Iconist: The Art and Science of Standing Out | Jamie Mustard | 280

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July 13, 2020

Jamie Mustard is a strategic multi-media consultant and award-winning author of the book The Iconist: The Art and Science of Standing Out. He has identified the primal laws of what makes any idea or message iconic, and is now using this information to help professionals, artists and brands stand out to their desired audiences.

Jamie is a graduate of the London School of Economics, and he has worked with some of the world’s leading companies, such as Adidas, Intel, and Wieden + Kennedy. Most recently, he was interviewed live on stage with Mindhunter lead actor and movie star, Holt McCallany.

Jamie’s purpose is to share the power of getting attention in an over-messaged-to culture. When we get attention at will, we can motivate and inspire others, adapt faster, get buy-in, improve organizational culture, generate demand, increase productivity, creativity and ultimately be more fulfilled as organizations and individuals.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

Jamie Mustard talks about feeling invisible and how his experience helped him write his book
Jamie identifies the biggest mistakes that people make when trying to stand out in a world overloaded with content
What is your “road sign” and how do you create one that will make people notice you?
Jamie explains what dilution is and its negative mental consequences
Where to learn more about Jamie Mustard
The 1 to 3 action steps that listeners can take away from this episode
Jamie talks about how you can apply his primal laws of standing out in different aspects of your life
The trigger of inspiration that caused Jamie to move forward every day and successfully stand out

In this episode…

Have you ever had an idea, a message, or a product that you wanted to put out into the world? What held you back? Was it the feeling of invisibility? The feeling that in a world overloaded with content, it’s seemingly impossible to catch the attention of your audience?

But should you give up on standing out that easily?

Jamie Mustard, author of the book The Iconist: The Art and Science of Standing Out knows first hand what it’s like to feel invisible. But he was able to push past it and make his presence known to everyone and he intends to help you cut through the noise and start standing out to your desired audience. Jamie has gone from invisibility to success, all thanks to his primal laws of becoming iconic.

In this week’s episode, Dan Kuschell interviews Jamie Mustard about the personal and professional experiences that helped him stop being invisible and start standing out. Jamie talks about the biggest mistakes people make when trying to stand out, how to best identify your unique “road sign,” and the trigger of inspiration that started his journey toward success. Stay tuned.

Resources Mentioned on this episode

Sponsor for this episode

Thanks for listening to this episode of growthtofreedom.com.

Are you struggling to get a steady flow of new clients every day? Or maybe hit a plateau or hit a wall in growing your business? Well, let’s help you solve this problem today. Let’s review your business and have a conversation. You can do that for free today at breakthroughstrategycall.com. That’s breakthroughstrategycall.com.

In addition, if you’re looking for a simple way to implement some of what we’ve been talking about in today’s episode, I want to encourage you to get our free small business toolkit. You can get that at activate.breakthrough3x.com. That’s activate.breakthrough3x.com.

If you’d like access to the special resources and all the show notes for this special episode, make sure to visit growthtofreedom.com.

Episode Transcript

Dan Kuschell 0:02

Welcome to growthtofreedom.com, the show that brings you inspiration, transformation, and leadership are helping you connect the dots, see the blind spots, get unstuck. So you can go out there and grow your sales, grow your impact or your reach, and most importantly, so you can make a bigger contribution. Is that what you want? If that’s what you want, you are going to love today’s segment. Our guest expert today is an expert at helping you cut through the noise. If you ever felt like maybe you had a great product, a great service, a great message, but maybe felt invisible. Or maybe like you’re the world’s best kept secret. Or maybe you thought to yourself, God if only they knew what I could do for them, or what our product could do or service could do for them. Well guess what? Today you’re going to learn how to transform from that, to being an economist, and the art and science of standing out. You’re going to want to grab a piece of paper. You’re going to watch grab a pen, you’re going to want to jot down some notes. Our guest expert is Jamie Mustard. I’m going to read just a little bit about his background because his credentials are amazing. He’s an expert on perception in the physical world, a strategic multimedia consultant art design, a product futurist, creative artist and author of the best selling book, iconoclast. He’s codified the primal laws of what makes anything iconic. How would you like to be iconic? Like even if you’re brand new in business today? How would it transform the game if you could go from where you are right now that being thought of like the Jordan brand, or the Nike brand or many other brands like what would that do for your business even if you’re new it’s possible I know you might let me speak to the elephant you might be going that sounds too good to be true. Well then stick around unless you don’t want to stand out unless you want to continue to be dominated by your competition who is see if you’re not using this your company petition is, don’t let that happen to you. In fact, why don’t you put this in place before they do. And you can do that starting today he’s going to reveal some of the anatomy of what causes any idea, art or message to stand out and take hold in the human mind. And more importantly, in the heart, right across any medium his passion is the teacher, the science, and the art of obviousness, helping pros change agents, artists and businesses like you confidently and will make their messages, brands, and ideas standout to their desired audiences. Again, is that what you want? If that’s what you want, grab that pen, grab that piece. If you’re driving, pull over right now. Pull over right now. You’re not gonna want to miss this. Jamie, welcome to the show, my friend. How are you?

