Stop Disguising Your Procrastination as Productivity: Interview with Shuntay Grant [Ep #168]

Hey guys! What’s up? I am Andrea, your host of the profitable practice podcast. And we’re here for another fantastic interview episode. And I will say that after doing this interview with Shuntay Grant that I really loved how she put her program together. But it sounds so similar to the 1 90 37 1 plan that we used inside the maximized practitioner method. And really, when it comes down to it, is, we are talking about getting you off that chaos hamster. We are talking about getting rid of the overwhelming, we’re talking about having you end your day feeling like you’re productive and not just doing all of the admin things. We are talking about getting you performing at that 5% level while improving your personal growth as well as your business growth. And your ability to show up as that maximized practitioner, and ultimately just getting you performing, and functioning and accomplishing all of those goals that you have been wanting to accomplish. Probably for years, a lot of times when we are onboarding our elite members by the time they worked with us for three months they will always say ‘man, you got done in three months, but I’ve been wanting to get done for two years. And a lot of it is just lack of planning, lack of accountability, and lack of commitment as well as seeing that goal every single day, top of mind. Because most of us when we wake up we just hope and pray that today is going to be a better day; that we’re going to accomplish those 50 things that were on our to-do list. And we all know that that never happens, that usually we’re lucky if we get one of those big things done and the rest of the day will just be filled with; we don’t even know what. So that’s why I wanted to bring on Shuntay to talk about her approach that she takes with her clients on really mastering the productivity in your life, really mastering that smart action cycle. Getting you out of the fear, getting you out of the laziness. Really clarifying what your mission is, your daily mission is. And validating why you are in business to begin with. I think that’s kind of one of the biggest things; what I see in a lot of the practitioners I worked with and those that I struggle with is we were so underprepared when we graduated school. We had no idea the mountain that we were actually standing at the bottom of. And so when we graduated, and were now pushed at base camp one or base camp zero or whatever that’s at the bottom. And then we looked up and were just like ‘oh damn.’ And it is really daunting and no one told us to prepare for that. So this interview is hopefully going to reconfirm what you want in your life. It’s going to reconfirm what you do not want in your life and the best part is with Shuntay’s structure, you are going to be reliving that every single day instead of just doing it at some random workshop writing it down on a piece of paper, closing the book and then never looking at it again. So let’s jump into that interview now.

ANDREA: Hey Shuntay! Thank you so much for coming on to the podcast today. I listen to you during a launch with Tyler Jay McCall and as I was saying to you before we started your presentation was one of the most stands out, well-delivered, the messaging in it was so spot on I knew I had to get you in front of my audience so I am thrilled to have you here. For those that don’t know who you are, do you want to just introduce yourself, and kind of tell some little bit of your journey?

SHUNTAY: Yes, sure! Hello, my name is Shuntay Grant. I am among other things a woman who is on a mission to help people be proactive and intentional with their time. I want to help you show up as your best once a day at a time. And so because of that, the name of my company is ‘The Best Today Company’; the best today brand. And what we do is just that we create resources to equip women, but it can work for men too. With resources that really help them to be intentional and practical with their time. Because our time is our most limited resource. My journey to get here has been really interesting, I started off as a returnee in private practice. With that, I started a company that I loved making hair bows so my daughter can still exist. And then from that, I started doing business coaching, teaching, and I have to work with thousands of women business owners. I realized, it is not talking to them more about lives, it’s just much about business because I think it is so intertwined and it gets so important to get the life part. Right? It actually will flow into your business, and so from that, I really realized I want to keep doing this lifework. And that’s when I started ‘The Best Today Brand’ and we created ‘the best today guide’ which is our signature physical product that helps you do just that. Really intentional with your time, maybe smart in business and in life. So that’s what I do every day now and I love it very much.

