How To Be Fucking Awesome Read online

  But, and it’s a big but, I have, by being shameless, managed to secure million pound contracts, written copy for some of the top names in fitness and marketing, funded my own fitness business, been invited to share a stage with big names speaking to hundreds (now thousands), and have clients all over the world.

  Really – like proper really – when there’s something you want to achieve in your life or business, what truly is the worst that can happen? I’ll tell you one thing – your imagination can create some epically horrific shit, when in reality, it is never that bad.

  So do me a favour. If there is something you have been putting off – a business you have had in your head; someone you want to connect with (on a business or romantic level) – just fucking do it! I can’t stress enough how bad it isn’t when you give it a try. I know, because I was a slave to the ‘what if’ gene which stopped me so many times going for things that – if I’d known then what I know now – I would have gone balls deep for!

  Little ‘what if’ bastard. Don’t let it stop you from creating the life that you deserve.

  Oh, and you think asking for help, for connections, for guidance, admitting you have failed/fucked up and need a hand makes you weak or somehow a failure? Does it fuck! It makes you bloody smart, that’s what it does.

  Like I said, pride will fuck you up. I mean that 100%. Your ego, the annoying little shit, will prevent you from lowering your barriers and doing the one thing that will actually make a difference.

  Shall I tell you what I have found? When you ask for help or admit things have gone wrong, people often help you – and help you willingly.

  Why?

  Put it this way – when you help someone, how do you feel? Crappy? Resentful? Like they owe you somehow? No, of course you don’t (unless you are a massive tool). So when you ask for help/advice/guidance/assistance, you are making the other person feel good, because it feels good to help people.

  Here is another great way of looking at it: if you don’t let people help you and admit when you need a hand, you are actually a selfish arsehole because you are denying someone those good feelings.

  I tell you what – when you’ve been knee deep in stripper shit, nothing seems too bad when it comes to being shameless.

  I won’t go into the story too much, but in my mid-twenties I fell out with my then boss and moved to London from Leeds. I found myself in London with the grand sum of £22 to live off. Now if you’re not aware of London prices, to say ‘fucking daft’ would be an understatement.

  So, I needed to make money, and pretty sharpish.

  I’d put myself through university by having multiple jobs – from personal trainer to security guard to being a barman at a strip club. And before you say, ‘Oh yeah, tits and booze, what could be better?’ let me tell you one thing. What you see of strip clubs is glamorous – the reality ain’t. I got the job because I ended up training a fair few of the ladies, and when they said I ‘wasn’t a creep’ I got the gig.

  A new club opened up just round the corner from me in London and, as I couldn’t go back into the corporate world, I had to take what I could. So I walked in, suited and booted, and asked for work. Ended up being a floor manager.

  So, imagine a club with 100+ women in it every night, plus customers, and it was a ‘premium’ environment so everything had to look and, well, smell the part. You know, there’s a reason why they say not to flush sanitary products down the toilet – so that the damn toilet doesn’t get blocked, and some poor floor manager (aka me) doesn’t have to walk into the overriding smell of shit.

  But I needed the job, I was broke, so I ended up creating a ‘biohazard’ suit out of bin bags, a woodworking mask and sunglasses.

  And a stick.

  Into the tank I went!

  Not the highlight of my career, but you know what? I learned a valuable lesson because of ‘Shitgate’, as I like to call it. And that lesson is currently framed and standing up to the left hand side of the computer I am typing on.

  It’s a £10 note.

  Why?

  Well it was given to me by one of the dancers as a thank you for the horrid job I’d had to do (meaning they, in turn, could now work). This was at a time when Mum and Dad sent me a £15 voucher for a budget frozen food store and I walked round with a fucking calculator making every penny count. This was at a time when I would get to the club just before it opened, after the sandwich shop next door shut so I could get the ones they were throwing away before they went into the bin. This was at a time when £10 meant more to me than anything on the earth because I couldn’t afford to fucking eat.

  I didn’t spend it.

  I put it in my wallet where it remained for several years. Considering how skint I was back then, that does seem kinda dumb, doesn’t it? Well this was me truly at my lowest – no money, no woman, all cry – yet I saved it.

  I vowed that was the last £10 charity I would ever take, and if I had to spend it, that would be it. I would give up on any form of dream I had of making it and return home with my tail between my legs. It now serves as a reminder of how low life had been and to never, ever take for granted where I am now. It’s my daily lesson never to let my life get to such a low point again.

  Life isn’t always going to be easy – in fact, if you are trying to better yourself or business in any way, be prepared for a pile of grief coming your way. Be willing and able to do the things that no one else will.

  The thankless jobs.

  The ‘grunt work’.

  The shit.

  In my case, what doing that thankless job, knee deep in shit, gave me was hope – that and the massive kick in the pills I really needed to crack on and make some big changes in my life.

  And I have applied this to every area of my life. I’ll explain the story of how I got to work for him later on, but I ended up getting a gig under one of the biggest names in online marketing (and the smartest bastard I know too – bloody neuroscientist!). He didn’t need me, but he had some thankless jobs that needed doing.

