180: Pat Flynn on Growing from Failure

Hello, hello, everyone. Welcome to Productivity Paradox. I’m your host, Tanya Dalton,
and this is Episode 180. And have I got a treat for you today! I am really excited
because as you know, all season long, we’ve been talking about leading with
confidence, how we can truly step into leadership, and how we can do it and feel
really good about it.
And so today I have a special guest on the show who I know you are going to
absolutely love. Pat Flynn is going to be joining me and sharing some of his favorite
nuggets and resources for how he stepped into leadership himself with confidence.
Now, Pat is a very, very generous leader in the entrepreneurial space and he’s
generously offered to do a giveaway of one of his courses.
I’ll share details on all of that at the end of the show, but for right now, let me give
you a quick intro to Pat. He is a father, husband, and entrepreneur who lives and
works in San Diego, California. He’s the owner of several successful online businesses.
He’s also a professional blogger, a keynote speaker, and a wall street journal
best-selling author.
And he’s the host of Smart Passive Income and Ask Pat podcast. Those have earned
a combined total of 60 million downloads. He’s won multiple awards and he’s had
features in publications like the New York Times and Forbes. And I am absolutely
thrilled to have him on the show today. So let’s dive into today’s conversation.
Tanya: Pat, I am absolutely thrilled to have you on the show today. Thank you so
much for coming.
Pat: I’m grateful for you. Thank you, Tanya. I’m excited to be here.
Tanya: Absolutely. Well this season, we’re all about leading with confidence and how
we can really step into leadership. And I know that you have really done a great job
of that. You’ve built a solid team around you, which I think is funny since you were a
solo-preneur for a very, very long time.

1 of 13

© Productivity Paradox

Tanya: I like what you said there, ‘too long.’ I think a lot of people do that, right? We,
we hold onto all the things we need to do. So did you feel confident right from the
start to lead?
Pat: No, not at all. And even now after doing this for over a decade, I still have
moments where I’m like, am I doing this correctly? And you know, the self-doubts
creep in and the resistance–and especially now with the team, it’s tough. I got into
this because I wanted to break free from, uh, the 9 to 5. And actually I was forced to
do that after I got laid off in 2008 and I wanted to be on my own.
Pat: I was like, I have total control if it’s just me; if there’s nobody else involved and I
don’t have to worry about managing and taking care of them, I can do everything
myself. And unfortunately, that got me into trouble because I did actually try to do
everything myself.
Pat: You know, a clear example of this was one day. I remember I was on my website
and I was, uh, you know, I did the website myself; I did the graphics myself. And I
remember one day I was trying to move an image from the left side of the page to
the right side of the page. Like, that’s all I wanted to do. And it was giving me so
much trouble. And after eight hours–a whole day of trying to do that, my wife came
in and she’s like, ‘You seem very stressed out, like what’s going on?’ And I was like,
‘I’m trying to move this image over here, but it’s not working.’ And I’m on YouTube all
day trying to figure it out. And she’s like, ‘Yeah, let me call my friend, Mel.’ And I was
like, ‘No, you don’t have to do that.’ Like, I’ll figure it out. Right? Like a typical guy
would say. And she’s like, ‘No, let me call Mel. He’s like a web developer. Like he can
help you out.’
Pat: So I got on a call with Mel and literally after three minutes, he solved the
problem for me. And he was even like, ‘Who designed your website? Like, it’s actually
not coded very well.’ And I was like, ‘It was me; thank you for the help.’
Pat: And you know, if only I had asked for help earlier, which I think is a huge
strategy, right? Like, ask for help when you need it. If you’ve tried it and it doesn’t
work, or, you know, that’s not your specialty, like there’s people out there who can do
it better, faster than you. And you can focus on the things that you are good at or
where you should be. And that, that was a big lesson for me.
Tonya: Pat, I feel like you just told one of my own stories, I’m not kidding; where
you’re like Googling, How To HTML.
Tonya: I’ve been there where you’re just, and you are, you’re spending eight hours
working on your website and then someone comes in and three minutes later, the
problem is fixed and you’re simultaneously like ecstatic and happy and also
frustrated. Like, why did I do that to myself? But I think so often it’s scary, this idea of
bringing people on, losing some of that control, losing some of that, you know, ‘Oh,
nobody else can do it as well as I can.’ So how do we know when it’s time to really
add people to our team, do you think?