ANDREA: And you know what, that is probably one of the biggest reasons why I want to have you come on. This past year, I would say the biggest thing that I let go of was this need to hold on to every profit penny that I could. And I completely undervalued my time, and now I’ve just become so comfortable with literally paying for my time freedom that it seems like I’m still making the same amount of revenue that I would have before. I am at home more, I’m showing up better as a wife, better as a business owner, better as a practitioner, better as a mom. And so many of our audience members get constantly caught into that hamster wheel of ‘I need to do it all’, their whole day is run by all of the admin work or what you like to call the treadmill movement. So you’re going to break that down for as I hope, and we really need to shift them into that smart way of running their time. So what is the biggest obstacle you see when it comes to time management with the people that you work with?

SHUNTAY: Not being clear on what really matters. Not being clear on who you are, not being clear on your vision for your life. And if we talk about business owners not being clear of your vision for your business and what really matters in your business. We’re trying to do 17 different things, for 17 different audiences and none of that is going to work, the lack of focus. Those are the things that I see as being the core root problem with how we spend our time or invest our time. And that’s because if you aren’t clear or are trying to go for and clear your vision; what’s the in-goal? If you’re not clear on what I actually want to do, what’s important to me? You’re going to spend your time doing just about anything. Right? It’s not leading you to a specific place. And still you wake up, you do these things that you do and then you go to sleep and you wake up and you do that and until your last breath. And that for me is not how I want to live my life. It is definitely not how I want to see others live it. And so, that is why I’m so passionate and kind of animate about what it is that I deal with when I teach. Why it’s called ‘the best company today’ is because our lives are made up of what we do in each ‘today’. And our time is how we spend our months, our years, and our life. And if you have to live every day for the rest of your life the way you live yesterday, would you be placed with the type of life that resulted in today? And most people would say no. and so, if that’s the case you can do something about that today. But it starts with the foundational work on being really clear on what matters and letting go of everything else. So I would say that’s another thing I see is being afraid of saying ‘no’ and let go. If you don’t want to do that, you don’t want to live an intentional life. You don’t want to live a peaceful life. Right? You don’t want to live your best life. And I can only help people who want to live their best.

ANDREA: Yeah, and that is something that it was so crazy you’re saying that. I read a story about a celebrity whose son drowned. And they lost their three-year-old child, and the biggest encompassing thing that they learned was that they only have today. They only have today, you have to soak in every single moment and a lot of us are parents. And we understand how quickly our children grow up and I think that was one of my major motivating pieces. While my girls are young, and still asking mommy for help and I’m still their hero. I want to make sure that I’m there for them. So to start people on this journey of ‘I am committed to becoming my best self, I am committed to making every day count’. How do you start to break away that treadmill that people are on?

SHUNTAY: I think the first thing is to get very clear about what you want. And for some people, they have a hard time with that question so I’ll ask the flip. What don’t you want? Because there’s sometimes when it’s easier to know what I don’t want. And that sometimes will then give us some revealing information on what it is that you do want. What do you really want out of this life you have? At the end of it, how do you want to have felt? What do you want to experience? What do you want the status of your health to be? Your financial health, your emotional, all the health. What do you want that to look like? Write that down, get really clear on that. Because if you can do that, that’s the starting place. We can now say ‘okay what are the things that I’m doing that are getting me here?’ and then ‘what are the things that are actually going to keep me from getting there? That is actually taking me in the opposite direction. Right? So starting off that work of being really clear who you are and what you want. And guess what, you get to decide. I don’t say ‘oh what you want is evil. Who wants to own 100 pairs of Manolo Blahnik’s? If that’s your desire in your life, girl goes get you those shoes. You get to decide what you want is. No one else, it is all yours. And that’s part of the problem because a lot of time it’s really hard for those. Because you’re thinking, I have to do what people in my profession say what looks good, I have to live in the neighborhood where ‘this is where the practitioners live, this is what we do I have to–‘. No, no, no, no. You have to break that up, and that’s really hard for some adults. Because so much of their lives trying to conform, they don’t even know who they actually are, what they actually like and don’t like. So you have to uncondition and unlearn a lot of stuff. Right? You have to unwiring a lot of bills. What actually matters to you, not what other people say that should matter, what the sides that should matter. But, what do you want? Because we can start there. What we’re starting to do is I say build a triangle and we’re putting the important things inside of there. And were going to learn that everything that’s not in that triangle is noise and distraction. And we’re not going to get time to face for it. So just first getting clear on what you want and what your role is in that. Because if we’re talking about business, a lot of things that we want and need to do– we can’t do all by ourselves. It’s going to involve other people. So we have to decide what are the parts of this ‘I’m responsible for’ and be willing to let go of all the other parts as well.