Jamie Mustard 2:44

I’m very well thank you for that incredible introduction. Thank you.

Dan Kuschell 2:50

You’re welcome, brother. I mean, you have such an amazing, amazing experience. I know. We got a chance to meet through a mutual friend of ours who got us connected and then I’ve been helping get you connected to some friends of ours too, because your message is just so simple, and yet so powerful, because who wouldn’t want to stand out? Especially, you know, in today’s time when it’s very noisy out there. So before we get into some of the strategy, which you’ve got a lot around that, why are you doing what you’re doing today?

Jamie Mustard 3:19

Speak to, I really appreciate that. And before I kind of launch into kind of why I’m doing what I’m doing, I should say that ultimately, my book, The Iconist: The Art and Science of Standing Out, is a business book. It is a professional handbook. So I do work with a lot of creative people. But I’m in the business category, I have a business publisher. And the book was endorsed by the publisher of Forbes and founder of Fast Company. So it’s definitely first and foremost a business book, but it does have a lot of crossover. Why am I doing what today you want the human answer or the professional answer? I mean, there’s a lot of ways I could ask this, okay. I mean, I have a very unconventional background. You know, I, I’m a child, I grew up as a child of poverty and neglect, in and around downtown Los Angeles. And, you know, I’m mixed. I grew up in Hispanic in neighborhoods, Mexican neighborhoods in Los Angeles at a time where there was a drought. So I think from a very young age, I felt because I had been neglected by my parents. I wasn’t often in school, I felt very invisible. I don’t I not only felt very invisible. I felt like the kids. All of us were invisible. We all kind of faded into the brick. And I think that I was aware of it at a very young age that something was wrong. The stork had dropped me off at the wrong doorstep. And then I was I knew I was in trouble. And I knew that being invisible was a part of it. And I also knew growing up in Mexican neighborhoods, seeing how hard they work. that hard work was not going to be enough. And so that I might, you know, that had created a puzzle for me like if you can work that hard and not have a wealth of or a means, then what? What do I need to know? And so I don’t I don’t that I was not aware of it. I don’t even think I had it. I saw the connection between the fact that I have discovered these kind of Gladwell, Ian or primal laws that why we noticed one thing and walk onto one thing and ignore another. I don’t think I was even willing to admit that connection between that and the visibility of my childhood until the book was turned into my publisher when honestly, well, I didn’t want to look at it. I wanted it to stand on its own. But then it became very obvious. You know, I mean that my publisher wanted me to talk a little bit about that in the intro, and when so I had to take a hard vulnerable look on myself. And the truth of the matter is, is that was a subject that I dealt with. And so I don’t I do not believe and I’ve now discovered that there’s a lot of successful people at every level of professional endeavor there’s people that are starting out that are really, really have a lot of anxiety about whether people are going to be able to get their product or messenger service out there, no matter how good they are. And then there’s really highly successful people that CEOs of billion dollar companies that hire me that are doing very well, they’re highly profitable companies, highly successful companies, and they, but they know that they would, they could be doing better if they thought their messages were being heard. And then and the fact that they’re doing well, and they know they’re not really being listened to. It really bothers them and and it creates with what I call drag, huh, yeah. So, so yeah, so I help people at kind of every level of professional development in that way. And there’s, you know, very substantial human effects when we labor to make something great.

There's very substantial human effects when we labor to make something great. - Jamie Mustard Click To Tweet

And then we don’t have would it? How would I, Bill Taylor when he reviewed or endorsed the book, he said scarcity of attention is the defining business challenge of our time. We don’t notice anything anymore. And so I’m very interested in the idea if everyone around you no longer has time to pay attention, or dig deep on what you’re offering is because we’re also bombarded. What is that doing to you? And it’s doing things to you professionally, but it’s also doing things to you. There’s also mental effects from that. So, so to answer your question is, I want people that have that work hard that have a good idea to be able to get their message put across with with deliberation and at will in a matter of minutes with certainty rather than hop hope luck cants were yours and anxiety and that’s really what I’m trying to do.

