 4, or 5 months, until this sentence becomes a part of these molecules. Because every day when I am in the office I’m constantly looking at terminologies that I love, I’m constantly looking at sentences that I can’t get out of my mind.
These in the years to come will become books, movies, plays, events, products, and everything else in between, speeches, a toast. These worlds will actually come out of my mouth at sometime, because for a year’s time I’m looking at it. Every time I see that sentence I memorize it.
Now memorization, everyone goes how do you remember all the stuff that you talk about? I attach it to my molecules. That’s what I want you to do. Think of your office, think of where you create. There is another, I was just looking at this the other day. Think of where you create and make it an artist domain, where you can throw stuff up here.
Now some of this might be unusable but a lot of it will be usable. I was looking at this, the cost of greatness. There is a lot of cost to that. I want my clients. I want the people that I coach, I want them to know. I want my kids to know what it costs to be the best. What it costs to sacrifice being The Best, greatness; blood for sure, injuries, surgeries for sure, tears, a lot of tears, loneliness, a lot of that.
So, this is how I just throw, I basically throw up on my walls. By the way this drives my wife, Dawn, crazy. A lot of you know her. She loves a beautiful home. She loves an immaculate office, which over there on her side, it’s all sofa and the pillows, and it’s beautiful. Sometimes I invade her territory with my artistry. She goes, “You’ve got to get those papers out of here.”
Like look at this, my son Axel and Lyla, Axel is 8 and Lyla is 5, they were in here drawing the other day. Axel draws this picture of me when I used to play for the Oilers. Now I’m not looking too good. Look at this scar here, which I think that one is accurate, then this one, and the little blood, and a little Houston Oilers derrick down there on the pants. Not bad though. I’m just wondering where my arms are. So, this is being passed down in the family.
This is how I want you to start memorizing. Don’t memorize with your brain. Memorize with your body. So, I watch this stuff and I look at this stuff. I rehearse it all day everyday for a year at a time. Then what’s going to happen is maybe a year from now, maybe 2 years from now, maybe 10 years from today, you’re going to be seeing me on a stage, or somewhere speaking. You’re going to hear a term like this, “Undefeated from the neck up.”
Just because I can’t get those 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 words, I can’t get them out of my mind. What if we were undefeated from the neck up? What if my son, my daughters were undefeated from the neck up? What if my clientele, what if we’re undefeated from the neck up, like we’re so strong in the mind that nobody can beat us?
Imagine that world. You’re going to see that term come out of my mouth. I don’t know when it’s going to be. But it’s going to be because the memorization is here in my solar plexus. Not up here in my brain where I’m trying to think of what to say.
We’re all artists. If you work with me, I work with a lot of financial advisers. I work with a lot of serious businessmen and women. They are artists. That’s what distinguishes you from everybody else. We have to be more creative than everyone else. Start by making your office this creative place, no different than Vincent van Gogh, or William Shakespeare, or Plato, true artists, true leaders and thinkers.
Immerse yourself in the words and the terms that haunt you. That’s what you have to teach this world. Try this in your office. Try this in your home. I want to hear the successes that you’ve had. I want to see these words that have been applied to your molecules. I want to see them fall out of your mouth.
Everybody got it? Great having you, I’d love to hear what you’re going to do with your office. I’d love to have pictures and see what you’ve done. I might steal a little bit from you. I might take what you’re doing and use it for myself, because I’m always looking for creative ways to get this expression outside of this body. You got it? We’ll see you next time.