ANDREA: Now the number one thing that’s always come up for me. Because this is now rewiring your habits. This is like as you said; breaking down, unlearning everything that you’ve been conditioned with. And here’s what I think people tend to do is they’re like ‘sure, I’ll write it all down, I’ll write what I want with my goals to be, I’ll write what my non-negotiables are’. And then they flip the page and they might as well not have done that work. So my follow-up question is, there’s one thing about taking that one step about writing it all down and then the moment it feels really good. But to actually take it, to actually grasp for what you will and will not invite into your world anymore. What is that journey like? What are the steps that people need to take for that?

SHUNTAY: This is actually the reason why I create the ‘best day guide’. So what the best day guide is at the beginning you’re doing that work. Getting you started at those pages, ask you those questions; what is your vision for your life? What are the things that are in your way? What do you need to prune? What are the self-destructing habits that you have? What does your best look like? You do that work in the beginning and then after that every day we’re doing that work. It stays top of mind. I don’t let you get away with saying ‘oh I want to retreat, I’ll learn how these great things and these great practices, but now I’m back into real life.’ No, right? That’s what I think you’re referring to.

ANDREA: Exactly.

SHUNTAY: What the best day guide does was to teach you the three-step process. And with that process, it helps you to incorporate those things in your every day. It starts with previewing your week every week and we’ll show you to do that. Define what the most important thing is, it’s a little bit of space to do that, and really honing into adding things that only get you to what you wrote down. If you wrote your vision is to be healthy. So I’m a runner, and every morning I write down that part of my vision is to be able to run with my children and my grandchildren and travel the world and try to find the most beautiful scenic runs. I can see it in my head, I have visions of it every single day. So very few times that I hardly ever am I going to say ‘I’m going to skip today’s run, I’m going to skip today’s workout’ I don’t’. Because it’s tied to who I want to become; I want to be healthy, I want to stay healthy, I want to be stronger this time, next year than I am today. I am stronger today than I was this time last year for sure. And still, thinking about that big picture, I have to ask myself everyday like how am I contributing that today? And so the best that you got to preview your week and every night you have to plan the night before. And what it requires is it has two boxes: one that says; what are you doing for your mental and emotional health, what are you doing for your physical health today? It’s right there like there’s no bypass. It teaches you how to set up a morning routine, and then think about your day in terms of results and outcomes as supposed to. Others can make a to-do list, if I get to sum up and grade I don’t. If I do something that isn’t on here, I write it down and scratch it off like most people. I train you to start thinking in terms of results and outcomes. What are the results that need to happen? What are the outcomes that you need? And then at first every morning you answer four questions; what is my best look like today? Because that changes from day to day, right? What are the self-destructing habits that I need to avoid? This is like what makes the best today guide unlike anything on the market. Every day you have to call that stuff out. Every day I created this, and I have to call myself out. There’s never been a day where that box has been blank. Identifying your self-destructing habits at the beginning of your day is so helpful because when you go to do that thing that is so normal, so comforting. You’re triggered, you remembered– I just said this morning that I’m doing this to myself, a self-destructive thing and it catches you. And you turn away, and you keep it open all day. So calling yourself out on those things is the way to actually overcome them. And then there’s a space to write your vision for your future. Keeping in mind where you’re trying to go. And then the last question is one thing that I’m going through today progresses me toward that vision; it’s keeping in front of your face every single day, really thinking about the vision for your life every day. Really calling yourself out on the things you know you do that are self-destructive every day. Consistency, everything you want in life is on the other side of consistency. So if consistency is what you’re avoiding, then the thing you want you will never get. And I will say, you can be consistently terrible. Right? So you could be doing consistently bad things, so that’s what you’re going to get. So you’re probably consistent one way or another, you might as well be consistent in a way that’s actually building something good for you. And the answer to your question in short is building that inconsistency into your every day and that’s why I created the product that makes you answer these questions. And think about life in these terms every single day, and it works.