Dan Kuschell 8:14

Yeah, I mean there’s so many layers of what you just shared.

Know in one direction I’m going to go personal I’m going to tie in for you as you’re listening first of all you’re listening or watching thanks for making us part of your day. If you want to come back to this episode, by the way, the show notes some of the quotes some of the resources we’ve got some special resources available for you that we’ll talk about near the end of June come back to this episode at growthtofreedom.com/280. That’s growthtofreedom.com/280 or if you never want to miss an episode go to growthtofreedom.com/subscribe. So Jamie is your work and you’ve done your work on moving from invisible to standing out. Like, what do you see are some of the biggest mistakes that most people are making, like on this journey of trying to stand out because, you know, there’s probably such a thing of trying to trying too hard to stand out, which causes a counter result too. So speak to the big mistakes that you see out there.

Jamie Mustard 9:20

Okay, I’ll speak to what i think is the biggest mistake. And before I do that, I’ll give it again, contextualize it with my history. You know, I was abandoned by my parents. I spent a lot of my life my early childhood in and out of institutional environments. I rarely was in school. I was semi literate at the age of 19. And by the age of 25, I graduated from the London School of Economics, which is one of the best schools in the world. So I’ve had, in a way I see myself as an escape artist, or, you know, add myself into platform after platform after platform where now I work with some of the smartest people in the world. So my life has been you know, quite an And I saw contextualize it with that, but the biggest mistake that people make, is it a world overloaded with content. And I, what happens is, if you’re if, if 30 years ago, I’m a business coach, we had business coaches, you know, I was in a small town, when no say 1950 I was a some sort of a business consultant. And I lived in a medium sized town and I was consulting. I was competing with five other business consultants in town. Okay.

Well, today during that time, if I walked around my neighbor went to work came home, walked around my neighborhood. I was bombarded with about, or hit with not even bombarded, I would be exposed to about 250 advertising messages today. By 1970. That was 2000 advertising messages a day at The burgeoning days of the internet. That was five to 7000 advertising messages a day. This is 1998. By post social media posts, Facebook, Twitter, post 2007-2008. Most people are being hit with about 10 to 15,000 advertising messages a day. I call this dilution. So what that means is you’re being watered down. And this is the first third of the book, what I cover is that you so to the degree that there’s more things going on around you, you become smaller. And that’s the primal laws that I teach my book of how to stand out, despite all of the things surrounding you that obscure you and hide you the scarcity of attention problem. But so that we in that context, the biggest mistake people make is, in a world overloaded with content where people are bombarded anything busy, gets instantly discarded.
The biggest mistake people make is, in a world overloaded with content where people are bombarded, anything busy gets instantly discarded. - Jamie Mustard Click To Tweet So if someone can’t understand a major part of what you are, and why they would want to engage with you, in a microsecond, and that second before they have a chance to think in their lizard brain, they move on cut, you have to be able to communicate with a magnetism and a power that gives people a reason to look at you with the same immediacy as a warning label or a road sign. And so that’s the biggest mistake people make is they lead with 15 things. You there, you have to lead with one thing and there’s and in my book, I systemize and I can explain it to you depending on how specific you want to go right now. But in my book, I systemize How to come up with that one thing that’s your road sign that cause people to walk on.

You have to be able to communicate with a magnetism and a power that gives people a reason to look at you with the same immediacy as a warning label or a road sign. - Jamie Mustard Click To Tweet

Dan Kuschell 12:52

Now, as you’re listening right now, would you like to know that one thing to come up with your roadside that is the most important thing to focus on? Well, if so when we come back, we’re going to take a deeper dive into the strategy of how you can come up with your sign so that you stand out in the crowd. More on The Iconist: The Art and Science of Standing Out and avoiding dilution with Jamie Mustard, right after this on growthtofreedom.com.

Thanks for listening to this episode of growthtofreedom.com. Are you struggling to get a steady flow of new clients every day? Or maybe hit a plateau or hit a wall and growing your business? Well, let’s help you solve this problem today. Let’s review your business and have a conversation. You do that for free today at breakthroughstrategycall.com. That’s breakthroughstrategycall.com. In addition, if you’re looking for a simple way to implement some of what we’ve been talking about in today’s episode, I want to encourage you to get our free small business toolkit. You can get that at activate.breakthrough3x.com. activate.breakthrough3x.com. If you’d like access to the special resources and all the show notes for this special episode, make sure to visit growthtofreedom.com.