2 of 13

© Productivity Paradox

Pat: Yeah. I mean, I think you have to really focus on the inner voice inside of you and
consider what is giving you the stress. And I think a lot of times we get into that work
mode where we’re just working.
Pat: We kind of believe we have to be stressed. It’s like, we’re not actually working
unless we’re actually working hard. And I think working smart is really the thing that
we need to do. And I know you talk a lot about, you know, prioritization and not just
like, spending eight hours on something, but what about spending time, you know,
finding people to help do those things for you instead–if it makes sense.
Pat: And I think we really have to slow down a little bit to read the label from outside
the bottle. Cause when you’re in the work, you can’t read the label cause you’re so
inside of it. So you sort of have to zoom out or have other people see it for you, which
is why I truly believe in having coaches and mentors and mastermind groups to help
you see those things.
Pat: But for me, it takes a lot of just, ‘Okay, I’m gonna, I’m like really intentionally
going to figure out what I need to do and what I don’t need to do, but still has to
happen.’ Or the things that I can just cross off the list entirely.
Pat: My friend, Chris Ducker, wrote a really good book called Virtual Freedom, which
has this exercise in it that’s really great. And in this book, it’s called the three lists of
freedom, that he calls it. And the first list you write–you know–you divide a paper
into three columns. The first list is write down all the things that you just absolutely
hate doing in your business (or this could be about other things, uh, not just
business), but you write down the things that you just absolutely hate doing but you
still have to do.
Tonya: There are those things, no matter what your business is, there are things you
have to do, you don’t necessarily love. Yes.
Pat: Exactly. And then the things that you don’t know how to do, but you know,
eventually need to get done: that’s the second list. And those are like future-based
and things that you could think about, ‘Okay, well, I can’t do this yet because I don’t
know how to do these, but there may be opportunities to find people to do those
things.’
Pat: And then the third list, and this is the hardest one, is writing down the things
that you like to do and the things that you have to do, but you shouldn’t do. And this
is the one where you begin to put your, your business, big boy/big girl pants on
because that’s what is the difference between a CEO and the leader versus
somebody who’s just the worker bee, right? And that’s where you determine . . .
Pat: For example, for me, I had a really hard time letting go of letting other people
touch and edit my podcast. I had edited my podcast, myself, uh, the whole thing for
six years straight. And I knew, I knew internally that I should probably let somebody
3 of 13

© Productivity Paradox

else do it because I have so many other things to do. And it was taking up hours
every single week.
Pat: But I don’t know if it was a sense of pride or just because it was my baby and I
didn’t want to give it to anybody else, but that was one that was on that list. And so
what I did was I didn’t go all-in with it.
Pat: I think this is another sort of myth that people have when it comes to hiring for
help. And that’s like, okay, you have to give control of everything. But no, I just
started small. And I said, ‘Okay, I’m still going to produce the show myself. I’m still
going to be able to listen to it after to make sure it’s good, but I’m going to let
somebody else chop it up and turn it into something that hopefully sounds great.’
Pat: And I found out sooner, immediately after the first show that I had hired help for
that, ‘Wow, this was, this was the most beautiful thing.’
Tonya: It’s like the clouds parted and the angels were singing, right?
Pat: It was unreal. And it actually was done better than I could do it. Like, that was
the crazy thing. People who, that’s their business, that’s their job, that’s what their
specialty is. That was not my specialty. It was something I was good at and I could
do, but wow, I got, I think four or five hours a week back that I then put into writing
my book and all these other things.
Tonya: Yeah. I feel like maybe we’re twins separated at birth. I’m not gonna lie. Cause
I feel like, I mean, I did the same thing where it was like, well, I need to edit it. I would
record it. And then I would edit and I would, you know, it was, it was my baby. And I
think that so often we have this feeling of like, ‘No one else can do it as well as I can.’
Tonya: So that’s a little bit of the perfectionism complex, right? A little bit of, you
know, ‘Well, I don’t want other people knowing my stuff.’ And so there’s a lot of this
kind of protecting ourselves and it feels maybe a little bit vulnerable to have people
come in and to help us because we’re the ones who are in charge and we know
what we’re doing, even when we don’t know what we’re doing, right?
Pat: For me, the tactic that I like to use when I consider things like this is, ‘Is what I’m
telling myself, a story I’m making up or is it actually the truth?’ And so in the case of,
you know, editing my podcast, the story I was telling myself was, I have to do–
Pat: ‘I’m the only one who can do this myself. Nobody can do it as well as I can, or
nobody can, can match my style.’ These were stories I was telling myself because
that’s just what I believed. However, I soon found in a small micro experiment with
just having one person edit one episode to see what that was like, I then discovered
the truth: No, it didn’t have to be me. No, I’m not the only one who can do this. And it
was actually done better.