ANDREA: And it reminds me of this quote that I heard. I can’t remember who said it if it was Jim Forton or somebody else “The way you do one thing is the way you do everything.” And that’s exactly the encompassing thing is we’re going to have you do all those things that don’t support you or you can start doing all the good things. Now, I wanted to ask again. So sure, people will be like ‘yeah, I’m all gung-ho for a week but I know that there are definitely some big obstacles that people need to overcome. And in that same presentation, you listed and it was fear, lack of a clear mission which you’ve already talked about, and then just being lazy. And I think the most stand-out statement that you said to me was ‘if you don’t want to show up for your business–and I apologize for breaking this down. But if you don’t want to show up for your business, you basically have a really expensive hobby. Or it was something to the effect of something like an employee but you’re an unemployed business owner. Something like that, something along those lines and I would love for you to just touch on these recurring themes of fear, laziness, again lack of clarity, just staying safe that people need to break through to get past seven days. And then really start to make it more of like an ingrained habit.

SHUNTAY: Yeah, I think again it goes back to one of the questions that I ask and actually don’t get asked as much anymore because I don’t talk so much about it is people are like ‘how do you stay so motivated?’ ‘How do you just keep showing up?’ and I might listen. Do you have to have a clear picture of what you want so much that there’s nothing that can stop you? And you have to have that resolve, and here’s the thing. No one can give you resolve, that’s why I don’t really match well with the motivational speaker because no one can speak motivation into you. Someone can inspire you but I’m still not going to jump in your bones and get up and do the work. If you aren’t finding the motivation within, one you’re extremely lazy or two, you actually haven’t decided what it is you want. Because when there’s something you want you’re going to get up and go for it. If you think about what sportspeople, which is not me but let’s say if your team is coming to your town then there’s a chance you get a ticket you’re going to do the thing that doesn’t seem, like convenient or easy or fun. You’re going to do the thing for the thing you want. Right? We do things for the things we want. A lot of times what I have found is people are lying to themselves. This is why I have to say it loud and clear saying you want one thing, but your actions are not matching up. So either you’re lying, or you just don’t understand what it takes. These people would say ‘oh I want to be a millionaire, but I also want to work one hour a week.’ Well, good luck with that. This is why every day I write what I want so that I can remember.  You know the other thing I write about is I have two children as well, two young children because I want to have a close relationship with them individually, I want them to have individual relationships with me and know them well, that doesn’t start when they’re adults, that starts right now. So that reminds me that sometimes I have to do the hard work of putting the phone down, I have to put the phone down, I have to do the thing that I don’t want to do, I have to listen to baby sharks a thousand times and in one day. It’s like these are the things that we have to do, so first of all make sure you’re doing something that you actually want. Because all of the steps are going to be fun, it’s not always going to be laced with ease, not at all, but it makes the hard days like for me the vision of me where I’m trying to go makes the hard days bearable and it keeps me going. So that’s the first thing, are you actually doing what you want to do, number two if you’re a lazy person just go find somebody else to work for although I wouldn’t hire you because you’re lazy, so you know I think I said something along the line is like ‘Entrepreneur who doesn’t like want to do any work’ like there’s a word for that and it’s called ‘Unemployed’ because you have to do the work you make it to a place later where the work shifts and changes with that looks like but like in the beginning building something up that’s like raising children the hard years that’s a lot of like attention to details in the early years you have to put into work like getting a rocket off the ground the work is really, in the beginning then it starts to become a coast, so I think a lot of people are afraid to put into that work, and that fear, like I said the fear so many things, fear of the unknown, do you think doing something is not going to help you know anymore, No! the way you know is by doing something that didn’t work, you learn  from that you try it again and you keep trying it again, that is business that is life. So the fear of the unknown, I’m not buying it number one. Number two is the fear of “what if I picked the wrong thing?” then pick another thing you know I could’ve said that I think about that leaving the practice of law starting or not start growing because of Zoey that’s all I was going to do but that was the thing that leads to the next thing, you start it now because what you’re doing now may not be where you end up but that’s the thing that leads to the next thing. So again, make a decision, stop sitting in indecision. There’s also fear of success like a lot of people have that fear like “what if I do well then that’s going to be an expectation I had to do it again, what if I can’t replicate that?” you have to let that go, you become your own enemy, you become Judge, Jury, and Executioner for yourself, you’ve already sentenced yourself to failure and for me, the failure is in not trying and not moving. I always tell people if you find me flat on my face come up to me and say “Good Job Shuntay you failed!” That means I did something, I tried something, I’m going to get up and try again. So you have to move beyond that, you have to be better than your excuses because there’s always going to be that and another thing you have to do is surround yourself with winners because there’s no human who will ever win if you surround yourself with losers and complainers that’s just fact. You have to be willing to cut off relationships, cut off the environments that are sucking you dry, that is telling you “this is too hard” no it’s too hard for them. I can’t tell you anyone I know successful who hangs around lazy people or complaining people. As for me, I tried to surround myself with generous people because I want to be generous and you know what people with a lot of money they are in a great position to be generous and so you have to also evaluate the people that you’re going to be around because all of this is affecting you, your environment, the things that you’re telling yourself but a lot of it is just like stop telling yourself these lies and these narratives that induce fear, that induce second-guessing and you need to surround yourself with some winners so that you can get out there and win because someone is in need of what you can offer and someone will come in and swipe you know the things that were meant for you if you’re just going to sit there on the flat lines. 

