MFM Mini - How to Turn Any Bad Experience into a Good One

Some of you might have heard me tell this story before, but I'm gonna do it again. This is a story that my trainer told me, my coach, my trainer. Basically, I hired this guy to help me lose weight, and he, yeah, we work out, but we also, as he likes to say, we also work in, meaning he's kinda like a mental coach while doing physical personal training. Anyways, he was like, he came over and I said, I was like, what's up? I said, "How's your day?" And he goes, "Dude, you won't believe my day." I said, "Why?" I said, "What happened?" And he goes, "So I've been on the down low stressing about my car for like 2 years." I said, "What's wrong with your car?" He goes, "Nothing's wrong with my car. What's wrong with my car is that my license has been expired for 2 years. And every time I drive it, there's this little part of me that's like, 'Oh God, I hope, I don't get pulled over and have this expired license. It's gonna be such a pain in the ass. And the only thing worse than that is going to the DMV and actually getting a new license. So I haven't done it for 2 years. So I said, "Okay, well, what happened this morning?" He goes, "I went to the DMV." I said, "Well, why did you go? What happened? What changed?" He goes, "Well, I woke up this morning and I felt that same underlying stress." Right? These like, Everybody knows what stress is like when there's like a big hairy problem or something really big looming. But those aren't the real killers. The real killers are these silent persistent stresses. The things you just live with day in and day out that just eat at you. They just, they become a part of you. And he goes, I kind of noticed it was there and I decided, all right, I'm getting rid of this today. I'm not living with this. All right, I'm going to the DMV. So he said, well, if I'm gonna go to the DMV, I'm gonna go to the DMV on my terms. What does that mean? So, he said he went on Yelp, and he looked up his local DMV, and like you might guess, not the best ratings. So I think it was like a 2, 2.5 star rating on Yelp. And he goes, okay. The DMV is a 2 to 2.5-star experience for most people. I'm going to have a 5-star experience. I said, what? He goes, yeah, I decided I'm going to have a 5-star experience at DMV. I'm going to say, well, how are you going to do that? I'm going to be a 5-star customer. So, uh, what do you mean? He goes, I'm gonna walk in there like I'm a 5-star customer. And I'm gonna have a 5-star experience. Okay, so what happened? He goes, so I— he goes, I got dressed, I got excited, I went to the DMV like people go when they're going to a party, when they're going to their best friend's, you know, dinner party, or, you know, they're going to the game and they're full of excitement. He goes, I got myself into that state of mind, and then I went to the DMV. And I went to the DMV and I walked in and I was greeting people and I was just excited. I was on one. And he goes, sure enough, I get to the DMV and I see the 2.5-star experience. I see the long line of depressed people, right? Like, you know, it's like that Louis C.K. joke that everybody in line for Cinnabon looks the same. They all hate themselves. Uh, you know, that's what the DMV line looked like. And Sure enough, as he walks in, somebody, this woman who's working there goes, "Can I help you?" Because he didn't look like everybody else at the place. He was smiling, he was walking around, he was, posture was right, making eye contact. And he goes, "Yeah, you might be able to help me out. I've been putting off coming here for 2 years and I need to get my license renewed." You know, who's, who's the best, who's the best person in this place to help me out? She goes, I, I can help you. Come here. Cuts him, cuts the line, takes him on the side, takes him to the counter. Normally, 2 years expired, you got to take the written test again. He didn't study. He doesn't know. We don't, nobody remembers that shit. And, uh, but things just started to go his way this day. So she takes him, cuts the line, renews his license without having to take the test again, the written formal test. He obviously knows how to drive. He's been driving 20, 30 years or whatever. And he gets his, gets his thing. She makes a joke. You know, she touches his arm. Oh, like, look at that arm. Oh my God, you're, you got muscles. And he starts laughing. And he's, you know, he's flirting with her. She's flirting with him. And he tells her, you know what, gives her a compliment on the way out because he's being a 5-star customer. He's being the type of customer who would have a 5-star experience. And, um, and then he walks out of there 15 minutes later, license renewed, and he had a 5-star experience. And so he shared this with me, and I'm sharing it with you because I thought this was amazing. I've been to a lot of self-help talks, I've been to seminars, I've read the books. Watching somebody or hearing somebody go to the DMV and have a great time That meant something. And it reminded me of the truth. The truth is that you get to choose your experience. In any given situation, you could be waiting in line, you could be delayed, you could have gotten stood up on a date. You get to choose what experience you're gonna have. That's a better question to ask. Most people ask themselves questions like, "Shit, why did this happen?" Why is this person such a jerk? Why don't they get it? Why is everybody so annoying today? Blah, blah, blah, right? We ask ourselves terrible questions and then we get terrible answers. Better question, eh, what experience do I wanna have right now? What experience do I wanna have today? Do you wanna have a boring experience or a fun experience? I'll take fun, right? Do you wanna have it hard and painful? You wanna have it speedy and easy? I'll take speedy and easy, please. You get to choose the experience you're gonna have. And when you choose the experience before you go into it, you will start looking for evidence of that experience rather than the, the latter, right? If he went to the DMV looking for a 2.5-star experience, I guarantee he could have found it. But instead, he went in for a 5-star experience, looked for people who would give him a 5-star experience. He carried himself as a 5-star customer and therefore attracted a 5-star experience. We can do that in any situation. So that's a little mini superpower. The ability to choose your experience and critically to not expect the world to give you that experience, but to carry yourself in that mood, in that state, to be a 5-star customer rather than a 1-star customer who's pissed off they're not getting 5-star service. Be a 5-star customer, have a 5-star experience. All right, that's it. That's the lesson of the day. Story time with Sean. Hope you guys liked it. If you like these little mini episodes, I'll keep doing them.