4 of 13

© Productivity Paradox

Pat: And so that, that totally rewrote the story. And actually then the story I was
telling myself, which was based on truth now was, ‘I need to have somebody else
edit this for me because I have these more important things to do that only I can do.’
Pat: Somebody else could do the podcast now. There are things that only I can do,
like direct communication with my audience and empathizing with them. That’s,
that’s something that I feel I have to do. And that’s, that’s where my brain comes in.
But yeah, hopefully, hopefully that sort of–sort of finding the truth, right?
Pat: I don’t know if any of you listen to this fellow, Elon Musk, but he has this
principle called First Principles and that’s, you know, no matter what the problem is,
let’s, let’s bring it down to the first principles and find the truth. Because when, when
you have physics involved, it’s like, that’s the truth. You can’t deny that there is
gravity, right?
Pat: So when he was trying to build rockets, he’s like, okay; he was going out there
and trying to build a rocket to go to Mars. And it was expensive to go buy one. And it
was, it was, it was hard to put together, but he’s like, ‘Okay, well, what if we just like
rearrange these atoms to their fundamental truths? We need some propellant. We
need a rocket, and we just need to shoot it really high in the air. Like, why is this so
expensive?’
Pat: It’s because all the parts to these rockets come from all these different places
and the different kind of fuel. But, he brought it down to the physics, brought
everything in-house, and now Space X is sending rockets that are 10% the price that
they used to be, and even bringing them back down to earth, which was also
thought to be impossible.
Pat: So I don’t know. That’s, I’m a big Elon Musk fan.
Tonya: Yeah. I love that. I love it. I love how you approach it, almost like an
experiment, because I think life is a big experiment. Let’s try something. Let’s fail at
it. Let’s try something else. Let’s fail at it again. Let’s, let’s figure out what really works
for us. So, I love what you said too about, you know, we don’t have to give over full
control. We can just kind of dip our toes in a little bit, give it a test. And a lot of times
you’re going to be like,
Tonya: ‘Oh my gosh, why, I need to give more of this over. It’s so, it’s so empowering.
It’s like a weight lifted off of you. Um, you know, it’s, it’s interesting because you’re
very transparent with how you run your business. And I think that transparency
really helps with your team knowing what to do.
Tonya: You know, I’m curious, how transparent do you feel like people should be
with their teams? Not just with delegating, but you know, even thinking about right
now as we’re recording this episode, we’re all sheltering in place. And while I’m
hoping this episode airs after we have this behind us, cause I’m hoping it’s soon,
there’s a lot of panic. There’s a lot of worry.