ANDREA: Oh my goodness girl! I could just listen to you, I love your delivery you’re so like ‘In your face’ but it has to be that way, I do love to align myself with people that are like ‘I’m not storytelling there’s no fluff here, this is work you have to do it, this is reality” and I’m so appreciative of that. So on the flip side, we do the work, and we go through the discomfort because yes it’s going to be uncomfortable like other than the obvious, what are some of the big, amazing things that you’ve seen happen with your students when they put in the work when they do the things. I know it’s like so much!

SHUNTAY: It’s so good right and I get it I have the benefit of helping people in business and in life, but you know some of my favorite things are when people write back, my daughter came to me today and said “Mom, you’ve been happy lately, you seem like you’re spending more time with us.” Like when your children can see the difference in you, and that’s when I get all the time, whether it’s people with younger children or the children, your children are watching. And you’re setting an example for them one way or the other. But they can tell when you’re building good habits. Another woman said that her teenage daughter saw her mom getting up and making her health the priority and she said “I want to start getting up and working out with you, can we go on a walk, can we do these things together?”  when you see the effect doesn’t just the work I do, doesn’t in with that person it trickles down into their family, it’s not just changing one life it’s changing many lives. That is like win when I get to see people who get to do work that they didn’t think they were qualified or capable to do, I had one client who when I first met her she was trying to do a little bit everything, whatever people wanted her to make, she would make it in, I asked her what is it that you wanted to do like I said get clear what you want, she’s like this is what I really want to do, I want to do live events for high-end clients she thought she just can’t do it and now I remember she called me today, she booked her first 20,000 dollar client to do a live event for them and  I was like, “Oh I’ve known, I knew this as I told you.” She was like “I changed the price as you told me.” I was like “Yeah! I know, I’m excited for you but I want you to understand, I’ve been telling you this!” But to see people doing the things that they’re incapable of and to trust me enough to know that I see it for you I want you to see it for you, but to trust enough to take those leaps and bounds and also people call me back and we had had one girl who came in and did our routine class like about a month and getting her routine to settle she had a death on her family and this year where everything is a little different with traveling and she sent me an email and said I’m so glad that I found you before this happened because you know life hitting you when you’re already in a place where you’re disorganized trying to do too much, that makes like already living in a hard place and adding something hard. But she was like ‘Having to meet me here where I already have a structure and I have routine and I’m actually intentional with my time, the blow is different, and I’m better able to go to my family and support there I can stay longer than I normally could, just little things like that, when a woman would reach out and say she got an offer from her dream job and she’s like there’s no way I could’ve taken it if I didn’t take your routine workshop and really start building my structure with my family so that I could take on this dream job and so just seeing how, if people come and do the work, it takes being introspective you got to look inside and you have to do the hard work and sometimes, turning down a lot of things saying no but it has a reward on the other side you just have to do it. And I can think of another client who I told her she needed to make time to stop working she grew up in a family where your value is tied to how much you produce, how much you work, and I said you need to set in a time where you actually stop working and you just sit and rest and that was her best month of revenue she worked the least she’s worked ever, she signed a new book deal, when she told me on the steps she’s like “And I did fewer stuffs”, and I was like “I know!” and how nice when that happens when you let go of some things and let other people handle things, or you let go of some things and saw what happens, as your creativity comes back when you actually let your mind rest and not always going. And so it’s just story after story of people are understanding when they first get clear on what matters and they’re willing to do the work of removing certain things, letting go of certain things that it really does get you closer to where you actually want to be, feel like we would do the opposite but it really does propel you towards where you want.