Welcome back to growthtofreedom.com. Jamie, I want to dive right into it. You know, you talked about most people make the mistake, or a mistake is leading with 15 things instead of one thing and there’s that one thing that road sign that really helps us differentiate helps us stand out if we get it right. Speak to the process. So that what can someone do today? Like what are a couple steps someone can do today to identify that one thing that makes them invaluable, if you will, in the market.

Jamie Mustard 14:42

All right, well, I’ll do what I usually do when I’ve been answering your questions, which is all contextualized. But I mean, one of the things we have to realize is that people respond to childlike communication, you know, when we teach children in very simple kind of monolithic ways What ends up happening is that we get above elementary learning, we stop communicating to each other in elementary ways. The truth is, even in a world that isn’t overloaded with content, I have tons of pop culture stories and historical examples and academic studies in the book that are really interesting to read. It’s very fun read that explain that. Adults crave this elementary communication even more than kids do. And it becomes a sanctuary and a magnet, when there’s so much fizziness we lock on to anything simple, like a tractor beam even more in our current climate. So that being said, you need to have this road sign you need to give the people a reason to engage before they have a chance to think. Okay, and so the simple way that you come up with that thing is, there might be 25 things that you do, but there’s always intersection Between the best of your offering, and the emotional concern of your potential audience. And if you take if you find the intersection there and choose one thing out of those 25 and you blow it up big way oversized like Sesame Street. And you have that be what represents you at the top of your website, or at the top of your brochures, you give people a reason to lock on engage and look further and the oversize thing. And there’s lots of research in the book that explains why you have to do this is there’s lots of when we see something and it’s overly big with negative space around it like a road sign or warning label. It communicates a sense of dedication, authority, and the person looking at it feels an instant credibility. Because it really comes across as a declaration, when it’s said over big and monolithic. So that’s a big part of it. Yeah. So that that’s what it is, is that intersect point between the best of you, and others? 24 things? What’s the thing that corresponds to the emotional concern? which is typically, yeah, the emotional concern of your potential customer. And then boom.

Dan Kuschell 17:26

Now one of the amazing guys, I’ve gotten a chance to meet is Daymond John and Daymond’s book, one of his books, he says that, you know, if you can’t articulate if you can’t communicate what you do in three words or less, you’re missing it. And it sounds like to a degree, what you’re saying is, you make it so simple, it can’t be misunderstood. And yet so powerful, that it commands attention.

Jamie Mustard 17:56

Yeah, and if you Yeah, and if you pick up the book, you’re you know, you can You know, get a lot more information as to how and why that works. And I think people tend to stay disciplined and do what they should do to communicate when they understand how the mechanism works, but I think I’ve read that book but I’m a big fan of Daymond. Yeah, yeah, I’m a big fan of his I’m a big fan of fubu and I think he’s a really bright guy and I think there’s a lot of truth to it and then my book just explains why is that true? What is it about the kind of primal way that human beings like to perceive and always like to perceive that make that true and so when you understand the how the how the mechanics of how that work works and why that works, it makes it a lot easier for you to do a lot of us think that we want to stand out but really, you know, we don’t we hide behind the busy Okay, and because when you know, it’s like being on stage right, you know, I I do a lot of stuff. Speaking I think I want to be a speaker. But once I go up there, it’s every time and I do it a lot, you know, there’s always a significant amount of anxiety. I walk on and have everyone staring at me. So I think to some degree, you know, standing out is like that. And when an icon is does, it’s an icon, it pushes past that and get simple and stands out anyway.

Dan Kuschell 19:23

That’s me, I want to go back as well. You brought up the idea of dilution. Right? Yeah. And, you know, there are consequences of like, dilution, and there’s mental consequences, you know, and everything we do, there’s benefits and consequences. Speak to some of the the the consequences of mental dilution and, you know, what you’ve witnessed what you’ve observed. I mean, and all the research, you’ve done, all the clients, you’ve worked, I mean, which numbers in the thousands and thousands of business owners and people you’ve been around and worked with, and, you know, study this, speak to that a little bit.

