IAM2510 – Conquering Daily Surprises: Be Unstoppable!

Gresham Harkless shares the challenges he faces in maintaining focus as increasing daily distractions and obligations make it more difficult to keep moving toward his goals.

He highlights the exhaustion that comes from constantly juggling priorities — family, business, leadership, and how that often leads people to choose more stable paths like traditional jobs.

Gresham reflects on the difficulty of committing to new opportunities, especially when results aren’t guaranteed, and how it requires a leap of faith.

Gresham emphasizes the value of getting just 1% better each day and embracing the long game, recognizing that real success comes through steady effort, adaptation, and an honest acknowledgment of life’s challenges.

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Transcription:

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Intro 00:01

Are you ready to hear business stories and learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and level up your business from awesome CEOs, entrepreneurs, and founders without listening to a long, long, long interview?

If so, you've come to the right place. Gresh values your time and is ready to share with you the valuable info you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO Podcast.

Gresham Harkless 00:28

Hello, hello, hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO Podcast. And this is a special episode of our I AM CEO Podcast.

And this is actually going to be a snippet of a snippet, so to speak. I'm just doing an intro because I've been starting to document my journey into starting what is now called Blue Star Franchise.

We're also going to do a kind of sub site within CB Nation called Franchise CEO. So you'll see some links in the show notes related to that.

But just wanted to give you a little bit more insight, give you a little bit more color in some of the aspects of why I'm actually doing this.

Because one of the things I was doing as I was going through training to start up this new business was realizing and hearing from the founder of FBA, the Franchise Brokers Association, that it'd be really cool to document your journey going through and building this out.

I think it's something that would be super helpful, obviously for people that are looking for and thinking about starting franchises.

But frankly, if you're starting anything, any type of business, I think it's really cool to kind of just even see the journey and how it's been going from there.

So I'm going to share a few of those snippets from the, from the first couple of videos that have been created.

But definitely, of course, subscribe to our YouTube, check out a lot more where I figure out exactly where we're going to post this.

So I'll have that information that's available to you. But regardless, if you're a builder, continue to keep building, continue to do your thing.

The world definitely needs exactly what you're trying to build and needs you to be your unique self.

So make sure to run your own race, because nobody can run your race like you. This is Gresh signing out. I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

Just like that, it's day 185 and I'm just seeing and noticing just how many distractions are kind of eating at me and pulling from me and just like what's happening.

What I have to ask myself and be honest is like, what am I doing to kind of stop these distractions?

What am I doing to try to make sure that I can stay focused on my goals and my aspirations?

And I think at the end of the day, you just end up being exhausted just because there's so many things that are happening.

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That's why I honestly think a lot of people do end up going into, working a job and doing things that are a little bit less dependent upon you because you don't have the energy and you want to be there for your family.

You want to do all those things. And I think yesterday was one of those examples where I pretty much lost half the day.

The other half was spent on, leadership and then one client meeting. And I think that I wasn't even able to get the things done that I need to get done.

And I think those days will happen. And when those days happen, you don't know what you do.

And you feel like you can't get ahead because you are constantly like fighting battles or doing things.

They're not even necessarily battles. You're just doing obligations that take over. And that's why I was so adamant around, trying to have things in place before, I took the step, and had on more responsibility because you want to be there.

You do it for that. And you want to prioritize that as well. But the reality is that a lot of people, you choose either or. And I think that's where, it becomes a really big challenge.

So I think that's just the reality of life. I think that with a job, you usually can't get out of it with, having a business that allows you to be, to have more flexibility.

You do it for that, but you have to know that you're taking a step back with your business as well, too.

So I think that's something that, I'm still coming in kind of terms with. I'm still kind of working through.

But I think the reality of everything is that you try to get 1% better every single day.

If you can do that, then you can be great. I think I just understanding that as a marathon is one of the big things.

So, with that being said, again, the human part of business is very big. We zoom past it.

But obligations, things that happen, making sure that your your household and those things are in order and you have a consistency is such a huge thing.

And I think that this is something that I haven't really, dealt with as much with my business.

But over the last two or three years, I think there's been more things that have cropped up than any other time within the business.

And I can be honest to say, like my marketing business has taken a hit as a result of that.

And even frankly, the digital work, I mean, the franchise business as well, too, has been stunted as a result of that.

So I think you just kind of have to operate differently. And that's kind of the biggest challenge that I have.

It's like, how can I move and operate differently? knowing that there's so many things that are pulling at me and decisions that I'm making too.

Even me going to the franchise event in and of itself was taking a large part away from me being at home, but also me with my marketing business.

It's something that's really, really a challenge, something I have to navigate and I have to just like kind of commit to say, hey, I'm going to do that and this is what it's going to look like.

I think that's the hard process. It's like committing when you haven't seen any results and that there's struggles around.

It's like you're making that step of faith and I think you want to make that step of faith, but that you got to succeed.

You have to make this succeed, whatever happens. So I think that's the biggest challenge that I ultimately have.

Please let me know if there's anything I can do to help. And of course, looking forward to giving you more and more updates.

Outro 05:43

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by CB Nation and Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co. I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community.

Check out the latest and greatest apps, books, and habits to level up your business as CEOhacks.co. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless Jr. Thank you for listening.

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