  Now bear in mind at this time I still had a full-time personal training commitment in my gym and was training myself aggressively as a direct-response copywriter. I ended up doing several thousand customer care calls (the thankless task), from when I got home at 8pm until around 3/4am, Monday to Friday, then getting up at 6.30am to get back to the gym.

  There was no money in it for me, but I was shameless, and seeing an opportunity where I could handle some work that nobody wanted to do, I pitched myself in. I did the work, and continued to do everything that was asked of me, from flying around the world to be at events and delivering 1,000+ ‘turbo coaching’ calls to writing 15,000 word sales letters in twenty-four hours at the weekend. All for free.

  Daft, eh?

  Well, as a result of my lack of shame, I ended up being coached by some of the world’s best marketers/business people, learning skills that would have taken me easily five+ years to master, blowing up my network, and eventually landing a high five-figure a month contract to launch an agency on his behalf.

  See, being shameless does pay off, eh? But more importantly, I did the work. The grunt work, to be exact. I put in the hours, with almost no expectation of anything in return. That and my lack of shame (or simply drinking enough at the time to ignore what I was about to do – I don’t recommend this!) is the biggest contributor to where I am now.

  And you wouldn’t be reading this book if it wasn’t for the sheer shamelessness and determination on my part.

  Fact!

  BE SHAMELESS TO DO/ACTION STEPS

  Become shameless. This isn’t for everyone, but those of you who do embrace it are the ones who will have the most stories to tell and be the most successful. Yes, you need to take pride in what you do, but, pride can fuck you up. Be humble in what you do otherwise it will come round and bite you in the arse (trust me).

  Get the fuck over yourself. This is rather simple, but if you ask yourself in most scenarios nowadays, ‘What’s the worst
that could happen?’, likely it will be you look like a bit of a knob or someone saying, ‘I’m not interested’. Your imagination can create some epically horrific shit, when in reality it’s never that bad. You need to get over yourself and get out of your own way.

  Do me a favour: if there’s something you’ve been putting off for a while, just fucking do it!

  Ask for help. Make other people feel good by asking for help. When you go out of your way and offer help, what happens? You feel good. Don’t deny other people those same feelings. You’ll find out quickly, when you ask for help or admit things have gone wrong, people will help you, and help you willingly. If you’re struggling and feel like the weight of the world is all on your shoulders, go and ask for help from someone who knows how to get you over the hump.

  3

  BE WEIRD

  (BUT NOT TOO FUCKING WEIRD)

  The weird set an example for the rest of us. They raise the bar. They show us through their actions that in fact we’re wired to do the new, not to comply with someone a thousand miles away.

  SETH GODIN

  I want to share with you a concept of ‘uniqueness’. Not enough people understand it fully so I decided to dedicate a whole chapter to it.

  But first, let me run a couple of things by you, because you may well be thinking shit, Dan, now I gotz ta be a weirdo too? What you playing at? All I want to do is make wonga and play video games all day.

  Listen up.

  Why do antiques and collectibles demand enough dinero to make a normal person weep? Or why are rare paintings swiped up for more than what an average person earns in a lifetime? Maybe that dress (yes, ladies, I know this publication until now has been very masculine. Sorry) which you pay over the odds for just because it’s exclusive and one of a kind – why do these things happen?

  Well because they are unique, one of a kind, limited edition, singularis.

  And so for you, my friend, embracing your unique self, warts and all, is the single most beneficial thing you can do if you want to kick balls in life. When you are yourself, you are more than valuable – you are irreplaceable. There’s no one else like you.

  Fact.

  I’m going to come straight out of the gate with this – I am not suggesting you act like an out-and-out oddball. We all knew the person at school who was quirky, a little different – they were cool. Then there was the one – you know, the weirdo who was just too strange. I’m all for dancing to your own beat – what I’m trying to say is if you think you’re a bit odd, a bit different, a bit weird, that’s great. Embrace it.

  I know for a fact I am!

  Look, when I started out in business – first in headhunting, then personal training, then copywriting and now the coaching/business/speaking/writing madness that is my life – I played it pretty straight. I’ve always been told I’m funny and that people seem to get on with me easily, but for far too long I tried to be someone I wasn’t.

  In fact, it got to the point where I had lived the lie for so long, I didn’t know who I was anymore. I wanted to be this successful, sporty, badass tough guy who didn’t give a shit and was all about ‘living it large’ and making money, but in real life, I’m quite geeky. I love being on my own and reading. Wandering around an aquarium listening to classical music is my idea of heaven. Spending all the monies buying miniatures in model stores and painting them is fucking awesome. Also pizza.

  Don’t get me wrong, I still like to tear the arse off a crazy night in Vegas, LA, or London, dancing absolutely terribly until the small hours and demolishing a mini bar and singing out loud in my boxers. But I would be just as happy figuring out if I can make bread.

  See – hardly ‘cool’, is it?

  But that’s the thing. As entrepreneurs, I’ve found that we are all a bit odd. Which is great. I mean, let’s face it – society, as a rule, expects us to go to school, go to college/university, get a job, work our way up, get a mortgage, a car, maybe get married and have kids – and keep this up till our late sixties when we can finally retire and do all the things we wanted to do. But then we get there and we’re too tired, our knees don’t work so well anymore, and it’s all so…noisy.