5 of 13

© Productivity Paradox

Tonya: And a lot of the repercussions are going to be, you know, far-reaching. And I
see two camps of leaders: ones who think that it’s their job to shoulder all the weight
and don’t share a lot with their, their people, right? They don’t share about what
they’re working on behind the scenes.
Tonya: And then there are other ones who are very open about what’s happening
and they give a lot of information to the people on their team. What do you find
works for you?
Pat: For me? I think, I mean, I’m more in the camp of, let’s just be honest and
authentic. And those are the keywords that drive me just in daily life, and my
business, and at and at home. And I remember back in 2008 when I was in the
architecture field; I was working as an architect and everything was going great until
June, when the recession hit.
Pat: And then I got let go. And unfortunately, my boss, who was trying to shoulder all
that weight and trying to shield it from all of us, was essentially saying, ‘We’re going
to get out of this. I’m working overtime to make sure everything’s okay. I’m
crunching the numbers. Like, we’re going to be fine. We’re going to be fine. Like, I’m
working, I’m working my best.’
Pat: And then of course getting let go after you’re told everything’s going to be okay
doesn’t really feel really good. Uh, and I went through a state of depression and
trying to figure out my life and just everything unraveled. And thankfully I found and
discovered all my business, and then everything changed after that.
Pat: So in fact, that really tough moment of my life became a blessing in disguise.
And I was able to find new opportunities out of that . . . A very relevant story for the
times now, especially with a number of people getting furloughed and laid off, you
know, the question to ask yourself is, What does this make possible?
Pat: And it wasn’t until a couple months after I got laid off that I then changed from
thinking about . . . well, what I–like all I could think about was what I couldn’t control.
And then I started focusing on what I could control.
Pat: So with my team now I’m very authentic and open with them. We actually have
what’s called a retro every Friday. A retro is a call where we talk about the previous
week together. And it’s a space for all of us to share openly how we feel and what
worked well, what didn’t go well, and what we hope to achieve next week. And it’s a
really great thing.
Pat: All the team members, even, even the sort of, you know, administrative
executive assistants and those kinds of people are in there, because we’re a team
together. And I often use that opportunity to share how I’m feeling as well. And in
midst of all the stuff that’s happening right now, I think it’s really important for, as a

6 of 13

© Productivity Paradox

leader, to be open and honest, but also show how you are trying to help manage the
situation.
Pat: And I think that inviting other people to come along with you on this crazy
journey we’re in right now is the best thing you can do versus shielding everybody
and having them come up with their own stories about what may or may not
happen.
Pat: I mean, that can lead to a lot of anxiety, that could lead to a lot of stress. I like
having people come along the journey with me, and that includes my team, that
includes my audience and my family. And, and I think that just lends to more honest
conversations.
Tonya: Yes. I love that. We’re very aligned there. I really believe allowing other people
to support you is a gift that you can give to other people. That when you give them
the opportunity to step up and lift you up, it really makes them feel more a part of
the team. I think that’s true with your team at work. I think it is incredibly true of your
team at home; your kids, doing things to help you in your business and in your life:
Nothing makes them feel more involved.
Tonya: And I think you’re so right. This time reminds me of 2008 also, which is when I
started my first business. So we both kind of started our businesses around the same
time.
Pat: We are twins.
Tonya: We are twins, I know. It’s funny! But you know, I think this is a thing; people
are getting really caught up in this idea of, ‘Oh my gosh, all these things are
happening to me.’ And there are so many opportunities to be had.
Tonya: I think if we get really caught up in this idea of, of what’s happening to me,
instead of what’s happening for me–which is a phrase we’ve all heard before–but
really shifting the way we look at it, we can begin to see this could be a really good
thing for your business. It can be really a good thing for how you can step into
leadership. It really is shifting that mindset, don’t you think?
Pat: It’s all about mindset and it’s so funny that you mentioned 2008, cause you’re
not–you and I are not the only ones to have built something amazing coming out of
that crisis. And I would imagine that there’s going to be a whole number of other
people who use this opportunity right now to create something new. To start fresh
again, and to create. And you know, what really helped me back then was: because I
couldn’t go back into architecture, I was almost forced to take action that was
outside of my comfort zone. Stuff I’ve never done before. And that’s, that’s how you
get ahead.
Pat: Like if you just continue to do the same things over and over again, you’re going
to continue to get the same results. And it’s until you sort of step out of that comfort
7 of 13

