The Introvert Leader

How To Learn New Skills

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In this episode, I’m talking about how to learn and apply new skills and why it’s one of the fastest ways to grow your career. Whether you’re stuck in your role or want to become more valuable at work, acquiring the right skills can make a huge difference. I’ll break down how to choose the right skill, where to learn it, and how to push through the messy parts of the process.


Timestamps

:40 – Austin Update

1:28 – Why Acquiring New Skills Is Important: Why skill-building is one of the most underrated ways to stand out in your career.

2:52 – What Learning New Skills Can Do For Your Career: The impact of adding new tools to your toolbox and how it compounds over time.

5:37 – Identifying The Right Skills to Learn: How to figure out which skills are worth your time and aligned with your goals.

10:38 – The Best Vehicles To Learn New Skills: My favorite ways to learn quickly, from books to hands-on practice.

14:20 – Overcoming Challenges in The Learning Process: What makes skill-building hard and how to push through it.

20:49 – Actionable First Steps / Applying The New Skill: What to do once you’ve picked a skill and how to apply it right away.

23:22 – Story Time: A behind-the-scenes story about how I taught myself to edit audio and video for this podcast and my YouTube channel.

26:28 – Challenge For Listeners: Pick a skill, take 15 minutes to start learning it today, and commit to action.



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 Hello, this is your host, Austin Hopkins, and welcome to the Introvert Leader Podcast.

When was the last time you learned something new? Be honest. I mean, really learn something new. Picked up a new skill. Looked like a total rookie. Got outta your comfort zone. Well, today's episode is about acquiring new skills. So if it's been more than a year. This episode is gonna be right up your alley, and maybe you're the type of person that's always learning new skills, but you're not sure which ones to prioritize.

Then this episode's definitely for you. But before we do that, I wanna give you a quick update on what's been going on in my world. So speaking of acquiring new skills, I thought it would be a genius idea to learn how to install blinds in our home. Instead of spending the money to have a professional dude, I thought, you know what?

I'm handy. I can figure this out. I grew up on a farm. It just can't be that tough. Well, it was kind of tough and I was a little overwhelmed. So me and the wifey put up the blinds a couple of days ago and, uh, they look good, but I gotta tell you, woo, learning curve, didn't know what I was doing, had lots of issues.

Here are my three tips. Number one, don't do home projects if you're hungry. Number two, don't do home projects if you're hungry. And number three. Don't do home projects if you're hungry. Uh, it doesn't turn out well, but we ended up getting them up. They look good. It was a fun little, uh, project and, uh, yeah, we learned a new skill.

So thought I'd share. All right, let's jump into it. So you're getting left behind at work. I. I don't wanna be blunt. I don't wanna seem uncaring. I'm being honest with you. There are people right now that you work with who are prioritizing learning and growth way more than you'd expect. They're reading books, they're listening to podcasts, they're learning new things.

They're getting outta their comfort zone, they're practicing. And if you're not the type of person that has made that a priority, well then this episode is. Definitely gonna give you some strategies and show you why it's so freaking important to focus on acquiring new skills. So for a lot of years, in the beginning of my career, I wasn't really focused on acquiring new skills.

I was just kind of focused on the job. How did I make sure I could do the job the best that I could, you know, get results, make sure I meet performance expectations, you name it. But it wasn't until I started to care about growth, until I really started to care about learning and acquiring new skills.

That's when my career really took off because I became way more valuable than the candidates around me, than the people around me. And because I had more skills. So that's why it's important. So I wanna talk about acquiring new skills today. I wanna talk about how to figure out which ones are the best ones to focus on, how to get through the challenges of learning something new.

'cause that's not always the easiest part. It could be uncomfortable, right? And then I wanna leave you with a challenge. Something that you can put into practice this week to start growing and becoming a better version of yourself. Okay, let's jump into it and talk about why learning new skills can do wonders for your career.

