You are Worthy with Dr. Eli Joseph

george grombacher 0:00
Come on

I’m left with this is George G. And the time is right to welcome today’s guest strong and powerful. Dr. Ely, Joseph. Dr. Ely ready to do this.

Dr. Eli Joseph 0:18
Yes, I’m ready to do this. Thank you for having me.

george grombacher 0:22
I’m excited to have you on Dr. Ely as a statistician, he’s currently serving as a faculty member at Columbia University in Queens College. He’s a member at TED and the Recording Academy. He is the author of The Perfect rejection resume readers guide to building a career through failure. Dr. Eli, tell us a little about your personal life some more about your work and why you do what you do.

Dr. Eli Joseph 0:47
Great. So I was born and raised in New York City in Brooklyn, New York in particular, I didn’t have it all. But I had something to work with. And I’ve always been that that kid that had this chip on the shoulder, just to not to try to prove people wrong, but prove to myself that I’m I’m worthy of doing the work.

I’ve always been the math guy. I had two brothers and I suffer from the middle child syndrome. So

it’s one of those phenomenons where it’s like, okay, you know what, I need to make a name for myself and prove that I am worthy of being in the room. So growing up, hard working, I had to fight through troubles and trials and tribulations, grew up in a good community as well. However, it’s more so of get it, do it your own, get out the mud. Make sure you know you do you make a name for yourself. So that way, you’re respected. And

I’ve been through so many rejections. This is the point of the book, been through so much rejection, so much trial and tribulations where I’m like, one day, you know what, I need to talk about this. And, you know, try to give that because, you know, Perception is everything in this day and age. And I wanted to make sure that, look, I can be successful, but I’m going to show you my scars. And that is basically why I wrote this book.

george grombacher 2:12
I love it. I think it’s such an important thing. You know, people probably assume that a lot of people look at you today. They’re like, wow, look at this. Look at this guy. He’s a doctor, he does all these things. He’s writing for these huge magazines like Fast Company, and you must have just been super easy for him. But you’re like, No, not so fast. But even more importantly, how do you think about? Do you think about a responsibility that you have to say, this is really hard. And I want to give evidence to the next generation or other people that are maybe struggling with rejection that it’s gonna happen? You just got to keep moving?

Dr. Eli Joseph 2:51
Yes, it’s funny, because when, last year when before writing this book, I received the comment, I was reading the comment section on a recent Forbes article that was published, it was about my work. And someone was saying, it must be easy for him to say, you know, he, he must have a silver spoon. Oh, hold on. Okay, you know what, let me remind you, as far as the row that it took for me to get there, and I wrote this book, because it’s more so to your point, it’s my responsibility to share that to share the opposite side of of success. And not only to share it, but provide it as a fuel to fail forward and need to, you know, the greater things here. And I want people to feel comfortable to sharing their own success sharing their own rejecting resume, per se, because I’m pretty sure everyone, you’re talking about everyone we think that are successful. We talk about Elon Musk, Bill Gates, anyone you can think of Dave have gone through, you know, past failures that have gone through rejection, and I’m pretty sure this share that along the way. So I think it’s more so a responsibility for me to say, okay, you know what, look, it’s time for me to share my story and be intentional about it as well. And that was just basically the main ideas, just drive that point forward that you will, will fail, but it’s important to fell forward.

george grombacher 4:19
Yeah. I love it. So how did you why did you decide to structure the book, just just tell us a little bit about the book. It’s this the perfect projection resume? How did you come to find this vehicle for telling your story?

Dr. Eli Joseph 4:33
Okay, so before I even before I get into that, I would like to shout out that code star Darren Roberts, he he basically pioneer the model of a rejection resume where he shared his failures in a form of a resume. Yeah, so we know that a traditional resume basically it. It basically accounts for all of our accomplishments and achievements in education and professional endeavors and whatnot. But rejection resume is the complete opposite. We’re doing the same, but we’re applying, you know, the negative aspects of our lives, the schools that were rejected to the jobs that have gotten us fired, or we felt like to get those jobs and I wanted to, I wanted to model that and I asked him, I said, Look, can I use the model rejection resume? He’s like, yes, sure, you can do it. And I wanted to take it a step further, to provide him a story behind it. And that’s where the rejection resume comes into play. And in the book, I didn’t want to only share my story. I wanted to share other people’s stories, because I know I’m not the only person. So I’ve, I’ve gotten other thought leaders I’ve got in Russia Lambert, who works at Forbes, He’s the senior vice president there. Janice Gaston was a senior contributor, diamond, Simone, Jari Lee, Canetti Jones, who write for the black, you know, Black Enterprise, and he’s an entrepreneur as well. So I’ve gotten other people that have been successful in their outright to share their story, as well. And I wanted to provide lessons more so than just saying, hey, you know, here’s, here’s a long list of stories about my life, I wanted to provide lessons more so than just a long, boring list of you know, what happened in my endeavors, just so that readers can feel comfortable to sharing their stories as well.

george grombacher 6:22
I was just reading this morning thinking this morning about what really causes burnout. And it’s just sort of doing the same thing over and over again, and not feeling like you’re progressing. And so you’re talking about failing forward. And that’s a really important thing.

