Episode 51: Defining Success On Your Terms with Cliff and Kenny
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Hello, and welcome to The Thoughtful Realtor podcast. I'm Kenny Gong.
I'm Cliff Tsang, and we are the founders and partners of Willowmar Real Estate.
And this is a real estate podcast where we get real personal.
Every episode, we sit down for insights, stories, and conversations about things in the market today, running a real estate team in California, NorCal and SoCal, and finding our ways as leaders and business partners.
And speaking of being leaders and business partners today, we're going to tackle the different ideas and notions of success. There are so many different ways to define and measure success, and today we wanted to do some of that defining and measuring in real time for you to hear. So, let's maybe start off with a fun question, which is: what did success look like for you when you were a little kid?
How little are we talking about?
Oh, uh … ten.
Ten, okay, so that is fifth grade-ish, okay. It's funny because I'm trying to think: I wonder if I even knew a definition of success at ten, but 35, 36 now reflecting as a ten, I think I had a very simplistic view of success. But I'm not saying that in a derogatory way at all because I was really happy.
I think it was just based on fun, doing what was most fun at all times, and then also trying to do well in school. Those are really the only two things that I thought about at the time, yeah. Well, what about you, Kenny?
You know, what's coming to mind is that I always attributed success, even from a very young age, to a job. And I remember even–and I think maybe it was because in school we had–there was a lot of “What do you want to be when you grow up?”
What'd you say? What was the answer to that?
Well, you know, I had a list. I had a list, probably about ten of different professions that I wanted to be. And they were all so silly because, there's two that I'll mention that make zero sense, but one was a neurosurgeon because I watched a soap opera that was in a hospital. And because of that, I was like, “Oh, I want to be a neurosurgeon.”
And then, this is dating me, but I also remember very explicitly watching The Parent Trap with Lindsay Lohan, and her dad was a vineyard owner. And so, because I really liked that movie, I wanted to be a vineyard owner. So it didn't correlate to anything that I was actually passionate about, but I associated from a young age deriving success from the thing that you did professionally.
Hmm.
So yeah, I …
That's deep as a ten year old.
That's a ten year old. Yeah. Yeah, and I always, even from ten years old … Actually, this is really interesting. I'm now just thinking about it: from a very young age, I always thought about what kind of business I wanted to have.
And I always wanted to make things and turn it into–and sell things. So, I remember going to the library and getting all of these books on candle making because I wanted to have a candle-making business and sell my candles or, and this was probably when I was nine years old, or I really liked cooking.
And so, I even remember being like, “Oh …” We had this tiny little nook in our house that had a window that looked out to the street that you could open. And I was like, “Oh, you know, I would love to make pancakes and have people come up to the window and order pancakes.”
So you've always had such an entrepreneurial spirit.
I think so, I think so. That's a long answer to say that that was success as a kid for me.
So then, how has the idea of success changed over the years and how has it evolved?
You know, I don't think it's changed. It hasn't evolved. I think it's just–
Are you still dreaming about selling pancakes through your window?
No, no, no, no, no, but sometimes … actually, do I? Do I think about selling pancakes? There is though, I think, what I'm taking from this is that, yeah, it hasn't changed much. I've always wanted to create things and sell them.
And from that neurosurgeon and vineyard and Parent Trap life, I think that there was something about creating the life. I think there's something about creating a meaningful life through your profession and the things that you do.
Hmm. That's incredible. That's really cool, and seeing that you had such an inspiration from such an early age till now, it makes sense. There's that through line all the way across. For me, it's been evolving and changing because I think, as I mentioned, it was a simplified view of success before.
And then, I think after college, I started to just be much more pragmatic in how I thought about success. I think it was still simple because it was just much more financially driven, just thinking that there was a measuring stick in terms of, I don't know, income and how much money you had saved up.
