IAM2622 – Reframe Your Broker Journey Today

In this episode, Gresh believes that sharing the highs and lows of starting any business can help aspiring founders see the real‑world path, not just polished success stories.

He also shares a daily gratitude journal practice he’s kept for four years, citing a Maya Angelou quote—“you may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated”—and reflecting on Michael Jordan’s pivot from basketball to baseball as an illustration of having to relearn fundamentals and stay resilient when new ventures don’t immediately take off.

The core of Gresh's message is about mindset. He admits that recent years have left his mental sharpness dulled, so he now prioritizes “sharpening his mind” through deliberate learning, reframing, and focusing on the process rather than the outcome.

He stresses that challenges on his “broker journey” are part of growth, urging listeners—especially builders and creators—to keep running their own unique race, stay committed to personal development, and reach out for further support or updates.

• Blue Star Franchise: http://bluestarfranchise.com
• Browse the Franchise Inventory: https://bluestarfranchise.com/franchise
• Is franchising right for you? Check this out to see: http://bluestarfranchise.com/assessment
• Franchise CEO (A CBNation Site – coming soon) – http://franchiseceo.co

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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 subcite within CB nation called.

So you'll see some links in the show notes related to that. But I just want 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 docent 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 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 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.

It 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.

On the 261 of this broker journey, I had a phenomenal prompt yesterday. I do this gratitude journal every single day. I kind of look into my day.

I've done it for a couple of years, last maybe four years or so. One of the things it said was, there's a quote from Maya Angelou, it said, you may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated.

It may be necessary to encounter the defeat so you can know who you are. And it talked a lot around the actual prompt itself.

It talked around Michael Jordan decided to leave basketball at the height of his career going to pursue basketball and pursue baseball. And how he did it, because it was a passion, his dad's passion, after his dad passed away.

And I think that how we went through that process and how it showed so much him, even the hility of like not being able to do it having to learn something again, be better at it and I'm, I feel like I'm not calling myself a Michael Jordan of digital marketing or anything like that have some success and having that success you try to replicate that with this broker business and it has not taken off.

I don't want to draw the parallel and say this is my baseball from Michael Jordan, but it is something that you have to kind of learn the basics again.

I was just thinking this morning like it's a lot harder than I thought it would be and I think when you're in this space and spirit and those things are happening the way you don't you they don't you want them to.

They're not going the way you want them to you just have to really Respect the process, understand the process, understand these things are happening for you and not against you or in spite of you or any of those things and have that mentality.

As I was running this morning and as I get ready to go to church, one of the things that I realized is I have not sharpened my mind and continue to sharpen my mind as much as I had in previous years this past probably two to three years or so.

So it's something that I really, really want to hone in on, take some more time and create space to do. It's something that I realized, like, you know, you're going to the next goal, the next goal, the next goal, and you use sight of the mindset that it takes to be there.

And I can frankly probably even say I, I listened to a lot of stuff. I did a lot of podcasts, but I wasn't as deliberate with those things.

So that's something that I really need to do is to kind of do that reframing, refocusing of like where I am and, but sharpen my mind more than anything else, because that's the thing that can be your greatest strength or can honestly betray you depending on how you're sharpening it.

So that said, you know, these challenges, this broker journey that the struggles that I'm going through here and not being able to kind of get as much ground as I wanted. It's all part of the process and what I want to ultimately do.

So that's it. 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 04:18
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.

Don't forget to schedule your complimentary digital marketing consultation at Blue16media.com. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless Jr. Thank you for listening.

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