Jamie Mustard 19:59

All right. I would love to and I’ll again, I’ll contextualize really quickly. You know, I, you know, again, the the, the when I started beta testing these ideas almost 15 years ago, all I was, I came across a pattern, I thought, wow, if I brought this to the world, it would really help a lot of people. It would give me a light, it would give me a professional career would do a lot of great things. But mostly it would help people professionally. That was my first when I came across the this patterns, primal laws, that was the biggest deal to me. And then I started doing it for all these CEOs. And something very remarkable happened. What I realized very quickly, when you’re dealing with a guy that runs a $1 million company, or they have a startup or they run a $50 million company or a billion dollar company, it’s not really just their professional career. It’s their life. It’s their identity. It’s Yeah, it’s their kids college. It’s their mortgage. It’s they’re standing in the community. So, you know, in Western society, we ask people when we meet them, we don’t say who are you we say what do you do, so much of what we, how we see ourselves in American or Western society is connected to our work. Right. So the transformation that would occur in people and that was never anything I was looking to do, when I would, when they when I would deliver their work, deliver their blocks to them there there would make them iconic, these their road signs. But even before they would deploy it, their face would change. They would look happier, they look lighter. And I realized that I was doing something far more than just helping people professionally. And I kind of fell in love with the meaning behind. You know what that does to a person when they’re able to self actual, you know, have people reach in and prosper professionally based on what they’re feeling internally. And it’s kind of goes back Maslow’s hierarchy of needs right as we get above our basic shelter and basic food, then self actualization transcendence into what we care about becomes paramount. And I found that that’s what this being able to be seen at will, that’s what it was doing for people. But that So, but to speak directly to your question, there’s this, this concept of what I call dilution. D-I-L-U-T-I-O-N. And it was funny because I did a podcast recently and the guy heard it as delusion. Right? And he wrote it everywhere. And I actually kind of loved it, because it is delusion, you know, not realizing that you’re in being made invisible by this content swirling around you is a form of delusion and just communicating and everyday just going about your communication, your miscommunications, pretending that you’re not invisible is his delusion. So I actually loved that he misheard it. Okay, yeah. Talking about dilution and all contextual there was a book that came out in 2004 by a brilliant guy named Barry Schwartz, who’s a professor of social theory at Skidmore, and University of psychologist Skidmore College. And he wrote a book called The Paradox of Choice where he talks about how when you have choice overload what we all do now, there’s actually psychological effects that come from that anxiety about choice. Oh, what if I choose the wrong one? paralysis? I’m not going to choose anything at all. Because what if I, what if I choose the wrong one? dissatisfaction I choose and then I think, well, what if I could have got the other one? Right, so dissatisfaction of choice and ultimately depression of twice, and I found that no matter where you are, whether you’re a startup, you’re a millennial, or you’re a billion dollar CEO and everyone in between, that they experienced similar mental effects from having not feeling like their message is truly being seen and heard. potential audience they have anxiety about is this even? No one’s really paying attention to this right? So the anxiety about it paralysis, why even try and be seen and heard, if no one is going to see and hear me, right dissatisfaction with their life on the subject of being seen and heard, and then ultimately depression, about being seen and heard. So there’s serious mental consequences. When we have something inside of us, that drives us that that sets us on fire that we really care about, for whatever our motivation is, whether it’s to pay for our lives, or whether it’s just purely a passion, and we can’t get traction for that. It affects us in ways that are deeply human that go far beyond our professional endeavor, but it does also, most obviously affect our pocketbook and our ability to make a livelihood. Yeah.

Dan Kuschell 24:55

I mean, that is so good. And as you’re listening right now, as you’re watching right now, like How would it shift the game for you to number one, recognize that regardless of all the noise, regardless of, you know, all the potential commoditization in your industry in your niche, and how noisy it really is, that if you’re feeling invisible, that one simple shift, can transform your business, to create freedom to get you to a place where you’re unique and different, that you are positioned as a category, not of many, but a category of one. Would that be worth it to you? How would that transfer form the game for you? Right, I estimate that it would be a big shift, and a big shift over, you know, short term as well as long term. And speaking of that, like if you’re intrigued by what Jamie has, I mean, we’ve just literally scratched the surface and time flies when we’re having fun here. We’ve literally just scratched the surface. Now, Jamie, if people want to get more You they want to understand about the economist and how to the art and science of standing out. Where can they go to learn more about you, your tools, your resources, I mean, you’ve got a wealth of information available.

Jamie Mustard 26:12

Well, thank you, the theiconist.org.

And T-H-E-I-C-O-N-I-S-T.org, theiconist.org, Google me, it’ll come right up. If you can’t afford my book, go on the contact page, email me, I talk to everybody. I’m really on a mission to help people and if I can help you with your problem or workshop you through your problem in a simple way, then I will help people of every shape and size. I speak to a lot of kids. So that’s one way the book you know, I’ve been really fortunate the book. One of the coolest things that happened with the book because it just came out in October is I got nominated for and I won the OWL award, the Outstanding Works of Literature award from BookPal and I’m really proud of that because BookPal is a Book book. They’re one of the largest book booksellers in the world. And they really have a mission of learning, continued education and continued learning. So somebody that has, so the fact that they awarded me that and I was in the mix with all these amazing writers like Safi Bacall, and Malcolm Gladwell and David Epstein, but the fact that they saw the book as something that would be valuable for continued education and continue learning, it’s one of the things that I’m most proud of was that they anointed that from their particular perspective.