That was one big barometer of success for me. And then now, as I've gotten older, I think more about balance. I actually think there's a lot of people in one of my first jobs that are maybe still stuck in that career. And I use “stuck” because I think they would agree that they're still stuck in it, handcuffed by the financial aspect.
Not that I feel bad, but I just value balance so much more now, and I think it's really hard to have balance in different careers and different jobs. And now that we have a baby on the way too, that's really just been top of mind of like, what example do I want to set to my children?
And I think balance is one of those themes that's really important to impart to the next generation.
Let's dig in and get real specific about balance. What does balance look like? And it could be, you know, work-life balance, work-life harmony, that kind of thing. But I wonder, I know that there's something even deeper in how you can define that balance.
Maybe you'll help me uncover it. So, that is evolving too, as well, because I used to think balance was like each day, each week, feeling balanced. You have your balanced meals, you have your plate of veggies, and even your diet, and then you get your eight hours of sleep. And that means you only did eight hours of work and each day was perfectly balanced.
And I think this was a Brandon Turner thing, the Bigger Pockets real estate podcast host. But he talked more about zooming out and feeling balance in maybe a year and what I mean by that is the nature of some jobs like as a real estate agent, you're going to have weeks or months that are just really really intense. And those might not feel balanced, but if you could take a November, December, and have those be more relaxed times generally. You know, just taking more of a holistic view on balance versus trying to thread it through the needle every single day and then being frustrated if you don't get it in that sense.
So, I'm trying to have more balance in that sense, just like a zoomed-out balance, and I've been feeling that. It's taken a few years in this career, but I'm starting to feel that more now, because I think it's very natural for real estate agents early on to just be hard charging, never know when to put down your phone, never know when you can't be available for a client, and that leads to burnout, the opposite of balance.
Mm hmm. I'm curious to know: when you think about easy, restful, balanced Novembers and Decembers over the course of a year, do you approach that knowing … is your phone really off-off? How is the evolution of your relationship to your phone and your relationship to work changed as you've evolved this definition of balance?
That is an evolving process as well because I would say, in old jobs that I've had, the Sunday scaries are a real thing. You're on Monday through Friday, and then Friday, you clock out and then Friday through Sunday, you're a completely different person.
You're just completely unplugged. You feel untethered, and you're free, and then Sunday night comes, and you're just dreading that first Monday meeting. And for me, this is a job or career that I really enjoyed and I've loved so many aspects of it.
To answer your question, I don't really ever fully unplug but I think I'm okay with that. That's what I mean by the balance has been evolving because early on I was like, “Is that wrong that I can't unplug when I'm taking two weeks off for vacation?”
And I get actually anxious not checking a little bit and being a little plugged in. Maybe that's a weird quirk with myself, but I'm okay with it. I still … I feel very balanced. Recently, Mee-sun and I were in Japan. I was doing an hour or two of work every day, checking emails, just being plugged in. I felt really, really great. It was still very, very recharging for me.
What about you? And I wonder if you have a definition of balance or if that's something that's on your mind as well when it comes to success
Oh, it is. I never actually get to think about this kind of stuff. So, I'm thinking about it, on the spot, I think for me, balance is … I think it does go back to what ten-year-old Kenny would think, which is just that the balance is not necessarily off mode and on mode. It's more, “Am I doing the things that give me joy and that I'm passionate about? Is there a balance of how I'm spending the time? And the balance is, am I doing things that feel nourishing?”
Hmm.
If I'm doing something that feels really nourishing and that I'm passionate about and that I feel good at, I don't mind spending a lot of time doing that. And so the balance is not “Am I off or on?” It's more so: what's the balance between doing things that are truly, truly nourishing and doing things that maybe just, I have to get done, but may not necessarily be super nourishing to me. Finding that balance has also been–that's my evolution for what balance has looked like.
How does that connect with your thoughts on success, then? Because I think we've talked a lot about career-oriented success; naturally, there's going to be things that are not nourishing in someone's work day, work week, or things that are not joyful. Does that then mean it's not successful to be doing those? Or how do you think about those tasks that are not nourishing?