Dr. Eli Joseph 6:37
Yeah. So when we are, and this is where people get, you know, they reach that plateau, where you’re doing something repetitively, you’re successful at it, you’d all feel comfortable getting out of your comfort zone, and trying something new, because you are afraid of failing. So you’re so used to doing the same thing, you want to do the same thing every single day, and you’re wasting time. And this is why I know I always dwell on the fact that time is your biggest competitor, you’re not competing against yourself. The only way that you’re competing and get yourself is when you’re practicing or training. That’s the only way that you’re competing against yourself. So when you go in against time, you’re going to try new things, you’re going to fail, you’re going to learn it succeed and go on to the next endeavor. This is why you reach that plateau, and you continue to drive up. And it’s like a step, a step wise graph that you want to approach yourself. So when I look at people that are trying to, you know, that data trying to same thing over and over. And so I’ve been doing this for 10 years, and I feel like I’m not accomplished. I think it’s time for you to move on and try new things to fail, it’s important to fail, you will learn from your mistakes, and you will move forward and fail forward as well. So that’s basically the main idea of failing forward, it’s just you will fail, you get hit, you get punched, but if you can roll with the punches, and punch back and, and, you know, be offensive as well, you’d be able to succeed and succeed as well.

george grombacher 8:04
I love that. And we all do have a comfort zone, right? And our bodies keep us there because our bodies want to our brain keeps us safe, right? It doesn’t want us to do anything crazy that that’s that’s that’s that’s gonna get us hurt or killed or whatever. But that does cause us to waste time. And that’s the biggest adversary. I wrote down training versus performing. Because if we’re not cognizant, or thinking about training and getting new skills, then we’re just always sort of performing. And if you think about professional athletes or musicians, they spend the opposite. They do most of their time training, and then a small amount performing.

Dr. Eli Joseph 8:43
Yeah, I remember I think Usain Bolt, he had this great quote, saying that I’ve trained I’ve trainable for years to run nine seconds. Yeah. It goes, it ties into the point where you you spend a lot more time training, the 10th hour, the 10,000 hour, right? You spent a lot of time training and driving home, you are practicing how much stuff you’re training yourself to succeed in new heights. This is why when people say I’m competing against myself, that’s That’s true. To a certain extent, you are competing, get yourself while training. But when it comes to performing, this is where you are competing, it’s time. Right? Read this every day is another that’s another principle that I drive home and the book that rent has been doing every day. And what I mean by that is, you know your goals, your goals are your landlord. So once you establish your goals, you basically lock in that contract. You but you have to pay that landlord every single day, not every month, not every week, not every year, but every single day. And the reason that we’re paying it forward every single day is because we’re using the currency, the currency as far as paying our goals is our effort. whether we win or lose that is our effort. That’s basically the that’s basically our current See, to pay off our goals. And once you’re competing, it’s time and you realize that okay, rent is due every day I need to, I need to accomplish something every single day to get to the end goal here. And that’s when I get to that end goal that is the end of my contract. And that’s when you reach that plateau up until you have a new goal. You set new goals every other time. That way, you are constantly moving forward, and you try new things as well. And that’s the main point that we know, we have to understand that we have to try new things we never know.

george grombacher 10:32
I love that. That’s an awesome, awesome metaphor goals that a landlord rents do every day. And effort is the currency I picked. That’s super powerful, and very helpful. I’m somebody that also still has a pretty good chip on my shoulder. And it’s interesting that you need to feel worthy of yourself to be trying new things. But how do you get to that point where you do feel like you’re worthy to try new things.

Dr. Eli Joseph 11:06
This is where the imposter syndrome come into play where people would think I’m not sure if I’m ready to be in this room. And I, you know, we, we always feel that way. You know, when we think of other people that have been successful. And we’re thinking wow, I’m, you know, I’m so grateful. I’m so thankful and lucky to be here. Now, you know, lucky to be here. You were meant to be here. That’s that’s the goal. So when you when you say that, you know you if you feel as though you’re not worthy. No, you were you were meant to be here, you were meant to be here, and it’s all about leaving a mark here. How do you how do you separate yourself from everyone else? Right? If you’re in a room full of highly successful individuals, how do you? How do you successfully separate yourself from the others? And just just try new things. And even if you fail, yeah, people will laugh, people will laugh in the room, you will feel embarrassed, but at least at least you try. You can. If you fail, if you try something you failed, and everyone laughed at you, the jokes is actually on them because they never tried. Because if they tried any Phil, the laughter will tend to die off. Because if you people tend to die, die off as far as laughing We laugh at one joke, because you’re the only unique person to try something and fail. But if you say okay, I want to try it, it will blind I don’t want to try it because they don’t want to feel embarrassed themselves. But if they tried it, people will laugh as well. But as more and more people will try and complete something and fail at what you were originally doing. You realize that no one was laughing. And people will realize, okay, you know what, he has a point. And that’s how you separate yourself. Just realizing that, hey, you were meant to be in this room. You were meant to be in this room. And you don’t have to deviate from the fact that, you know, someone else is much more accomplished in their endeavors than you are.

george grombacher 12:58
Yeah, it’s theirs doesn’t matter, right? There’s always a spectrum. There’s always going to be Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos. So if I feel like, it just does, that’s great. And that’s always going to be the case you’re here. Get to work, work on getting yourself better work and differentiate yourself like that. That’s awesome. So you said your math guy, or you also you’re obviously now a written word guy, because you wrote a book and and you’re an author, you write consistently. How was that it was was was was that a transition? Is that a hard new skill to learn?