  And who knows? We might not even get to the wispy hair and cranky voice stage. ’Cause quite frankly, if there’s one thing we can’t control is our own mortality. So I say, surprise surprise, ‘Fuck. That.’

  We basically have (as an entrepreneur or someone who wants change) said to that scenario, ‘Thanks, but no thanks. Not for me. I’ll do my own thing. Now.’ Turning your back on what is essentially the norm is a pretty fucking weird thing to do. Hence we are all a bit odd, eh?

  Now I mentioned earlier that I tried to be something I am not for quite a while, and as much as I had seen people espousing the benefits of being myself, I thought, who on earth would be interested in me? I’m a bit of a dork.

  Yeah, that’s the kinda crap that holds so many back from achieving everything they want from life. It took time, don’t get me wrong, but I started to be more me when I put my content out there. I wasn’t afraid to share the highs and lows. I became Dan on the outside more and more, and as a result I became closer to the me that I was on the inside.

  You know what the funny thing was? The more I was me, the more my audience grew and grew. The more I was me, the more people I connected with and could actually help. The more I was me, the more money flowed into my bank account. The more I was me, the more people identified with me and wanted to be a part of the journey.

  My journey.

  Crazy, eh?

  All I had to do was stop hiding behind the mask I thought people wanted me to wear, stop giving quite so much of a fuck, and just be me. Warts and all. Good shit and bad shit.

  The more honest I was with those I worked with, and my audience, the better life got, to the point where I use a cartoon of my ridiculous face on everything I create now (including, as you will have seen, this book). I’m going to ask that, over time, you stop trying to be who you think people want you to be.

  The you inside – the one who has all the quirks and oddities and fuck-ups – be that person.

  Be you!

  You, when you’re being you, are fucking awesome.

  You, when you’re trying to be someone or something else, are not awesome.

  I’m not going to go all ‘woo-woo’ here, but figuring out who you are – why you are here, what your purpose is – is an absolute bitch. If you know all of that, fucking awesome! I know that for me, it’s a work in progress.

  As I have got older, what I stand for, what I believe in and who I essentially am has changed. And that’s fine; people will see your progression and follow you regardless. We humans can smell bullshit and fakery from a mile away. But being genuinely you – well, that’s a whole new ball game.

  There’s no one like you. You are unique. Your quirks are unique and your personality is unique. You’re irreplaceable when you are genuinely you. And that’s an awesome place to be as an entrepreneur/coach.

  I can’t stress this strongly enough: if you don’t know who the real you is yet, start being the person who, deep inside, you have always wanted to be. Your uniqueness is what will draw people to you. Everyone loves a flawed hero.

  I don’t want perfect people. I want people who have a story, have been through some shit, dance to their own beat and still make it work, not the fake-arsed posh fuck-wits who look down on us slightly geeky weird-but-cool entrepreneurs.

  A friend of mine gave me a great little sound bite, and he has turned this into a multi-million dollar business:

  ‘Your mess is your message’.

  All that stuff which you think is weird, embarrassing, or a failure – that’s the exact stuff that people will bond with you over.

  Why?

  Because it makes them feel less weird. There are other weirdos just like them who have the balls/ovaries to put themselves out there.

  We’re human at the end of the day, and that’s how we bond. Sooner or
later the shit hits the fan for almost all of us, and it’s these experiences that we can all resonate with.

  I’ll give you an example from my own life. When I had my first speaking gig I really wanted my personality to shine through, own the stage and make it a great experience for those watching. Instead, what I did was stand behind the lectern and deliver a PowerPoint presentation.

  Yes, the content was good and I got great feedback, but looking back that must have been dull as piss – and I was hardly being myself.

  Roll forward nearly three years. In front of a room of some extremely successful marketers and business owners, I proceeded to deliver a forty-five minute presentation wearing a Mexican wrestling mask and drinking vodka out of a crystal skull.

  To be fair, I wasn’t doing it for attention – I didn’t know I was going to be on camera (let alone in front of so many people). It was 7pm and I looked a fucking state, and the only clean receptacle I had was a crystal skull acquired the night before. Old Dan would have been paranoid: ‘What if people don’t like me?’; ‘What if people say bad things about me?’; ‘What if they don’t think I’m professional?’

  Can you guess what happened?

  I was widely regarded as one of the best, most entertaining and memorable speakers of the weekend. Floods of friend requests, new members on my site and a stack more presence followed.

  Not bad for embracing my weird side, eh?

  Look, you probably know if you are more on the introvert or extrovert scale (or the newly talked about ‘entrepreneurial’ personality that is gaining some serious ground). But you can find out about yourself in more scientific ways if you want.

  I have put myself through the Kolbe, Myers-Briggs and DISC assessments, and these have been really useful in finding out who I am, what I’m good at and what makes me tick. Equally they’ve helped me grow and scale my businesses, as in the past I would have recruited people like me and invariably things would go tits up at some point. Now, as I know what I’m like in a more easy to understand way, I can recruit people who have the skills that I don’t have, and as a result we have been able to scale fast.