Your zone of excellence keeps you from your zone of genius and makes your business small.

Your zone of excellence includes all the things you’re great at, but other people can do them too.

Even if they can’t do them as well as you, they can still do them. And they should.

Because that frees you up to spend time in your zone of genius.

Your zone of genius consists of your unique abilities. Those things at which you are naturally gifted and uniquely talented.

The things you love doing that put you in a flow state where you’re effortlessly focused and engaged.

Time spent in your zone of genius gives you 10X results as well as enjoyment. Flashes of insight and creative solutions appear.

Your body releases positive hormones like dopamine and serotonin.

You’ll live longer by spending more time in your zone of genius.

Say your zone of genius is delivering presentations and speeches to a specific audience about a specific topic, but you’re also really great at writing proposals and handling sales in this area.

Doing all four of these activities is like a flood light, you cover a broad area but the outer edges are not as bright as the center.

Channeling your energy into presentations and speeches works like a laser. You don’t lose energy on the outer edges.

You focus on your zone of genius, reach and inspire many more people, while simultaneously doing what you love.

In essence, you amplify your impact.

But, you say, “I can’t do that! Someone has to do the proposals and sales and I’m great at it.”

Start thinking of it as a 10 to 1 ratio. It takes 10 hours of work in your zone of excellence to yield the results of 1 hour in your zone of genius.

You’ll get old and tired fast spending your life in your zone of excellence. It’s deceiving because it feels good. Which makes you want to do it more.

But it doesn’t feel extraordinary. It’s not what lights you up the most.

So what do you do with those things in your zone of excellence?

Delegate them.

When you delegate activities, realize they may not be done the way you would do them. They might not even be done as well.

Accept that as a price you’re willing to pay for the life-changing benefits of living in your zone of genius.

The real reason we have trouble delegating is we think every mistake by people who work for us is a reflection on us personally.

This only happens when we conflate our identity with our business. When we think it’s who we are, instead of a vehicle for creating value in the world.

If you think every mistake is a reflection on you, it’ll limit the growth of your business. There’s simply a cap on how much you can do yourself.

The 4-step process for an extraordinary life:

1. Separate your identity from your business

2. Commit to living in your zone of genius

3. Delegate everything else

4. Evaluate results and iterate next actions