Dr. Eli Joseph 13:32
Yes, it’s hard to know skill. And as far as mathematics and quantitative analysis is easy, because I understand numbers. Here’s where I struggle with when it comes to writing. I struggle with math starts, how to begin a byline article, how do you begin a chapter because when you start something new, I know how to transition pretty well, I can transition pretty well from from one idea to the next, but just starting it, that’s the that’s the main goal. And if I can work on my starts, I’ll be able to write and I told myself, I work on my stuff, I’ll be able to write for the major publications, provide some insight, and you know, and try to be a thought leader in that in that sense. But it’s more so of understanding and and getting the cadence down, understanding and practicing as well competing as myself because I know I will fail. Even putting putting this book out. It’s more so it’s a risk that I’m taking. It’s like, okay, wow, I’m about to publish this book. And if I can’t take it back, I can’t unpublish what I put out. Just understanding that, you know, like, you know, I can’t publish that and you know, take it back say, Hey, guys, I messed up this whole thing. It’s too late. So just realizing that once you hit submit and sene, it’s out of your hands and the world is the market decide whether or not your piece is good or not. So that’s one thing I had to understand as far as was writing and doing mathematics, you know, simultaneously as well.

george grombacher 15:04
Yeah. Interesting, right? It turns, turn it out into the world. And there are no backseats, so to speak. So, yeah. And I’m confident it’s been a well, how, how has it been since hitting that button and turn it loose? It’s

Dr. Eli Joseph 15:21
been great. It’s been great. It’s been great. It’s been wonderful. The feedback has been great. I think yesterday, someone showed their rejection resume. So I think I’m making some form of an impact. When people share their rejection resume, I go, okay, you know, it’s it. I did my I did my job. I did my job pretty well. Yeah, that’s,

george grombacher 15:39
that’s totally awesome. For sure. What a great. I mean, giving somebody a framework for how to do something, and then showing, okay, here’s the value of an exercise like this, here’s how you do it. And you hand that to them. And then they actually do it, what up? What a huge thing that is.

Dr. Eli Joseph 16:01
Yeah, and I think is more so of a icebreaker too, because I’m pretty sure they didn’t want to share their failures and their rejection. Up until now they feel more comfortable sharing, you know, they’re mishaps and it’s okay, you know, what, yeah, I’m going to share my story too, since Eli did it, I can share my story too. And then, you know, just just that domino effect, where I say, Okay, since John did it, since George did it, I’m gonna do as well, I feel I feel motivated to share my story. And now Now, all of a sudden, we have everyone’s sharing their, you know, the ideas and how Dave, they failed. And they failed their way to success and build a career through failure.

george grombacher 16:39
I love it. What, what a powerful thing. I’m gonna write mine, Eli, I’m going to do my rejection resume. So you can hold me to that. And by the time that this episode is released, you’ll be able to check that out also. So I love it. Well, Dr. Ely, people are ready for that difference making tip even though you’ve already given us a bunch, what do you have for them?

Dr. Eli Joseph 17:03
No difference making tip that I have in mind is I got one, okay. World Records exists for a reason. And if something if it’s possible that something is impossible to accomplish, then it is possible that nothing is impossible. I’m going to repeat. If it’s possible to accomplish something that you thought was impossible, then it is possible that nothing is impossible. You have to remain limitless. That’s the that’s the key takeaway goal here.

george grombacher 17:38
I think that that is great stuff that definitely gets to come after you like thank you so much for coming on. Thank you for the courage and the hard work and and everything that you are doing. How can people connect with you? Where can they get a copy of the perfect rejection resume readers guide to building a career through failure.

Dr. Eli Joseph 17:57
You can get the book The perfect rejection resume on Barnes and Nobles. You can get it on Amazon. You can get it on Walmart, you can get it anywhere pretty much. As far as connecting with me. I’m available on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, LinkedIn as Eva Joseph, Instagram, and the the Twitter Instagram, Snapchat, all the all these usernames are the same. It is Dr. e li, J o su P H. Once again. It’s Dr. Ely Joseph d r e li j o su pH across all media platforms.

george grombacher 18:32
Excellent. If you enjoyed this as much as I did show Dr. Ely your appreciation and share today’s show with a friend who also appreciates good ideas, pick up a copy of the perfect rejection resume, wherever you buy your books and then find him on social media across all the platforms at Dr. Ely Joseph. Dr. E. Li, Joseph. Thanks again. Dr.

Dr. Eli Joseph 18:53
Ely. Thank you so much.

george grombacher 18:54
Thank you for having me. And until next time, keep fighting the good fight. We’re all in this together.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai