Russell Going A Little OCD About His Hair And His Socks

How to get rid of friction that keeps you from performing at your highest level.

On today’s episode Russell is on his way to get a haircut and jokes about his unusual hair issues he’s had in his life. He also discusses how being comfortable can have a positive effect on every aspect of your life and being uncomfortable can keep you from doing what you want to do.

Here are 3 cool things in today’s episode:

• Why doing his hair in middle school gave him anxiety.
• How shaving his head in 10th grade helped Russell gain confidence.
• And how something so small (like thick hair) can have such a huge impact, and slow us down and hurt us.

So listen below to hear about Russell’s childhood hair drama and why it still effects him today, but in a positive way.

---Transcript---

Hey everyone, this is Russell Brunson and welcome to Marketing In Your Car. Alright, everybody today you’re going on a different trip with me. We’re not going home from the office, we’re not even going to the office. We are heading to get my haircut. Yes, my head is starting to swell. I’ve got really thick, I’ve got a fat head just to start out with, and then I’ve got really thick hair on top of that, and it just keeps getting thicker and thicker, so as my hair keeps growing, the size of my head actually looks bigger to the point where it gets hard, and I’ve got a thick neck from wrestling, but it gets hard to hold my head up. I’m just kidding.

I remember, you guys have all seen So I Married an Axe Murderer, one of my favorite movies ever. There’s the kid with the huge afro, he keeps watching TV and he keeps sitting in front of them. Mike Meyers playing his dad in front of the TV is yelling at his head. He’s like, “It’s like an orange on a toothpick.” I always thought that was funny, and I feel like that today. My head is like an orange on a toothpick, so I’m going to go get it chopped down to normal size, which would be super cool. Then I’ll be able to function better.

It’s interesting, I’m going to tell you guys all my personal drama as a kid growing up, when I was a kid growing up….everyone in my family has really thick hair, actually my brother, Scott who edits these audios so he’ll probably hear this, he’s got the thickest hair of my family. Just insane, I remember we used to drive down the street and he’d stick his head out the window, and be going crazy. He’s like, “Check out my hair guys.” And he’d pull back in and be like, thunk, and he’d just sit there, like this big shell. So yes, his is the thickest. Mine’s right behind it, just thick hair. So growing up I was embarrassed because I didn’t know how to comb my hair, I never combed it. It was always just this helmet on my head. Even my parents didn’t know how to style it. So I was subconscious about it my whole life, In junior high, my first couple of days of junior high someone was like, “How come you don’t comb your hair?” And then I’m just like, as a junior high kid, I’m just devastated and scared and all these things wrapped into one. So I start combing my hair, but it’s not like me getting a comb and combing it. It was trauma. I’d have to wake up two hours earlier, I’d go in there and put gel in my hair, but my hair is so thick you can’t part it, so with a mountain full of gel, put all these gel in it, and I’d part my hair, and it always looked horrible. I had to make a cool wave in the front, and I’d blow dry it until it would get hard as a rock, because of all the gel in it, it would harden and crunch. I’d get the big old girl brush, and I’d break it out and it would just stay with the part. But I always hated it, and it looked so horrible, but I’d go to school after two hours every day of trying to do my hair so it looked normal. And I was just like….if someone would bump me my whole, my turkey tail in the back would pop up, boom. And it would just be horrible right. It was so socially, I would have extreme anxiety every day that someone might bump me and my hair would pop out of place and I looked like an idiot. That’s what I did because some punk kid told me I needed to comb my hair.