Dan Kuschell 27:38

So I want to encourage you if you’re looking for a way to stand out from the crowd, if you’re looking to also understand the science and the art of why you can stand out versus your competition and you want to dominate your niche, create more freedom, get out of the day to day, right also get more referrals as a result of having a simple message. It’s impossible to misunderstand

Jamie Mustard 28:00

What was available on Amazon? I should have said the book is available on Amazon. It’s in every Barnes and Noble. Yeah, the book is available everywhere. For what? everywhere.

Dan Kuschell 28:08

Yeah, everywhere and you can get it today we’ll have links in the show notes as well. But theiconist.org, that’s theiconist.org. We’ll have the links in the show notes. But go there, check out what Jamie’s up to. I mean, he’s a fascinating human being. And he’s a human being. He’s got a lot of the human doing stuff that he’s accomplished. But he is the human being, he leads by example. He walks his talk, and he’s constantly iterating and updating, he can help. He’s a lifelong learner, like, maybe you are if you’re watching or listening right now, right? Because here’s the thing. It’s not just about learning, right and staying stagnant. It’s about learning and then adopting and innovating. And what’s that next thing? What’s the first step? And then what’s the next step? And if you just take that approach in your life, and you would take that approach with this book and go through it, what’s the first step from it? What’s the next step? Then you can come back to the book Three months later. And go, okay, what’s the first step now? What’s the next step? Now, it’ll be different. Have you ever heard the teacher will appear when the student is ready, the book, the icons can help transform your life, your business, and your team. If you have a team that you want to get them on the same page, get them in alignment. If you want to join in this, you know, keep doing what you maybe you’ve been doing. But if you want to get people in alignment on your team to have a bigger difference to dominate your niche to stand out from the crowd to be unique, as a category one thing go to theiconist.org right now, or go on Amazon or go everywhere because it is everywhere, as Jamie just mentioned. So Jamie, as we wind this down and having some fun, like what are 1 to 3 action steps that you hope our viewers or listeners will take from our time today?

Jamie Mustard 29:46

I think one is the acceptance and realization that they’re being made that all of this content is being made you invisible. There was a woman in the late the late ‘90s before the internet got rolling, named Linda Stone who was doing research for Microsoft and Apple. And in 1990, she coined the term continuous partial attention to describe how nobody’s really paying attention anymore. So there’s lots of books about distraction out there. There’s lots of people talking about distraction. What I’m concerned with, is if everyone else is distracted and can’t pay attention because of shorter attention spans, what is that doing to you? So, taking a hard look at that, facing it, and embracing it, okay? And then secondly is monolithic simplicity. Okay, leading with one to three things that are unavoidable in terms of what your customers care about. And the third would be repetition, repetition, repetition, repetition, to the point where you’re sick of repeating that simple thing. And without, if you repeat that monolithic thing, To the point where it’s making you sick, you’re quickly becoming an economist. That’s what I would say. It’s an uncomfortable feeling. But as you use it, it starts to give you confidence. And it starts to make not only you feel anchored because your customers have been barred, being bombarded with so much, they’re kind of feeling floating. So it also anchors them in something that they can connect to. It’s a very powerful, what it does for the person who’s looking for you, and what it does for you as the person deploying it.

If you repeat that monolithic thing to the point where it's making you sick, you're quickly becoming an Iconist. - Jamie Mustard Click To Tweet

Dan Kuschell 31:33

And having witnessed versions of the iconic approach, the science of standing out when you do apply, you know, the ability to stand out and not be invisible, and be in a place where you have ultimate simplicity, right, not only for you, your team but also your clients and your competitors. And repeat this over and over again. You know what happens? Many times you turn your greatest competitors into your greatest ambassadors. You For greatest partners, strategic partners, that’s where I mean life changing. Things can happen in your business. And there’s a whole lot more to this again, go to theiconist.org. Right now get the book. Check it out theiconist.org. Jamie, what is what is something I should have asked you today that we didn’t have a chance to cover in our few minutes together today?