So, like I said a minute ago, when I started really prioritizing growth and learning, that's when things took off. So I moved faster, I moved further than I had ever thought because I was acquiring things that made me incredibly valuable. So there are lots of reasons why you might want to acquire new skills for your career, but I wanna just cover a couple the ones that I've seen in my own life that have really.

Made it like, oh my gosh, this is obvious. You have to care about learning and growth Austin. So number one, it separates you from your peers. So the truth is, there's lots of people that you work with that aren't caring about this kind of stuff. They're right, they're just, they're happy where they're at.

They're good to stay in the same job, making the same money, doing the same things every day. And there's nothing wrong with that. But if you wanna separate yourself, if you wanna be the type of person that people look at and say, whoa. This guy's different. This girl's different. They have something different than the average person.

Then you have to care about learning new skills because that's what separates you from the other people that don't care about that. Number two, it's gonna make people respect you more. So I don't know about you, but when I look at people that I can tell are consistently getting outta their comfort zone and growing instantly, I have respect for them.

Instantly I tell myself, Ooh, this is someone who is okay to look stupid. Okay. To get outta their comfort zone and okay to do things that people aren't doing around them. So I think it absolutely kind of creates an aura of respect around you, and people just instantly kind of gravitate towards those kind of people, those kind of leaders.

Number one is I think it positions yourself incredibly well for opportunities, pay raises, promotions, you name it. So imagine there's two candidates, and on paper, they're exactly the same except for one thing. One of those people has all of these extra skills, right? All of these things that are very, very valuable to their boss, to the company, to the organization, to their clients.

And one person doesn't do that. I think you can figure out who's gonna get hired. It's the person with all the skills, the person that is incredibly valuable that that's signaling, Hey, I'm able to do this job. And even more so, I think it 100% sets you up for those kind of things. I can draw a line from all of the opportunities I've got, all of the promotions, the raises, all the good stuff that's happened in my career.

And all of it, if I'm really honest, is tied back to skills that I had learned, things that I was doing that people weren't doing around me. So the last one, it builds confidence. I don't know if you're like me, but when I learn something new, when I acquire a new skill, I feel more confident. Right? Um, it tells my, it tells my brain that I'm smart, I'm capable, that I have follow through, that I'm okay to take risks, that I'm okay to get uncomfortable.

All of these things, you're basically telling yourself higher value. When you get outta your comfort zone and you learn these new skills, so it's not only just an external thing, it's an internal thing. You're gonna feel better the more skills that you acquire. And, and I'll tell you some stories later and some examples of, of really what that looks like in real life.

Okay. I wanna transition and talk about how to identify the right skills to learn the right skills to prioritize for your career, for your life. So there's lots of things that we can learn, right? There is an endless amount of information on the internet. You could learn anything about anything, right? You could learn about farming, you could learn about how to do pottery.

You could learn how to play video games. I mean, you could literally learn it. Anything. So that being said, that's not the issue anymore is, is there things to learn? The issue is how do I prioritize what are the right things to learn? So in this section, I thought it'd be kind of fun to give you a couple of questions that could help guide you, figure out what are the type of things you think you might wanna learn.

And then I also wanna give you, before we wrap on this section, the top five things that I wish I would've learned earlier in my career that have made the biggest impact over the last 15 years. So I wanna start with one of the first questions that I thought would be kind of interesting. What would have the most significant impact with the least amount of investment.

So if you could learn something where it wouldn't take all that long, but it would have the biggest impact. Maybe something to think about. Another question you could ask yourself is, what skills do the folks have that are in my dream role that I don't have? So think about the people that are in your dream role, and what are the things that when you look at them, you're like, Ooh, they've got that.

They've mastered that skill, they've figured that out. Could be interesting for you to focus on that, right? Start thinking about how you're gonna get to your dream role. Another one. What is something that's always kind of seemed interesting to you? So this is an important one because I think a lot of times when we're interested in something, instead of then pursuing it and actually starting to learn something or research a little bit more about it, we just let that thought go by, right?

We just think, oh, that seems kind of interesting. And, and then, and it goes, and out it goes. And. And we don't do anything with it. Well, I think those are some really cool cues and clues that our mind is leaving us and is saying, Hey, this could be something that I might be good at. This is something that sounds interesting.

Maybe I should learn that. Another really good question is what's the skill that if I mastered it. It would open the biggest doors for me. So there's gotta be something right now that you think, if I could learn this, my goodness, it would set me up for success. It would put me in the right rooms, at the right tables, and the right conversations.

So I want you to start thinking about those questions, right? What are, what are the clues? What are the cues that your brain is leaving you that you may be able to tap into? So we talked about the questions. Slight transition. I wanna tell you, here are the things that I wish I would've learned early on.

Honestly, these are the things that, if. I would've learned when I was in my early twenties, oof, man, I would've been even faster and gone farther than I did. So here are the, the, the top ones that come to mind. Number one is communication. So things like written communication, verbal, uh, communication during meetings.

Those are the kind of things that I think really, really make a big difference. As you move up higher, it's going to be just an automatic expectation that you can communicate effectively and get people to understand your ideas and get points across and that kind of stuff. So very, very important. So the next one is influence and persuasion.

So getting people to do stuff, right? Effectively, giving presentations, basically being able to get people to come around to your ideas. I mean, think leadership, right? How are you gonna get people to do what you want if you don't understand how to use your influence or how to persuade people? Now, of course, I always say that with a caveat.

I don't mean weird evil stuff or bad stuff. I'm just talking about when you want someone to do something that maybe isn't their own good, but maybe they just don't wanna do it. Super, super important skill that I wish I would've learned earlier. Another one I think, is situational leadership and emotional intelligence.

So when I first started as a leader. It wasn't necessarily clear to me that I needed to treat each employee differently. So, you know, my first couple of months I thought, okay, I'm just gonna treat everybody the same. I'm gonna be polite, make sure it's fair. It's even, well that doesn't work because not everyone on your team is the same.

So I think that's why situational leadership is so important. So it's really adapting your style to the individual person. So giving the people on your team exactly what they need as opposed to just giving them this one version of you and expecting them to adapt to your style. And I think the last one that I really wish I would've mastered earlier on is learning how to coach, mentor, develop people.

So it's not enough to just sit there and let your team do the work. As a leader, you have got to be the person that's growing your team. They're not always gonna be doing that themselves. They're gonna be counting on you to do that. Now, if they're a good employee, they're gonna own their own growth. But that being said, there's lots of employees that are gonna wait for their boss to kind of pull the trigger on that kind of stuff.

So if I would've learned that earlier. Man, I really think that would've helped me turn the dial, turn low performers into better performers, and honestly, just manage the different emotions, the different talents, and that kind of stuff of the team. So again, skills wishlist. The things I would've wish I would've learned at, you know, 25 instead of 35.

Communication, influence and persuasion, situational leadership, and then coaching, mentoring, or developing people, if I would've learned those things. Could have been a game changer. So the good news is I did learn those things. It just took years and you know, it still ended up working out. But again, if you could master those things early on in your career, you're gonna be set up for an amazing ride.

I. Okay, so what I wanna do now is transition and talk a little bit about the methods or the vehicles in which you can learn stuff. So there's lots of different ways to learn stuff. I'm just gonna share with you the ones that have been the most impactful in my own life, the ones that I go back to over and over again.

So the first one is podcasts. Now, what I wanna say before we go into further about podcast is just because someone's talking into a mic, looking at a camera does not make them an authority in whatever they're talking about. So that being said, podcasts can be great, but you gotta do your research a little bit.

So here are the things that I would do if I was looking to learn something new. I would find a niche podcast and the specific thing I wanna get better at. And then I would look those hosts up on LinkedIn. I would see, you know, do they have a successful career? Have they actually been able to do the things they said they're doing in the, in the podcast?

Are they actually the real deal? And if it's just two bros sitting on a couch talking about a growth mindset, I, I, I don't think that's. The right kind of podcast to be looking at. I would look at high performers, high achievers, people that have actually done the stuff that you admire, that you respect in your life, right?

Another one would be online courses or classes. So think sites like Masterclass, uh, you Dimmy, LinkedIn. Learning those things can be really good. My only caveat would be look for ratings and reviews of those courses. 'cause a lot of times you'll see some ratings and you'll be like, Ugh, I don't know what I think about that.

I'd also. Encourage you to be really careful about taking courses from random people on the internet. Again, it goes back to are they an expert in what they're talking about? If they're not an expert, if they've been doing it for six months and then that they wanna sell you a course, that's not the vibe.

You need to go to people that are experts that know what they're doing so that they lead you in the right direction. Right. Another one, and this is a big one, it's YouTube, so I have learned. More than you can even imagine on YouTube. I have spent hundreds and hundreds and hundreds, maybe thousands of hours on YouTube over the course of my life, learning different stuff and not just professional stuff, personal stuff, how to change a faucet, how to replace a toilet, how to fix a sliding glass door.

I mean, literally you can learn anything on YouTube. Again, though, I think it's really good to go to reputable channels that have solid content that maybe have. You know, a history of delivering that kind of content. Also, don't be afraid to ask recommendations from friends. I think that's another great way to learn new channels and things like that, but just keep your guard up, right?

Just because someone's in front of the camera talking does not mean they're qualified. Really, really make sure that the person you're listening to knows what they're talking about. That's important. The next one I think, is in real life. So observing the people around you. This is a hack. This is something that I have done my entire career that really, really helped me.

There are bright spots all around you. There are people that are doing things that you're not able to do yet that are performing at higher levels than you, and all you gotta do is look for them. You just gotta look around. You gotta be quiet. You gotta listen. You gotta observe and see who are the people around you that are doing the things that you admire, that you wanna learn.

Take notes, right? Don't just observe and, and watch, but take notes. Like if you heard someone say something cool during a meeting, take that down as a note and then. Maybe you try that during your next meeting, or if you really like the way someone handled a, a difficult situation at work, maybe write down some of the talking points they used or how they, you know, broach the subject.

I don't know what it's gonna be for you, but learning in real life is a gold mine. And by the way, it's free. I. So those are the like maybe the four main ways that I have learned in the course of my career. Again, it's podcasts, online courses or classes, YouTube, and then just in real life, look around. You know, pick your head up, stop looking down at your phone, look at the world around you.

Look at the people around you. There's amazing bright spots all around us. We just gotta look for 'em. Okay, so we talked about some of the different vehicles and some of the different methods. You can learn stuff. What I wanna do now is transition a little bit, and I wanna talk about some of the challenges that you might face when you're learning a new skill.

So you might think you probably don't, but maybe you think it's gonna be super easy to learn a new skill. All I gotta do is just pick it up. Watch a couple of videos and I'm a master. Well, that's just not how it works. It's gonna be challenging. So what I thought I would do is give you the five biggest challenges that I faced when I was learning new skills in my career.

And then I wanna give you the fix for each one. So I'll go one by one, give you what the challenge is, and then I'll give you what my fix has been in the past. So the first one is getting bored or not learning anything. So maybe it seems interesting at first. And then for whatever reason, you lose interest.

So for me. What I usually did in that moment is if I started, you know, researching a new skill and started to try to learn something and then, you know, within a couple of minutes, maybe 30 minutes, an hour, I'm like. This just doesn't seem interesting. What I really like to do in that moment is take a second pause and think to myself, is this truly something I wanna learn or not?

And if you're not confident that this is something you wanna learn, you won't stick with it. So I would recommend abandoning it. Now what I'm also gonna tell you is this, sometimes you might have just picked the wrong vehicle to learn something. So maybe you wanted to learn about accounting and you thought it'd be a good idea to read a book.

Well, maybe a book's not the best way to learn accounting. Maybe that's on an online class or maybe that's a seminar in person. I don't know. But I would say before you give up on learning a new skill, make sure too that you, maybe you reevaluate is the vehicle you chose the right one. And if it's not, it can make a big difference.

Okay, another one, not making time. So. A common challenge that I hear people say is, I don't have time. I don't have time. I'm too busy bs. No, don't care. I don't care if you have kids. I don't care if you have a full-time career. I don't care if you have a side hustle. I don't care. I don't care. I don't care.

We all have time. Now, I'm not saying we all have the same amount of time. I'm just saying we all have time. No person that I've ever met in this world has every minute of their day scheduled. There is 100% time within your day that you can learn something new. Even if it's 10 minutes, maybe it's five minutes.

Maybe you just listen to a opening of a podcast every morning on your way to work. I don't care what it is. There is 100% time in your day. Now it will take you to make a, a decision and say, this is a priority. So maybe you have to watch a little less tv. Uh, maybe you don't get to go out with friends on this Friday.

Maybe you, you know, can't do the things that you would normally do. And you have to make a sacrifice, and that's okay. But don't make the excuse that you don't have time because you do. We all have time. We're just not making the time. So the fix is stop making excuses that you don't have time, and make the decision that this is gonna be part of your new identity.

You're gonna be the person that's gonna learn new skills. And once you make that decision that, Hey, this is my identity, I'm the type of person that's gonna learn new stuff. You will 100% make the time, but until you do that, it'll be much more challenging to actually make the time because you haven't made it a priority.

You haven't decided in your heart. This is important to me. This is the type of person I'm gonna be. Um, okay. Another one would be, you're not picking it up as fast as you would like. So maybe you compare yourself to others or even just you're kind of self-critical and you're like, dude, I should be picking the sump.

What's going on here? Well, here's the deal. Here's the fix. Stop complaining. Be patient. It's gonna take time. Anytime you're learning something new. It will take time, especially the more complicated thing you're learning, right? It only may take me, uh, you know, five minutes how to learn to do something quick around the house, but it may take me hours, 10 hours, 50 hours to learn something That has to do with my work, some big skill in life.

So be patient, you're going to have to put in the time, and again, go back to the identity thing. Is this important to you? Have you made the decision that. I'm gonna learn a new skill. I don't care if it's gonna take me days, months, years, I'm gonna learn it 'cause this is who I am. So make that decision and I think that will really, really help you.

I know it's worked for me when I've tried to learn something and it took too much time. I want to give up, dude. Like I can give you an example. The piano. I was trying to learn the piano. I haven't learned it yet, it's still on my wishlist to do, but like I practiced for like, I don't know, three hours over a course of a couple of weeks.

And I thought, eh, this isn't going fast enough. I quit. That was a mistake. I didn't stick with it because I didn't tell myself this is gonna be who I am. This is my identity. I'm a piano player. By the way, I'm taking my own advice. I don't think I'm just sitting here preaching to you. I know the importance of those kind of things.

So I'm gonna learn piano, don't you worry. Um, okay. Another one is self-doubt. Now, you might tell yourself it's gonna be too hard, you won't get it. Maybe you aren't capable. All of these are automatic negative thoughts. And here's the good news. All of us have control over what thoughts we fit into. Now, we don't always have control of what thoughts pop into our head, right?

Those are automatic. I'm not setting out to have self-doubt, but it just pops in, right? We're humans. The key here is do you give into that thought? Do you believe that or do you just acknowledge it, label it, and say, oh, okay, that's, that's me being negative. It's not true. It's okay. It's just a negative thought.