So that’s my childhood drama.  I know, I lived a horrible life, that was the worst of it all. But it was tough for me. So there’s a reason why I’m telling you guys this. Fast forward now to 9th grade, no 10th grade, I’m wrestling, which just makes your hair get even bigger, right. It’s horrible, it’s just huge. So I go to wrestling practice and come out and it’s just like my head’s twice the size of the rest of my body. It’s horrible, so everyone’s kind of making fun of me all the time. So finally that summer I shaved my head. Shaved it off. The next morning I woke up and didn’t have to comb it, didn’t have to do anything. I remember as it started to grow back, I kept shaving it off, shaving it off. Then one day I realized I had more self confidence having a shaved head. I had more excitement, more happiness, more everything. So I shaved my head every week, or every other week, for probably 10 or 15 years. I feel like, kind of like in the bible, you know the story of Sampson and he’s got hair and if you cut it he becomes weak. I felt the opposite. As soon as I cut my hair I became this strong person again. So I cut my hair for forever, and it gave me the confidence I needed to be able to become a wrestler, all the other things in my life. And my hair was this limiting factor and it’s funny because I think 5 or 6 years ago, maybe a little longer, my wife’s like, “You should grow your hair out, I think it’d look good.” So I did, and when I did it was weird, when I grew it out I became super self conscious about my hair, about everything. I was like this is not good, this is ruining me. So finally I figured out a way to do it where it’s easy, it looks alright, doesn’t look great, but it’s like whatever, I look fine. And now I’m okay with it.

But it took me a couple of months to get to that point where I was okay with it. I was literally hiding because I was so embarrassed of my hair. And another problem is, my head is so fat, I can’t wear normal hats. I always tell people that and they’re like, “Yeah, whatever try this hat on.” I put the hat on and they’re like, ‘Whoa, your head is really fat.”I’m like, “I know. That’s what I’m telling you. I can’t wear a normal hat. I’m not a normal person. My head is just thick.” There you go. There’s my drama.

The reason why I’m sharing with you guys, is because as stupid as little things like that are, they have a huge impact. I can’t even tell you how hard it was to function in school because of my stupid hair. Even when I started growing it, I was embarrassed to go to the office, and to do videos and all these kind of things that were brought up because of that. Why did I tell you guys that? I don’t really know other than, when I feel comfortable I can do more stuff with myself. It can be a lot of things. It could be your looks, it could be you weight, it could be your clothes. Whatever those things are. You know, I know that…..I don’t want to sound like a jerk, so I’m trying to phrase this carefully.

When I buy clothes that I like, that I fit well and I feel comfortable, I do better. I’m not a suit and tie guy. I can’t stand a suit, I can’t stand a tie, I can’t suit jackets, I can’t stand all those kind of things. I can’t even stand shoes and socks, like I wear bare feet all winter long, because I feel more comfortable. I think a lot of times we try to put on a suit or uniform or something to impress other people right. And there’s a place and a time for that. I go to church, I dress up, I dress nice. If I was to go get a job interview, I’d dress nice. There’s time’s to dress nice. But there’s times that are functional times, when you’re trying to get things done, and accomplish things and move things forward. And you’re trying to be an entrepreneur and your trying to run  all these  kind of things. I really think that these little barriers that are in our way can actually slow us down and hurt us. It’s kind of interesting. I remember, if you listen to my podcasts for a while, you know my stories. But back when we had our big office with 100 employees, the guy that ran the sales floor, he liked dressing up, so he made guys dress up nice every single day, and on Friday they’d have a casual day. I was like, that’s kind of cool, but I wanted to flip it, so I’d have casual day everyday and on Friday everyone would dress up. And I remember for probably 2 or 3 months, I’d wear a shirt and a tie and everything, and everyone did. We looked good, but I remember hating it. I hated it so bad. I was so miserable and I remember one day, I’m trying to put this stupid tie on, I’m tying it and I’m like, I hate this. Why am I doing this. I created this business, I shouldn’t have to do this if I don’t want to. I don’t think anyone else is enjoying it. Let’s just not do it. Let’s all just be comfortable. If we’re comfortable we can all just do our thing and get stuff done. So I’m a big believer in that.

So I would say, sit back and next time at your desk, or wherever you do your work, sit there for a second and just notice what it’s  like. What parts are comfortable. Are your shoes really comfortable? They are cool, but take them off and put on sandals like I do. If you are wearing slacks and you’re like, these are….. or jeans or whatever. My kids hate jeans, I love jeans. I would sleep in them if my wife didn’t think that was weird. But my kids hate jeans, so why make them wear jeans if they want to wear basketball shorts every day, even in the winter. It’s comfortable, if they’re comfortable they’re going to perform at a higher level.