© Productivity Paradox

zone and you try something new that you’ll, you know, find that opportunity, uh,
available. Um, and it is experimentation, like you had said earlier. And the hard part
about that, however, is, and you had mentioned this again–it’s like you experiment,
you try something, you fail, you try again, you fail.
Pat: Failing does not feel good. It’s hard. And you have to learn how to appreciate the
failures and learn from them and just know that that’s a part of the process. And
when I first started in business, it was really tough for me to get over that because I
grew up in a house where you had to be perfect.
Pat: And I remember coming home from, uh, from school with a math test score of
97% and I showed it to my dad–I was really proud. And then he goes, ‘Yeah. So what
happened to the other 3%?’ And we worked for the next three to four hours to figure
out how to solve those problems, versus really focusing on the 97% that I got correct.
Pat: Now I love my parents. They’re still with us today. I appreciate them pushing me
very hard, but it definitely gave me, like, a condition that everything had to be 100%
perfect. And in most cases it was, I got a 4.2 grade point average in high school,
graduated magna cum laude from Berkeley because I just worked so hard to be
perfect.
Pat: And even though I did everything correct (and perfectly), even in work, I still got
let go. That was the first eye-opener for me. Like, ‘Wow, I did everything the way I
was supposed to. And I still got let go. That’s not, that’s not right. Like that formula
doesn’t work.’ And so when I learned about entrepreneurship, I really had to get over
the perfectionism and eventually embrace it. That mistakes are a part of the process.
Tonya: Yeah. I call myself a recovering perfectionist because I don’t think you’re ever
quite over it. You’re always kind of battling that demon. I have to really say to myself
like, ‘This is, this is okay, this is all right. It’s okay. That it’s not quote unquote perfect.’
It’s it is hard to let go of that.
Tonya: And I think one of the things for me that helped is this whole idea of
approaching life as an experiment where it is . . . You know, you purposely want to fail
in experiments because you learn from it. In fact, I was watching something with the
Disney Imagineering. I don’t know if you have Disney Plus, but there’s this whole
special on the Imagineers where literally they had a failure rate they were trying to
hit of like 60%.
Tonya: They wanted to hit failure again and again, because if they were not failing,
they weren’t really trying. And I really feel like that’s, that’s the approach we need to
take more often; that it’s okay. It’s okay, right now, if you’re struggling a little bit with
the feeling focused. It’s okay if you’re struggling with, you know, what’s going on in
the world today, but let’s go ahead and embrace some aggressive imperfection in
ourselves.

8 of 13

© Productivity Paradox

Tonya: That’s been kind of my code word throughout this whole season has been,
you know, ‘aggressively imperfect’ is good. Like, just go for it, right?
Pat: I love that, aggressively imperfect. That’s so great.
Tonya: Thank you. As a perfectionist, or recovering perfectionist, saying that to
myself makes me feel–cause I kind of had a very similar upbringing; again, I think we
were twins–where it’s like, you know, ‘Oh, why didn’t you get these three points
right?’ So it’s always pushing for that, not 100, but 110.
Tonya: So it has to be perfect. And when it’s not, you failed even if, even if it’s good
enough. So I think that’s really hard. So I’m curious because I know you’re a big
Enneagram fan. I’m an 8. So I’d like for you to talk a little bit about your Enneagram
number and how that fits in with this, and how you think understanding different
personality traits helps you with your team.
Pat: Ah, so you’re a challenger.
Tonya: I am yes, an 8 with a 9 wing.
Pat: I see, uh, I love the Enneagram. It’s, it’s helped me in my business, my team and
I, we’ve taken the Enneagram, uh, and the Myers-Briggs to learn about each other
and how to communicate with one another, which I think is what it’s very helpful for.
Pat: And most importantly, it’s helped with me and April, my wife, our marriage
together–it’s helped us learn how to have better conversations with each other and
understand where each of us is coming from in conversations about all kinds of
things. Um, I am a 3 and 3 is the performer, which is interesting because I’m also an
introvert, but I find that I thrive and I am in my happy place when I see that I’m
actually helping other people.
Pat: And so this is why I’m very open online and why I show up. And, like, currently
during the crisis, I’m going live every single day on YouTube, for example–even the
weekends–to be there for people because I get . . . I feel great when I know that I’m
helping other people. And that can be good.
Pat: Like with any Enneagram number, there are good sides and bad sides, you
know, healthy and unhealthy, you know, numbers. But I think it’s just no matter
what, it’s important to know a little bit about how your brain works and how you
function both mentally and physically related to different situations because it really
reveals a lot. And where I find it’s most helpful is when I know about somebody else
and how our numbers can relate to each other.
Pat: Right? So for example, my wife, uh, she is a 6. She is, she’s a loyalist. So she has
really, really amazing friendships with people, but not a ton of people. But she has
her core group of friends and she will be there for them no matter what kind of
thing, right?

9 of 13

© Productivity Paradox

Pat: For me being a 3, being somebody who wants to reach as many people as
possible, that can often clash with a 6, because a 6 has a very thick wall. When you’re
in the wall, man, she’s going to take care of you forever, but it takes a lot for you to
get into that wall, right?
Pat: And so when I put her in situations, for example, where I go to a conference and
I invite her along, I know that I’m putting her in an uncomfortable situation because
there are all these new people that she has to feel out; who she doesn’t know, who
sometimes even know her through me, and that’s very uncomfortable. So I have to
realize that.
Pat: But then at the same time, she also knows that, well, this is what’s, uh, not just
paying the bills, but also is what is making me happy. And, and, and that’s just a part
of who I am. It’s not anything wrong, it’s just who we are. And so she can empathize
with me in going to conferences and meeting new people and can understand why I
do that.
Pat: And it’s not because I am just wanting to be famous, but that’s what drives me.
Um, and so that, it’s just that communication, I think, is what it’s been most helpful
for.
Tonya: Yeah, I have to agree. I think it’s . . . I’m always fascinated. And we talk a lot on
the show, I talk about a lot about it in my book, as well; you know, how your brain
works, because I think when you understand how your brain works, it’s like, ‘Oh,
that’s why I do this.’ Right? But it’s also so important to understand how other
people’s brains work. Like, ‘Oh, this is how my husband’s brain works. This is why he
feels this way and how it’s different.’
Tonya: Cause it’s so hard, you know, to put ourselves in their place. So I have to
agree, I feel like it really does help to understand where people are coming from, you
know? And so I think that, you know, you’re really able to lean more into different
strengths for different people when you understand who they are.
Pat: Yeah. And you can help them better, right? Cause you understand where
they’re coming from. Um, and that’s the biggest thing, that empathy, that I think is
often missing in relationships and, uh, you know, in business as well. Yeah. You, you
had popped something in my head about, uh, the perfectionism that reminded me
of a Neil deGrasse Tyson commencement speech that he offered.
Pat: And I want to share this really quick, cause I think it really speaks to a lot of the
themes we talked about today. And you know, if you imagine a spelling bee, right?
And there was a person who came up on stage to spell the word “cat,” and they
spelled it like this: q-z-a, “cat.” You’d be like . . .
Tonya: ‘Not quite right.’

10 of 13

© Productivity Paradox

Pat: ‘That’s completely wrong. That’s absolutely wrong. Sorry, sit down. Good try.’
Student number two comes and spells “cat:” k-a-t. ‘Sorry, that’s incorrect as well.
Please sit down.’ And then the third person comes up, c-a-t, “cat.” Ding, you got it
right.
Pat: We treat often “q-z-a” the same as “k-a-t” even though “k-a-t” is obviously that
much more closer to the correct answer. However, we put them in the bucket of just
being incomplete, just wrong. And I think that we, especially, if we have kids, we
have to realize that “k-a-t” is still a great answer. It’s not completely right, but we
have to credit that versus the “q-z-a,” if that makes sense. And it’s just, we have this
dichotomy of you’re either right or you’re wrong.
Pat: And that’s why grades are tough to deal with because it’s like, if you don’t get an
A, you’ve done bad. But a B is pretty darn good. Cause you could also have a C, D or
F. And it’s like, we have to just pay attention to–especially if you’re an entrepreneur
or a business owner or a parent or whatever, that there’s places in between the two
dichotomies that we often sort of associate with things that we offer.
Pat: So, um, I don’t know. That just reminded me of that.
Tonya: Yeah. I love that. It’s a, it’s kind of that whole, you know, uh, what is it
Talladega Nights, “If you ain’t first, you’re last.” We have that mentality a lot of times,
like ‘second isn’t winning’ when you know, good enough is often good enough. And
we need to be okay with that. And I think that that, too, you know, ties into what we
talk about with leadership: that we don’t have to have it all figured out. We don’t
have to be perfect. We don’t have to have it all together in order to lead others, we
just have to have that desire to lead; that empathy, to see what other people are
dealing with, and the communication to make it happen.
Pat: Right.
Tonya: Yeah. I love it. I love it. Now I know that you have a lot of fabulous resources
and some courses, one of which you’re going to give away to one of our listeners and
I’ll share some details on how that’ll work in just a minute, but can you tell me a little
bit about where people can find you online and what you offer?
Pat: Yeah, so right now, uh, especially if you are listening to this and we’re still in this
sort of crisis that we’re going through right now in early 2020, um, where I’m driving
all my traffic to right now, smartpassiveincome.com/toolkit. That’s a special page
that we have on my website, where we are just putting as many resources as
possible to help people during this time. We have a lot of things that are very helpful
in this situation. Very similar to when I was in 2008, there were a lot of resources that
came up that helped me get started. We now have the ability to help others now
during this time. So we’re sort of paying it forward.
Pat: We have some courses there that are for free. Some of my books are there for
free, as well; especially some podcast episodes that are sort of emergency podcast