I'm gonna keep going. So when you have that self-doubt, I really want you to not give into the thoughts and just allow them to come in and, and leave and just say, oh, that's my reality. This is who I am. It's not your reality. It's you maybe fighting against what's happening, but you have control over those thoughts.

Just like you have control over the positive thoughts and which ones you give into, you have control over the negative thoughts you given into. So really, really important. If you have self-doubt, I want you to just realize we all have self-doubt. Like all of us, even the most confident people, I have self-doubt.

I doubt myself all the time, but when I doubt myself, if I know it's just me being negative and it's not reality, I just label it and I say, huh, okay, Austin, I'm being negative right now. That's okay. It must be challenging. Maybe I'll take a break. Maybe I'll go get a cup of coffee. Something like that.

Right? Change up the pattern. I. Okay, so the last one, the last big challenge that I've struggled with is getting stuck in the learning cycle or no action. So maybe you have done this yourself, or maybe you know people, but they like to learn stuff. They're always learning something new. They're watching something.

They're reading something, but they never take any action on it. So they have all this knowledge, but they haven't acquired a new skill. They've just acquired knowledge. So knowledge without action is just knowledge. Knowledge with action is acquiring a new skill. So if you find yourself bouncing around learning new things, but never actually taking action, putting into practice, maybe you should stop trying to learn so much and just double down on the things that are actually important.

What are the real skills that you actually wanna learn? And then put your time and effort into that. I think that will really, really make a big difference. Okay, so we talked about how to overcome some of the challenges. I talked about some of the vehicles that I've used. What I wanna do now is talk a little bit about.

The actual steps you can take to learn a new skill. So there's five steps, five really, really easy steps. I've used them so many times and it works. So step one, identify something that interests you, that could benefit your career. So we talked a little earlier about asking yourself those questions. So I want you to start asking yourself those questions.

And then I want you to identify something that interests you, that you think could make a big difference in your career. So then step two is pretty simple. I want you to learn the basics. I want you to learn the basics by reading a book, listening to a podcast, talking with a friend. Taking a course, a class, I don't care what it is, but I want you to start learning just a little bit.

Just a little bit. Getting your feet wet, dipping your toe in there, if you know what I mean. And then here's step three. Immediately after you have learned a little bit, I want you to take some action. I want you to put it immediately into practice. And here's why this works so well. Once you've learned something, when you put it in the practice, it instantly ingrains it in your brain more and makes it.

Stick. It makes it way more sticky, so put it into practice right away. Super important. Okay, step four, I want you to ask for feedback or observe the results. So what you're gonna do is, let's say you just practice public speaking. I want you to give a speech at work, stand up during meeting, do something like that, and then afterwards ask for some feedback.

See if that new skill that you're starting to learn, you're, you're making the right moves. You're, you're getting traction for it. People are gonna be honest with you, right? If you have the right friends around you, the right people that you ask for feedback, they're gonna give you feedback and say, Hey, this didn't sound so good.

Or, Hey, you need to tighten up this. But also don't be afraid to just observe yourself. So if you're trying to acquire this new skill, and maybe it's excel. Observe, how quickly are you getting through those Excel formulas that took you hours before? Can you get it done in 50 minutes now? Can you get the spreadsheets in a good spot in 30 minutes?

If you're observing that you're getting better at it, you're on the right track. So observe or ask for feedback. Super, super important. Step five. I want you to practice it until it becomes boring. So here's the key. The more you practice something, the easier it gets. And then eventually you'll get to a point where it's almost kind of boring.

You're like, I've mastered this. Like I, I've figured it out. I don't need to research. I don't need to spend 30 more hours. Like I've got it. It's good. And I think that's the key when you're acquiring a new skill, is to really just. Pound it into your brain. The more you try it, the more you practice it, the more it becomes part of you, and then you've actually acquired that new skill.

So again, those are the five steps. Identify something that interests you. Learn the basics. Immediately pick something and put it into action. Ask for feedback or observe, and then practice that new skill until it becomes pouring. I know for a fact if you try those things, it will work because it's worked in my own life over and over and over again.