The thing about that. I think about for me for weight a lot of times. Day’s when I eat healthy and I do good, I feel better. But some days I don’t and I see my stomach or my double chin or whatever those things are and I’m like, those things make me self conscious and they keep me from producing. Even on the small subconscious level. I might not want to get on the phone with someone, or talk to someone, or do a webinar or go to a seminar or whatever, because I don’t feel comfortable. And again, it could be any feature. Your hair, I’m really like, the last three days I haven’t done a Periscope. Guess why. Guess why this is a Marketing In Your Car and not a Periscope. Because my head looks like an orange on a toothpick, it looks horrible to me. So because of that, I’m not producing at my highest level. It’s these stupid little things that don’t matter at all, except they matter so much because it keeps you from doing what you want to do.

I guess my message for today, and maybe it’s like the dumbest message of my entire, however many episodes we’ve done, but I think it’s important to be comfortable. You can’t produce if you’re not in a comfortable spot. I’m talking about weight, I’m talking about how you look, I’m talking about how you feel. I’m talking about the clothes you wear, the chair you’re in, your surroundings. All those kinds of things have huge, a little tiny impact, but they compound and they become really, really huge. And when you have all those things together, it can keep you back from doing what you need to do. We’re entrepreneurs. We’re on a mission, we have something we’re trying to do and trying to accomplish. And people’s lives we’re trying to change. So all those little things are friction points, they keep you from moving forward. So I think a big thing is next time you guys are sitting there working, is to stop and become aware. How am I feeling? Do I feel awkward, do I feel weird, do I feel good? How do you actually feel and then try to figure out how to break off those friction points.

For me it was as simple, I stopped wearing socks. It was just like, this is the dumbest thing, but when I wear socks, they compress on your feet, so you take your socks off, and there’s that sock line. I hate it cause you go to someone’s house, and you take your shoes off and maybe your socks stink, and you’re like, “Oh crap. Let me take my socks off.” And you do and you get that sock compression. All these issues that seem so dumb that happen in a split of a millisecond in your head, but all those things keep you from producing and performing at your highest level. When I flipped it off and got flip flops, and I don’t have that issue anymore. It just magically disappears. Again, it’s so dumb. Some of you guys are rolling your eyes. Are you serious Russell? You have OCD like I never even knew.

But it’s not about that. It’s about getting rid of any resistance to me performing at my highest level. So become aware of those things. It’s interesting, I was, this is a long time ago, I was listening to a Matt Fury course about productivity and about, I can’t remember exactly what it was, but he was talking about how changing your environment, your atmosphere, how much it changes things. For example, next time you go in your office, just move something. Move your desk or move your monitor, move something and notice how it feels. It feels different right? There’s a whole study about Fung Shei, and I don’t know anything about it, but I know it has to do with that same kind of concept. It’s just like, if you start becoming aware of it, how are these little things all effecting me, and if you start tweaking them and changing them and moving them around, then it can have a really big impact long term. So there you go.

There’s the message from the OCD Russell. I’m just excited because in 7 minutes from now, my hair will be chopped back down to size and I will be able to get back to work on things that are important. Move our mission and our message forward. So there you go guys. That’s where I’m at today. I’m now officially at the hair cutting place. I almost just t-boned this lady, that would have been bad. So that’s it for today guys. I appreciate you all. Thanks for listening, thanks for hanging out, thanks for using Clickfunnels, thanks from the Funnel hacking event. And if you’re not doing one of those things, come on now. IT’s about time, it’s about time to jump on the band wagon. Clickfunnels is the best. Funnel Hacking Live is going to be amazing. A whole bunch of good stuff’s happening. So drink the kool-aid, jump on in you guys. We’re having a good time here. We’d love to have you join us as well. So that’s it for today. Appreciate you guys. Have an amazing day and we’ll talk to you all again soon.