This week I watched an interview between Pete Docter and Mike Birbiglia. It has a mere 20,000 views – which is a shame, because it might be the most encouraging conversation I’ve watched in years.
Why? Because it clarified something for me:
True excellence requires sacrifice.
“Yeah, duh,” you might say. But hang with me…
How often do we repeat societal mantras without actually internalizing what those mantras mean when the rubber meets the road?
Even that idiom! Ever said “when the rubber meets the road” without thinking about what it actually refers to? Let’s unpack its meaning. “When the rubber meets the road” refers to the moment a race car is dropped after a tire change – when the fresh rubber hits asphalt. At that point, all theory is off. Planning is in the rearview. All that’s left is to drive like hell.
Here’s the real point:
We rarely visualize the lived reality behind the slogans we parrot. Especially when it comes to the saying, “True excellence requires sacrifice.”
Everyone says this. And yet…most people aren’t excellent.
I can hear the objections: “Don’t be so critical! People are doing their best!”
No disrespect. But by definition, most of society isn’t excellent. Excellence means excelling – rising above the norm. Webster’s calls it “first class” or “superior,” which implies a hierarchy of quality. “Excellence” only exists because there is something less than excellence to contrast it.
In most measurable contexts – sports, academics, business – excellence is the top 10%. That means 90% of people are not operating at that level. So when the majority talks about excellence, we have to admit: they’re often speaking about something they haven’t actually experienced.
Which led me to this thought: Looking to the 90% for advice on how to be in the 10% is a fool’s errand.
You wouldn’t ask the Monday morning quarterback at the water cooler for help designing a world-class playbook. You’d ask Tom Brady.
So why do we take cues from the people around us – online, in offices, at dinner parties – about what makes a great career, business, or life? Shouldn’t we be listening to the actual greats?
Which, brings me back to Pete Docter.
In his conversation with Mike Birbiglia, Pete – the brilliant director behind Monsters Inc., Up, and Inside Out, says something that gave me pause.
He describes how every Pixar movie requires hundreds of artists to endure 3 a.m. nights, creative crises, and sheer exhaustion. Final stretches where all-nighters are more common than 9-to-5 workdays.
Hold up. Pixar – 30 years into its reign as the world’s leading animation studio – still hasn’t figured out how to make excellent films without pain, sacrifice, and emotional turmoil??
If they haven’t cracked the code, what makes us think we’ll find a shortcut?
And oddly…that question felt freeing.
Mr. Beast proves there’s no shortcut
Once I saw this question clearly, I started noticing corollary questions. I recently watched interviews with Jimmy Donaldson (MrBeast) and Steven Bartlett (Diary of a CEO), where they describe their lives: jetting from Egypt to L.A. for a shoot, driving to North Hollywood for a midnight interview, sleeping on planes, and filming into the early hours.
That kind of pace sounds insane to average people. But maybe that’s the point. Maybe it’s only insane if you’re not actually trying to build a world-changing empire. And maybe that’s okay.
We don’t all need to adopt the lifestyle of MrBeast or Pixar. But we do need to acknowledge the tradeoffs. Because excellence doesn’t come cheap. And if you want to reach the top 10% in your field – whether it’s design, ministry, filmmaking, nonprofit leadership, or entrepreneurship – you’ll need to count the cost.
We all carry competing responsibilities – to our teams, our families, our clients, and to our own souls. But at some point, we have to tell the truth, which starts with honest questions: What are we actually trying to accomplish? And are we willing to make the necessary sacrifices?
Excellence Requires Sacrifice
I initially planned to end on this point, but at Yetta’s urging, I realized I should say a word about what sacrifice actually looks like in practice. Because the sacrifice most of us least want to make (comfort and personal enjoyment) is often the one most necessary to achieve any kind of excellence.
A friend of mine (and my first landlord) used to say, “In life, you have to triage your responsibilities.” Unless you’re a rare exception, your life probably involves more than just one priority. For me, it’s Family, Business, and Health (spiritual, mental, physical). You’ll notice “hang with the guys” didn’t make the list.
It’s taken me decades of focus to *try* to figure out how to allocate time between these areas, and if you’re interested in seeing my personal schedule, shoot me a note. I’m happy to share it and talk about it in more detail.
The point – and this is really Yetta’s insight – is that sacrifice doesn’t mean giving everything up for one thing. It means choosing the few spinning plates you refuse to let drop, and being willing to sacrifice everything else to keep those going.
Heck, I wrote this at 11pm on a Friday night because I committed to send out these newsletters twice a month and I’ve been on set all week for 14-hours at a time. That’s what “the rubber meets the road” looks like for me right now. So what’s it look like for you?
If you want to build the most impactful nonprofit in your space, what are the current leaders sacrificing to be there?
If I want to build the most influential film studio of the 21st century, what did the pioneers give up to lead at that level?
Are we matching that commitment?
Whether your answer is yes or no, isn’t actually the point of this email. That’s a deeply personal accounting and one every person and team needs to make for themselves. But the question must be asked. Because no path to excellence begins without a clear-eyed understanding of what it costs.
And once you see it, you can no longer unsee it.
Here’s to excellence and human flourishing,
– Ian
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