11 of 13

© Productivity Paradox

episodes to help if you get laid off or how to manage a business during this time,
very business-centric. But, um, my course “Smart from Scratch,” for example, which
helps people build businesses . . .
Pat: Uh, we’ve given away over $2.5 million dollars worth of that course already for
free. And, um, we’re just continually and dynamically adding new things every day as
new information comes up about, you know, a lot of the, um, the stimulus packages,
like everything that you might need to know is there. So that’s
smartpassiveincome.com/toolkit. Um, and then I’m @PatFlynn on most social media
channels.
Pat: I also have patflynn.com if you want to learn a little bit more about me and my
family and things like that too. But, um, yeah, I’m here to help. So, uh, I’m thankful
that I had the opportunity to come on today and share, and hopefully, you know,
inspire some people today.
Tonya: Well, thank you so much, Pat. You really are such a great resource for so
many different aspects of business and leadership, and I’m just grateful for all that
you do and your generosity with everyone. It really, it really makes a difference to the
community as a whole. So thank you.
Pat: Thank you so much. I appreciate you.
Tonya: Oh my goodness. I had such a great time chatting with Pat. I found it so
funny how aligned our lives were and in a lot of the ways that we run our business.
And so I feel like I could just chatted with him for a lot longer. And in fact, we actually
did that. He and I recorded a little bonus segment called Random Questions where
Pat and I dived into a few things like, What does success look like to him? And, if he
was in a fire, what would be the one item he would grab?
All kinds of fun, little extra questions. I’m going to be posting that in my Facebook
group this week. So if you’re not a member of my Facebook group, what are you
waiting for? This is the perfect time to join. I love my group of women who are there
to support and encourage each other and take what we learn in the podcast and
actually start applying it. And we have a lot of fun while we’re doing it.
Things like this little extra bonus episode, that’s what you’ll find in my Facebook
group. So go right now, join the group, tonyadalton.com/group. Now, before we sign
off, I do want to tell you that Pat is very generously giving away one of his courses to
one of my listeners.
He’s being incredibly generous and he’s making it up to you, which one of his
courses you want to take. So if you’re the lucky winner you get to pick. And it’s really,
really easy to enter: All you need to do is snap a screenshot of today’s episode. So
right now, while you’re listening, snap that screenshot and then share your favorite
takeaway from today’s episode. And then just be sure to tag both me and Pat.

12 of 13

© Productivity Paradox

I’ll choose one lucky winner. I’ll be reading what your takeaways were and the best
one will win one of Pat’s courses. And again, it’s up to you which course you end up
winning–and he’s got a lot of options to choose from. So enter! There’s no reason not
to; it’s so easy, it’s simple to do.
Enter right now, while you’re listening to the show. Snap that screenshot, post your
takeaway. Easy as pie, all right? And while you’re at it, head on over right now to my
Facebook group to join. You’re not going to want to miss this bonus content that
we’ve got with Pat and I chatting about his random questions.
All right, everybody, I’m excited about this season. I hope you are, too! So until next
time, have a beautiful and productive week.