Jamie Mustard 32:21

Oh, gosh, that’s tough. What should you, I mean, did you take pretty good man, in terms of I don’t know that I’ve covered this much ground in this much time. Before, right. But yeah, I think. Yeah, man, I don’t know that there’s anything that you should have asked me that we didn’t cover other than Okay, that of how maybe how many different things you can apply this to? Okay. So, like this, if, if you are a designer, there’s AI in the book, there’s these primal logic How to construct your designs in a way that have that monolithic attraction. If you’re a musician, it shows the anatomy of monolithic attraction in music with academic studies and historical examples. If you’re a public speaker, there’s a whole public speaking capital. It shows you how to use these monoliths in a public speech with undeniable historical examples and research, right? So the thing is how you can use these climate laws which I call blocks, which are the anatomy of what cause anything to become iconic, in every aspect of your life and your existence, the fact that it’s a rate that there’s not one thing that I don’t cover.

Dan Kuschell 33:49

And as you’re listening or watching right now, Jamie mentioned this right up front, right? See, this is more than a book, right? Do you really want another book? To learn and read? No. You want a handbook a guide, right? You can go get the blocks to apply and use starting like today, this moment for you like if you’re a musician, if you’re in art, if you’re in business, if you want to have a message that stands out, if you’re gonna do a presentation ever, like you might be doing a lot of presentations on virtual platforms right now. Would it be worth it if you could have people captivated, compelled to want to move forward with you to move forward with your ideas? With your stories, whatever that might be? Right? Would that be valuable? Well, you can go get the handbook right now at the icon us.org or everywhere for that Amazon? Yeah, Amazon all the back.

Jamie Mustard 34:39

There’s one more thing I could say. But I think we’re done right. We’re out of time.

Dan Kuschell 34:43

I work close. But I’ve got one other thing I want to ask you. That’s like a personal thing. But go ahead and jump in what you were gonna say?

Jamie Mustard 34:50

Yeah, I just had one example in the book that I’m really it’s one of the early chapters because I’m really unexplained dilution from 1000 different angles of the first 30 To the book. And one of the examples I talked about is online job boards, where there’s a study that says, you know how many people think they can get a job at an online job board, and it’s like 30 to 50%. And then you look at the research of how many people get hired based off of an online job board, like the big ones, and it’s far less than 1% per million hires. Wow. So that’s dilution. The person fit 50 years ago, if I got a bunch of resumes, because I put an ad in the classifieds. I look through 50 resumes. Today, if I put out an electronic ad for a job, I might have 10,000 resumes, still the same person reviewing, they’re not going to be engaging with those resumes in the same way. So if you’re not using everything’s like that now, whether you’re a product, a service, a job application, so if you’re not using blocks, if you’re not using the formula for iconic communication, which is in the book, you’re invisible, and

Dan Kuschell 35:56

I would encourage it even there’s another way to think about this. Maybe we haven’t touched on yet. How about at home? Like, why would it be worth it to get you and your kids and your family on the same page in alignment at home? Because in many ways, this is about articulating and communicating simply, your value, your values, isn’t it? Right? Think about that would be the power and the fun of being able to establish at home, in your business, in your craft and your art, whatever that might be. When you can do that go to theiconist.org, that’s theiconist.org. Get more info, connect with Jamie, go get the book. You can go right now get the book Amazon everywhere. Go No. And so Jamie, I want to kind of shift just a little bit with you. If you don’t mind, right,

Jamie Mustard 36:43

absolutely. I’m loving this. This is taking me on a ride and I

Dan Kuschell 36:49

get a little bit off off kilter and you go hey man timeout

because this is a little bit more personal, right? I love to kind of understand, like where people Like, what was the motivating factor? The inspiration that moved them from there? To here? Right? You know, if you can think back, and I don’t know whether it would be 10, the 10 year old Jamie, I mean, think of that 10 year old Jamie, right? You know, in your situation or whether it was 12 or 14, can you think about like, a, your lowest point that maybe you’d gotten? And then as you were moving through it, what was the trigger of inspiration that got you to, like, see things differently? To go? I’m more, I can do this. Doesn’t matter where I’ve been, it doesn’t matter. You know, the past it matters where I want to go. Can you think back to that? and kind of give us a feeling of what that was like?

Jamie Mustard 37:51

Yeah, man. That’s, that’s, that’s, that’s a tough one. I mean, it’s a tough one to think about. And it’s interesting that you say that you phrased it the way that you Because if you get a hard copy of the book, actually dedicate the book to my nine year old self, because that guy should not be here. So it was my way of kind of tipping the hat I almost see him like, I carry him with me. We walk together and I almost see him as a separate person. And, and, but I think that for me, um, you know, I was very lucky that I had, you know, and I don’t want this to sound like a cliche story of like, you know, the, the brown boy and the loving grandmother, I had people. My grandmother was a huge I used to go visit her every year or two as a kid. And that I saw there was a different way of living, you know, that there was different standards of living, and she always kind of valued education and that was not something that I was growing up with.