Okay. I wanna transition and tell you a story about a skill that I'm actually using today, right now, right in front of you right now, which is editing a audio or video podcast. If you would've asked me a couple of years ago how to do this, I would've looked at you blankly and said, I have no idea slash I have zero interest in doing it.

Well, then came the time where I was like, okay, I need to start a podcast, right? I was feeling a calling to do that. So then the natural thing is to think, well, how am I gonna edit this dang thing? So I was like, okay. I'm gonna suck at this, but I'm gonna do a little bit of research. I'm just gonna watch a couple of videos on YouTube.

I'm gonna listen to a podcast on how to do some editing. So I listened to a podcast, I watched a couple of videos, and I recorded my first podcast episode. It was like 12 minutes and it was rough. It was not good. Um, but I edited it. I put it together on my Mac. It took me like. Two days to edit 12 minutes, but I got it done.

So I sent it to my friends and the first thing they said is, dang, Austin, this is good. The content was really good. Didn't even talk about the editing because I had done enough to where it didn't sound horrible. So I decided, okay, I'm gonna put out the podcast and, and, and use what little editing skills I have, right?

And each week I got a little bit better. I watched some more videos. I read a couple of more books. I listened to a couple more podcasts, and every time it got a little better. In fact, I'd have people reach out and say, Hey Austin, your audio sounded better this week. I dunno what you did, but it sounds great.

Or, Hey Austin, I really like the intro music you used. Just little things, right? So over time I got better and better, and then I realized. Okay, I need to really take this to the next level. I, I'm not getting as good as I want. So I decided to sign up for masterclass. I dunno if you've heard of Masterclass, but it's an online learning platform that basically pulls together all of the best and brightest from around the world and they teach you stuff.

And I had noticed that Marcus Brownley, uh, famous YouTuber, mk, BHDI think. And uh, he was teaching audio and video editing and just the basics of videography. So I watched that video over and over and over again, probably like six times all the way through. It was like a two hour class. Kept watching it, taking notes, and then I put it into practice, and then I launched my YouTube channel.

At the beginning of this year. I had no idea what I was doing, but I thought, I don't care. If I look stupid, I'm gonna just put it together and it doesn't matter. As long as I'm continuously trying to get better, I. It's gonna work out, and I'm happy to say I'm in a good place now. I don't feel like my YouTube channel or a podcast is perfect.

I never wanna claim perfection, but I'm proud of the product. I'm now proud to show this to anybody and say, yeah, I created this. And it took time and it took me feeling uncomfortable and I had some self-doubt and I wasn't sure I wanted to stick with it, but I made it part of my identity. I said. I'm gonna be a YouTuber, I'm gonna be a podcaster, I'm gonna be the type of person that can edit and, and really own their channel.

And so I share that story with you just to say you can learn anything. Like three years ago, editing was different language to Austin. I don't even, I don't even know that Austin, this is a new Austin, but it took time, it took three years to really get comfortable editing and doing all the things to put out a, a finished product that I'm proud of.

So, I don't know, maybe there's a skill in your life that you feel like. You need to learn, right? I want you to ask yourself those questions. In fact, that's the challenge for this week, is I want you to take a couple minutes and I want you to just ask yourself those questions. What's something I could do that would take the least amount of investment, that would have the biggest ROI?

What's something I'm interested in? What's something that could make a big impact on my career? And then I want you to take a little action. I want you to just spend 15 minutes over the next week just dipping your toe into learning that new skill. Don't worry about doing it all at once. It's gonna take time.

But I just want you to get outta your comfort zone and try learning a new skill. I promise you you'll feel better, and then over time you're gonna start showing others around you. This is someone who is focused on learning, who's focused on growth, and you become more high valuable. So I wanna say thank you so much for listening to the episode today.

Make it a great day.


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Austin Hopkins

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