There's a ratio, right? Before, it was: if I have spent ten percent of my time doing nourishing things, that feels successful. Now it's like, okay, if I feel like I'm doing 50 percent of things that are nourishing, like, that feels successful. Or am I spending my time doing even more than that? And I think that has been such an important part of how I've structured my life nowadays is to feel like I have the spaciousness to be able to dedicate time to doing things that feel nourishing or that I've structured my professional life.
We just did an episode on coaching and mentoring, and that stuff is so nourishing to me. So if I can do that more, and I have been able to incorporate more of that into my everyday life. So because I can do that more, that feels like a step forward towards more success.
And because we now have an incredible team and now that we've built more structures and aligned differently on all the things that need to get done, there are so many things that are not nourishing to me that I do not have to do that get done by other folks on the team.
And of course, there's the balance between things that I'm not nourished by, but I just do anyways, and that's totally fine, and I'm okay with that, and finding all of those ratios, I think, is success for me.
Hmm. That's good to hear. I'm curious about this question, which is: who are the people around you that you deem successful? And what makes them successful in your eyes?
Oh, that's a really good question. What are the people around me that I think are successful? I was thinking about my dad, and the reason why I think he's successful is for so many things. I think he has built an incredible life for his family and was able to find things that allowed us to live a really good life and allowed him to build his life, build his wealth, build generational wealth.
And I think that is successful. And also, through it all, he has found work that he loves doing. And he is 76 years old and still working full time and will need to work full time as long as he possibly can because it keeps him energized.
It keeps him going, and he just, you know, it's stressful work. He does real estate as well and property management. But, he has found his way into it and has found joy and love for that work. And because of that, he wants to do it forever. And that feels like success.
That's awesome. Yeah, your dad has such a youthfulness to him. So I'm guessing that there was probably some connection there of you identifying that success is related to finding purpose and joy in work by seeing your dad go through that and find that for himself.
Yeah, and he's always been an entrepreneur. I can remember him being like, “Hey, should we buy a franchise for this ice cream shop?” Which we did not end up doing, but that was always part of how I grew up is seeing that there's this amazing alchemy of creating something from scratch and then being able to–what we know as monetize now–we didn't say that word 30 years ago. But it was monetizing things that you created value out of, and I think seeing that was definitely a model. What about you?
I've gotten a lot of inspiration from my dad. I think I've talked about that in past podcasts. Just the entrepreneurialness and the franchise example that you shared was something that reminded me of my dad always thinking about new business ventures. But I would say the person who comes to mind who I think of modeling success as someone in my Gopod in Gobundance, his name's Cam.
He lived in South Carolina, Charleston, and when I think about balance, I just feel like he's someone who has found that balance. He has two young daughters. You can just tell the thoughtfulness that he has about being a dad on our calls. He talks about the thoughtfulness about showing up as a better husband.
He runs a successful business; he's a general contractor. Yeah, there's just an energy about him, there's a free-spirited energy about him that's just really really balanced. Yeah, he's kind of an inspiration to me, and one thing too that I really respect about him is his ability to listen and take feedback, which is something that I'm personally trying to get better at.
I think everyone thinks that they listen and take feedback. I'm sure some people are like, “I don't like it.” But if you polled most people, they're like, “Yeah, I listen to feedback and I take it well.” That's what everyone thinks, but there's levels to it, you know? And I think he's someone who actually takes it to heart, takes action, commits to change, and you just see him over time, over years, just really change and evolve as a person because he trusts the people around him.
So, that to me is just success, growing, molding and shaping yourself to be, to listen to people around you and then finding that balance in life.
Do you think there is a connection? I love that you had also identified free-spiritedness as part of that success. Do you think he is free-spirited, so then took feedback well, or did he take feedback well to become free-spirited?
Oh, I think the former. Yeah, I think, early on in his career, he spent summers being a river rafting guide and working at big national parks and then was a ski bum. He just was outdoorsy, very free-spirited before he landed in this career.