But um, I think that just a sudden desire to, you know, there’s a great Paul Simon song that I listened to when I was dealing. I was listening to this album of this Paul Simon album a lot when I was dealing with my remedial education in my late teens. And there’s a song that says, I can’t run, but I can walk much faster than this. And that’s how I felt. I mean, I felt I was dealing with my literacy. And I felt that I couldn’t be into everything that I wanted. But I could do better than what I’m doing right now, if I pushed myself, and I think that I just, I don’t know that I’m answering the question the way that you meant it. But I think that, you know, for me, if I could just take one baby step, and go further up the wrong, one baby step, go five rungs up, fall back two rungs, if I could just possibly just continue to grow. And I realized and I would do things that you know, when I was younger, I would do things the hard way. And I used to think that I was just glutton for punishment. But I came to realize that by doing things the hard way I would learn, I would focus on my weaknesses, that maybe that’s the best way I could describe it. I was willing to most of us if we if we, there’s something that we’re bad at or that we’ve been, you know, that we were avoiding, of the thing that we’re we’re not strong, and I would hug the cactus and work on the thing that I was horrible at, no matter how much it hurt me emotionally and painfully with the goal of just trying to move forward a little bit every day, fall back, but ultimately be moving forward all the time. And it’s crazy how if you do that, and if you have spine and grit and you never quit, and you’re constantly not holding yourself accountable to hard work, but holding yourself accountable to forward motion, you’ll end up doing that 10,000, and being at the top of a skyscraper. And that and that’s, that’s, that’s what it is, is just those little micro steps, no matter how insignificant you might feel at some point, if you keep doing them, and you just never stop for 5, 10, 20 years, it’s it’s crazy where you can get that I’ve never quite described it that way before. But that’s what came into my head when you asked me.

Dan Kuschell 41:29

I mean, as you’re watching or listening, I mean, you get the business side, you get the human side and a lot in between. I’d encourage you, if you’re looking for a way to learn from somebody to work with somebody who walks his talk leads by example, who started at the bottom and just took one little baby step at a time. And over the course of 20 years, people look at him and go, Oh my God, look at you. It’s amazing. And he probably does the same. Go man. Look at nobody more than me.

Jamie Mustard 41:57

And one thing I will say is when I Do my work. And the way I wrote the book because I don’t look, I don’t. Obviously, I’m helping people professionally. It’s why my publisher bought the book. So I don’t want to like, you know, say that that’s not what I did. But when I’m working with someone I am, you know, and again, I’m not saying this is to solicit clients. I’m trying, I’m saying it’s a reveal. I’m busy. I’m saying it to reveal who I am as a person. I don’t look, I don’t look at it. Like I’m helping that person get business I’m looking at that I’m helping that person live a complete life. I thought a lot about transparency in the book and transparency to me is when our outer life matches our inner drivers. Yes, true transparency. And that’s what I’m trying to give to people. And you don’t need to read it. Yeah, you can read the book. You don’t need to hire me to get that.

Transparency to me is when our outer life matches our inner drivers. - Jamie Mustard Click To Tweet

Dan Kuschell 42:52

Yeah, yeah. And you’re getting a taste listening and watching right here right now. So I encourage you, go check out what Jamie’s got going on, go to theiconist.org, that’s theiconist.org. All the notes, quotes, resources, all kinds of things are going to be available in the show notes you can come back to this epic Jamie, man. Pleasure to have you with us my friend.

Jamie Mustard 43:16

Thank you for thank you for this Dan. I mean I’ve had talks that have been human and I’ve talks that have been highly professional. I don’t know that I’ve covered so much ground on both sides in one interview so special. Thank you.

Dan Kuschell 43:31

Thank you, and I encourage you to take action with what Jamie shared with you. I mean, I’ve got three and a half pages of notes here. And I do this a lot. So I don’t know what you’ve got to notes but if you don’t have the notes, you can get the notes you can get the notes by coming back to this episode today. Like right now. growthtofreedom.com/280, that’s growthtofreedom.com/280. You never want to miss an episode go to growthtofreedom.com/subscribe, seize the day, make it a great week. We’ll see you next time on growthtofreedom.com.

Conclusion

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