ANDREA: Thank you so much for sharing all of these, I mean I feel like this just flew by. I feel like we’ve been talking for five minutes, like no it was half an hour, I could just listen to you and listen and listen, and I am so inspired. Now, I know you have a download like a roadmap where our audience could get I will link to that in the show notes and that’s kind of a great starting point, but is there any other resources or the best way to contact you directly if people are like, Yes this girl is for me I need this mind work, let’s go!

SHUNTAY: Yes, okay so the first thing is what we’re talking about is Right Now Routine it is fantastic, thousands of people have walked through it, and it is just so fantastic, we’ll break down in 40 minutes, exactly how to create a realistic routine for your life right now and that’s in rightnowroutine.com everything else all the resources are at besttodayguide.com and if you really want a community of people who are kind of at the same place with you and want to show their best, we also have a membership community besttodaycommunity.com and we just did a class with a key to focus and we talked about focus in our lives, that’s a great place it’s for women only, but if you’re a woman listening to this it is a fantastic community, we have support ability classes, workshops we talk about this every single day and it’s people’s real lives that I get to see and seeing everybody come together and support one another it’s really fantastic. And if you’re a Social Media Person, I’m on Social Media I’m at Shuntay Grant and we’re also at the @thebesttodaybrand on Instagram as well. 

ANDREA: Shuntay, thank you so much again for coming on to this show and for also leading this movement that is so important and the steps seems so simple and obvious, and easy, but it’s not easy work but like once you let go of all that negativity like look at what you just get, you attract right? Thank you so much for coming on to this show. Alright, guys! That is another massively informative interview in the works and as I’ve mentioned to Shuntay, I love women that just delivers things as they are, very blunt in your face, there is no scuttling, this is what you have to do, this is the work that you needed to do, and I find that in a lot of ways, I’m very much that way with my students and when I’m delivering my material, because we don’t need to hear the soft words anymore we are at that point where we’re just like tell me what I need to do to get that lifestyle that I’m dreaming of and I will do that. And so step 1 is for you to go to those resource links that are in the show notes and start downloading the blueprints and start working with that and then if you’re ready to not only do that planning work every single day, but now build out the systems and the structure and get your social media machine kind of running on autopilot with maximized messaging, with modernized marketing, and basically all of the pillars that we’ve described in the maximized practitioner method, pillar one foundational essentials attracting those top 100 patients, pillar two is business systems and essentials that’s where we are automating everything really developing your branded unique sales, position your USP, your unique solution and then finally getting into modernized marketing using that Facebook ads really going into that deeper into your messaging. So all of that can be yours where I encourage you to start is going to our free masterclass video training the link is in the show notes and it’s also in the bio on Instagram @andreamaximnd and of course I’m always here for you drop me a DM anytime I would love to start a conversation with you, I’m Andrea Maxim, and I’m out!