Yeah. I love that you brought that up because free-spiritedness, I think, it highlights that free-spiritedness can lead to a lot of wonderful things, right? Like, free-spiritedness maybe makes someone more adaptable, makes them more open to feedback, and then open to being molded, and allowing their life to unfold as it will.
Yeah, yeah, agreed.
So, I think maybe we can give a couple of tips. How do you think, if someone is trying to define and envision success for themselves, how would you guide them towards that?
Oh, that's a good question. I think the definition of success is just such an elusive thing. I think for most people, the one thing that comes to mind–just related to the last question that we answered which is–think about someone who you think is successful and think about what those traits, why that person is successful in your eyes. And then I think that gives you kind of a framework to try to emulate. Yeah, that's the one that comes to mind. What about you, Kenny?
I would say, I think … I don't know if this is a copout answer, but what I would say is to live life and then reflect, to allow yourself to live life as naturally and organically as you can. And then, to find moments when you're really retrospective and really introspective. And then when you're really looking at, looking back and finding, “Okay, who am I inspired by? What has come up in my life that may point to what my definition and vision for success is?”
Because I think that there's–this is a little bit woo woo, but I think that there's something innate in us as human beings that is guiding us, right? There's so much that we can do to inform and learn and absorb knowledge from and there's also a lot inside. That instinct that we have inside–there's something internal, right? There's some spark, and I think doing that work of absorbing a lot of information and reflecting on what's inside is huge.
And I think the only way to do that is learning a lot and committing to education, but then also allowing yourself to live, allowing your mind and body and spirit to go where it will, and then to use that as instruction for how to move forward.
I don't think that's a cop out. I think that's a really good answer. Yeah, I think it's hard, though. I would say, in my own personal journey with that–I agree. There's some inner guidance that you can follow, and it's best to be guided by yourself for your definition of success. Because ultimately, that definition of success should just come from yourself. But I've also found it's incredibly difficult.
Maybe I just haven't been able to block out all the thoughts, the cliches of “define your own path and that'll be successful” or “don't listen to what other people say about you, it's your life.” I understand all the intent behind that. Maybe I just need to put in more of the work, but I think you're right, that is where you find true success is like living your life and then being guided by your own light and where you want to go.
Yeah. And I think it's interesting because I think a big part of it is living your life, but also learning from everyone. Like really, really learning from what people are–especially now there's so much knowledge out there, taking that and absorbing it and then finding your way into it, finding your own interpretation of it–maybe might be a better way to think about it.
So, I think it's a balance of both because I personally am like, “Yeah, don't just live without intention.” It's like, how do you actually allow yourself to find your own way with intention and with inspiration from other people?
Yeah, so I think it's all good stuff. I love these kinds of juicy conversations because it also allows us to step up and step outside of the daily grind to check in with ourselves and ask ourselves: are we on the right path? Right? Are we on the right path?
This would be such a fun episode to bring in our team as well, or topics similar to this because I agree: these more heartfelt topics, they're really good discussion, and it's a really good way to get to know people, too.
And maybe we do this same question with all of our team members. Because I think individually, it's a great question that everyone should answer: how they define and envision success for themselves.
Yeah.
Cool.
Awesome. Should we end there?
Yeah. Do you want to do the outro?
Sure. I really enjoyed this one, and this was just such a fun topic to chat about. It's always so great to share and learn each other's vision of success and how those visions can change and evolve. I know you all have some things to share about your own visions of success. So please, please let us know your thoughts.
We'd love to hear from you, any comments that you have about this episode. As always, you can find us at Willowmar.com or on Instagram @thoughtfulrealtor. Or you can just reach out to us directly. And if you haven't already, please hit that subscribe button and leave us a review. We read each and every one of your reviews and have always appreciated when you share the love.
So thank you so much for listening and until next time, bye!
Bye!
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